Last thread hit bump limit.
Previous thread: >>284789 →
Continuing from my last post: >>294025 →
Once again, Velvet's basic argument here seems to be that killing in self defense or in defense of others is okay, but she draws a line in the sand at doing it for profit. It would be hard to justify Littlepoop's actions at the slaver colony by this logic.
Self-defense, as far as I'm concerned, is right out. She attacked them, and they were the ones defending themselves; again, the morality of who the slavers were or what they were doing doesn't factor into the equation here. As to the defense of others, you could argue that she was acting in defense of the slaves, but on the other hand the slaves didn't ask for her help, and she had no direct connection to them that justified getting involved.
Also, she drew the train ponies and arguably the entire town of New Appleoosa into her fight against their will, and got the train ponies killed. Does rescuing a few slaves balance out the equation and justify the loss of all that innocent life? Again, it's not particularly important what you or I might think about this; the issue is that these questions ought to have been weighing heavily on Velvet's mind for most of the past few days, but by all appearances they haven't. Really, the author has a pretty nice opportunity here to create a difficult moral dilemma for Velvet, and develop her character by having her try to solve it, but unfortunately this seems to have gone over his head as usual.
We also have LP's actions since the train scene to consider. Between the farm scene and their first meeting with Gawd, there was an entire scene in which LP and Calamity butchered another group of raiders. That wasn't in self defense at all, nor was it in defense of others; they walked up, picked a fight with the raiders, and then killed them all. Here is exactly what happened:
>Velvet Remedy crouched beside me, tending to a gash in Calamity’s side. To her credit, she’d actually tried to talk to the raiders. They returned her hello with some extremely perverted suggestions, at least one of which involved necrophilia. That’s when Calamity started picking off the ponies who had taken sniping positions on the roofs.
So basically, they were walking along the road and they came across a group of raiders. Velvet made an effort to talk things out, the raiders insulted her, and Calamity started shooting. Does this sound like self defense or defense of the innocent to you?
Granted, the raiders probably would not have let them pass and it would have escalated into violence one way or the other, but from Velvet's perspective this shouldn't matter; Calamity was the one who opened fire, so technically their side initiated the conflict. Plus, they could have just as easily turned around and found a way around the settlement, which is what what Velvet would likely have favored.
Anyway, now let's hear Littlepoop's side of the Gawd-contract debate:
>I felt like I was bleeding out, dying. But the more they yelled at me, the more I realized I had already chosen my course. I just had to make them understand why.
>“Silver Bell.”
Oh yeah, Silver Bell. I'd almost forgotten about her. As I recall, Deadeyes, for some reason, made an entry in his accounting ledger in which he confessed to being responsible for the farm attack that killed her parents. Well, I suppose that's a good enough reason to murder somepony as far as Littlepoop's logic goes. So, the question is: does the additional moral justification of Deadeyes being an icky meanie-pants baddie-pone who deserves a horrible poopoo death solve the ethical dilemma for Velvet, and also for Calamity who for some reason has a problem with murder for hire all of a sudden? Let's find out.
Littlepoop goes on to explain what she read in the ledger: that Deadeyes sent his evil meanie-pants poopoo henchmen to murder Silver Bell and her sister's parents in front of them. They also did it really slow and gruesome and made it really really painful, probably with ball-torture and butt stuff and everything, and they did a lot of other bad meanie-pants stuff too, like prank call a bunch of pizzas to Silver Bell's farm that she didn't order, and they left flaming doodie bags on her front porch that she had to step on to put out, and...and...
Anyway, you get the point. Blah blah blah, Deadeyes was a baddie and this justifies turning him into worm food; we've heard this bit before. How do her friends react?
>Calamity spoke first. “Well, now, that changes things.”
Of course it does. Killing for material gain is always wrong, even if it's not material gain you're receiving as compensation for killing, but is just the regular type of material gain you normally get from doing the type of killing you normally do anyway. But, if the pony you're killing is BAD, well that just changes everything now doesn't it?
>Velvet Remedy shook a little, but stayed firm. “What does it change?”
Velvet Remedy taking a moral stand for once? In my Fallout Equestria? It's more common than you think lol not really.
>Velvet Remedy shook a little, but stayed firm. “What does it change?”
>“Ain’t murder no more,” Calamity stated without reservation. “It’s justice.”
>Velvet shook her mane. “Revenge, you mean.”
What's vexing to me about all of this is that kkat clearly wants to explore some complex moral questions in this story, but obstinately refuses to put even a tiny bit of serious thought into the questions he wants to explore. The only character in this story with any clearly-defined ideals is Velvet Remedy, and she almost goes out of her way to avoid adhering to them most of the time. Everyone else seems to (loosely) follow a basic-bitch white-hats-vs-black-hats code of morals that basically amounts to: "bad stuff is bad, unless the pony you are doing bad stuff to is also bad, in which case bad stuff is good."
/mlpol/ - My Little Politics
Archived thread
>>294025 →
Velvet's "Heal the slavers, and the enslaved" moment would have been less stupid if the slavers put a potentially-lethal shock collar on her neck (the kind that automatically tazes runaways who get too far away from the masters' remote) and forced her to heal/sing/dance. Just imagine her trying to sing a cheery little song about love while on a stripper's stage, as a bunch of evil meanie-pants poopie-head ponies yell lewd shit at her. The baddies could possibly even projectile-nut onto her stage, because the author's a weirdo who loves his bodily fluid-soaked beds/bedsheets. LP's attempt to violently save her from this life and practically kidnap her would more sense after that, if Velvet visibly hated working here.
>LP had no direct reason for getting involved
author should have bugfixed that by giving Derpy a kid, making the Old Appleoosans take the kid, and making Derpy beg LP "Please save my kid! While eliminating the town's military advantage over us so they can never enslave us again and couldn't take vengeance on us if they wanted to."
>ow oof ouch my bones- i mean blood, being whined at by Velvet hurts sooooo much
This is stupid, why is LP still acting like a smitten fangirl desperate for Velvet-Sempai's approval? Velvet's newfag moments on the train "And her choice to heal slavers" should have killed LP's crush on her and forced her to see this doc in a more realistic light.
>revenge
Can it truly be called revenge if you're killing one baddie because they're responsible for an ex-baddie who tried to kill you turning out the way she did?
Silver Belle might justifiably want vengeance, if she was here to get mad about shit relevant to her character and backstory, but she's no longer a main character. She isn't with them. This Tiny Tina wannabe got on a bus that traveled offstage straight to irrelevance town. She's out of this game, just like a Heartless Qwark and Nobody Qwark. Even though the story's acting like Silver Belle is still relevant, she isn't here! The heroes are getting offended on Silver Belle's behalf!
The story's going to treat LP like she's morally right and entirely justified in this scene. The story's going to treat her like she's right, but LP is accepting an "Assassination request" without any direct pay given by a paid assassin of dubious morality/loyalty. LP should bring up a better reason like "That baddie I want to kill is clearly bad for the environment and if we don't put a stop to this villainy soon this area of the world will only get worse as a result of his greed and sin!".
If this scene's supposed to make LP look "Noble" for accepting a hitman job without pay, it should be bugfixed so the Griffon offers LP a cash prize, half up front and half when the deed's done, and LP says "I don't want your money! I'm no assassin. I'm an adventurer, and the hero of my own story! I'm killing that baddie because I want to! His wicked deems have harmed innocent lives for far too long!"
Velvet's "Heal the slavers, and the enslaved" moment would have been less stupid if the slavers put a potentially-lethal shock collar on her neck (the kind that automatically tazes runaways who get too far away from the masters' remote) and forced her to heal/sing/dance. Just imagine her trying to sing a cheery little song about love while on a stripper's stage, as a bunch of evil meanie-pants poopie-head ponies yell lewd shit at her. The baddies could possibly even projectile-nut onto her stage, because the author's a weirdo who loves his bodily fluid-soaked beds/bedsheets. LP's attempt to violently save her from this life and practically kidnap her would more sense after that, if Velvet visibly hated working here.
>LP had no direct reason for getting involved
author should have bugfixed that by giving Derpy a kid, making the Old Appleoosans take the kid, and making Derpy beg LP "Please save my kid! While eliminating the town's military advantage over us so they can never enslave us again and couldn't take vengeance on us if they wanted to."
>ow oof ouch my bones- i mean blood, being whined at by Velvet hurts sooooo much
This is stupid, why is LP still acting like a smitten fangirl desperate for Velvet-Sempai's approval? Velvet's newfag moments on the train "And her choice to heal slavers" should have killed LP's crush on her and forced her to see this doc in a more realistic light.
>revenge
Can it truly be called revenge if you're killing one baddie because they're responsible for an ex-baddie who tried to kill you turning out the way she did?
Silver Belle might justifiably want vengeance, if she was here to get mad about shit relevant to her character and backstory, but she's no longer a main character. She isn't with them. This Tiny Tina wannabe got on a bus that traveled offstage straight to irrelevance town. She's out of this game, just like a Heartless Qwark and Nobody Qwark. Even though the story's acting like Silver Belle is still relevant, she isn't here! The heroes are getting offended on Silver Belle's behalf!
The story's going to treat LP like she's morally right and entirely justified in this scene. The story's going to treat her like she's right, but LP is accepting an "Assassination request" without any direct pay given by a paid assassin of dubious morality/loyalty. LP should bring up a better reason like "That baddie I want to kill is clearly bad for the environment and if we don't put a stop to this villainy soon this area of the world will only get worse as a result of his greed and sin!".
If this scene's supposed to make LP look "Noble" for accepting a hitman job without pay, it should be bugfixed so the Griffon offers LP a cash prize, half up front and half when the deed's done, and LP says "I don't want your money! I'm no assassin. I'm an adventurer, and the hero of my own story! I'm killing that baddie because I want to! His wicked deems have harmed innocent lives for far too long!"
>>294032
Anyway, it looks like the matter is settled for now. Littlepoop has already made up her mind anyway, and plans to go ahead with the "contract" regardless of what her friends have to say about it, and Calamity's mild objections seem to have been almost immediately placated by Littlepoop's assurances that bad pony is bad, so murder, which is normally bad, is now good.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzG4wYQ9QNM
sorry, I went through a wigger phase in high school so I know rap references
>Calamity nodded to me. “Ah’m in.” He glanced at my horn meaningfully. “How’s yer TK?”
I'm assuming that "TK" means telekinesis, as Littlepoop's Titty Klamps appear to still be functioning.
>“Rest did wonders. I won’t be juggling train cars,” I admitted, “But I think I can manage barrels. How’s your wing?”
Ah, nice. The minor handicaps that LP's tiredness and Calamity's wing injury posed won't be a factor anymore; we can assume they will be kicking ass and chewing bubble gum at full strength now. Everyone charge up your murder-boners, I suspect this next fight is going to get messy.
>Velvet Remedy’s eyes jumped between the two of us over and over. With a touch of desperation in her voice, she tried, “Are you planning on finding out which raiders were involved and killing them too? Or are you just going to lay waste to the whole of Shattered Hoof?”
>“They‘re raiders,” Calamity said evenly, stretching his wing. “Honestly, Ah been wonderin’ just why we’re helpin’ them out at all. Ah figure, let ‘em and the slavers duke it out. Stomp down what’s left.”
Wait, which raiders are they helping? Which slavers are said raiders fighting? Once again, I find I'm almost as confused about alliances in this story as its author is about his gender. Is the implication that Gawd and her party are raiders? I thought they were mercenaries. Or are mercenaries a kind of raider? The ambiguous terminology in this world is apt to drive a man insane.
>I had another idea. “Actually, not everypony here is bad.” I was thinking of the rock-breaker I had talked with while he escorted me out. “I think... I believe this place could be turned around. Maybe become a trading town instead of a raider fortress.”
Wait, isn't it already a trading town? Or wait, no; it's like a rock-breaking factory or some shit. But wait, it's also a fortress. Are Deadeyes and his crew supposed to be raiders? I thought they were rock-breakers, but also soldiers working for Red-Eye. Or is it Topaz? Jesus Fucking Christ, this shit is getting ridiculous.
Anyway, it seems like Littlepoop's grand ambition here is to have Gawd take over Shattered Hoof, which she hinted at earlier:
>Even as the words came out, I knew they were stupidly idealistic. But I pressed on. “I’m thinking: kill Deadeyes. Find Mister Topaz and deal with him -- amiably if possible, lethally if not. And leave Gawd in charge.”
I guess this kind of makes sense. But have we had any indication that Gawd would be interested or capable of managing a rock breaking plant? Or is that even what she's planning on using it for? If I had to hazard a guess, here is what I suspect LP's idea is:
Their crew goes in guns-blazing and murders Deadeyes, pew pew pew. Once Bad Pony™ is dead, along with whatever other Bad Ponies™ are in there, the remaining Good Ponies™ will form the backbone of a new Shattered Hoof, which will probably be in the same business as the old Shattered Hoof (rock breaking I guess), except it will be Good™ now. Gawd, who despite being a killer for hire (which is Bad™ according to Velvet and possibly Calamity) is actually Good™ because reasons, and so Littlepoop will have no moral qualms about leaving her in charge, even though nothing that Gawd has said or done thus far would indicate that she has any interest in running a large-scale industrial rock breaking operation, nor that she would know how to run such an operation, nor that she would run said operation in a Good™ manner should she be given the opportunity to do so.
Presumably the idea here is that the new Good™ management will eliminate the Bad™ practices of the previous management, so instead of raping and killing the farmers who harvest rocks for them, they will simply buy their rocks at an equitable price, and will probably not rape or kill them with any more frequency than local customs permit. Well, I'll hand it to Littlepoop: as far as hare-brained Littlepoop schemes go, this is one of the more practical ones we've seen.
Anyway, there's a page break here. When the next scene resumes, Littlepoop is walking back to Shattered Hoof by herself, stroking her guns and thinking about all of the Morally Justified™ murderous murder she's about to commit.
>Deadeyes had told me to come back for one more job. Feeling the comforting weight of Little Macintosh in my saddlebags, my sniper rifle and assault carbine now returned to my back and side, I suspected this wasn’t the job he had in mind. But his invitation was the perfect opportunity.
Oh, Littlepoop, you're such an uppity know-it-all cunt. How can you be sure that when Deadeyes told you to come back for another job, he wasn't planning to have you murder him? No, that's actually a serious question; this story is nonsensical enough that I honestly wouldn't be surprised it that were an actual plot twist that kkat had in mind.
>I had explained that I planned to take the long way, explore some of the wings of Shattered Hoof that I hadn’t seen yet. Including how to get down to the mine below. Seeing the yard in daylight for the first time, Calamity had immediately spotted the metal plates of a hydraulic cargo lift, but the controls were damaged beyond repair. If it worked at all, it would only be from within the mine itself. There had to be another way. Somewhere, there was a door that went beneath the prison itself, and I wanted to know where it was.
So wait, she has free rein to just wander around this place at will now? That's just...oh, whatever; I don't even care anymore.
Anyway, it looks like the matter is settled for now. Littlepoop has already made up her mind anyway, and plans to go ahead with the "contract" regardless of what her friends have to say about it, and Calamity's mild objections seem to have been almost immediately placated by Littlepoop's assurances that bad pony is bad, so murder, which is normally bad, is now good.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzG4wYQ9QNM
sorry, I went through a wigger phase in high school so I know rap references
>Calamity nodded to me. “Ah’m in.” He glanced at my horn meaningfully. “How’s yer TK?”
I'm assuming that "TK" means telekinesis, as Littlepoop's Titty Klamps appear to still be functioning.
>“Rest did wonders. I won’t be juggling train cars,” I admitted, “But I think I can manage barrels. How’s your wing?”
Ah, nice. The minor handicaps that LP's tiredness and Calamity's wing injury posed won't be a factor anymore; we can assume they will be kicking ass and chewing bubble gum at full strength now. Everyone charge up your murder-boners, I suspect this next fight is going to get messy.
>Velvet Remedy’s eyes jumped between the two of us over and over. With a touch of desperation in her voice, she tried, “Are you planning on finding out which raiders were involved and killing them too? Or are you just going to lay waste to the whole of Shattered Hoof?”
>“They‘re raiders,” Calamity said evenly, stretching his wing. “Honestly, Ah been wonderin’ just why we’re helpin’ them out at all. Ah figure, let ‘em and the slavers duke it out. Stomp down what’s left.”
Wait, which raiders are they helping? Which slavers are said raiders fighting? Once again, I find I'm almost as confused about alliances in this story as its author is about his gender. Is the implication that Gawd and her party are raiders? I thought they were mercenaries. Or are mercenaries a kind of raider? The ambiguous terminology in this world is apt to drive a man insane.
>I had another idea. “Actually, not everypony here is bad.” I was thinking of the rock-breaker I had talked with while he escorted me out. “I think... I believe this place could be turned around. Maybe become a trading town instead of a raider fortress.”
Wait, isn't it already a trading town? Or wait, no; it's like a rock-breaking factory or some shit. But wait, it's also a fortress. Are Deadeyes and his crew supposed to be raiders? I thought they were rock-breakers, but also soldiers working for Red-Eye. Or is it Topaz? Jesus Fucking Christ, this shit is getting ridiculous.
Anyway, it seems like Littlepoop's grand ambition here is to have Gawd take over Shattered Hoof, which she hinted at earlier:
>Even as the words came out, I knew they were stupidly idealistic. But I pressed on. “I’m thinking: kill Deadeyes. Find Mister Topaz and deal with him -- amiably if possible, lethally if not. And leave Gawd in charge.”
I guess this kind of makes sense. But have we had any indication that Gawd would be interested or capable of managing a rock breaking plant? Or is that even what she's planning on using it for? If I had to hazard a guess, here is what I suspect LP's idea is:
Their crew goes in guns-blazing and murders Deadeyes, pew pew pew. Once Bad Pony™ is dead, along with whatever other Bad Ponies™ are in there, the remaining Good Ponies™ will form the backbone of a new Shattered Hoof, which will probably be in the same business as the old Shattered Hoof (rock breaking I guess), except it will be Good™ now. Gawd, who despite being a killer for hire (which is Bad™ according to Velvet and possibly Calamity) is actually Good™ because reasons, and so Littlepoop will have no moral qualms about leaving her in charge, even though nothing that Gawd has said or done thus far would indicate that she has any interest in running a large-scale industrial rock breaking operation, nor that she would know how to run such an operation, nor that she would run said operation in a Good™ manner should she be given the opportunity to do so.
Presumably the idea here is that the new Good™ management will eliminate the Bad™ practices of the previous management, so instead of raping and killing the farmers who harvest rocks for them, they will simply buy their rocks at an equitable price, and will probably not rape or kill them with any more frequency than local customs permit. Well, I'll hand it to Littlepoop: as far as hare-brained Littlepoop schemes go, this is one of the more practical ones we've seen.
Anyway, there's a page break here. When the next scene resumes, Littlepoop is walking back to Shattered Hoof by herself, stroking her guns and thinking about all of the Morally Justified™ murderous murder she's about to commit.
>Deadeyes had told me to come back for one more job. Feeling the comforting weight of Little Macintosh in my saddlebags, my sniper rifle and assault carbine now returned to my back and side, I suspected this wasn’t the job he had in mind. But his invitation was the perfect opportunity.
Oh, Littlepoop, you're such an uppity know-it-all cunt. How can you be sure that when Deadeyes told you to come back for another job, he wasn't planning to have you murder him? No, that's actually a serious question; this story is nonsensical enough that I honestly wouldn't be surprised it that were an actual plot twist that kkat had in mind.
>I had explained that I planned to take the long way, explore some of the wings of Shattered Hoof that I hadn’t seen yet. Including how to get down to the mine below. Seeing the yard in daylight for the first time, Calamity had immediately spotted the metal plates of a hydraulic cargo lift, but the controls were damaged beyond repair. If it worked at all, it would only be from within the mine itself. There had to be another way. Somewhere, there was a door that went beneath the prison itself, and I wanted to know where it was.
So wait, she has free rein to just wander around this place at will now? That's just...oh, whatever; I don't even care anymore.
>>294048
>Just imagine her trying to sing a cheery little song about love while on a stripper's stage, as a bunch of evil meanie-pants poopie-head ponies yell lewd shit at her.
>Just imagine her trying to sing a cheery little song about love while on a stripper's stage, as a bunch of evil meanie-pants poopie-head ponies yell lewd shit at her.
>>294057
>I believe this place could be turned around
This should be Gawd's motivation, not "Muh contract but also fuck that guy"
If Gawd went on a big motive-explaining rant where everything here is set in stone, the pacing would be improved and the confusion would be cleared up. The author shouldn't rely on Littlepoop's sometimes-right sometimes-wrong assumptions and unwillingness to ask follow-up questions as a crutch to "keep the audience guessing".
>Gawd: "Being one of many PMC armies in a crime-ridden shithole society full of dumb thugs ruling fearful peasants sucks. I want to be paid the big bucks to defend a prosperous nation-state! I want to conquer this Wasteland with Red-Eye's help! He thinks he's manipulating me, but I am manipulating him. Red-Eye wants us to manage this rock-breaking penal labour prison, to train obedience into slavers. But taking over this rock-breaking penal labour prison and turning it back into a gem mine will let me manufacture sick magical guns to arm my privately-owned army better! We'll take all the protection gigs in the land, defending towns and caravans alike, starving our rival PMCs and forcing them to war with us. Then we'll kill them with the help of Red-Eye's shitty army full of drafted slavers and ex-raider cunts. They're low-skill and poorly-equipped, but we're high-skill and equipped with great gear! Soon, we'll have a monopoly on violence as Red-Eye's only choice for a powerful standing army, even though we could dethrone him at any moment! And we will effectively have all the power we need to keep Red-Eye's authoritarian tendencies in check! Mwahahahahaha! I'm the hero of my own story, bitch!"
>I believe this place could be turned around
This should be Gawd's motivation, not "Muh contract but also fuck that guy"
If Gawd went on a big motive-explaining rant where everything here is set in stone, the pacing would be improved and the confusion would be cleared up. The author shouldn't rely on Littlepoop's sometimes-right sometimes-wrong assumptions and unwillingness to ask follow-up questions as a crutch to "keep the audience guessing".
>Gawd: "Being one of many PMC armies in a crime-ridden shithole society full of dumb thugs ruling fearful peasants sucks. I want to be paid the big bucks to defend a prosperous nation-state! I want to conquer this Wasteland with Red-Eye's help! He thinks he's manipulating me, but I am manipulating him. Red-Eye wants us to manage this rock-breaking penal labour prison, to train obedience into slavers. But taking over this rock-breaking penal labour prison and turning it back into a gem mine will let me manufacture sick magical guns to arm my privately-owned army better! We'll take all the protection gigs in the land, defending towns and caravans alike, starving our rival PMCs and forcing them to war with us. Then we'll kill them with the help of Red-Eye's shitty army full of drafted slavers and ex-raider cunts. They're low-skill and poorly-equipped, but we're high-skill and equipped with great gear! Soon, we'll have a monopoly on violence as Red-Eye's only choice for a powerful standing army, even though we could dethrone him at any moment! And we will effectively have all the power we need to keep Red-Eye's authoritarian tendencies in check! Mwahahahahaha! I'm the hero of my own story, bitch!"
Gawd's flimsy characterisation is probably the biggest problem with this whole arc, for reasons which will become particularly apparent later. Granted, flimsy characterisation is a well-established hallmark of this story by now, but the plan that Pip's developing here hinges heavily on Gawd being trustworthy and, at the very least, less of a heinous shit than Deadeyes and Topaz. Bearing in mind that Gawd has explicitly pointed out that her loyalty is solely reserved for her contract, and that the Talon Company as presented in Fallout is an utterly amoral mercenary company even by the standards of the wasteland, we're lacking in tangible reasons to get behind her.
Pip's plan to replace Deadeyes with Gawd is at least nominally solid, provided that we assume a grizzled mercenary with no personal loyalties would make a better leader than a slaver/raider/bandit/whothefuckevenknows with flexible ones. But considering that this is ultimately setting up Gawd to become President of Equestria in the supposedly happy ending, we desperately need more reasons to trust or AT LEAST like her.
Pic unrelated.
Pip's plan to replace Deadeyes with Gawd is at least nominally solid, provided that we assume a grizzled mercenary with no personal loyalties would make a better leader than a slaver/raider/bandit/whothefuckevenknows with flexible ones. But considering that this is ultimately setting up Gawd to become President of Equestria in the supposedly happy ending, we desperately need more reasons to trust or AT LEAST like her.
Pic unrelated.
1607710416.png (407.5 KB, 1441x1000, when you get to murderhobo for money.png)
>>294117
"The Hitman with a heart" cliche is a really old cliche, and it's hard to believe the author's fucking it up so badly.
You know that thing where the Hitman's got some moral limits like "I might willingly work for baddies, but I refuse to kill innocents/children/innocent children"?
That.
Fallout Equestria, so far, has been a comically black and white world.
Raiders smear poop on their walls and make gruesome spectacles of random bodies within their own homes and piss and nut onto their own beds before sleeping within them. Slavers abuse their slaves even though this would logically make their slaves worth less money. And heroes can do literally anything as long as they slaughter enough baddies, because genociding raider ghettoes reduces the number of rapists and mass murderers in the world faster than they can use rape to spawn more stupidly-named ugly raider bastards with shattered skulls and ring targets and bloody knives for cutie marks.
Baddies do stupidly disgusting/evil things that directly reduce the quality of their lives and their chances of survival because they just don't give a shit about anything except pissing off the heroes before their inevitable deaths.
The baddies are so stupid and evil, even a complete novice like Littlepip is able to channel some cheesy Young Adult fiction protagonist by berating a Raider for being inefficient and not thinking anything through.
It's a bizarrely literal interpretation of how you literally gain more Positive Karma Points from killing one raider than you gain from giving one free water bottle to a perpetually-thirsty hobo outside Megaton. If the author sees any problem with the Set Designers of F3 dropping random gore decorations outside Raider homes AND EVEN INSIDE Raider homes, he thinks it'll be enough to copy it completely and then write a disgusted pony calling this a bad habit that makes no sense.
But this "Gawd" character...
What the flying fuck are we supposed to think about Gawd? hehehehe geddit? geddit? it's because griffons fly. hey lois! lois! lois, I made a funny! ehehehehe
The author might think he's "clever" for taking The Talons from Fallout 3, an entirely-unexplained type of baddies you can randomly encounter sometimes, and giving them a leader with one character trait (muh contracts) but he's not clever. A bad explanation is worse than no explanation. A bad attempt to flesh out a bad idea still isn't good when it would be so easy to take the blank cheque that is the Talons and write something that makes sense onto it.
If there has ever been a place for the "Noble Demon" cliche, this is it.
You know, that thing where a villain is bad or on the side of baddies but not outright evil.
He's honourable, or he's got some moral restraints. He's concerned with bystander casualties. He'll tell you to "Fuck off and heal yourselves and fight me at full strength" when you're tired instead of killing you for the easy win.
If this baddie and the hero have to team up, this baddie won't backstab the hero at the end of it like a meaner villain would. If he's got meaner thugs working for him, he'll tell them to behave.
Where other villains would do petty evil shit for no reason, he wouldn't. Maybe it's because he's pragmatic and doesn't believe in killing or torturing underlings for fucking up, or maybe it's because he's a good person deep down. If you're honourable, he'll comment on it instead of calling you a stupid-ass pussy.
Maybe this "Noble Demon" is an underling of a 100% evil big bad evil guy. Maybe he is the big bad evil guy, or one of the many baddies. Maybe he's got good goals and bad methods, or an evil goal and nice methods, but the end result is a villain that you could realistically see a hero turn to the side of good. Or at the very least, understand why a hero would be sad after killing this baddie. Maybe if he seemingly wins for a while, he'll even mourn the hero.
You know, less the "Dr Eggman" and "Lex Luthor" type and more the "Senator Armstrong" and "Magneto" type.
"The Hitman with a heart" cliche is a really old cliche, and it's hard to believe the author's fucking it up so badly.
You know that thing where the Hitman's got some moral limits like "I might willingly work for baddies, but I refuse to kill innocents/children/innocent children"?
That.
Fallout Equestria, so far, has been a comically black and white world.
Raiders smear poop on their walls and make gruesome spectacles of random bodies within their own homes and piss and nut onto their own beds before sleeping within them. Slavers abuse their slaves even though this would logically make their slaves worth less money. And heroes can do literally anything as long as they slaughter enough baddies, because genociding raider ghettoes reduces the number of rapists and mass murderers in the world faster than they can use rape to spawn more stupidly-named ugly raider bastards with shattered skulls and ring targets and bloody knives for cutie marks.
Baddies do stupidly disgusting/evil things that directly reduce the quality of their lives and their chances of survival because they just don't give a shit about anything except pissing off the heroes before their inevitable deaths.
The baddies are so stupid and evil, even a complete novice like Littlepip is able to channel some cheesy Young Adult fiction protagonist by berating a Raider for being inefficient and not thinking anything through.
It's a bizarrely literal interpretation of how you literally gain more Positive Karma Points from killing one raider than you gain from giving one free water bottle to a perpetually-thirsty hobo outside Megaton. If the author sees any problem with the Set Designers of F3 dropping random gore decorations outside Raider homes AND EVEN INSIDE Raider homes, he thinks it'll be enough to copy it completely and then write a disgusted pony calling this a bad habit that makes no sense.
But this "Gawd" character...
What the flying fuck are we supposed to think about Gawd? hehehehe geddit? geddit? it's because griffons fly. hey lois! lois! lois, I made a funny! ehehehehe
The author might think he's "clever" for taking The Talons from Fallout 3, an entirely-unexplained type of baddies you can randomly encounter sometimes, and giving them a leader with one character trait (muh contracts) but he's not clever. A bad explanation is worse than no explanation. A bad attempt to flesh out a bad idea still isn't good when it would be so easy to take the blank cheque that is the Talons and write something that makes sense onto it.
If there has ever been a place for the "Noble Demon" cliche, this is it.
You know, that thing where a villain is bad or on the side of baddies but not outright evil.
He's honourable, or he's got some moral restraints. He's concerned with bystander casualties. He'll tell you to "Fuck off and heal yourselves and fight me at full strength" when you're tired instead of killing you for the easy win.
If this baddie and the hero have to team up, this baddie won't backstab the hero at the end of it like a meaner villain would. If he's got meaner thugs working for him, he'll tell them to behave.
Where other villains would do petty evil shit for no reason, he wouldn't. Maybe it's because he's pragmatic and doesn't believe in killing or torturing underlings for fucking up, or maybe it's because he's a good person deep down. If you're honourable, he'll comment on it instead of calling you a stupid-ass pussy.
Maybe this "Noble Demon" is an underling of a 100% evil big bad evil guy. Maybe he is the big bad evil guy, or one of the many baddies. Maybe he's got good goals and bad methods, or an evil goal and nice methods, but the end result is a villain that you could realistically see a hero turn to the side of good. Or at the very least, understand why a hero would be sad after killing this baddie. Maybe if he seemingly wins for a while, he'll even mourn the hero.
You know, less the "Dr Eggman" and "Lex Luthor" type and more the "Senator Armstrong" and "Magneto" type.
My biggest problem with Gawd is that so much focus has been put on Muh Contract. As if work ethic is ethics in general.
If Gawd was given a contract to slaughter every mare, stallion, and foal in New Appleoosa would she do it?
If the answer is no Gawd should have revealed that by now.
If Gawd was given a contract to slaughter every mare, stallion, and foal in New Appleoosa would she do it?
If the answer is no Gawd should have revealed that by now.
>>294143
>My biggest problem with Gawd is that so much focus has been put on Muh Contract. As if work ethic is ethics in general.
>If Gawd was given a contract to slaughter every mare, stallion, and foal in New Appleoosa would she do it?
>If the answer is no Gawd should have revealed that by now.
This is precisely the problem. Up to now Kkat's leaned heavily on presupposing that the reader is intimately familiar with Fallout in general and Fallout 3 in particular. In that game, the Talons' indiscriminate killings of women and children for pay is precisely what they're infamous for. With that in mind, it's expectation we can reasonably have of Gawd too. We also know that at least some of the Talons are working for Red Eye, who appears to be a Pretty Bad Dude.
Kkat probably imagines that having Gawd NOT be an ice-hearted puppy-kicker is therefore some kind of clever twist - and without any of the effort necessary in actually giving her a history, personality, long term goal or motive himself. Convenient.
>My biggest problem with Gawd is that so much focus has been put on Muh Contract. As if work ethic is ethics in general.
>If Gawd was given a contract to slaughter every mare, stallion, and foal in New Appleoosa would she do it?
>If the answer is no Gawd should have revealed that by now.
This is precisely the problem. Up to now Kkat's leaned heavily on presupposing that the reader is intimately familiar with Fallout in general and Fallout 3 in particular. In that game, the Talons' indiscriminate killings of women and children for pay is precisely what they're infamous for. With that in mind, it's expectation we can reasonably have of Gawd too. We also know that at least some of the Talons are working for Red Eye, who appears to be a Pretty Bad Dude.
Kkat probably imagines that having Gawd NOT be an ice-hearted puppy-kicker is therefore some kind of clever twist - and without any of the effort necessary in actually giving her a history, personality, long term goal or motive himself. Convenient.
Hell, I almost forgot. The Fo3 Talons' full banner is literally a skull-headed vulture preying on a crying baby. Might as well throw a swastika on there for good measure.
>>294144
Aye.
It would be one thing for a pony romance fanfic to rely on our existing knowledge of Rainbow Dash when she suddenly shows up halfway through a Pinkie and Twilight romance story. But this is a Pony fanfic that arbitrarily forces random Fallout elements to be born within ponyland to give the illusion that this is a crossover.
They've usually been about as "Ponified" as Germany would be if you copypasted our world's germany into ponyland and gave it a pony name like Germaney.
The Eyebots are renamed Spritebots but they're still floating balls with a laser and radio. And when evil Diamond Dogs show up, they're still evil Diamond Dogs but with a new Fallout-ish name and laser miniguns from Fallout 3.
But this right here...
The Talons were nothing when it comes to their writing/motivation/backstory/gimmicks. Team Aqua wanted to expand the ocean and Team Magma wanted to expand the landmass in Pokemon RSE, but The Talons in F3 AND in F4 are just there to shoot at you on sight while looking different from the Raiders(TM) and Slavers(TM) and Bandits(TM) and Orange Orc Super Mutants(TM) who already shoot at you on sight.
The author isn't just relying on your familiarity with external media unconnected to MLP. He's relying on everyone who reads this to say "Well, this take on The Talons is better than nothing!". But you'd only know the Talons were absolutely fucking nothing but some moving targets to shoot at if you played Fallout 3.
He's relying on you to dislike something from Fallout 3 so much that you'll think his gang of "Muh contract!!1!" faggots is superior by default, even though he normally relies on you to love Fallout 3 so much that you'll happily read it again but very slightly ponified, insofar as a texture/name-changer mod and a gameplay upgrade to give the protag sometimes-overpowered sometimes-unuseable Telekinesis counts as ponification.
Speaking of magic, we still have absolutely no idea what the limits of LP's magic are beyond vague "Tired=barely any TK" handwaves.
I think if magic was split into named spells with limited numbers of uses per day like in DND and Goblin Slayer, it would improve the story.
Because when LP floats over landmines, instead of thinking "Why would Wastelander ponies even invent or use landmines in a world where at least two thirds of the population can make them irrelevant and unicorns could toss your own mines at you or disable them and loot them?" we'd think "Oh geez, Littlepip just used Telekinesis to float over landmines! She can only use magic twice more today, and after that she's FUCKED!"
And speaking of romance, I thought of this when we were reading that knight and Celestia story but forgot to ask.
Why does it seem most romance writers would rather write anything other than romance?
After character A and B get to know each other and seem to like each other, circumstances and the universe conspire to keep them apart pr give them some stupid misunderstanding so the writer can write a load of "One character longing for another while something else happens" scenes and won't have to write as many "Two characters growing closer together and existing together" scenes. What's up with that? Instead of giving you a romance and letting you watch it develop and possibly face realistic challenges, it gives you two characters and tries to make you want them together so it can cocktease you over it until the finale, where "And then they finally got together" is treated like a happy ending rather than a new beginning.
Aye.
It would be one thing for a pony romance fanfic to rely on our existing knowledge of Rainbow Dash when she suddenly shows up halfway through a Pinkie and Twilight romance story. But this is a Pony fanfic that arbitrarily forces random Fallout elements to be born within ponyland to give the illusion that this is a crossover.
They've usually been about as "Ponified" as Germany would be if you copypasted our world's germany into ponyland and gave it a pony name like Germaney.
The Eyebots are renamed Spritebots but they're still floating balls with a laser and radio. And when evil Diamond Dogs show up, they're still evil Diamond Dogs but with a new Fallout-ish name and laser miniguns from Fallout 3.
But this right here...
The Talons were nothing when it comes to their writing/motivation/backstory/gimmicks. Team Aqua wanted to expand the ocean and Team Magma wanted to expand the landmass in Pokemon RSE, but The Talons in F3 AND in F4 are just there to shoot at you on sight while looking different from the Raiders(TM) and Slavers(TM) and Bandits(TM) and Orange Orc Super Mutants(TM) who already shoot at you on sight.
The author isn't just relying on your familiarity with external media unconnected to MLP. He's relying on everyone who reads this to say "Well, this take on The Talons is better than nothing!". But you'd only know the Talons were absolutely fucking nothing but some moving targets to shoot at if you played Fallout 3.
He's relying on you to dislike something from Fallout 3 so much that you'll think his gang of "Muh contract!!1!" faggots is superior by default, even though he normally relies on you to love Fallout 3 so much that you'll happily read it again but very slightly ponified, insofar as a texture/name-changer mod and a gameplay upgrade to give the protag sometimes-overpowered sometimes-unuseable Telekinesis counts as ponification.
Speaking of magic, we still have absolutely no idea what the limits of LP's magic are beyond vague "Tired=barely any TK" handwaves.
I think if magic was split into named spells with limited numbers of uses per day like in DND and Goblin Slayer, it would improve the story.
Because when LP floats over landmines, instead of thinking "Why would Wastelander ponies even invent or use landmines in a world where at least two thirds of the population can make them irrelevant and unicorns could toss your own mines at you or disable them and loot them?" we'd think "Oh geez, Littlepip just used Telekinesis to float over landmines! She can only use magic twice more today, and after that she's FUCKED!"
And speaking of romance, I thought of this when we were reading that knight and Celestia story but forgot to ask.
Why does it seem most romance writers would rather write anything other than romance?
After character A and B get to know each other and seem to like each other, circumstances and the universe conspire to keep them apart pr give them some stupid misunderstanding so the writer can write a load of "One character longing for another while something else happens" scenes and won't have to write as many "Two characters growing closer together and existing together" scenes. What's up with that? Instead of giving you a romance and letting you watch it develop and possibly face realistic challenges, it gives you two characters and tries to make you want them together so it can cocktease you over it until the finale, where "And then they finally got together" is treated like a happy ending rather than a new beginning.
>>294146
Man had a huge rant I was about to post with my gripes with the community when it comes to the abilities of all 3 races but to cut it short I agree authors for the show or fanfics should decide on the capacity for unicorns. Seen so many where they just write unicorns as these demigod magi who can do nearly anything they want with just a simple thought which kind of kills any tension or makes situations seem improbable.
If LittlePip is a weak magic user and midget but can still lift box cars effortlessly then we'd have to assume most unicorns are Dr. Manehattan level casters who can simply bend the laws of reality to suit any if their whims.
Another minor thing that bothered me to was how LittlePip and Calamity snuck into Shattered Hoof. She levitated a mattress infront of them but even back in season 1 unicorns when levitating an object had a slight glowing shimmer and glitter effect around the object and after had a very distinct shimmer effect around it. It's pretty much the 1 weakness he could have made for LittlePip's magic but she doesn't even have that holding her back. They should have been able to see the glowing glittering mattress and since unicorns are somewhat common they should be able to tell that the floating mattress is likely being manipulated by a unicorn somewhere.
Man had a huge rant I was about to post with my gripes with the community when it comes to the abilities of all 3 races but to cut it short I agree authors for the show or fanfics should decide on the capacity for unicorns. Seen so many where they just write unicorns as these demigod magi who can do nearly anything they want with just a simple thought which kind of kills any tension or makes situations seem improbable.
If LittlePip is a weak magic user and midget but can still lift box cars effortlessly then we'd have to assume most unicorns are Dr. Manehattan level casters who can simply bend the laws of reality to suit any if their whims.
Another minor thing that bothered me to was how LittlePip and Calamity snuck into Shattered Hoof. She levitated a mattress infront of them but even back in season 1 unicorns when levitating an object had a slight glowing shimmer and glitter effect around the object and after had a very distinct shimmer effect around it. It's pretty much the 1 weakness he could have made for LittlePip's magic but she doesn't even have that holding her back. They should have been able to see the glowing glittering mattress and since unicorns are somewhat common they should be able to tell that the floating mattress is likely being manipulated by a unicorn somewhere.
>>294185
To avoid that "OP Magic" problem, where do you think the average Unicorn, and the super-special protagonist unicorns like Twilight and LP, should fall on this tiering system? https://vsbattles.fandom.com/wiki/Tiering_System
To avoid that "OP Magic" problem, where do you think the average Unicorn, and the super-special protagonist unicorns like Twilight and LP, should fall on this tiering system? https://vsbattles.fandom.com/wiki/Tiering_System
>>294237
Come to think of it, limiting Unicorn magic to "Can only lift up to 120 pounds for 10 seconds before exhaustion sets in, can only make magic shields about as tough as a brick wall, and being able to destroy a small cottage with a single explosion spell puts you in the top percentile" still wouldn't change how useful magic can be.
What can one party member contribute to a Wasteland Adventurer party? Are you a medic, a sniper, a tough soldier with more experience than most? Fuck you, the Unicorn nerd here has 50% of his head filled with worthless anime trivia and the other 50% filled with spells to solve the unsolvable.
Low on food? He can convert rocks into burgers.
Low on water? He can conjure water, or purify water wherever he sees it.
Low on medicine? Who needs some chemicals or bed rest or herbs when one spell can heal you in seconds?
Low on ammo? Transmute the raw materials you find in scavenged trash into bullets and high quality guns.
Low on cash? Just fix all the broken crap in a town for pay!
Found a locked box you can't open because the thief is out of bobby pins? The wizard just transmutes the box open.
Threatened by an enemy? Just hide behind a wall while you psychically float your gun and fire it at foes without ever moving out of cover, using your Pip-Buck Compass to tell where the enemies are!
The author's solution for this was to "Limit" LP by making her unable to cast any real spell besides telekinesis. And then because he feels entitled to write a strong character even though this ruins the "underdog in a desperate world" tone, he made LP's telekinesis strong enough to lift fucking boxcars.
Is there some kind of disorder that causes "I must make all my characters strong, or people will think they're lame" syndrome?
Come to think of it, limiting Unicorn magic to "Can only lift up to 120 pounds for 10 seconds before exhaustion sets in, can only make magic shields about as tough as a brick wall, and being able to destroy a small cottage with a single explosion spell puts you in the top percentile" still wouldn't change how useful magic can be.
What can one party member contribute to a Wasteland Adventurer party? Are you a medic, a sniper, a tough soldier with more experience than most? Fuck you, the Unicorn nerd here has 50% of his head filled with worthless anime trivia and the other 50% filled with spells to solve the unsolvable.
Low on food? He can convert rocks into burgers.
Low on water? He can conjure water, or purify water wherever he sees it.
Low on medicine? Who needs some chemicals or bed rest or herbs when one spell can heal you in seconds?
Low on ammo? Transmute the raw materials you find in scavenged trash into bullets and high quality guns.
Low on cash? Just fix all the broken crap in a town for pay!
Found a locked box you can't open because the thief is out of bobby pins? The wizard just transmutes the box open.
Threatened by an enemy? Just hide behind a wall while you psychically float your gun and fire it at foes without ever moving out of cover, using your Pip-Buck Compass to tell where the enemies are!
The author's solution for this was to "Limit" LP by making her unable to cast any real spell besides telekinesis. And then because he feels entitled to write a strong character even though this ruins the "underdog in a desperate world" tone, he made LP's telekinesis strong enough to lift fucking boxcars.
Is there some kind of disorder that causes "I must make all my characters strong, or people will think they're lame" syndrome?
>>294243
Magic's a tough thing to 'balance' (remember that this is a story based partly on a game, but not actually a game). What's important is establishing consistent rules for the setting early on, so that there's a reasonable expectation in the reader's mind for what the characters can do. Kkat doesn't do this, probably because he's basing magic on how it appears to work in S1, where unicorns simply learn a handful of spells related directly to their special talent and Twilight's an anomaly because her talent IS magic. This is speculation on my part of course, since Kkat hasn't taken the time to explain within the context of the story.
Presumably, since no other character seems to show the same level of lifting power, Littlepip is supposed to be a sort of telekinetic savant. Unlike Twilight whose range of spellcasting is unusually broad, Pip's magic appears to be focused entirely into her basic TK spell. Or, to put it another way, she has the unicorn equivalent of tard strength. Detracts from the whole "generic newcomer underdog" thing, but that died almost immediately after she left the stable.
Magic's a tough thing to 'balance' (remember that this is a story based partly on a game, but not actually a game). What's important is establishing consistent rules for the setting early on, so that there's a reasonable expectation in the reader's mind for what the characters can do. Kkat doesn't do this, probably because he's basing magic on how it appears to work in S1, where unicorns simply learn a handful of spells related directly to their special talent and Twilight's an anomaly because her talent IS magic. This is speculation on my part of course, since Kkat hasn't taken the time to explain within the context of the story.
Presumably, since no other character seems to show the same level of lifting power, Littlepip is supposed to be a sort of telekinetic savant. Unlike Twilight whose range of spellcasting is unusually broad, Pip's magic appears to be focused entirely into her basic TK spell. Or, to put it another way, she has the unicorn equivalent of tard strength. Detracts from the whole "generic newcomer underdog" thing, but that died almost immediately after she left the stable.
>>294250
Limiting magic exclusively to Cutie Marks is a common solution to keep Unicorns interesting yet specialized taken by most fanfics. So a unicorn with sweets for a cutie mark could do something taxing like make an entire house out of candy, or do something complex like shoot a beam that turns you into candy on contact while still keeping you alive and conscious, but she would be unable to do something simple with magic like fix one leg of a broken wooden chair because her mark has nothing to do with wood. This means multiple Unicorns in the party can still contribute different magical things.
Kkunt probably thought he was being clever when he gave Littlepip a Pip-Buck for a cutie mark, since he spent so long trying to snark about it, and tried to snark about Diamond Tiara's mark too. But who the fuck needs a natural talent in operating what's basically a glorified smartphone with an aimbot app?
I'd call it simpler to use than a smartphone since its main functions are accessed through big, clearly-labelled red buttons.
It keeps track of what items you carry, keeps track of your "karma level" and relationships with various factions, it has maps and a radio, it can generate a map around you using echolocation or let you view a top-down satellite map of the area, it can let you check your physical and mental capabilities and the condition of your limbs, it can show you a list of all the effects upon you(like buffs from drugs and clothing), and it's got an auto-aim auto-firing mode that...
Well in this fic it turns you into an aiming god, but in the actual Fallout games every shot in VATS is RNG-based. If you have low Guns skills, you'll have a low chance to fire at anything more than a few feet from you.
And then the fucking author Kkunt goes ahead and says LP can queue up telekinetic attacks and other spells in VATS!
Who needs a "natural talent" for using a marketable plushie of a stupid-looking device that's desperately trying to make videogame menu elements look "In-universe"?
When it comes to Cutie Marks, it makes sense that a few wrapped sweets can represent making sweets and a watch can represent fixing watches and a campfire can represent camping and a spanner can represent fixing things in general since you fix things with a spanner, but a Pip-Buck is a pip-buck. If he's trying to say LP's talent is repairing tech, why does that skill rarely if ever come up compared to her far-more-used Lockpicking and Sneak and Small Guns skills? She has no justification for having those skills! It's not like she, as a child, got good at sneaking around her family's Stable Room to avoid waking her single alcoholic mother. It's not like she signed up for Stable Security Service because she wanted to be an official Stable Guard and fire guns and wear armour and hopefully help people, only to flunk out of basic training for being short and small despite the handiness with a gun she earned after thousands of hours at the gun range.
Is he trying to use the VATS Cutie Mark to justify why she's a natural at scoring auto-aim killshots in VATS/SATS?
That's fucking stupid! He had an opportunity to give her a Cutie Mark that makes sense for her character and could justify making her an underdog with one gimmick that stops her from being completely useless, but he chose to give her a mark exclusively restricted to the use of one specific piece of highly user-friendly technology with over 10 incredibly different uses.
Having a Cutie Mark of a Pip-Buck isn't like "Having a Cutie Mark of a Cutie Mark". It's like having a Cutie Mark for turning on and operating your Coca-Cola(TM)-brand combination Apple Smart Watch, old-timey radio, and Meta Runner TAS arm that turns you into a godly shooter for a few seconds at a time.
I wish this fucking author would spend less time trying to sound smart with all this "Hurr durr, isn't it silly that the Raiders in Fallout decorate their homes with gore? Isn't it fucking silly that the guards can't notice you if you telekinetically hide yourself with psychically lifted physics objects? Isn't Diamond Tiara a silly character with a silly Cutie Mark?" bullshit
It reminds me of Assman's pseudointellectual musings on human nature, and the modern sexual marketplace, and relationships with women
Except at least that faggot tried to do something about these things and do something with these ideas when writing his shitty pony fanfic! Even if it was just putting all of humanity inside their own Matrix-inspired cum pods where they can be duped into thinking they're cumming inside Rainbow Dash or their own custom-made meek and adorable bullied-to-perfection waifu forever so nobody ever has to deal with a stupid selfish spiteful shitty human whore-woman again.
Assman fucking TRIED to write scenes where the copy of a human and his custom-made waifu NPC speculate together on whether simulated events such as things that happened six years ago to a character literally invented yesterday happened. And, in the process, speculate on whether any of this fake-ponyland shit is truly "happening".
It's disappointing that those two characters came to the "Fuck it, if it feels real and evidence of it seems to exist then it must be real" conclusion, but Assman still tried harder than Kkunt ever did.
Still, fuck anyone who thinks putting your brain inside a jar is transhumanist. Transhumanist chads want sick laser-arms and robo-legs and multiple downside-free ways to cheat death. But MatrixFags like Assman? You aren't transcending your human limitations or impulses, you're succumbing to your primitive lust for safety and easy unearned dopamine by locking away your brain inside a cum jar matrix machine where you play videogames and get blowjobs from your imaginary waifu all day. Or worse, taking a photograph of your brain and then committing toaster bathtub as a computer tosses your brain in the trash where it belongs and gives simulated buttsex to an AI imitation of you vaguely inspired by that brain photograph
Limiting magic exclusively to Cutie Marks is a common solution to keep Unicorns interesting yet specialized taken by most fanfics. So a unicorn with sweets for a cutie mark could do something taxing like make an entire house out of candy, or do something complex like shoot a beam that turns you into candy on contact while still keeping you alive and conscious, but she would be unable to do something simple with magic like fix one leg of a broken wooden chair because her mark has nothing to do with wood. This means multiple Unicorns in the party can still contribute different magical things.
Kkunt probably thought he was being clever when he gave Littlepip a Pip-Buck for a cutie mark, since he spent so long trying to snark about it, and tried to snark about Diamond Tiara's mark too. But who the fuck needs a natural talent in operating what's basically a glorified smartphone with an aimbot app?
I'd call it simpler to use than a smartphone since its main functions are accessed through big, clearly-labelled red buttons.
It keeps track of what items you carry, keeps track of your "karma level" and relationships with various factions, it has maps and a radio, it can generate a map around you using echolocation or let you view a top-down satellite map of the area, it can let you check your physical and mental capabilities and the condition of your limbs, it can show you a list of all the effects upon you(like buffs from drugs and clothing), and it's got an auto-aim auto-firing mode that...
Well in this fic it turns you into an aiming god, but in the actual Fallout games every shot in VATS is RNG-based. If you have low Guns skills, you'll have a low chance to fire at anything more than a few feet from you.
And then the fucking author Kkunt goes ahead and says LP can queue up telekinetic attacks and other spells in VATS!
Who needs a "natural talent" for using a marketable plushie of a stupid-looking device that's desperately trying to make videogame menu elements look "In-universe"?
When it comes to Cutie Marks, it makes sense that a few wrapped sweets can represent making sweets and a watch can represent fixing watches and a campfire can represent camping and a spanner can represent fixing things in general since you fix things with a spanner, but a Pip-Buck is a pip-buck. If he's trying to say LP's talent is repairing tech, why does that skill rarely if ever come up compared to her far-more-used Lockpicking and Sneak and Small Guns skills? She has no justification for having those skills! It's not like she, as a child, got good at sneaking around her family's Stable Room to avoid waking her single alcoholic mother. It's not like she signed up for Stable Security Service because she wanted to be an official Stable Guard and fire guns and wear armour and hopefully help people, only to flunk out of basic training for being short and small despite the handiness with a gun she earned after thousands of hours at the gun range.
Is he trying to use the VATS Cutie Mark to justify why she's a natural at scoring auto-aim killshots in VATS/SATS?
That's fucking stupid! He had an opportunity to give her a Cutie Mark that makes sense for her character and could justify making her an underdog with one gimmick that stops her from being completely useless, but he chose to give her a mark exclusively restricted to the use of one specific piece of highly user-friendly technology with over 10 incredibly different uses.
Having a Cutie Mark of a Pip-Buck isn't like "Having a Cutie Mark of a Cutie Mark". It's like having a Cutie Mark for turning on and operating your Coca-Cola(TM)-brand combination Apple Smart Watch, old-timey radio, and Meta Runner TAS arm that turns you into a godly shooter for a few seconds at a time.
I wish this fucking author would spend less time trying to sound smart with all this "Hurr durr, isn't it silly that the Raiders in Fallout decorate their homes with gore? Isn't it fucking silly that the guards can't notice you if you telekinetically hide yourself with psychically lifted physics objects? Isn't Diamond Tiara a silly character with a silly Cutie Mark?" bullshit
It reminds me of Assman's pseudointellectual musings on human nature, and the modern sexual marketplace, and relationships with women
Except at least that faggot tried to do something about these things and do something with these ideas when writing his shitty pony fanfic! Even if it was just putting all of humanity inside their own Matrix-inspired cum pods where they can be duped into thinking they're cumming inside Rainbow Dash or their own custom-made meek and adorable bullied-to-perfection waifu forever so nobody ever has to deal with a stupid selfish spiteful shitty human whore-woman again.
Assman fucking TRIED to write scenes where the copy of a human and his custom-made waifu NPC speculate together on whether simulated events such as things that happened six years ago to a character literally invented yesterday happened. And, in the process, speculate on whether any of this fake-ponyland shit is truly "happening".
It's disappointing that those two characters came to the "Fuck it, if it feels real and evidence of it seems to exist then it must be real" conclusion, but Assman still tried harder than Kkunt ever did.
Still, fuck anyone who thinks putting your brain inside a jar is transhumanist. Transhumanist chads want sick laser-arms and robo-legs and multiple downside-free ways to cheat death. But MatrixFags like Assman? You aren't transcending your human limitations or impulses, you're succumbing to your primitive lust for safety and easy unearned dopamine by locking away your brain inside a cum jar matrix machine where you play videogames and get blowjobs from your imaginary waifu all day. Or worse, taking a photograph of your brain and then committing toaster bathtub as a computer tosses your brain in the trash where it belongs and gives simulated buttsex to an AI imitation of you vaguely inspired by that brain photograph
>>294252
Pip playing up her pip-boy cutie mark as uninteresting and meaningless is simply bizarre, considering that it essentially means that her destiny is to be an FPS/RPG protagonist with all the powers and narrative privilege that implies.
Pip playing up her pip-boy cutie mark as uninteresting and meaningless is simply bizarre, considering that it essentially means that her destiny is to be an FPS/RPG protagonist with all the powers and narrative privilege that implies.
>>294255
I know why the author gave the audience his "My OC's not a SUUUUUE, I swear!" lecture. It's because he's a faggot.
You know what?!
You can tell the term "Mary Sue" was invented by a woman, because it's as fucking worthless as the whore responsible for burdening all of fiction with it!
A Trekkie's Tale is a joke of a story intentionally made out of every cliche one stupid boomer woman got sick of seeing in stupid boomer fanfictions sent in to stupid Star Trek fan-magazines. A stupid author wrote this while screaming "STOP WRITING THIS!", but because she's a fucking failure, the lesson everyone took away from this was "Don't make your protagonist like this chick".
This boringly-perfect yet mopey chick who dies in the end and gets Kirk and Spock to want her sexually and has the same unusual half-alien heritage of one canon char and has the middle names of assorted later-series canon chars and MORE MORE MORE!
But not all sues look like mary sue, talk like mary sue, or act like mary sue.
Not all bad characters are sues, and whether a character has "too many" sue traits or not is subjective.
Not all boringly perfect characters die tragically in the end "to explain their absence from later canon material". Some can't die!
Not all bad OCs written by trashy writers desperate for your sympathy make their heroines overpowered! Some are underpowered and constantly-rescued!
Discussions on whether a character fits someone's personal definition of a Sue or not are usually wastes of time unless the character is so blatantly awful (Rey from Star Wars) that she literally is every Star Wars fanfiction cliche out there.
Is a character boringly perfect and bland? Call her boringly perfect and bland and ask yourself what traits could make her more exciting!
Is a character boringly strong? Call her boringly strong, and ask yourself what about the strength makes her boring! Is it dull because the author never sics anyone stronger than the OC on her, or boring because nothing creative is ever done during her fights, or boring because there is never any tension or threat?
Does it strain the suspension of disbelief that an OC can get away with breaking rules right in front of a rules-obsessed superior officer, get away with directly insulting an easily-angered character without a single punch being thrown, get away with wearing whore clothing like fishnet stockings in a military setting, and get away with attempting countless daring death-defying stunts she should logically lack the ability to pull off? Then fucking say so instead of trying to construct a new "type of Sue" just so you don't have to explain why you hate the character in ordinary words anyone can understand!
This author is DISHONEST.
And that's what REALLY pisses people off about sues, deep down.
It pisses people off when you tell them this perfectly-ordinary chick is a helpless underdog, and then write a story where she effortlessly defeats everyone. It pisses people off when you lecture the audience about how "Plain" the heroine's face is, and then write the ultimate chad billionaire falling in love with her because of her plain-ass face. It's annoying to be lied to and told this goddess is "just like you", because you know some dumb fucking woman in the audience actually sees herself as the bitch from The Hungry Divergent's Twilight featuring Angelina Jolie as the self-insert whore and Chris Hotmann as Bruce Wayne.
Come to think of it, that "protagonist cutie mark" is a terrible idea but it could be salvaged.
Imagine if Littlepip was a bored adrenaline-junkie bookworm obsessed with stories of heroism but deeply in over her head.
Imagine if she said things like "My dream is to save this world! If I die trying... then I die! Giving up on my dreams would truly make my soul die!" instead of pretentious emo poetry like "If this evil world will gobble me up then I will float myself down a stream and make it choke on me! I am the lightbringer because I say so!"
It'd be an interesting character trait if she often said "I must be the hero, because my Cutie Mark is a hero's weapon of war! Pre-war heroes used these to destroy many evil zebras!"
She could be propagandized into a patriot for a fantasy version of Equestria that never existed. Or a bookworm who truly adores the old Equestria she only knows from big hardback books and old newspapers.
Learning more about pre-war Equestria could shatter her worldview if she was raised to think Equestria never did anything wrong but then it turns out they did and caused the apocalypse.
It could be fun. She could be the type of RPG player who picks wacky dialogue options just to see how her friends react, even when something more tactful would work better. The world could shit on her constantly for trying to do the right thing. And the story could constantly shit on her for treating this like an adventure novel when it's really a tragedy now.
I know why the author gave the audience his "My OC's not a SUUUUUE, I swear!" lecture. It's because he's a faggot.
You know what?!
You can tell the term "Mary Sue" was invented by a woman, because it's as fucking worthless as the whore responsible for burdening all of fiction with it!
A Trekkie's Tale is a joke of a story intentionally made out of every cliche one stupid boomer woman got sick of seeing in stupid boomer fanfictions sent in to stupid Star Trek fan-magazines. A stupid author wrote this while screaming "STOP WRITING THIS!", but because she's a fucking failure, the lesson everyone took away from this was "Don't make your protagonist like this chick".
This boringly-perfect yet mopey chick who dies in the end and gets Kirk and Spock to want her sexually and has the same unusual half-alien heritage of one canon char and has the middle names of assorted later-series canon chars and MORE MORE MORE!
But not all sues look like mary sue, talk like mary sue, or act like mary sue.
Not all bad characters are sues, and whether a character has "too many" sue traits or not is subjective.
Not all boringly perfect characters die tragically in the end "to explain their absence from later canon material". Some can't die!
Not all bad OCs written by trashy writers desperate for your sympathy make their heroines overpowered! Some are underpowered and constantly-rescued!
Discussions on whether a character fits someone's personal definition of a Sue or not are usually wastes of time unless the character is so blatantly awful (Rey from Star Wars) that she literally is every Star Wars fanfiction cliche out there.
Is a character boringly perfect and bland? Call her boringly perfect and bland and ask yourself what traits could make her more exciting!
Is a character boringly strong? Call her boringly strong, and ask yourself what about the strength makes her boring! Is it dull because the author never sics anyone stronger than the OC on her, or boring because nothing creative is ever done during her fights, or boring because there is never any tension or threat?
Does it strain the suspension of disbelief that an OC can get away with breaking rules right in front of a rules-obsessed superior officer, get away with directly insulting an easily-angered character without a single punch being thrown, get away with wearing whore clothing like fishnet stockings in a military setting, and get away with attempting countless daring death-defying stunts she should logically lack the ability to pull off? Then fucking say so instead of trying to construct a new "type of Sue" just so you don't have to explain why you hate the character in ordinary words anyone can understand!
This author is DISHONEST.
And that's what REALLY pisses people off about sues, deep down.
It pisses people off when you tell them this perfectly-ordinary chick is a helpless underdog, and then write a story where she effortlessly defeats everyone. It pisses people off when you lecture the audience about how "Plain" the heroine's face is, and then write the ultimate chad billionaire falling in love with her because of her plain-ass face. It's annoying to be lied to and told this goddess is "just like you", because you know some dumb fucking woman in the audience actually sees herself as the bitch from The Hungry Divergent's Twilight featuring Angelina Jolie as the self-insert whore and Chris Hotmann as Bruce Wayne.
Come to think of it, that "protagonist cutie mark" is a terrible idea but it could be salvaged.
Imagine if Littlepip was a bored adrenaline-junkie bookworm obsessed with stories of heroism but deeply in over her head.
Imagine if she said things like "My dream is to save this world! If I die trying... then I die! Giving up on my dreams would truly make my soul die!" instead of pretentious emo poetry like "If this evil world will gobble me up then I will float myself down a stream and make it choke on me! I am the lightbringer because I say so!"
It'd be an interesting character trait if she often said "I must be the hero, because my Cutie Mark is a hero's weapon of war! Pre-war heroes used these to destroy many evil zebras!"
She could be propagandized into a patriot for a fantasy version of Equestria that never existed. Or a bookworm who truly adores the old Equestria she only knows from big hardback books and old newspapers.
Learning more about pre-war Equestria could shatter her worldview if she was raised to think Equestria never did anything wrong but then it turns out they did and caused the apocalypse.
It could be fun. She could be the type of RPG player who picks wacky dialogue options just to see how her friends react, even when something more tactful would work better. The world could shit on her constantly for trying to do the right thing. And the story could constantly shit on her for treating this like an adventure novel when it's really a tragedy now.
>>294257
Nigel, we talked about this.
Thesis statements, not essays.
You need to separate your emotions and hate-boners. When you dont, you write unreadable trash like above.
Nigel, we talked about this.
Thesis statements, not essays.
You need to separate your emotions and hate-boners. When you dont, you write unreadable trash like above.
>>294257
>This author is DISHONEST
Are you speaking of Kkat, or are you speaking of your unbalanced hatred for Sue's as evidenced by yet another unwelcome diatribe, ostensibly to exhaustively (that's the one thing it is, definitely) definitely e mary Sue's in a manner that totally isnt strawmanning, but just so happens to look sound, and feel like a strawman.
The entire first half of your post could and should have been deleted under the thesis statement "This author is a dishonest faggot".
>It pisses people off when
Hmmm, that seems a bit off
>It pisses me off when
Ah, that fits like a glove.
To properly write a mary sue, the author has to deceive their audience. If one seeks to implement a mary sue they have to limit their activity and make them seem incompetent, excepting those few instances where they succeed.
>Imagine if
No. Stop it right now. We've been over this, this is not an imagination thread. If you cant get your point across without resording to 'imagine' rhetoric then you should NOT BE POSTING. I get it, you need that dopamine. And I mean NEED it, cuz otherwise you'd take a step back and see how abysmally atrocious your attempts to get it are and continue to be in spite of all the effort that has been put into you specifically. Seriously, countless hours have gone into (you), but it's like trying to change Tyrone Biggums (and THAT is how you make a referential point. Do you see me explaining the point? No, I'm walking away, leaving it to those who get it and allowing the rest to either look it up or remain oblivious).
I wi advise you to keep a saved copy of your posts in the future. It would be a shame if someone rejected the post and you hadn't the means to go back and refine it.
P.S. Your writing has always been unrefined. You need to learn to turn a rough draft (which all your writing is) into a final draft. You think you can, which is why you're always being rejected. And it's a shame, cuz with a little polish you can write decent shit. It's a shame you have deliberately dismissed any efforts or attempts to be of assistance. So it will be forced on you.
>This author is DISHONEST
Are you speaking of Kkat, or are you speaking of your unbalanced hatred for Sue's as evidenced by yet another unwelcome diatribe, ostensibly to exhaustively (that's the one thing it is, definitely) definitely e mary Sue's in a manner that totally isnt strawmanning, but just so happens to look sound, and feel like a strawman.
The entire first half of your post could and should have been deleted under the thesis statement "This author is a dishonest faggot".
>It pisses people off when
Hmmm, that seems a bit off
>It pisses me off when
Ah, that fits like a glove.
To properly write a mary sue, the author has to deceive their audience. If one seeks to implement a mary sue they have to limit their activity and make them seem incompetent, excepting those few instances where they succeed.
>Imagine if
No. Stop it right now. We've been over this, this is not an imagination thread. If you cant get your point across without resording to 'imagine' rhetoric then you should NOT BE POSTING. I get it, you need that dopamine. And I mean NEED it, cuz otherwise you'd take a step back and see how abysmally atrocious your attempts to get it are and continue to be in spite of all the effort that has been put into you specifically. Seriously, countless hours have gone into (you), but it's like trying to change Tyrone Biggums (and THAT is how you make a referential point. Do you see me explaining the point? No, I'm walking away, leaving it to those who get it and allowing the rest to either look it up or remain oblivious).
I wi advise you to keep a saved copy of your posts in the future. It would be a shame if someone rejected the post and you hadn't the means to go back and refine it.
P.S. Your writing has always been unrefined. You need to learn to turn a rough draft (which all your writing is) into a final draft. You think you can, which is why you're always being rejected. And it's a shame, cuz with a little polish you can write decent shit. It's a shame you have deliberately dismissed any efforts or attempts to be of assistance. So it will be forced on you.
>>294257
Jesus, I wrote all of this? LP's a Sue, and more importantly, a bad character. That rant about Sue being a stupid concept and a bad way to sort good characters from bad ones doesn't belong here. I know there are people who agree with me about the dishonesty in "I swear she's an ordinary relatable underdog nobody" because I've met people who agree with me about this, especially when it came to Ma-Rey Sue from Disney's Star Wars but that shit isn't really relevant here
Sorry about this.
I need to focus on the author, not the culture that gave him such stupid misconceptions of what will make people like his OCs.
Even though the desperation to make people like his OCs is keeping him from really putting these OCs through hell, showing us them at their worst, and telling a good story involve them.
I get that the author's trying to make his OC "cool" because he wants to write an explodey quippy emotionless tensionless Marvel movie. Someone who shoots baddies and points out the idiocy in others is his idea of cool. He wants to put his OC above the "silly" thoughts that resulted in almost-Fallout happening on Equestria's grave. Ponies only object to Littlepip's murderhobo methods so she can have scenes where she's right about the necessity of bloodshed and violence
But at the same time, he didn't put any serious thoughts into what mindset or mistakes caused Equestria's downfall, so he can't think of any ways Littlepip could go out of her way to avoid the mistakes that caused Equestria's downfall and reject the ideas that let it happen
A small post-apocalyptic story works best when it focuses on the characters and their responses to the wasteland
The hellish world is a backdrop for a character-focused tale
But a big post-apocalyptic story like this that focuses on the world and its downfall and offscreen restoration works best when it's one specific flaw or vice that caused the earth's destruction, like short-sightedness or pride or greed or "the cycle of revenge"
So the hero can break this cycle by going out of his way to not act vengeful and try taking better third options
The author made Team Littlepip better murderers than the Mane Six so they can thrive in a world the mane six couldn't stop from existing. Eventually murderhoboing fixes everything when there are no more baddies left to shoot. Nothing was learned from the ashes of old Equestria or the pain endured in the Equestrian Wasteland.
You see the problem here, right?
LP and pals are products of this world. LP's murderous nature is a product of this world and her Pip-Buck is a product of the era that let Equestria die, yet neither of these are ever painted as bad things she must overcome or reject. Team LP is not united by their desire to reject the fates they were born with
Only two out of i forget how many main characters have "I don't want to be like my guys" for their personality and it never meaningfully goes anywhere
Never inspires serious introspection from other chars. It's just some backstory element with little to no effect on them, making it mostly irrelevant
You could argue that Equestria died for putting the Mane Six in charge of shit they weren't qualified for, but putting unqualified poners in power and giving them absolute power works just fine later on
But the author's mindset with the bond one-liners and "Here's how you could be evil more effectively, the protagonist newfag said to the lifelong expert in evil! Wait, you use coal to transport coal? I need a fucking drink, cried the protagonist" shite just doesn't suit the dark tone this story tries to go for.
LP might be an effective hired killer but that doesn't make her a hero. Heroism makes heroes! Virtue! Passing up opportunities to be evil and take the easy ways out even when they present themselves temptingly!
It's not just about being the best killer in a dark world. It's about not letting the dark world turn you into another cog in its cycle of evil
LP talks big about being "Incorruptible" because she never starts dressing evilly and speaking evilly and doing evil shit for fun, but she still does violent shit for fun to baddies and tells herself it's okay because she's a hero
No meaningful commentary on anything is ever added to elevate this above the... What did Glim call it? MurderPorn? MoralityPorn? SplatterPorn? He's right
That's all this story philosophically is and I'd be fine with that if the story didn't waste so much of the reader's time on pretentious pseudo-philosophical shit that's never allowed to meaningfully challenge any characters or restrict their murderhoboing action-movie sidequests. Because the author missed so many goddamn points I still don't know where to begin with this.
And at the same time, this world isn't even that dark. Because it's a world where somepony like Littlepip can take on endless swarms of baddies and win every time without any significant losses.
Is there a list of all the shit she's survived? I remember her surviving a point-blank nuclear sky-car explosion, and didn't she survive a point-blank rocket blast at Old A? Her plot armour's too great to put any tension into the action scenes the story's an excuse for
A dark world is a bleak and hopeless place where heroes can do nothing wrong and still lose. It's a place where no good deed goes unpunished. It's a place where the slightest mistake can get you and those you love killed. It's a place where the best most heroes can hope for is to die fighting to prolong the end of something they care about.
The author doesn't have it in him to threaten his characters with plot armour, or seriously wound them in a meaningful way, or kill them. So to compensate, he inflicts all sorts of horrible fates on canon characters we already have emotional connections with, and OCs who exist to suffer until people with plot armour save them.
He doesn't want anything bad to happen to his precious Littlepip, so he unfairly makes her OP from day one and then tries to insist she's nobody special.
Jesus, I wrote all of this? LP's a Sue, and more importantly, a bad character. That rant about Sue being a stupid concept and a bad way to sort good characters from bad ones doesn't belong here. I know there are people who agree with me about the dishonesty in "I swear she's an ordinary relatable underdog nobody" because I've met people who agree with me about this, especially when it came to Ma-Rey Sue from Disney's Star Wars but that shit isn't really relevant here
Sorry about this.
I need to focus on the author, not the culture that gave him such stupid misconceptions of what will make people like his OCs.
Even though the desperation to make people like his OCs is keeping him from really putting these OCs through hell, showing us them at their worst, and telling a good story involve them.
I get that the author's trying to make his OC "cool" because he wants to write an explodey quippy emotionless tensionless Marvel movie. Someone who shoots baddies and points out the idiocy in others is his idea of cool. He wants to put his OC above the "silly" thoughts that resulted in almost-Fallout happening on Equestria's grave. Ponies only object to Littlepip's murderhobo methods so she can have scenes where she's right about the necessity of bloodshed and violence
But at the same time, he didn't put any serious thoughts into what mindset or mistakes caused Equestria's downfall, so he can't think of any ways Littlepip could go out of her way to avoid the mistakes that caused Equestria's downfall and reject the ideas that let it happen
A small post-apocalyptic story works best when it focuses on the characters and their responses to the wasteland
The hellish world is a backdrop for a character-focused tale
But a big post-apocalyptic story like this that focuses on the world and its downfall and offscreen restoration works best when it's one specific flaw or vice that caused the earth's destruction, like short-sightedness or pride or greed or "the cycle of revenge"
So the hero can break this cycle by going out of his way to not act vengeful and try taking better third options
The author made Team Littlepip better murderers than the Mane Six so they can thrive in a world the mane six couldn't stop from existing. Eventually murderhoboing fixes everything when there are no more baddies left to shoot. Nothing was learned from the ashes of old Equestria or the pain endured in the Equestrian Wasteland.
You see the problem here, right?
LP and pals are products of this world. LP's murderous nature is a product of this world and her Pip-Buck is a product of the era that let Equestria die, yet neither of these are ever painted as bad things she must overcome or reject. Team LP is not united by their desire to reject the fates they were born with
Only two out of i forget how many main characters have "I don't want to be like my guys" for their personality and it never meaningfully goes anywhere
Never inspires serious introspection from other chars. It's just some backstory element with little to no effect on them, making it mostly irrelevant
You could argue that Equestria died for putting the Mane Six in charge of shit they weren't qualified for, but putting unqualified poners in power and giving them absolute power works just fine later on
But the author's mindset with the bond one-liners and "Here's how you could be evil more effectively, the protagonist newfag said to the lifelong expert in evil! Wait, you use coal to transport coal? I need a fucking drink, cried the protagonist" shite just doesn't suit the dark tone this story tries to go for.
LP might be an effective hired killer but that doesn't make her a hero. Heroism makes heroes! Virtue! Passing up opportunities to be evil and take the easy ways out even when they present themselves temptingly!
It's not just about being the best killer in a dark world. It's about not letting the dark world turn you into another cog in its cycle of evil
LP talks big about being "Incorruptible" because she never starts dressing evilly and speaking evilly and doing evil shit for fun, but she still does violent shit for fun to baddies and tells herself it's okay because she's a hero
No meaningful commentary on anything is ever added to elevate this above the... What did Glim call it? MurderPorn? MoralityPorn? SplatterPorn? He's right
That's all this story philosophically is and I'd be fine with that if the story didn't waste so much of the reader's time on pretentious pseudo-philosophical shit that's never allowed to meaningfully challenge any characters or restrict their murderhoboing action-movie sidequests. Because the author missed so many goddamn points I still don't know where to begin with this.
And at the same time, this world isn't even that dark. Because it's a world where somepony like Littlepip can take on endless swarms of baddies and win every time without any significant losses.
Is there a list of all the shit she's survived? I remember her surviving a point-blank nuclear sky-car explosion, and didn't she survive a point-blank rocket blast at Old A? Her plot armour's too great to put any tension into the action scenes the story's an excuse for
A dark world is a bleak and hopeless place where heroes can do nothing wrong and still lose. It's a place where no good deed goes unpunished. It's a place where the slightest mistake can get you and those you love killed. It's a place where the best most heroes can hope for is to die fighting to prolong the end of something they care about.
The author doesn't have it in him to threaten his characters with plot armour, or seriously wound them in a meaningful way, or kill them. So to compensate, he inflicts all sorts of horrible fates on canon characters we already have emotional connections with, and OCs who exist to suffer until people with plot armour save them.
He doesn't want anything bad to happen to his precious Littlepip, so he unfairly makes her OP from day one and then tries to insist she's nobody special.
>>294057
Anyway, apparently because Littlepoop delivered a message for Deadeyes she is now a trusted member of his gang, and can wander around the fortress as she pleases. Littlepoop and I at least agree on one thing here: Deadeyes most certainly deserves to die. Not because of all the stuff he did to Silver Bell's parents or whatever, but simply because anyone who is this lax on security has no business trying to run a banana republic in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. He even knows that LP is actually working for Gawd, and he still lets her wander around his completely unguarded fortress looking for the door to his secret treasure vault. At this point the most implausible thing about this scenario is that nopony has assassinated this retard already.
>I was behind the stage in the mess hall. To one side, the curtains, heavy and stained, concealed this darkened space from the large, catwalked area where the raiders ate whatever passed for their meals.
Are Deadeyes' soldiers supposed to be raiders, in the same way that the ponies we've seen before, that decorate their houses with entrails, are raiders? I'm still a little unclear on that point.
>Enough dust had accumulated back here that I could tell no pony ventured behind that curtain. Why would they? The space was full of rotting stage props and the skeletons of hundreds of ponies.
What?
>Countless bones were stuffed into cabinets, spilled out of metal boxes, and formed piles that must have been three ponies high when they still had flesh.
What????
This is probably a dumb question at this point, but why exactly are large numbers of skeletons being stored here? For that matter, why are they being stored at all? I get that the location was originally the site of a prison uprising or whatever that involved cannibalism and starvation, so presumably there would have been a lot of skeletons in this building at one point. However, wouldn't one expect that whoever became the next occupant of the building might, oh I don't know, get rid of them? Granted I'm an eccentric guy, but when I move into a new apartment, the first thing I usually do is gather up whatever corpses and skeletons and ceiling-entrails the previous tenant left behind and put them out on the curb.
>The “guests” of Shattered Hoof had spiraled into barbarism and cannibalism, and eventually every one of them had perished in here. I’d found logs; I’d found graffiti. I had wondered why I wasn’t tripping over their skeletons.
The reason you aren't tripping over their skeletons is because most normal people ponies, whatever don't want to live in places with piles of bones lying around all over the place. If some wannabe-third-world-warlord and his platoon of possibly-raiders-but-maybe-not decide that an abandoned prison complex would make an ideal fortress from which to administer their proto-industrial rock-smashing operation, but find that the building is full of skeletons, the normal thing to do would be to just remove them. In this case, assuming I'm understanding this scene correctly, Deadeyes seems to have opted to simply place the skeletons in storage rather than throw them out or bury them the way someone normal would do. However, we at least seem to be on the same page about not leaving the skeletons lying around in the halls and such.
Anyway, she finds a metal door surrounded by gun turrets in this area, which she deduces must be the entrance to the vault.
>I wanted inside. And not because there was a vault filled with possible treasure. Only Deadeyes had a key to the vault, and only Deadeyes had ever seen Mister Topaz face-to-face. If Mister Topaz really existed at all, I was dead certain he was down in that vault. My mind was conjuring up images of everything from a dedicated computer terminal that allowed Deadeyes to speak to a very remote Mister Topaz, to the vault being a Stable, to Mister-Topaz-the-Brainbot.
WHAT????
At this point I am actually beginning to worry that I will run out of original ways to call this author a retard, and will end up just endlessly writing the same complaint over and over for however many more threads this review is going to span. Even so, I would be remiss in my duties as commentator if I did not call this passage out for being [/b]completely pantsu-on-head retarded.[/b]
What insane leap of logic brought Littlepoop to this conclusion? Mr. Topaz is hiding in the treasure vault? Mr. Topaz is possibly a brainbot? What in the wide world of fuck could possibly have caused her to believe this? What is her train of thought here? She might as well say that Topaz is probably hiding in one of the skeleton-cabinets she just saw; it would make about as much goddamn sense.
So far, all we know about Mr. Topaz is his name, and the fact that he keeps a low profile. I've been more or less assuming that Topaz is some kind of regional boss, sort of a local Mafia chieftain who employs guys like Deadeyes to run little operations for him. He skims off the top and probably provides muscle and protection from bigger fish like Redeye, but otherwise stays out of the day to day operations of his enterprise, hence he is seldom seen by the pones with whom he does business. At this point it's beginning to sound like kkat's plan all along was to have Deadeyes actually be the final boss of this scenario, and have Topaz turn out to be some sort of elaborate ruse he cooked up to fool the masses...or something.
You know what, scratch that; I have absolutely no fucking idea what this author is planning to do. This is one of the most weirdly-constructed stories I've ever read. It's like the author purchased a build-your-own-story kit full of cliches, but instead of following the assembly instructions just started slapping everything together at random. This is like a child's Lego construction or something; the medieval castle that inexplicably has spaceship parts on the towers and Yoda in a cowboy hat guarding the ramparts.
Anyway, apparently because Littlepoop delivered a message for Deadeyes she is now a trusted member of his gang, and can wander around the fortress as she pleases. Littlepoop and I at least agree on one thing here: Deadeyes most certainly deserves to die. Not because of all the stuff he did to Silver Bell's parents or whatever, but simply because anyone who is this lax on security has no business trying to run a banana republic in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. He even knows that LP is actually working for Gawd, and he still lets her wander around his completely unguarded fortress looking for the door to his secret treasure vault. At this point the most implausible thing about this scenario is that nopony has assassinated this retard already.
>I was behind the stage in the mess hall. To one side, the curtains, heavy and stained, concealed this darkened space from the large, catwalked area where the raiders ate whatever passed for their meals.
Are Deadeyes' soldiers supposed to be raiders, in the same way that the ponies we've seen before, that decorate their houses with entrails, are raiders? I'm still a little unclear on that point.
>Enough dust had accumulated back here that I could tell no pony ventured behind that curtain. Why would they? The space was full of rotting stage props and the skeletons of hundreds of ponies.
What?
>Countless bones were stuffed into cabinets, spilled out of metal boxes, and formed piles that must have been three ponies high when they still had flesh.
What????
This is probably a dumb question at this point, but why exactly are large numbers of skeletons being stored here? For that matter, why are they being stored at all? I get that the location was originally the site of a prison uprising or whatever that involved cannibalism and starvation, so presumably there would have been a lot of skeletons in this building at one point. However, wouldn't one expect that whoever became the next occupant of the building might, oh I don't know, get rid of them? Granted I'm an eccentric guy, but when I move into a new apartment, the first thing I usually do is gather up whatever corpses and skeletons and ceiling-entrails the previous tenant left behind and put them out on the curb.
>The “guests” of Shattered Hoof had spiraled into barbarism and cannibalism, and eventually every one of them had perished in here. I’d found logs; I’d found graffiti. I had wondered why I wasn’t tripping over their skeletons.
The reason you aren't tripping over their skeletons is because most normal people ponies, whatever don't want to live in places with piles of bones lying around all over the place. If some wannabe-third-world-warlord and his platoon of possibly-raiders-but-maybe-not decide that an abandoned prison complex would make an ideal fortress from which to administer their proto-industrial rock-smashing operation, but find that the building is full of skeletons, the normal thing to do would be to just remove them. In this case, assuming I'm understanding this scene correctly, Deadeyes seems to have opted to simply place the skeletons in storage rather than throw them out or bury them the way someone normal would do. However, we at least seem to be on the same page about not leaving the skeletons lying around in the halls and such.
Anyway, she finds a metal door surrounded by gun turrets in this area, which she deduces must be the entrance to the vault.
>I wanted inside. And not because there was a vault filled with possible treasure. Only Deadeyes had a key to the vault, and only Deadeyes had ever seen Mister Topaz face-to-face. If Mister Topaz really existed at all, I was dead certain he was down in that vault. My mind was conjuring up images of everything from a dedicated computer terminal that allowed Deadeyes to speak to a very remote Mister Topaz, to the vault being a Stable, to Mister-Topaz-the-Brainbot.
WHAT????
At this point I am actually beginning to worry that I will run out of original ways to call this author a retard, and will end up just endlessly writing the same complaint over and over for however many more threads this review is going to span. Even so, I would be remiss in my duties as commentator if I did not call this passage out for being [/b]completely pantsu-on-head retarded.[/b]
What insane leap of logic brought Littlepoop to this conclusion? Mr. Topaz is hiding in the treasure vault? Mr. Topaz is possibly a brainbot? What in the wide world of fuck could possibly have caused her to believe this? What is her train of thought here? She might as well say that Topaz is probably hiding in one of the skeleton-cabinets she just saw; it would make about as much goddamn sense.
So far, all we know about Mr. Topaz is his name, and the fact that he keeps a low profile. I've been more or less assuming that Topaz is some kind of regional boss, sort of a local Mafia chieftain who employs guys like Deadeyes to run little operations for him. He skims off the top and probably provides muscle and protection from bigger fish like Redeye, but otherwise stays out of the day to day operations of his enterprise, hence he is seldom seen by the pones with whom he does business. At this point it's beginning to sound like kkat's plan all along was to have Deadeyes actually be the final boss of this scenario, and have Topaz turn out to be some sort of elaborate ruse he cooked up to fool the masses...or something.
You know what, scratch that; I have absolutely no fucking idea what this author is planning to do. This is one of the most weirdly-constructed stories I've ever read. It's like the author purchased a build-your-own-story kit full of cliches, but instead of following the assembly instructions just started slapping everything together at random. This is like a child's Lego construction or something; the medieval castle that inexplicably has spaceship parts on the towers and Yoda in a cowboy hat guarding the ramparts.
>>294308
>The gate was locked. I had to push aside mounds of crumbling bones to get to it, holding my breath as white flakes stirred into the air.
You know what? I'm not even going to bother asking why there would be mounds of crumbling bones blocking the gate to the treasure vault.
>It took several minutes of effort, but the gate finally opened to my talents.
Naturally, the most important location in Deadeyes' fortress would be sealed with nothing more than a common padlock that could be picked by some autistic klepto who learned simple lockpicking tricks by dicking around with PipBucks and reading magazines on the subject. I'm actually not being sarcastic here; this makes perfect sense. One consistent thing about this arc is that Deadeyes has repeatedly shown himself to be a complete dunce when it comes to personal security.
>The metal door, however, was another story entirely. It could only be opened by a terminal elsewhere in the building, and only then if I could restore power to it.
Oh my, a challenge; I wasn't expecting that. I'm not being sarcastic here, either; in this entire arc the heroine has not had to do anything more complex than run a couple of mundane errands, and I had every reason to assume this trend would continue until it was over.
However, with this particular challenge, we are once again back in vidya-game territory. This kind of thing is a common enough puzzle to encounter in a game, but in a real-world scenario it makes little sense that Deadeyes would lock his treasure vault with a remote terminal that needs to be opened from the other side of the compound. This would mean that every time he needs to go down there to get something, he has to go to the terminal, punch in the code, walk all the way across the fortress to the door, and hope that nopony thought to try the now-unlocked door in the amount of time it takes him to walk down there. Needing to switch the power to the door on and off every time makes it even more inconvenient.
It makes even less sense to set it up this way if Topaz is indeed living down there for some insane reason. Deadeyes and his underlings would presumably need to go down there fairly often to deliver supplies or run messages. Also: what happened to Deadeyes having the key to the vault on his person? I thought that getting the key was the whole point of coming here. Or is the key he carries just the key to the dumb padlock that LP was able to pick so easily?
Anyway, page break.
>I must have spent hours poking around Shattered Hoof, seeking to restore power to that door. It was just a simple matter of replacing a mouthful of fuses, and swapping out a row of spark batteries, but those proved annoyingly difficult to find.
Once again, it's a little ridiculous that she is able to do all of this without encountering any opposition at all. I know Deadeyes has shit for security, but does literally nopony have any questions about why this little weirdo who just joined the crew yesterday is suddenly wandering around the entire compound, screwing with fuseboxes and flipping random levers up and down?
>I did find the armory through a side room off the guard barracks. It was completely devoid of weapons -- no surprise, as most of the raiders seemed to be armed with magical energy weapons that I assumed were looted from the armory. There was, however, a framed news article on the back wall, and behind it, a safe.
Let me guess: the news article contains absolutely nothing relevant to the current situation, but will provide several contextless pieces of random information about the setting that will not factor into the story until ten chapters from now when we've forgotten all about it.
Yep, turns out that's exactly what it is. There is a photograph of what appears to be Applejack attending the funeral of Big Macintosh, who apparently sacrificed himself to prevent the assassination of Celestia. Do we care? There's no reason to at present, as we don't technically know either of these characters, but since it probably will be important in another twelve chapters or so, it's probably worth noting.
>The safe had opened to reveal two (!) Stealth Bucks, the last spark batteries I needed, and a variety of ammo clips which, according to the documents found with them, were magically enhanced.
I'm really getting tired of these safes. Again, I'm probably just repeating myself by now, but it's illogical and dumb for anyone outside of a video game to just find easily-cracked safes containing random bric a brac everywhere she goes. People ponies, whatever don't just lock up random commonplace objects in hidden wall safes, I don't care what universe you're in. In a video game? Sure, it's fine; scattering treasure boxes around the world for the player to find adds an extra dimension of entertainment, and is a good way to hide weapons, upgrades, ammunition, healing potions, and other useful objects that the player will frequently need. But in a story? You need to at least try to be somewhat realistic. Whose safe is this? Why did they put two StealthBucks and some extra clips and batteries in there? What kind of autismo does something like that?
I mean, think about it: this is the armory. It's a room that was built for the express purpose of storing weapons. We are told that it at one time contained magical weapons, probably far more powerful than anything Littlepoop needs ammunition for. I mean, imagine the situation here: you've got an entire room full of military-grade hardware just lying out in the open, but you feel compelled to keep that pack of AAA batteries and a couple of extra clips for your Hi-Point locked up in the hidden wall safe, because you don't want them to fall into the wrong hands? 555-come-on-now.
>The gate was locked. I had to push aside mounds of crumbling bones to get to it, holding my breath as white flakes stirred into the air.
You know what? I'm not even going to bother asking why there would be mounds of crumbling bones blocking the gate to the treasure vault.
>It took several minutes of effort, but the gate finally opened to my talents.
Naturally, the most important location in Deadeyes' fortress would be sealed with nothing more than a common padlock that could be picked by some autistic klepto who learned simple lockpicking tricks by dicking around with PipBucks and reading magazines on the subject. I'm actually not being sarcastic here; this makes perfect sense. One consistent thing about this arc is that Deadeyes has repeatedly shown himself to be a complete dunce when it comes to personal security.
>The metal door, however, was another story entirely. It could only be opened by a terminal elsewhere in the building, and only then if I could restore power to it.
Oh my, a challenge; I wasn't expecting that. I'm not being sarcastic here, either; in this entire arc the heroine has not had to do anything more complex than run a couple of mundane errands, and I had every reason to assume this trend would continue until it was over.
However, with this particular challenge, we are once again back in vidya-game territory. This kind of thing is a common enough puzzle to encounter in a game, but in a real-world scenario it makes little sense that Deadeyes would lock his treasure vault with a remote terminal that needs to be opened from the other side of the compound. This would mean that every time he needs to go down there to get something, he has to go to the terminal, punch in the code, walk all the way across the fortress to the door, and hope that nopony thought to try the now-unlocked door in the amount of time it takes him to walk down there. Needing to switch the power to the door on and off every time makes it even more inconvenient.
It makes even less sense to set it up this way if Topaz is indeed living down there for some insane reason. Deadeyes and his underlings would presumably need to go down there fairly often to deliver supplies or run messages. Also: what happened to Deadeyes having the key to the vault on his person? I thought that getting the key was the whole point of coming here. Or is the key he carries just the key to the dumb padlock that LP was able to pick so easily?
Anyway, page break.
>I must have spent hours poking around Shattered Hoof, seeking to restore power to that door. It was just a simple matter of replacing a mouthful of fuses, and swapping out a row of spark batteries, but those proved annoyingly difficult to find.
Once again, it's a little ridiculous that she is able to do all of this without encountering any opposition at all. I know Deadeyes has shit for security, but does literally nopony have any questions about why this little weirdo who just joined the crew yesterday is suddenly wandering around the entire compound, screwing with fuseboxes and flipping random levers up and down?
>I did find the armory through a side room off the guard barracks. It was completely devoid of weapons -- no surprise, as most of the raiders seemed to be armed with magical energy weapons that I assumed were looted from the armory. There was, however, a framed news article on the back wall, and behind it, a safe.
Let me guess: the news article contains absolutely nothing relevant to the current situation, but will provide several contextless pieces of random information about the setting that will not factor into the story until ten chapters from now when we've forgotten all about it.
Yep, turns out that's exactly what it is. There is a photograph of what appears to be Applejack attending the funeral of Big Macintosh, who apparently sacrificed himself to prevent the assassination of Celestia. Do we care? There's no reason to at present, as we don't technically know either of these characters, but since it probably will be important in another twelve chapters or so, it's probably worth noting.
>The safe had opened to reveal two (!) Stealth Bucks, the last spark batteries I needed, and a variety of ammo clips which, according to the documents found with them, were magically enhanced.
I'm really getting tired of these safes. Again, I'm probably just repeating myself by now, but it's illogical and dumb for anyone outside of a video game to just find easily-cracked safes containing random bric a brac everywhere she goes. People ponies, whatever don't just lock up random commonplace objects in hidden wall safes, I don't care what universe you're in. In a video game? Sure, it's fine; scattering treasure boxes around the world for the player to find adds an extra dimension of entertainment, and is a good way to hide weapons, upgrades, ammunition, healing potions, and other useful objects that the player will frequently need. But in a story? You need to at least try to be somewhat realistic. Whose safe is this? Why did they put two StealthBucks and some extra clips and batteries in there? What kind of autismo does something like that?
I mean, think about it: this is the armory. It's a room that was built for the express purpose of storing weapons. We are told that it at one time contained magical weapons, probably far more powerful than anything Littlepoop needs ammunition for. I mean, imagine the situation here: you've got an entire room full of military-grade hardware just lying out in the open, but you feel compelled to keep that pack of AAA batteries and a couple of extra clips for your Hi-Point locked up in the hidden wall safe, because you don't want them to fall into the wrong hands? 555-come-on-now.
>>294309
>Bullets for Little Macintosh, the needle gun, even Calamity’s battle saddle.
I've completely lost track of whether or not she ever actually built that needle gun, and if so where she got the parts she needed, and so forth. Part of me almost wishes I cared enough to go back through the text and find out. But I don't, so I'm just going to assume she has a needle gun now.
Anyway, she finishes raiding the safe and puts the article back where she found it, but then she overhears snippets of conversation from two approaching raiders.
>I hastily finished replacing the frame and hugged a wall behind one of the empty sets of ammo shelves, ears alert.
Why is she hiding? I thought she had free run of the place now.
She overhears bits and snippets of their conversation:
>They took all the mares and bucks they could, killed the rest and left them dead and rotting where they fell. But the colts and fillies? Red Eye doesn’t have any use for kids. So they just left us behind to fend for ourselves.
This seems like a potential continuity error. Red Eye runs the slaver operation, and from what I understand the Appleoosa slavers worked for him. If he doesn't have any use for kids, why were those slavers specifically rounding up kids?
>Place went bad real fast. Hell, it was bad to start with, so many of us seeing our parents sliced and splattered. But it got a whole lot worse. Got my tail out of there quick as I could. So personally, I’d be more than happy if a good deal of this raiding party died screaming with their legs blown off.
As ever, I find it very confusing trying to keep track of who is allied with whom and where exactly the battle lines have been drawn. Assuming I'm still following things correctly, Deadeyes' army is expecting an attack from Red Eye, who I guess is trying to round up slaves or take over Topaz' operation or something to that effect. When these ponies here talk about "this raiding party," I'm assuming this is what they mean. They presumably don't yet know that Deadeyes is planning to betray them and let Red Eyes take them all as slaves, if that is indeed still what he's planning. However, the use of the term "raiding party" is a bit confusing here: the story has made it clear that raiders and slavers are two separate things, Red Eye's attacking army is an army of slavers, and LP keeps referring to Deadeyes' soldiers as "raiders." So is this fight raiders vs. slavers or raiders vs. raiders? Or does "raiding party" mean something different than "raider?" Since in its normal context "raider" simply means someone who raids, it would logically follow that a raiding party would be made up of raiders, but if being a "raider" is not a prerequisite for raiding, then I guess you could have a raiding party made up of non-raiders. See how complicated all this shit gets when you're careless about how you use terminology?
As if all of this weren't complicated enough, k "kat then drops this bombshell on us:
>Ayep, Ah get that. But if Deadeyes’ trap works, we’ll have a whole mess o’ them slavers as our slaves. Then ya c’n take it out on ‘em all slow and personal-like. Ah’m sure Deadeyes won’t mind if a few o’ his new rock-breakers are missin’ some non-vital internal organs.
So Deadeyes is now planning to double-cross Red Eye and use the raiders to enslave his slavers, who are also apparently raiding? This shit is giving me a headache. Also: what is meant by "non-vital internal organs?" Are they going to remove their appendices or something?
>My mind raced to put together what I’d just heard. Deadeyes wasn’t, then, wasn’t betraying Shattered Hoof to the slavers after all. He was just tricking Red Eye’s forces into thinking he was -- luring them into a trap. Of course he wanted them to get in without any difficulties.
In all seriousness, though, this makes sense enough. Having complex allegiances between characters and throwing in the occasional surprise doublecross is a tried and true element in many different types of stories. That doesn't necessarily mean kkat won't fuck it up, but in and of itself this is fine.
>And he was deceiving Gawd into acting against him. Which, if this plan had the hoof-stamp of approval from Mister Topaz... or worse, was actually Mister Topaz’s plan...
>I needed to speak to Gawd. Before I went shooting anypony.
I'm not entirely following her reasoning, but here's my best guess: we already know that Deadeyes already knows that Gawd is planning to move against him, and if Topaz is in on the scheme, it could mean that he plans on using Gawd as some sort of expendable cannon fodder to accomplish whatever the fuck the greater objective here is supposed to be. Again, this kind of thing is a pretty well-established trope and there's nothing wrong with it, if it all makes sense.
Anyway, there is a page break here, and then in the next scene we have Littlepoop back in Deadeyes' office. Instead of murdering him like she is supposed to, she keeps playing along with her stupid scheme of pretending to work for him so she can get close to him and kill him, even though she's close enough to kill him right now. As it turns out, the mystery assignment is that Deadeyes wants her to kill Gawd. Apparently, delivering one letter proves that she is capable enough to handle assassinating the queen of the assassins. In fact, not only does he feel she's fully capable of handling this assignment based on her past experience as a delivery girl, he plans on making her one of his personal guards if she succeeds. Now I know this is all a ruse; he knows that she works for Gawd, and he may even know that she knows that, so obviously this whole thing is bullshit. However, it's still pretty implausible that he would just offer to promote her to one of his most trusted positions based on just two assignments. Then again, if this is his screening process, it would explain how ineptly guarded his fortress is.
>Bullets for Little Macintosh, the needle gun, even Calamity’s battle saddle.
I've completely lost track of whether or not she ever actually built that needle gun, and if so where she got the parts she needed, and so forth. Part of me almost wishes I cared enough to go back through the text and find out. But I don't, so I'm just going to assume she has a needle gun now.
Anyway, she finishes raiding the safe and puts the article back where she found it, but then she overhears snippets of conversation from two approaching raiders.
>I hastily finished replacing the frame and hugged a wall behind one of the empty sets of ammo shelves, ears alert.
Why is she hiding? I thought she had free run of the place now.
She overhears bits and snippets of their conversation:
>They took all the mares and bucks they could, killed the rest and left them dead and rotting where they fell. But the colts and fillies? Red Eye doesn’t have any use for kids. So they just left us behind to fend for ourselves.
This seems like a potential continuity error. Red Eye runs the slaver operation, and from what I understand the Appleoosa slavers worked for him. If he doesn't have any use for kids, why were those slavers specifically rounding up kids?
>Place went bad real fast. Hell, it was bad to start with, so many of us seeing our parents sliced and splattered. But it got a whole lot worse. Got my tail out of there quick as I could. So personally, I’d be more than happy if a good deal of this raiding party died screaming with their legs blown off.
As ever, I find it very confusing trying to keep track of who is allied with whom and where exactly the battle lines have been drawn. Assuming I'm still following things correctly, Deadeyes' army is expecting an attack from Red Eye, who I guess is trying to round up slaves or take over Topaz' operation or something to that effect. When these ponies here talk about "this raiding party," I'm assuming this is what they mean. They presumably don't yet know that Deadeyes is planning to betray them and let Red Eyes take them all as slaves, if that is indeed still what he's planning. However, the use of the term "raiding party" is a bit confusing here: the story has made it clear that raiders and slavers are two separate things, Red Eye's attacking army is an army of slavers, and LP keeps referring to Deadeyes' soldiers as "raiders." So is this fight raiders vs. slavers or raiders vs. raiders? Or does "raiding party" mean something different than "raider?" Since in its normal context "raider" simply means someone who raids, it would logically follow that a raiding party would be made up of raiders, but if being a "raider" is not a prerequisite for raiding, then I guess you could have a raiding party made up of non-raiders. See how complicated all this shit gets when you're careless about how you use terminology?
As if all of this weren't complicated enough, k "kat then drops this bombshell on us:
>Ayep, Ah get that. But if Deadeyes’ trap works, we’ll have a whole mess o’ them slavers as our slaves. Then ya c’n take it out on ‘em all slow and personal-like. Ah’m sure Deadeyes won’t mind if a few o’ his new rock-breakers are missin’ some non-vital internal organs.
So Deadeyes is now planning to double-cross Red Eye and use the raiders to enslave his slavers, who are also apparently raiding? This shit is giving me a headache. Also: what is meant by "non-vital internal organs?" Are they going to remove their appendices or something?
>My mind raced to put together what I’d just heard. Deadeyes wasn’t, then, wasn’t betraying Shattered Hoof to the slavers after all. He was just tricking Red Eye’s forces into thinking he was -- luring them into a trap. Of course he wanted them to get in without any difficulties.
In all seriousness, though, this makes sense enough. Having complex allegiances between characters and throwing in the occasional surprise doublecross is a tried and true element in many different types of stories. That doesn't necessarily mean kkat won't fuck it up, but in and of itself this is fine.
>And he was deceiving Gawd into acting against him. Which, if this plan had the hoof-stamp of approval from Mister Topaz... or worse, was actually Mister Topaz’s plan...
>I needed to speak to Gawd. Before I went shooting anypony.
I'm not entirely following her reasoning, but here's my best guess: we already know that Deadeyes already knows that Gawd is planning to move against him, and if Topaz is in on the scheme, it could mean that he plans on using Gawd as some sort of expendable cannon fodder to accomplish whatever the fuck the greater objective here is supposed to be. Again, this kind of thing is a pretty well-established trope and there's nothing wrong with it, if it all makes sense.
Anyway, there is a page break here, and then in the next scene we have Littlepoop back in Deadeyes' office. Instead of murdering him like she is supposed to, she keeps playing along with her stupid scheme of pretending to work for him so she can get close to him and kill him, even though she's close enough to kill him right now. As it turns out, the mystery assignment is that Deadeyes wants her to kill Gawd. Apparently, delivering one letter proves that she is capable enough to handle assassinating the queen of the assassins. In fact, not only does he feel she's fully capable of handling this assignment based on her past experience as a delivery girl, he plans on making her one of his personal guards if she succeeds. Now I know this is all a ruse; he knows that she works for Gawd, and he may even know that she knows that, so obviously this whole thing is bullshit. However, it's still pretty implausible that he would just offer to promote her to one of his most trusted positions based on just two assignments. Then again, if this is his screening process, it would explain how ineptly guarded his fortress is.
>>294305
It's clear that you have put some effort into improving your posting behavior, or whatever I should call it, in this thread.
>>294257
While I agree with this Anon here, >>294277 , about the fact that the Mary Sue rant was unrelated. I don't disagree with the boiled down point you are making: Mary sue isn't a specific criticism because many people disagree on what it means and therefore it is preferable to use other types of critcism. While I do have csome reservations about this. This is not the time. And the concept that I first learnt from E;R that the dislike for Mary sues comes from their dishonesty of not being special.
>>294305
I like this post. While a little bloated at times and a bit spoilery, it is on point and is relevant. Your point that, Lp and company should learn from the past as to not dothe same mistakes is very good.
It's clear that you have put some effort into improving your posting behavior, or whatever I should call it, in this thread.
>>294257
While I agree with this Anon here, >>294277 , about the fact that the Mary Sue rant was unrelated. I don't disagree with the boiled down point you are making: Mary sue isn't a specific criticism because many people disagree on what it means and therefore it is preferable to use other types of critcism. While I do have csome reservations about this. This is not the time. And the concept that I first learnt from E;R that the dislike for Mary sues comes from their dishonesty of not being special.
>>294305
I like this post. While a little bloated at times and a bit spoilery, it is on point and is relevant. Your point that, Lp and company should learn from the past as to not dothe same mistakes is very good.
>>294310
> k "kat
You didn't post about how gay kkat is here, mr. Glim"I didn't just drop the ball but the nutsack as well"Glam.
> k "kat
You didn't post about how gay kkat is here, mr. Glim"I didn't just drop the ball but the nutsack as well"Glam.
>>294310
>Yep, turns out that's exactly what it is. There is a photograph of what appears to be Applejack attending the funeral of Big Macintosh, who apparently sacrificed himself to prevent the assassination of Celestia. Do we care? There's no reason to at present, as we don't technically know either of these characters, but since it probably will be important in another twelve chapters or so, it's probably worth noting.
In fairness to Kkat here, Littlepip came across a statue honoring Big Mac's death back in chapter 3 (had to open the fic myself to double check), which memorialized him as the 'Hero of Shattered Hoof Ridge'. This gives some more context to that, so there is at least an attempt at slowly revealing a past series of events going on.
As with a lot of things in this story, I get the impression that Kkat had a big list of things to include in the story and maybe even a set timeline, but often simply fails to consider what the reader does and doesn't know. In this case, at the very least, it's a partial answer to a question that was set up earlier.
>This seems like a potential continuity error. Red Eye runs the slaver operation, and from what I understand the Appleoosa slavers worked for him. If he doesn't have any use for kids, why were those slavers specifically rounding up kids?
This is absolutely a continuity error, as we'll see later when we learn more about Red Eye's plans.
>Yep, turns out that's exactly what it is. There is a photograph of what appears to be Applejack attending the funeral of Big Macintosh, who apparently sacrificed himself to prevent the assassination of Celestia. Do we care? There's no reason to at present, as we don't technically know either of these characters, but since it probably will be important in another twelve chapters or so, it's probably worth noting.
In fairness to Kkat here, Littlepip came across a statue honoring Big Mac's death back in chapter 3 (had to open the fic myself to double check), which memorialized him as the 'Hero of Shattered Hoof Ridge'. This gives some more context to that, so there is at least an attempt at slowly revealing a past series of events going on.
As with a lot of things in this story, I get the impression that Kkat had a big list of things to include in the story and maybe even a set timeline, but often simply fails to consider what the reader does and doesn't know. In this case, at the very least, it's a partial answer to a question that was set up earlier.
>This seems like a potential continuity error. Red Eye runs the slaver operation, and from what I understand the Appleoosa slavers worked for him. If he doesn't have any use for kids, why were those slavers specifically rounding up kids?
This is absolutely a continuity error, as we'll see later when we learn more about Red Eye's plans.
>>294344
If, at the 85% mark you finally say 'lets get back to topic' you lost the point entirely.
Rejected, rewrite it. Stay on topic, fuck ur hateboners.
Stick to the facts
If, at the 85% mark you finally say 'lets get back to topic' you lost the point entirely.
Rejected, rewrite it. Stay on topic, fuck ur hateboners.
Stick to the facts
>>294349
I actually managed to copy your post >>294344 before it was removed.
After having read it, my verdict is that 20% of it was solid criticism that I liked.
About 23% were of tpoints that, if proven and elaborated a bit more could made into intresting points.
About 5% belonged to the thread as it was related to gg but was not connected to fe.
About 42% was ranting hateboners that didn't provide proof to their points and seem kinda meaningless.
10%
>"So I hereby crown Kkat with the gayest thing possible, a paper mache Naruto(TM) Ninja Headband but instead of a village symbol on the front there is just a poop emoji and a graffiti dick painted on the front instead."
>>294353
Sigh, don't throw a tantrum. No, the moderation here is not comparable to the chinese communist party. Or are you not implying this? Why are you otherwise posting this here?
I actually managed to copy your post >>294344 before it was removed.
After having read it, my verdict is that 20% of it was solid criticism that I liked.
About 23% were of tpoints that, if proven and elaborated a bit more could made into intresting points.
About 5% belonged to the thread as it was related to gg but was not connected to fe.
About 42% was ranting hateboners that didn't provide proof to their points and seem kinda meaningless.
10%
>"So I hereby crown Kkat with the gayest thing possible, a paper mache Naruto(TM) Ninja Headband but instead of a village symbol on the front there is just a poop emoji and a graffiti dick painted on the front instead."
>>294353
Sigh, don't throw a tantrum. No, the moderation here is not comparable to the chinese communist party. Or are you not implying this? Why are you otherwise posting this here?
It's fascinating how the fanfic's inaccessibility has driven some people to ignore it completely and exclusively post about something shorter: My posts.
But then people say they want my posts to be even shorter.
Isn't that crazy?
But then people say they want my posts to be even shorter.
Isn't that crazy?
>>294393
>the fanfic's inaccessibility
You proposed this as an explanation for why "fewer" people posted in the thread. While I don't know if fewer people post here compared to the thread before, I would like to politely disagree.
I don't think this fic is unaccessible at all. It's a mlp fic combined with an post-apocalyptical fps. So far, Lp and company hasn't really had any overarching story either. In fact, this story is almost episodic. Therefore, I don't think anyone needs to actually read this story to tag along. I don't and if I'm ever unsure of something gg's summary of events seems pretty acurate and all-encompassing.
>>294312
Here I approve of your post and the post in question isn't short. I don't want your posts to be shorter but for them to be on-topic. I also think your posts should be more structured and make your points like less rambling and so on but I don't actually demand that. It requires more practice to present your points better while the same cannot be said about not posting off-topic. That's just to stop.
>>294357
Here I wrote that 42% and that is just to remove. But I got a feeling that you have hard time to diffrentiate between what Anons mean with hateboners and your actual points. This also sort of involve those 23% of missed opportunities.
From my understanding, I could be wrong, a hateboner is in the context of this thread something you hate without providing insight to why you hate it. This is also regards those 23% which were points that I probably would have agreed with, since the sounded pleasing but you didn't provide reasoning for them so they were left as mute points.
Hateboners also refers to the moments when you just start to throw insults at the writer but compared to gg, it comes off less charming. Can't really put my finger on it. When gg does it, it's more cheeky, endearing, and often enough funny but you often don't come off as this.
But that's just my subjective take on it so you don't have to take it to heart. Maybe, it is just colored by bias or something.
>the fanfic's inaccessibility
You proposed this as an explanation for why "fewer" people posted in the thread. While I don't know if fewer people post here compared to the thread before, I would like to politely disagree.
I don't think this fic is unaccessible at all. It's a mlp fic combined with an post-apocalyptical fps. So far, Lp and company hasn't really had any overarching story either. In fact, this story is almost episodic. Therefore, I don't think anyone needs to actually read this story to tag along. I don't and if I'm ever unsure of something gg's summary of events seems pretty acurate and all-encompassing.
>>294312
Here I approve of your post and the post in question isn't short. I don't want your posts to be shorter but for them to be on-topic. I also think your posts should be more structured and make your points like less rambling and so on but I don't actually demand that. It requires more practice to present your points better while the same cannot be said about not posting off-topic. That's just to stop.
>>294357
Here I wrote that 42% and that is just to remove. But I got a feeling that you have hard time to diffrentiate between what Anons mean with hateboners and your actual points. This also sort of involve those 23% of missed opportunities.
From my understanding, I could be wrong, a hateboner is in the context of this thread something you hate without providing insight to why you hate it. This is also regards those 23% which were points that I probably would have agreed with, since the sounded pleasing but you didn't provide reasoning for them so they were left as mute points.
Hateboners also refers to the moments when you just start to throw insults at the writer but compared to gg, it comes off less charming. Can't really put my finger on it. When gg does it, it's more cheeky, endearing, and often enough funny but you often don't come off as this.
But that's just my subjective take on it so you don't have to take it to heart. Maybe, it is just colored by bias or something.
>>294398
When I use the term hateboner, I'm referring to an irrationally emotional response to the material that is neither justified (and is arguably unjustifiable) and/or results in a loss of composure and etiquette. As an example,... well, I think it would be redundant at this point to provide examples.
Here's another thing that I think you're trying to touch on (if not, no worries). There is an air to his writing that feels artificial. He phrases things as though he expects a friendly and concurrent reception to his spiels, as though his conclusions are, objective, unarguable, and unequivocal. I would simplify it as the "am I right?" propensity, where a person pats themselves on the back both self-congratulating and with the expectation/inference that everyone else would and should do likewise.
Conversely, one should maintain no illusions as to how effective any of this is or will be to correct the offending behavior. I can speak with specific authority as to how our friend responds to both negative and positive reinforcement (spoiler:he doesnt) and attempting to correct his behavior from a moderation standpoint is technically not in keeping with the site rules (I've been given a tacit pass in that he is a VERY special case, but trying to get through to him even if it WASNT an exercise in futility is not worth jeopardizing my position).
So ta da, theres really nothing to be done I'm sorry to say.
When I use the term hateboner, I'm referring to an irrationally emotional response to the material that is neither justified (and is arguably unjustifiable) and/or results in a loss of composure and etiquette. As an example,... well, I think it would be redundant at this point to provide examples.
Here's another thing that I think you're trying to touch on (if not, no worries). There is an air to his writing that feels artificial. He phrases things as though he expects a friendly and concurrent reception to his spiels, as though his conclusions are, objective, unarguable, and unequivocal. I would simplify it as the "am I right?" propensity, where a person pats themselves on the back both self-congratulating and with the expectation/inference that everyone else would and should do likewise.
Conversely, one should maintain no illusions as to how effective any of this is or will be to correct the offending behavior. I can speak with specific authority as to how our friend responds to both negative and positive reinforcement (spoiler:he doesnt) and attempting to correct his behavior from a moderation standpoint is technically not in keeping with the site rules (I've been given a tacit pass in that he is a VERY special case, but trying to get through to him even if it WASNT an exercise in futility is not worth jeopardizing my position).
So ta da, theres really nothing to be done I'm sorry to say.
>>294357
Now that the context for the comparison (this fic's "guy mentions a torture method to look edgy" moments are inferior to naruto fics) is gone, my subsequent "I hereby dub Kkat a gay person and give him some gay crown related to what I just mentioned" comment looks off-topic.
Now that the context for the comparison (this fic's "guy mentions a torture method to look edgy" moments are inferior to naruto fics) is gone, my subsequent "I hereby dub Kkat a gay person and give him some gay crown related to what I just mentioned" comment looks off-topic.
>>294410
I didn't really qoute that specifically because it was off-topic though it still kinda is. Becuase what really is your point?
>this fic's "guy mentions a torture method to look edgy" moments are inferior to naruto fics)
Yeah, in the post and here, it isn't very clear what the problem is. Is the problem that they aren't edgy enough or too edgy? Or is it that this trope is too cliche that is the problem?
But I mostly posted that qoute as I thought it spoke for itself. Not to say that you can't be funny nor that I decide what is funny or that I'm always funny but there seems to be no punchline here. I guess comedy is subjective.
I didn't really qoute that specifically because it was off-topic though it still kinda is. Becuase what really is your point?
>this fic's "guy mentions a torture method to look edgy" moments are inferior to naruto fics)
Yeah, in the post and here, it isn't very clear what the problem is. Is the problem that they aren't edgy enough or too edgy? Or is it that this trope is too cliche that is the problem?
But I mostly posted that qoute as I thought it spoke for itself. Not to say that you can't be funny nor that I decide what is funny or that I'm always funny but there seems to be no punchline here. I guess comedy is subjective.
To respond to >>294027 → from the previous thread:
>Could you mention which one?
I did some limited prereading/editing work on the early parts of Project Horizons and latter parts of Murky Number Seven - though mostly in spelling, grammar, continuity and formatting checking rather than content. As such I had to be pretty familiar with the original FoE and read through it a couple of times.
That said, this was several years ago now, so my opinions and understanding aren't the same now as they were back then, and I've forgotten a lot of the finer details. Not going to digress into a long spiel on PH or MN7 unless they end up being relevant to the thread.
>Could you mention which one?
I did some limited prereading/editing work on the early parts of Project Horizons and latter parts of Murky Number Seven - though mostly in spelling, grammar, continuity and formatting checking rather than content. As such I had to be pretty familiar with the original FoE and read through it a couple of times.
That said, this was several years ago now, so my opinions and understanding aren't the same now as they were back then, and I've forgotten a lot of the finer details. Not going to digress into a long spiel on PH or MN7 unless they end up being relevant to the thread.
>>294414
I didn't want my post to seem too long but I'll try and explain this better.
The way this character talks, with the "Ah" and "Y'all" just doesn't fit the sudden use of the phrase "Non-vital internal organs". It sounds silly. It sounds pretentious. It sounds completely at odds with the lazy and clumsy way of speaking the character's shown so far.
It doesn't sound cool and to the point, like "I'll slice them up" or "I'll smash their skulls in".
It doesn't sound graphic like "I'll crush their limbs and leave them to die!" or "I'll shoot their knees and watch them bleed out!" or "I'll chain them up and stick red-hot needles in their eyes!" or "I'll bite their throats out, gargle the blood, and spit it back in the shocked faces of their friends!" or even "I'll cut their hearts out with a rusty spoon! Yes, not a knife, but a fucking spoon, so it will hurt more!"
It's not a good threat.
But putting that aside, this threat in particular doesn't sound right from this mouth. It doesn't suit what we've seen of the character's diction so far, and that doesn't seem intentional in a kind of "This character talks like a thug or cowboy or some other stereotypically-stupid type of guy but is unexpectedly intelligent and able to whip out the big words when he wants to" way. Kkat's trying to make this character sound all violent and scary and spooky and creepy and dangerous, but who the hell would expect these random absolute motherfucking faggots to have the kind of medical skill necessary to remove any organs without fucking up and killing someone, whether those organs are "essential" or not?
"Non-vital internal organs" sounds fucking goofy. Even goofier than just mentioning one of those organs like "Spleen" and saying he wants to stab some spleens.
It doesn't sound plausible on its own. The problem isn't just that it's an attempt at needless edge, it's a really bad and stupid attempt that makes little sense and sounds more comical than anything else. These aren't highly-trained and incredibly experienced torture and interrogation experts from a secret village full of hyper-competent magical ninjas for hire.
This edge attempt doesn't sound good, but even putting that aside too...
They don't have a reason to talk like this.
They don't have an excuse such as "They are directly talking to a captured goon and trying to scare him into spilling his secrets".
These are just two random assholes, they're probably going to be killed by Littlepip at some point, and when Kkat decided he had to write dialogue for these characters so you won't like them, this is the best he could do.
This is the scene: Littlepip overhears two idiots talking to each other, and this really is how they always talk, even when they think they're alone, because they're baddies and that's how evil thugs think in this universe: "hurr durr me angry, so me wanna torture poners and remove *their non-vital internal organs!*".
This scene is cringe. It's CRINGE! It's also pointless, and stupid-sounding, and incredibly straining to the willing suspension of disbelief. It'd be one thing if these were Raiders(TM) who have some kind of flimsy justification like "We know we could die anyway so lmao why not be as evil as possible?". These are the kind of thugs in this facility, this is how they talk even when they don't think they need to put on some kind of act for some boss.
And it's really fucking stupid that the fic is like this. This is a fanfic, yes, but it's a world-renowned fanfic that's been printed, so you'd think it would get shit like this right!
I didn't want my post to seem too long but I'll try and explain this better.
The way this character talks, with the "Ah" and "Y'all" just doesn't fit the sudden use of the phrase "Non-vital internal organs". It sounds silly. It sounds pretentious. It sounds completely at odds with the lazy and clumsy way of speaking the character's shown so far.
It doesn't sound cool and to the point, like "I'll slice them up" or "I'll smash their skulls in".
It doesn't sound graphic like "I'll crush their limbs and leave them to die!" or "I'll shoot their knees and watch them bleed out!" or "I'll chain them up and stick red-hot needles in their eyes!" or "I'll bite their throats out, gargle the blood, and spit it back in the shocked faces of their friends!" or even "I'll cut their hearts out with a rusty spoon! Yes, not a knife, but a fucking spoon, so it will hurt more!"
It's not a good threat.
But putting that aside, this threat in particular doesn't sound right from this mouth. It doesn't suit what we've seen of the character's diction so far, and that doesn't seem intentional in a kind of "This character talks like a thug or cowboy or some other stereotypically-stupid type of guy but is unexpectedly intelligent and able to whip out the big words when he wants to" way. Kkat's trying to make this character sound all violent and scary and spooky and creepy and dangerous, but who the hell would expect these random absolute motherfucking faggots to have the kind of medical skill necessary to remove any organs without fucking up and killing someone, whether those organs are "essential" or not?
"Non-vital internal organs" sounds fucking goofy. Even goofier than just mentioning one of those organs like "Spleen" and saying he wants to stab some spleens.
It doesn't sound plausible on its own. The problem isn't just that it's an attempt at needless edge, it's a really bad and stupid attempt that makes little sense and sounds more comical than anything else. These aren't highly-trained and incredibly experienced torture and interrogation experts from a secret village full of hyper-competent magical ninjas for hire.
This edge attempt doesn't sound good, but even putting that aside too...
They don't have a reason to talk like this.
They don't have an excuse such as "They are directly talking to a captured goon and trying to scare him into spilling his secrets".
These are just two random assholes, they're probably going to be killed by Littlepip at some point, and when Kkat decided he had to write dialogue for these characters so you won't like them, this is the best he could do.
This is the scene: Littlepip overhears two idiots talking to each other, and this really is how they always talk, even when they think they're alone, because they're baddies and that's how evil thugs think in this universe: "hurr durr me angry, so me wanna torture poners and remove *their non-vital internal organs!*".
This scene is cringe. It's CRINGE! It's also pointless, and stupid-sounding, and incredibly straining to the willing suspension of disbelief. It'd be one thing if these were Raiders(TM) who have some kind of flimsy justification like "We know we could die anyway so lmao why not be as evil as possible?". These are the kind of thugs in this facility, this is how they talk even when they don't think they need to put on some kind of act for some boss.
And it's really fucking stupid that the fic is like this. This is a fanfic, yes, but it's a world-renowned fanfic that's been printed, so you'd think it would get shit like this right!
>>294425
>Not going to digress into a long spiel on PH or MN7 unless they end up being relevant to the thread.
You can make them relevant to the thread. All you have to do is make a point, using them as evidence and tie it into FE.
Having somebody tell us what kind of things that were brought over into other fics from FE, stuff that's already been covered like pipbucks, could be really intresting and add to the thread.
The point is always to use refrences to other things as evidence to your points.
But it really isn't such a problem if you happened to post things that are off-topic. Stuff like that happens, it's when it happens consitently and dominates a thread that it becomes a problem.
>Not going to digress into a long spiel on PH or MN7 unless they end up being relevant to the thread.
You can make them relevant to the thread. All you have to do is make a point, using them as evidence and tie it into FE.
Having somebody tell us what kind of things that were brought over into other fics from FE, stuff that's already been covered like pipbucks, could be really intresting and add to the thread.
The point is always to use refrences to other things as evidence to your points.
But it really isn't such a problem if you happened to post things that are off-topic. Stuff like that happens, it's when it happens consitently and dominates a thread that it becomes a problem.
>>294432
Yes, this is good post. You explain yourself and your point. I'll maintain that the post were you mention this first wasn't very clear but I do agree with majorly the points you are making in this post. However, that's based on my limited understanding of the situation sinceI haven't actually read gg's post on this part.
Yes, this is good post. You explain yourself and your point. I'll maintain that the post were you mention this first wasn't very clear but I do agree with majorly the points you are making in this post. However, that's based on my limited understanding of the situation sinceI haven't actually read gg's post on this part.
Was thinking some more about the story's strange moments.
The moments where Littlepip's strange little mind goes to some bizarre places but the story goes along with it because the author is on her wavelength to put it politely.
For example, Gamer Brain moments where LP attempts something that could only work in a video game such as attempting to loot a dead body for ammo in the middle of a firefight, or going along with bullshit sidequests for a guy you are supposed to kill just because you dont want to fail those sidequests, or pausing in the middle of a fight to enter a shack and read some computer terminal journal entries, or pausing your solo assault of a raider infested tree library to loot and lockpick.
And then there are LPs Book Brain moments where she assumes that just because a pony mentions Crane he surely must be an immensely important pony you can learm things from, or starts listening to dead pony diary mp3s while sneaking around an ememy base because she craves those stories more than she wants to be able to hear approaching foes.
These are weird. Hiding yourself with a cum soaked bed so guards cant see you is silly enough, but that scene where Calamity hides under a cum soaked bedsheet and it just works... this is silly. It's like a Looney Tunes skit sometimes. And that really doesn't suit the "ultra bloody adult Dorkly Skit cartoon with gore and realistic edgy consequences" tone this fic usually goes for. These tones cant combine.
And it cant be intentional characterization that rubs off on others like Pinkie doing weird shit because shes Pinkie. Because when Littlepip hears about something the author found silly - coal powered coal trains - Littlepip needs a drink so she can handle how stupid she finds the thought of a coal powered coal train.
The author wants to establish LP as an underdog hero facing an impossibly evil world, not an anti-logic anomaly that can do wacky Pinkie Pie stuff and make it work. But if the author leaned into that, a bit of Sam And Max bullshit could give this fic some desperately needed levity. Could write characters thst quip about the black comedy dead baby shit they encounter. And then make that dark and tragic by saying the characters use humor to hide the pain. Could make an automatic 9mm fire cylynder grenades by sticking one pill where the clipazine should go.
The fic would probably be better on a technical level if it lacked these moments of "well it worked in a game once so it must work now. Also this is a book so it must follow book logic therefore Crane is important because why else would he get screentime?" strangeness.
But while giving LP the power to break reality would make her OP and destroy the dark tone, my "bookworm littlepip" idea could be used to turn the choices she makes and the often bizarre conclusions she comes to into the result of consistent characterization other characters get to comment on and react to.
Littlepip was already a loot obsessed murderhobo from day one. She must have had some screws loose from day one, right? But all the significant characters adore her. Even the ponies banning her from their minecraft server- i mean town still love her. Nobody views her as an emotionally unstable walking grenade. Crane doesn't think she's an annoying weirdo best given an impossible task before coming around and liking her after she completes the task. In designated argument scenes Velvet The Pussy is wrong just so that Calamity The Guy can agree with LP for being right in the authors eyes. Calamity doesn't say anything like "I'd rather not get involved with fights this big when I hate everyone who could end up in charge anyway" but imagine if he was the sensible one providing reasonable arguments for her to sometimes listen to and saving LP whenever she gets herself in over her head.
LPs canon characterization is so flat that her teammates have very little to bounce off.
Canon Littlepips idea of a hero is one who slaughters all the baddies because they are there. Like Batman or The Punisher, except there are comics with these characters that try to deeply analyze these characters, ask if its worth it, examine the downsides of being like this, and show the toll these neverending crusades take upon their minds and bodies. I guess she never read those as a kid.
Shouldn't LP's simplistic definition of a hero be challenged by a grim and dark world of moral greys if the world is truly dark? Alternatively if the story is just splatter porn it should stop with the "littlepip is a helpless underdog and a brave strong female character who never gives up and will fill this world's dark soul with LIIIIIIIiiiIIIGHT" pretenses. Surely a bleak world where men run out of food and eat their dogs and are forced against their will to become raiders is darker than a popcorn action flick where all good guys have plot armour and all bad guys laugh evilly while kicking puppies and throwing out lines that are corny and cheesy enough to make Rita Repulsa cringe, right?
The moments where Littlepip's strange little mind goes to some bizarre places but the story goes along with it because the author is on her wavelength to put it politely.
For example, Gamer Brain moments where LP attempts something that could only work in a video game such as attempting to loot a dead body for ammo in the middle of a firefight, or going along with bullshit sidequests for a guy you are supposed to kill just because you dont want to fail those sidequests, or pausing in the middle of a fight to enter a shack and read some computer terminal journal entries, or pausing your solo assault of a raider infested tree library to loot and lockpick.
And then there are LPs Book Brain moments where she assumes that just because a pony mentions Crane he surely must be an immensely important pony you can learm things from, or starts listening to dead pony diary mp3s while sneaking around an ememy base because she craves those stories more than she wants to be able to hear approaching foes.
These are weird. Hiding yourself with a cum soaked bed so guards cant see you is silly enough, but that scene where Calamity hides under a cum soaked bedsheet and it just works... this is silly. It's like a Looney Tunes skit sometimes. And that really doesn't suit the "ultra bloody adult Dorkly Skit cartoon with gore and realistic edgy consequences" tone this fic usually goes for. These tones cant combine.
And it cant be intentional characterization that rubs off on others like Pinkie doing weird shit because shes Pinkie. Because when Littlepip hears about something the author found silly - coal powered coal trains - Littlepip needs a drink so she can handle how stupid she finds the thought of a coal powered coal train.
The author wants to establish LP as an underdog hero facing an impossibly evil world, not an anti-logic anomaly that can do wacky Pinkie Pie stuff and make it work. But if the author leaned into that, a bit of Sam And Max bullshit could give this fic some desperately needed levity. Could write characters thst quip about the black comedy dead baby shit they encounter. And then make that dark and tragic by saying the characters use humor to hide the pain. Could make an automatic 9mm fire cylynder grenades by sticking one pill where the clipazine should go.
The fic would probably be better on a technical level if it lacked these moments of "well it worked in a game once so it must work now. Also this is a book so it must follow book logic therefore Crane is important because why else would he get screentime?" strangeness.
But while giving LP the power to break reality would make her OP and destroy the dark tone, my "bookworm littlepip" idea could be used to turn the choices she makes and the often bizarre conclusions she comes to into the result of consistent characterization other characters get to comment on and react to.
Littlepip was already a loot obsessed murderhobo from day one. She must have had some screws loose from day one, right? But all the significant characters adore her. Even the ponies banning her from their minecraft server- i mean town still love her. Nobody views her as an emotionally unstable walking grenade. Crane doesn't think she's an annoying weirdo best given an impossible task before coming around and liking her after she completes the task. In designated argument scenes Velvet The Pussy is wrong just so that Calamity The Guy can agree with LP for being right in the authors eyes. Calamity doesn't say anything like "I'd rather not get involved with fights this big when I hate everyone who could end up in charge anyway" but imagine if he was the sensible one providing reasonable arguments for her to sometimes listen to and saving LP whenever she gets herself in over her head.
LPs canon characterization is so flat that her teammates have very little to bounce off.
Canon Littlepips idea of a hero is one who slaughters all the baddies because they are there. Like Batman or The Punisher, except there are comics with these characters that try to deeply analyze these characters, ask if its worth it, examine the downsides of being like this, and show the toll these neverending crusades take upon their minds and bodies. I guess she never read those as a kid.
Shouldn't LP's simplistic definition of a hero be challenged by a grim and dark world of moral greys if the world is truly dark? Alternatively if the story is just splatter porn it should stop with the "littlepip is a helpless underdog and a brave strong female character who never gives up and will fill this world's dark soul with LIIIIIIIiiiIIIGHT" pretenses. Surely a bleak world where men run out of food and eat their dogs and are forced against their will to become raiders is darker than a popcorn action flick where all good guys have plot armour and all bad guys laugh evilly while kicking puppies and throwing out lines that are corny and cheesy enough to make Rita Repulsa cringe, right?
>>294404
>I would simplify it as the "am I right?"
It wasn't what I was touching upon but I do agree that when you mention it that's a good description for the tone of a lot of his posts. While I actually think that believing in your own points isn't bad since otherwise they wouldn't be your points. (I hope I don't misunderstand.) I do think that it is generally easier to get people to discuss things when you don't go in hard and basically start of with, "This is how things are and you can't change my mind." Not saying that's how Nigel is... I think? Anyway, if one at least doesn't judge and let the discussion be free in a manner then people will truly allow themselves to think unqiuely or whatever...
I'm sorry but I honestly don't know if what I'm saying makes any sense right now and I haven't really thought this out I feel.
>I can speak with specific authority as to how our friend responds to both negative and positive reinforcement
I can actually also do this. I have been on this site since the first summer after that april that started it. If you check the Silver Star threads, which still aren't updated btw It is fine. Just wanted to inform anyone who is in charge of it again. But I guess I should do that on /qa/ instead., I'm all the swedish flags in both of those threads. I think. I'm 99% certain but there could perhaps be like one post that I didn't notice that popped up among them but I doubt it.
Well, I don't wanna put Nigel down now that he made such a good post >>294432 so here's for hoping.
>I would simplify it as the "am I right?"
It wasn't what I was touching upon but I do agree that when you mention it that's a good description for the tone of a lot of his posts. While I actually think that believing in your own points isn't bad since otherwise they wouldn't be your points. (I hope I don't misunderstand.) I do think that it is generally easier to get people to discuss things when you don't go in hard and basically start of with, "This is how things are and you can't change my mind." Not saying that's how Nigel is... I think? Anyway, if one at least doesn't judge and let the discussion be free in a manner then people will truly allow themselves to think unqiuely or whatever...
I'm sorry but I honestly don't know if what I'm saying makes any sense right now and I haven't really thought this out I feel.
>I can speak with specific authority as to how our friend responds to both negative and positive reinforcement
I can actually also do this. I have been on this site since the first summer after that april that started it. If you check the Silver Star threads, which still aren't updated btw It is fine. Just wanted to inform anyone who is in charge of it again. But I guess I should do that on /qa/ instead., I'm all the swedish flags in both of those threads. I think. I'm 99% certain but there could perhaps be like one post that I didn't notice that popped up among them but I doubt it.
Well, I don't wanna put Nigel down now that he made such a good post >>294432 so here's for hoping.
>>294310
>I looked around like a drowning pony looking for a helping hoof. And once again, my eyes fell on the picture of Stable Two’s first Overmare, Sweetie Belle. I remembered something that Velvet Remedy had told me. Something the Overmare had told her.
What in the name of everloving fuck is going on here? Why is she even standing here humoring this guy? The whole reason she's here is to kill him, so why not just kill him? Who cares if he wants her to kill Gawd or not; she already knew he was plotting against her. This really shouldn't be that surprising, and she's only working for him to get close enough to assassinate him, which she literally is now. Alternatively, she could take his offer and go assassinate Gawd if she really wanted to; not sure what that would achieve, but she could certainly do it. Either way, though, just pick someone and kill them already; I've got other shit to do today.
>Looking straight back into Deadeyes’ slate grey eyes, I nodded firmly. “Okay. Not a problem.”
No, I guess not. Oh well, whatever it was, I'm sure it was super-duper extra relevant.
Anyway, what the fuck. She is now apparently tricking Deadeyes into thinking she is going to kill Gawd, when in reality she is actually going to kill him, even though she sure is taking her sweet-ass time about it. Either that or she's going to kill Gawd now, I guess.
>I turned as if to leave, took a few steps, and stopped. Looking over my shoulder, “It’s not like ponies here won’t suspect you. You should have an alibi.”
What? Who cares? By "ponies here" I'm assuming she means Deadeyes' own troops, and I see no reason why they should care if Deadeyes kills Gawd or not. For that matter, I don't even see why he's using Littlepoop to do this. Wait a minute, if he knows that Littlepoop works for Gawd and is here as a double agent, does that mean he doesn't expect her to actually go through with it? Does he want Gawd killed or is this just part of the ruse?
On some level I want to applaud kkat's attempt at creating intrigue here, but this is just illogical. There's no reason for these characters to be pussyfooting around each other like this; all the doublecrosses and the lies upon lies are just making things complicated without making them interesting. If Deadeyes wants Gawd dead he should just send someone he trusts to kill her. If he doesn't trust Littlepoop, he should just kill her right here and now. Littlepoop herself has no reason to keep playing along with any of this; her task is quite simple. All she needs to do is kill Deadeyes, which she could also do right here and now. None of this needs to be as complicated as these characters are making it.
>“Tell you what. I’ve got a plan that will take care of your griffin problem and leave you looking clean.”
>His eyes narrowed now. “Oh do you? Please, do tell.”
>“Ever heard of a pony named Sweetie Belle?”
Hm, I was going to guess Aryanne. Oh well, I guess things are complicated enough that we may as well slather on yet another layer of complexity. Ok, Littlepoop, I'll bite; what the fuck does Sweetie Belle have to do with any of this?
>Well, by now you know I didn’t travel here alone. One of the people traveling with me just so happens to be a direct descendant of Sweetie Belle. And as it turns out, musical talent runs in the family.
>Her name is Velvet, and she’s on her way to Manehattan to record some new music for DJ Pon3’s radio station.
Wait a minute. I feel like I already knew that Velvet was a descendent of Sweetie Belle, but I don't remember if it's something I gleaned from the actual text or if it was in one of Nigel's spoilers. More importantly, though, I'm not sure if this is something Littlepoop should know.
More to the point though is that it shouldn't be this difficult to keep track of details like this. If one of the main characters is descended from Sweetie Belle and this fact is important to the story, then it should be a well established fact, and we shouldn't have to go back and comb through pages and pages of text to see if it was quietly mentioned somewhere, probably in a 9 point font footnote underneath an itemized list of crap that LP dug out of some poor bastard's abandoned safe. This work simultaneously suffers from being too detailed and not detailed enough. Details that pertain directly to the story, for example an explanation of what exactly a "raider" is, are frequently omitted on the assumption that we should already know; other important details, of which this business about Velvet's ancestry is a good example, are technically in the text but are buried under the constant deluge of extra garbage and trivia this author spews on us.
For instance, >>294347 mentioned that the article detailing the death of Big Mac filled in the blanks on a detail mentioned earlier: the memorial statue that LP found commemorating his valor at the Battle of Shattered Hoof. The details are consistent, but the problem is that neither of them have any apparent relevance to the story. Big Mac died protecting Celestia at Shattered Hoof. Okay, so what? What does that have to do with this current story about Littlepoop and her battle against Red Eye, or slavers, or whatever this novel is supposed to be about? The statue itself I remember struck me as an irrelevant detail at the time; her PipBuck pointed it out to her, but there was no apparent significance to it that made it feel like it bore specific mention.
The author has clearly built a very large and complex world here, and on some level that's commendable, but that doesn't give him open license to just throw whatever details he wants into the text and let us sort out which ones matter; he needs to learn how to tell a single coherent story. Just because an event happened in the history of your world doesn't mean it needs to be mentioned in the text. If I were going to novelize my own life, I wouldn't include details about WWI just because it was an event that happened in the world I live in.
>I looked around like a drowning pony looking for a helping hoof. And once again, my eyes fell on the picture of Stable Two’s first Overmare, Sweetie Belle. I remembered something that Velvet Remedy had told me. Something the Overmare had told her.
What in the name of everloving fuck is going on here? Why is she even standing here humoring this guy? The whole reason she's here is to kill him, so why not just kill him? Who cares if he wants her to kill Gawd or not; she already knew he was plotting against her. This really shouldn't be that surprising, and she's only working for him to get close enough to assassinate him, which she literally is now. Alternatively, she could take his offer and go assassinate Gawd if she really wanted to; not sure what that would achieve, but she could certainly do it. Either way, though, just pick someone and kill them already; I've got other shit to do today.
>Looking straight back into Deadeyes’ slate grey eyes, I nodded firmly. “Okay. Not a problem.”
No, I guess not. Oh well, whatever it was, I'm sure it was super-duper extra relevant.
Anyway, what the fuck. She is now apparently tricking Deadeyes into thinking she is going to kill Gawd, when in reality she is actually going to kill him, even though she sure is taking her sweet-ass time about it. Either that or she's going to kill Gawd now, I guess.
>I turned as if to leave, took a few steps, and stopped. Looking over my shoulder, “It’s not like ponies here won’t suspect you. You should have an alibi.”
What? Who cares? By "ponies here" I'm assuming she means Deadeyes' own troops, and I see no reason why they should care if Deadeyes kills Gawd or not. For that matter, I don't even see why he's using Littlepoop to do this. Wait a minute, if he knows that Littlepoop works for Gawd and is here as a double agent, does that mean he doesn't expect her to actually go through with it? Does he want Gawd killed or is this just part of the ruse?
On some level I want to applaud kkat's attempt at creating intrigue here, but this is just illogical. There's no reason for these characters to be pussyfooting around each other like this; all the doublecrosses and the lies upon lies are just making things complicated without making them interesting. If Deadeyes wants Gawd dead he should just send someone he trusts to kill her. If he doesn't trust Littlepoop, he should just kill her right here and now. Littlepoop herself has no reason to keep playing along with any of this; her task is quite simple. All she needs to do is kill Deadeyes, which she could also do right here and now. None of this needs to be as complicated as these characters are making it.
>“Tell you what. I’ve got a plan that will take care of your griffin problem and leave you looking clean.”
>His eyes narrowed now. “Oh do you? Please, do tell.”
>“Ever heard of a pony named Sweetie Belle?”
Hm, I was going to guess Aryanne. Oh well, I guess things are complicated enough that we may as well slather on yet another layer of complexity. Ok, Littlepoop, I'll bite; what the fuck does Sweetie Belle have to do with any of this?
>Well, by now you know I didn’t travel here alone. One of the people traveling with me just so happens to be a direct descendant of Sweetie Belle. And as it turns out, musical talent runs in the family.
>Her name is Velvet, and she’s on her way to Manehattan to record some new music for DJ Pon3’s radio station.
Wait a minute. I feel like I already knew that Velvet was a descendent of Sweetie Belle, but I don't remember if it's something I gleaned from the actual text or if it was in one of Nigel's spoilers. More importantly, though, I'm not sure if this is something Littlepoop should know.
More to the point though is that it shouldn't be this difficult to keep track of details like this. If one of the main characters is descended from Sweetie Belle and this fact is important to the story, then it should be a well established fact, and we shouldn't have to go back and comb through pages and pages of text to see if it was quietly mentioned somewhere, probably in a 9 point font footnote underneath an itemized list of crap that LP dug out of some poor bastard's abandoned safe. This work simultaneously suffers from being too detailed and not detailed enough. Details that pertain directly to the story, for example an explanation of what exactly a "raider" is, are frequently omitted on the assumption that we should already know; other important details, of which this business about Velvet's ancestry is a good example, are technically in the text but are buried under the constant deluge of extra garbage and trivia this author spews on us.
For instance, >>294347 mentioned that the article detailing the death of Big Mac filled in the blanks on a detail mentioned earlier: the memorial statue that LP found commemorating his valor at the Battle of Shattered Hoof. The details are consistent, but the problem is that neither of them have any apparent relevance to the story. Big Mac died protecting Celestia at Shattered Hoof. Okay, so what? What does that have to do with this current story about Littlepoop and her battle against Red Eye, or slavers, or whatever this novel is supposed to be about? The statue itself I remember struck me as an irrelevant detail at the time; her PipBuck pointed it out to her, but there was no apparent significance to it that made it feel like it bore specific mention.
The author has clearly built a very large and complex world here, and on some level that's commendable, but that doesn't give him open license to just throw whatever details he wants into the text and let us sort out which ones matter; he needs to learn how to tell a single coherent story. Just because an event happened in the history of your world doesn't mean it needs to be mentioned in the text. If I were going to novelize my own life, I wouldn't include details about WWI just because it was an event that happened in the world I live in.
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>>294514
Anyway, where were we? Oh yeah, Velvet Remedy is descended from Sweetie Belle. For some reason, Littlepoop brought this up during a conversation with Deadeyes. For some reason or another she lied to him and told her that Velvet is on her way to Manehattan to record for DJ Pon3.
>Wait... that’s actually a pretty good idea! And it would give me a way to talk with the wasteland’s most famous buck.
I still don't understand why talking to the DJ is a priority for her.
>“What I’m thinking: I think I can talk her into putting on a performance here. Using that very stage...” My mind was racing, trying to put together a decent-sounding plan as quickly as I spoke. “We’ll do it tonight. Invite everypony in to see it. And... Gawdyna Grimfeathers too.”
Again, some part of me wants to give k "it's not gay because I call my inside out scrotum a vagina" kat credit for attempting to create a complex and interesting storyline instead of just the usual "LP goes in, blasts baddies, steals treasure" routine. However, this really is getting absurd. She literally has one job here: kill Deadeyes. That's it. That's all she came here to do. She could do it right now: she has more than enough firepower, she appears to have him off guard, and since we have had no mention of them in this scene I'm assuming his bodyguards are not present. Just pull out your glock and pop a cap in this mark ass bitch, holmes. Bang bang. Don't be a busta.
>Deadeyes, I could see, was liking this idea. And with the battle coming tomorrow morning, he had to be figuring the timing for a morale-boosting celebration was perfect.
"An army is marching towards us in order to annihilate us, but we know the exact date and time they are going to arrive and attack us, so in the meantime let's have some pop idol do a concert for us." Only in Equestria, amirite folks?
Also, I may not have emphasized it enough, so I'll repeat it: this idea is completely, laughably absurd. Gawd and Deadeyes are not open enemies, but they obviously don't trust each other. It's clear that each is aware of the other plotting against them. So what is going to happen here? Littlepoop goes back to Gawd with an invitation to come alone and unarmed to Deadeyes' private fortress, which is filled with his soldiers, to enjoy a fun concert? This is about the same level of cunning that Wile E. Coyote uses to trap the Roadrunner; all it needs is a giant boulder suspended by a rope and a sign that says "Free Bird Seed."
>“I’ll be hiding up in the balcony. I’ll take two shots. One through the head of the griffin. The other into your table, close enough to look like you were also a target.”
So, on top of everything else that makes this ridiculous, she now expects Deadeyes, who I will once again emphasize knows she was sent here by Gawd to kill him, to just trust that she will "accidentally" miss him when he places her in the balcony as a sniper? How pantsu-on-head retarded do you actually have to be to believe that this is a good plan? fuck, I already used "pantsu-on-head retarded;" looks like I actually am running out of ways to call this author a retard
>I levitated out one of the Stealth Bucks. “I’ll be gone before any pony can catch me or even see who it was. You can blame it on a slaver assassin. Who wouldn’t buy that?”
Alright, I'm willing to give her some style points for waving the StealthBuck she just stole from him under his nose. However, I still don't see why all of this subterfuge is even necessary. Gawd and Deadeyes appear to be fighting kind of a cold war here; both are actively working against each other, both are aware, and both seem to be aware that the other is aware, but for some reason they have to keep pretending they're on the same side. For Gawd it has something to do with her contract, which kind of makes sense, but I have no idea why Deadeyes couldn't assassinate Gawd with impunity. It might have something to do with Topaz, since he hired Gawd and might take offense if his underling kills her, but he hasn't been mentioned; LP seems to be implying that the deception is for the benefit of Deadeyes' own troops. What do they care if their boss kills some strange griffon they have no connection to? None of this makes any goddamn sense.
>Deadeye contemplated the plan while I stood there, feeling increasingly nervous. He had to realize this plan put him in the same crosshairs as Gawd, and he already thought of me as her spy. Would he believe I would betray her so quickly, that my loyalty was up for grabs?
Once again: the author has enough brains to see the logic holes in his story, but apparently not enough to actually fix them.
Anyway, I've already spent far more time on this scene than it deserves. Yada yada yada, Deadeyes accepts the deal because he's a complete retard, and stipulates just one idiotic condition: that Velvet appear before the show and sing a couple of old Sweetie Belle songs for him. Littlepoop agrees, and takes her exit. On the way out, this happens:
>I noticed a sickly apple-colored glow which I hadn’t seen before. One of the terminals in one of the desks in the room outside of Deadeyes office was powered up. I was sure it hadn’t been before. Replacing those fuses and spark batteries must have powered it up. Pulling out my access tool, I hacked into the terminal.
Oh, the computer that opens the treasure vault was right there, how convenient. That's the last thing you need to get in there, right? That key that Deadeyes apparently keeps on his person that was the whole reason you came in here, you just don't even need that anymore? But you're still going to go through with the assassination of Deadeyes because of Silver Bell's family or whatever? But instead of just assassinating him now when you could get it done cleanly and efficiently, you're instead going to stick to this utterly moronic, overly-convoluted plan in which any number of things can and probably will go wrong? That's just the tops, kid.
Anyway, where were we? Oh yeah, Velvet Remedy is descended from Sweetie Belle. For some reason, Littlepoop brought this up during a conversation with Deadeyes. For some reason or another she lied to him and told her that Velvet is on her way to Manehattan to record for DJ Pon3.
>Wait... that’s actually a pretty good idea! And it would give me a way to talk with the wasteland’s most famous buck.
I still don't understand why talking to the DJ is a priority for her.
>“What I’m thinking: I think I can talk her into putting on a performance here. Using that very stage...” My mind was racing, trying to put together a decent-sounding plan as quickly as I spoke. “We’ll do it tonight. Invite everypony in to see it. And... Gawdyna Grimfeathers too.”
Again, some part of me wants to give k "it's not gay because I call my inside out scrotum a vagina" kat credit for attempting to create a complex and interesting storyline instead of just the usual "LP goes in, blasts baddies, steals treasure" routine. However, this really is getting absurd. She literally has one job here: kill Deadeyes. That's it. That's all she came here to do. She could do it right now: she has more than enough firepower, she appears to have him off guard, and since we have had no mention of them in this scene I'm assuming his bodyguards are not present. Just pull out your glock and pop a cap in this mark ass bitch, holmes. Bang bang. Don't be a busta.
>Deadeyes, I could see, was liking this idea. And with the battle coming tomorrow morning, he had to be figuring the timing for a morale-boosting celebration was perfect.
"An army is marching towards us in order to annihilate us, but we know the exact date and time they are going to arrive and attack us, so in the meantime let's have some pop idol do a concert for us." Only in Equestria, amirite folks?
Also, I may not have emphasized it enough, so I'll repeat it: this idea is completely, laughably absurd. Gawd and Deadeyes are not open enemies, but they obviously don't trust each other. It's clear that each is aware of the other plotting against them. So what is going to happen here? Littlepoop goes back to Gawd with an invitation to come alone and unarmed to Deadeyes' private fortress, which is filled with his soldiers, to enjoy a fun concert? This is about the same level of cunning that Wile E. Coyote uses to trap the Roadrunner; all it needs is a giant boulder suspended by a rope and a sign that says "Free Bird Seed."
>“I’ll be hiding up in the balcony. I’ll take two shots. One through the head of the griffin. The other into your table, close enough to look like you were also a target.”
So, on top of everything else that makes this ridiculous, she now expects Deadeyes, who I will once again emphasize knows she was sent here by Gawd to kill him, to just trust that she will "accidentally" miss him when he places her in the balcony as a sniper? How pantsu-on-head retarded do you actually have to be to believe that this is a good plan? fuck, I already used "pantsu-on-head retarded;" looks like I actually am running out of ways to call this author a retard
>I levitated out one of the Stealth Bucks. “I’ll be gone before any pony can catch me or even see who it was. You can blame it on a slaver assassin. Who wouldn’t buy that?”
Alright, I'm willing to give her some style points for waving the StealthBuck she just stole from him under his nose. However, I still don't see why all of this subterfuge is even necessary. Gawd and Deadeyes appear to be fighting kind of a cold war here; both are actively working against each other, both are aware, and both seem to be aware that the other is aware, but for some reason they have to keep pretending they're on the same side. For Gawd it has something to do with her contract, which kind of makes sense, but I have no idea why Deadeyes couldn't assassinate Gawd with impunity. It might have something to do with Topaz, since he hired Gawd and might take offense if his underling kills her, but he hasn't been mentioned; LP seems to be implying that the deception is for the benefit of Deadeyes' own troops. What do they care if their boss kills some strange griffon they have no connection to? None of this makes any goddamn sense.
>Deadeye contemplated the plan while I stood there, feeling increasingly nervous. He had to realize this plan put him in the same crosshairs as Gawd, and he already thought of me as her spy. Would he believe I would betray her so quickly, that my loyalty was up for grabs?
Once again: the author has enough brains to see the logic holes in his story, but apparently not enough to actually fix them.
Anyway, I've already spent far more time on this scene than it deserves. Yada yada yada, Deadeyes accepts the deal because he's a complete retard, and stipulates just one idiotic condition: that Velvet appear before the show and sing a couple of old Sweetie Belle songs for him. Littlepoop agrees, and takes her exit. On the way out, this happens:
>I noticed a sickly apple-colored glow which I hadn’t seen before. One of the terminals in one of the desks in the room outside of Deadeyes office was powered up. I was sure it hadn’t been before. Replacing those fuses and spark batteries must have powered it up. Pulling out my access tool, I hacked into the terminal.
Oh, the computer that opens the treasure vault was right there, how convenient. That's the last thing you need to get in there, right? That key that Deadeyes apparently keeps on his person that was the whole reason you came in here, you just don't even need that anymore? But you're still going to go through with the assassination of Deadeyes because of Silver Bell's family or whatever? But instead of just assassinating him now when you could get it done cleanly and efficiently, you're instead going to stick to this utterly moronic, overly-convoluted plan in which any number of things can and probably will go wrong? That's just the tops, kid.
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>>294515
Couple more things here before we move on.
>Pulling out my access tool, I hacked into the terminal.
What is her "access tool" exactly? This is the first mention I've heard of such a device. Is this how she's been "hacking" the terminals? News to me. If so, the author should have at least mentioned the existence of such a device the very first time she ever hacked a terminal. Also: where the hell did she get this thing? I was just joking earlier when I talked about her suddenly pulling the Staff of Ra out of her saddlebag, but this is almost the same level of absurdity. There exists in this world a device that just allows you to effortlessly crack any password on any terminal, and LP just magically has this thing in her possession because reasons? The author didn't think that was a detail worth explaining?
Where did she get this fucking thing? How did she come across it? What are it's origins? Who designed it originally, and how did it end up wherever LP found it? See, this goes back to what I was talking about with the difference between relevant and irrelevant details. The author goes out of his way to wedge in these interesting but ultimately irrelevant bits of trivia about his setting, like how Big Mac died protecting Celestia 200 years ago, but completely sidesteps gigantic logic holes like this one, which he leaves gaping wider than his anus after "ladies" night down at the Manhole Lounge in San Francisco.
>There were no menus, no entries. Instead, just a single function. I had found the terminal that opened door to the mines and vault below.
"Hey, Shattered Hoof construction committee, I've got an idea: let's design, build and install a dedicated terminal whose sole purpose is to unlock a door in a completely different part of the building, but only if a fusebox in yet another distant part of the building has the correct combination of fuses and spark batteries hooked up." This is why level designers don't build houses.
And then, page break. Littlepoop now returns to Gawd, who was no doubt expecting her to either return with the blood of Deadeyes on her hooves or not at all, and explains her idiotic plan to her. She now tells Gawd the exact same thing she just told Deadeyes, but in reverse:
>“I’ll put a bullet through Deadeye’s head,” I told Gawd. “And another into your table. Then use a Stealth Buck to slip out before anypony can identify me. You can blame it on the slavers who are attacking tomorrow.” Gawd was pondering the idea skeptically. “Sure, some ponies might still have suspicions, but not the kind they could act on. Particularly if you take over and lead them to victory against the slavers.”
Once again, the possessive form of Deadeyes' name is written inconsistently. Also: how dumb does LP think these two actually are? I mean, Deadeyes seems like a complete nitwit from what we've seen so far, but Gawd seems to be basically intelligent, or at least cagey enough to have survived in the backstabbing world of being a professional mercenary. I will also once more protest that THIS PLAN IS FUCKING RETARDED NO MATTER WHO YOU'RE TRYING TO SELL IT TO.
>Gawd shook her head. “I’ve got t’ hand it to you. Yer one hell of a devious plotter.”
No. No she isn't. She's this year's nominee for the "invent the most unnecessarily complicated solution to what is essentially a simple problem" award. Literally all she had to do was go in there and shoot this guy, glock glock nigga; now she's planning a Velvet Remedy concert at an abandoned prison apparently filled with skeletons, where she intends to hide in the balcony using a StealthBuck and fake-shoot one of them and real-shoot the other, and I guess it's supposed to be a point of suspense which one she's actually going to shoot. If both Gawd and Deadeyes are dumb enough to go along with this, she ought to shoot both of them for being morons, then shoot Velvet Remedy because she sucks, and then shoot herself for being the retard who thought up this ridiculous plan in the first place.
Anyway, this is the only thing Gawd has to say on the subject, so presumably she intends to go along with the scheme. Next stop is the boxcar, where LP informs Velvet Remedy that she will now have to perform a free show for what I'm assuming is still a group of raiders. Despite being vehemently opposed to the notion of Littlepoop assassinating Deadeyes only a few short scenes ago, Velvet now seems to have no problem whatsoever with being made an accessory to what is probably the dumbest assassination plot in the history of Edgequestria. Instead of simply refusing as would be both sensible and in keeping with her professed ideals, her only response is to get cutely flustered at only having a few hours to prepare for a concert, a reaction which no doubt causes LP's nether regions to start frothing like a cappuccino machine.
Calamity, being quite possibly the only character in this entire story with even a tiny iota of common sense, asks the first sensible question we've heard since LP left for Shattered Hoof:
>“An’ why are we doin’ this again?” Calamity was confused. “Whose side are we on now?”
I can sympathize. If Littlepoop accidentally shoots herself in the back of the head during this concert, perhaps Calamity would like to take over the protagonist's duties going forward.
Littlepoop's answer is less than helpful:
>“Same as before. Basic plan shouldn’t change. But first, I want to get those two in the same room together.”
What is the basic plan? I thought the basic plan was to kill Deadeyes, which she could have done like nineteen times by now. This blood-guzzling little lunatic murders half a platoon of raiders every morning before breakfast, but for some reason she's tiptoeing around this simple assassination of a target who blindly trusts her and has the most incompetent security team in the history of the Wasteland. Also: why does she want them in the same room?
Couple more things here before we move on.
>Pulling out my access tool, I hacked into the terminal.
What is her "access tool" exactly? This is the first mention I've heard of such a device. Is this how she's been "hacking" the terminals? News to me. If so, the author should have at least mentioned the existence of such a device the very first time she ever hacked a terminal. Also: where the hell did she get this thing? I was just joking earlier when I talked about her suddenly pulling the Staff of Ra out of her saddlebag, but this is almost the same level of absurdity. There exists in this world a device that just allows you to effortlessly crack any password on any terminal, and LP just magically has this thing in her possession because reasons? The author didn't think that was a detail worth explaining?
Where did she get this fucking thing? How did she come across it? What are it's origins? Who designed it originally, and how did it end up wherever LP found it? See, this goes back to what I was talking about with the difference between relevant and irrelevant details. The author goes out of his way to wedge in these interesting but ultimately irrelevant bits of trivia about his setting, like how Big Mac died protecting Celestia 200 years ago, but completely sidesteps gigantic logic holes like this one, which he leaves gaping wider than his anus after "ladies" night down at the Manhole Lounge in San Francisco.
>There were no menus, no entries. Instead, just a single function. I had found the terminal that opened door to the mines and vault below.
"Hey, Shattered Hoof construction committee, I've got an idea: let's design, build and install a dedicated terminal whose sole purpose is to unlock a door in a completely different part of the building, but only if a fusebox in yet another distant part of the building has the correct combination of fuses and spark batteries hooked up." This is why level designers don't build houses.
And then, page break. Littlepoop now returns to Gawd, who was no doubt expecting her to either return with the blood of Deadeyes on her hooves or not at all, and explains her idiotic plan to her. She now tells Gawd the exact same thing she just told Deadeyes, but in reverse:
>“I’ll put a bullet through Deadeye’s head,” I told Gawd. “And another into your table. Then use a Stealth Buck to slip out before anypony can identify me. You can blame it on the slavers who are attacking tomorrow.” Gawd was pondering the idea skeptically. “Sure, some ponies might still have suspicions, but not the kind they could act on. Particularly if you take over and lead them to victory against the slavers.”
Once again, the possessive form of Deadeyes' name is written inconsistently. Also: how dumb does LP think these two actually are? I mean, Deadeyes seems like a complete nitwit from what we've seen so far, but Gawd seems to be basically intelligent, or at least cagey enough to have survived in the backstabbing world of being a professional mercenary. I will also once more protest that THIS PLAN IS FUCKING RETARDED NO MATTER WHO YOU'RE TRYING TO SELL IT TO.
>Gawd shook her head. “I’ve got t’ hand it to you. Yer one hell of a devious plotter.”
No. No she isn't. She's this year's nominee for the "invent the most unnecessarily complicated solution to what is essentially a simple problem" award. Literally all she had to do was go in there and shoot this guy, glock glock nigga; now she's planning a Velvet Remedy concert at an abandoned prison apparently filled with skeletons, where she intends to hide in the balcony using a StealthBuck and fake-shoot one of them and real-shoot the other, and I guess it's supposed to be a point of suspense which one she's actually going to shoot. If both Gawd and Deadeyes are dumb enough to go along with this, she ought to shoot both of them for being morons, then shoot Velvet Remedy because she sucks, and then shoot herself for being the retard who thought up this ridiculous plan in the first place.
Anyway, this is the only thing Gawd has to say on the subject, so presumably she intends to go along with the scheme. Next stop is the boxcar, where LP informs Velvet Remedy that she will now have to perform a free show for what I'm assuming is still a group of raiders. Despite being vehemently opposed to the notion of Littlepoop assassinating Deadeyes only a few short scenes ago, Velvet now seems to have no problem whatsoever with being made an accessory to what is probably the dumbest assassination plot in the history of Edgequestria. Instead of simply refusing as would be both sensible and in keeping with her professed ideals, her only response is to get cutely flustered at only having a few hours to prepare for a concert, a reaction which no doubt causes LP's nether regions to start frothing like a cappuccino machine.
Calamity, being quite possibly the only character in this entire story with even a tiny iota of common sense, asks the first sensible question we've heard since LP left for Shattered Hoof:
>“An’ why are we doin’ this again?” Calamity was confused. “Whose side are we on now?”
I can sympathize. If Littlepoop accidentally shoots herself in the back of the head during this concert, perhaps Calamity would like to take over the protagonist's duties going forward.
Littlepoop's answer is less than helpful:
>“Same as before. Basic plan shouldn’t change. But first, I want to get those two in the same room together.”
What is the basic plan? I thought the basic plan was to kill Deadeyes, which she could have done like nineteen times by now. This blood-guzzling little lunatic murders half a platoon of raiders every morning before breakfast, but for some reason she's tiptoeing around this simple assassination of a target who blindly trusts her and has the most incompetent security team in the history of the Wasteland. Also: why does she want them in the same room?
>>294514
>Wait a minute. I feel like I already knew that Velvet was a descendent of Sweetie Belle, but I don't remember if it's something I gleaned from the actual text or if it was in one of Nigel's spoilers. More importantly, though, I'm not sure if this is something Littlepoop should know.
I don't recall if it's pointed out explicitly in the text, but presumably this is the reason that Velvet's pipbuck contained the "CMC3BFF" code to Stable 2's door back at the beginning - because it was passed down to her from the generations that followed Sweebles.
As with so many things in this story, Kkat seems to have no conceptual barrier between "what I know in my head" and "what I've made clear to my reader."
>For instance, >>294347 mentioned that the article detailing the death of Big Mac filled in the blanks on a detail mentioned earlier: the memorial statue that LP found commemorating his valor at the Battle of Shattered Hoof. The details are consistent, but the problem is that neither of them have any apparent relevance to the story. Big Mac died protecting Celestia at Shattered Hoof. Okay, so what?
The ponies we know and love from the show are dead and that's sad :((((((
Sarcasm aside, there's more information given on Big Mac's death later, but its relevance remains pretty questionable. It also ties into how Kkat handles the character of Celestia which is slightly more meaningful but oh lawd we'll get to that hot mess eventually.
>>294515
>I still don't understand why talking to the DJ is a priority for her.
Because the plot says so. This is another thing that relies on the reader being a superfan of Fallout 3 over making any kind of internal sense. In the game, you leave your home vault in search of your missing father. After resolving a few minor quests in the first town in return for information on his whereabouts, you're eventually pointed to his last known location - a local radio station in the ruins of Washington DC, home of Three Dog, a well-connected DJ.
Pip's already found the person she's looking for, but to anyone that's a fan of Fo3 and isn't thinking very hard, going to visit the DJ once she's done with the early quests would feel like the natural next step.
>>294516
>What is her "access tool" exactly? This is the first mention I've heard of such a device. Is this how she's been "hacking" the terminals? News to me.
This is bizarre, because as far as I know the access tool never comes up again. You can hack terminals in Fo3, but that's done purely with a good old fashioned clacky keyboard and 'find the word' minigame. There's scenes later on where she uses her Pipbuck to interface with things so ''presumably'' Kkat means that here, but otherwise I have no idea what this is supposed to be referencing.
>'''THIS PLAN IS FUCKING RETARDED NO MATTER WHO YOU'RE TRYING TO SELL IT TO'''
Get used to it. The entire story's primary conflicts hinge on Littlepip's enemies being less intelligent and competent than her.
>Wait a minute. I feel like I already knew that Velvet was a descendent of Sweetie Belle, but I don't remember if it's something I gleaned from the actual text or if it was in one of Nigel's spoilers. More importantly, though, I'm not sure if this is something Littlepoop should know.
I don't recall if it's pointed out explicitly in the text, but presumably this is the reason that Velvet's pipbuck contained the "CMC3BFF" code to Stable 2's door back at the beginning - because it was passed down to her from the generations that followed Sweebles.
As with so many things in this story, Kkat seems to have no conceptual barrier between "what I know in my head" and "what I've made clear to my reader."
>For instance, >>294347 mentioned that the article detailing the death of Big Mac filled in the blanks on a detail mentioned earlier: the memorial statue that LP found commemorating his valor at the Battle of Shattered Hoof. The details are consistent, but the problem is that neither of them have any apparent relevance to the story. Big Mac died protecting Celestia at Shattered Hoof. Okay, so what?
The ponies we know and love from the show are dead and that's sad :((((((
Sarcasm aside, there's more information given on Big Mac's death later, but its relevance remains pretty questionable. It also ties into how Kkat handles the character of Celestia which is slightly more meaningful but oh lawd we'll get to that hot mess eventually.
>>294515
>I still don't understand why talking to the DJ is a priority for her.
Because the plot says so. This is another thing that relies on the reader being a superfan of Fallout 3 over making any kind of internal sense. In the game, you leave your home vault in search of your missing father. After resolving a few minor quests in the first town in return for information on his whereabouts, you're eventually pointed to his last known location - a local radio station in the ruins of Washington DC, home of Three Dog, a well-connected DJ.
Pip's already found the person she's looking for, but to anyone that's a fan of Fo3 and isn't thinking very hard, going to visit the DJ once she's done with the early quests would feel like the natural next step.
>>294516
>What is her "access tool" exactly? This is the first mention I've heard of such a device. Is this how she's been "hacking" the terminals? News to me.
This is bizarre, because as far as I know the access tool never comes up again. You can hack terminals in Fo3, but that's done purely with a good old fashioned clacky keyboard and 'find the word' minigame. There's scenes later on where she uses her Pipbuck to interface with things so ''presumably'' Kkat means that here, but otherwise I have no idea what this is supposed to be referencing.
>'''THIS PLAN IS FUCKING RETARDED NO MATTER WHO YOU'RE TRYING TO SELL IT TO'''
Get used to it. The entire story's primary conflicts hinge on Littlepip's enemies being less intelligent and competent than her.
>>294514
This game of double-crossing is really quite bizarre. Reminds me of the kind of story an AI tells when it almost understands something, but not quite.
It's as if Kkunt knows people like political-intrigue games where everyone's double-crossing each other and someone's a double or triple or even quintuple-reverse agent, but he didn't understand what makes a political intrigue clusterfuck engaging on an emotional or intellectual level.
The characters involved are supposed to have clearly-defined personalities and backstories that influence the who they are today, why they turned out like this, and who's goal is whose. It's not mandatory for someone to have a flaw that's being exploited by a schemer, but schemers pulling shit like that that makes the schemer look credible and ruthless. It's supposed to be a game of wits where different schemers play their games and seek to get the newest pawn introduced to the game on their side. And there's supposed to be a big and clearly-established reason why the shadowy game of secrets is preferred to an outright duel or uprising or massive war or simple assassination.
If LP's target suspects LP of being a double agent, he should either kill her, give her a letter to give to Gawd and then subtly slip explosives into her saddlebags to be detonated when close to Gawd, announce "I know you're a double agent but I want you on my side for real", or avoid tipping her off while trying real hard to subtly sway her into thinking she should side with him instead of Gawd.
Yes, a good schemer usually has hidden motives and backup plans and more than one cards to play, but to get invested in this we need to understand what's really at stake.
We still know practically fuck all about Gawd. Not like she's a former hero beaten down into becoming nothing more than a hired gun who tells herself making the biggest baddest gang of ruthless assassins in the Wasteland will one day help her make this world a better place somehow eventually someday probably.
Littlepoop is "technically" the kingmaker here because she's been artificially thrust into the role, but she has barely any intel on who her manipulators are or what the long-term consequences of her choice will be. A Newbie Hero shouldn't be this gung-ho about risking her life and working for an unknown Griffon assassin to assassinate a baddie for another potential baddie until after she knows who killed Bootleg Pinkie's family. Then it makes sense for her to really want this guy dead and his stuff looted.
You'd think she would try to get some of that information, so she can learn more and decide for herself who to side with. This would give her an organic opportunity to find and read some kind of diary so she can learn why this baddie needs to die. A well-written "hero who doesn't want to be the pawn of someone less morally-upright" would do that.
Shouldn't there be some moral greyness in a situation like this? Kkat has a boner for making everything as black and white as possible, but heroes reveal their priorities and true essence when making morally-grey decisions with no clear right answers.
This is too easy for Littlepip, both in a difficulty sense (I'm amazed nobody assassinated this baddie before LP could get to him) and in a meta sense. Littlepoop's definitely had some screws loose from day one.
Littlepip trusts Gawd absolutely because the author knows Gawd's mostly morally upright, but LP shouldn't know that right now or make such major potentially-Wasteland-transforming decisions as if she does. Littlepoop should have gone through at least one internal argument about the ethics of accepting a "kill that baddie for my personal gain" job for some griffon she barely knows, at least until the baddie's evil makes her say "Fuck it, anything's surely better than this". And that kind of thinking could really fuck her over if Gawd turned out to be a total cunt, but what subjectively personally irritates me is that I know despite all of this nonsense web, there probably won't be any unforseen consequences. A moral about the dangers of thinking the world can be improved by putting the right people in power instead of embracing the ideal world where authority figures are minimized? Nah, that's too deep for Littlepip's looty-shooty-lockpicking misadventure.
There isn't anything to latch on to or get invested in when it comes to this clusterfuck of under-written characters playing shadow games for no real reason.
>"I wanna sing on the radio"
this fake motivation is too gay for anypony to realistically buy it. travelling cross-country just so you can get some song on the radio? He should at express at least a little skepticism over it, prompting LP to say some edgy shit like "What else will we do with our lives?".
>Big Mac and the Practically Overlooked Heroic Sacrifice
This "The author has no idea what to linger on, what to emphasize, what to repeat, and what to cut because he can't tell wheat from chaff" problem is bad.
Could fix the effective irrelevance of pre-war stuff to these OCs by giving every failed Mane canon character some kind of lesson the OCs can learn from them. Something like "Don't be reckless like Rainbow Dash was when she got a squad of fliers killed during the war" or "Don't be stubborn like Applejack was when she wasted shitloads of lives hanging on to some mostly-irrelevant landmark just for the propaganda value".
Could fix the emotional irrelevance of pre-war stuff to these OCs by establishing Littlepip as a history nerd who greatly respected the canon main characters at first based on the propaganda she was taught in high school, even making her fangirl over the Little Macintosh gun she gets when she discovers it once belonged to an Apple Poner, but then over time she learns of unsavoury things some main poners did like Pinkie inventing meth and Twilight... I don't know, running some nightmare science facility that would give WW2-era Japan a boner and nightmares.
>concert
*Paz from Peace Walker flashbacks*
This game of double-crossing is really quite bizarre. Reminds me of the kind of story an AI tells when it almost understands something, but not quite.
It's as if Kkunt knows people like political-intrigue games where everyone's double-crossing each other and someone's a double or triple or even quintuple-reverse agent, but he didn't understand what makes a political intrigue clusterfuck engaging on an emotional or intellectual level.
The characters involved are supposed to have clearly-defined personalities and backstories that influence the who they are today, why they turned out like this, and who's goal is whose. It's not mandatory for someone to have a flaw that's being exploited by a schemer, but schemers pulling shit like that that makes the schemer look credible and ruthless. It's supposed to be a game of wits where different schemers play their games and seek to get the newest pawn introduced to the game on their side. And there's supposed to be a big and clearly-established reason why the shadowy game of secrets is preferred to an outright duel or uprising or massive war or simple assassination.
If LP's target suspects LP of being a double agent, he should either kill her, give her a letter to give to Gawd and then subtly slip explosives into her saddlebags to be detonated when close to Gawd, announce "I know you're a double agent but I want you on my side for real", or avoid tipping her off while trying real hard to subtly sway her into thinking she should side with him instead of Gawd.
Yes, a good schemer usually has hidden motives and backup plans and more than one cards to play, but to get invested in this we need to understand what's really at stake.
We still know practically fuck all about Gawd. Not like she's a former hero beaten down into becoming nothing more than a hired gun who tells herself making the biggest baddest gang of ruthless assassins in the Wasteland will one day help her make this world a better place somehow eventually someday probably.
Littlepoop is "technically" the kingmaker here because she's been artificially thrust into the role, but she has barely any intel on who her manipulators are or what the long-term consequences of her choice will be. A Newbie Hero shouldn't be this gung-ho about risking her life and working for an unknown Griffon assassin to assassinate a baddie for another potential baddie until after she knows who killed Bootleg Pinkie's family. Then it makes sense for her to really want this guy dead and his stuff looted.
You'd think she would try to get some of that information, so she can learn more and decide for herself who to side with. This would give her an organic opportunity to find and read some kind of diary so she can learn why this baddie needs to die. A well-written "hero who doesn't want to be the pawn of someone less morally-upright" would do that.
Shouldn't there be some moral greyness in a situation like this? Kkat has a boner for making everything as black and white as possible, but heroes reveal their priorities and true essence when making morally-grey decisions with no clear right answers.
This is too easy for Littlepip, both in a difficulty sense (I'm amazed nobody assassinated this baddie before LP could get to him) and in a meta sense. Littlepoop's definitely had some screws loose from day one.
Littlepip trusts Gawd absolutely because the author knows Gawd's mostly morally upright, but LP shouldn't know that right now or make such major potentially-Wasteland-transforming decisions as if she does. Littlepoop should have gone through at least one internal argument about the ethics of accepting a "kill that baddie for my personal gain" job for some griffon she barely knows, at least until the baddie's evil makes her say "Fuck it, anything's surely better than this". And that kind of thinking could really fuck her over if Gawd turned out to be a total cunt, but what subjectively personally irritates me is that I know despite all of this nonsense web, there probably won't be any unforseen consequences. A moral about the dangers of thinking the world can be improved by putting the right people in power instead of embracing the ideal world where authority figures are minimized? Nah, that's too deep for Littlepip's looty-shooty-lockpicking misadventure.
There isn't anything to latch on to or get invested in when it comes to this clusterfuck of under-written characters playing shadow games for no real reason.
>"I wanna sing on the radio"
this fake motivation is too gay for anypony to realistically buy it. travelling cross-country just so you can get some song on the radio? He should at express at least a little skepticism over it, prompting LP to say some edgy shit like "What else will we do with our lives?".
>Big Mac and the Practically Overlooked Heroic Sacrifice
This "The author has no idea what to linger on, what to emphasize, what to repeat, and what to cut because he can't tell wheat from chaff" problem is bad.
Could fix the effective irrelevance of pre-war stuff to these OCs by giving every failed Mane canon character some kind of lesson the OCs can learn from them. Something like "Don't be reckless like Rainbow Dash was when she got a squad of fliers killed during the war" or "Don't be stubborn like Applejack was when she wasted shitloads of lives hanging on to some mostly-irrelevant landmark just for the propaganda value".
Could fix the emotional irrelevance of pre-war stuff to these OCs by establishing Littlepip as a history nerd who greatly respected the canon main characters at first based on the propaganda she was taught in high school, even making her fangirl over the Little Macintosh gun she gets when she discovers it once belonged to an Apple Poner, but then over time she learns of unsavoury things some main poners did like Pinkie inventing meth and Twilight... I don't know, running some nightmare science facility that would give WW2-era Japan a boner and nightmares.
>concert
*Paz from Peace Walker flashbacks*
>>294523
I'm supposed to explain my reasoning behind major references but not overexplain the references themselves so I'll spoiler it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R47dF1Q7tPQ basically Peace Walker had a better excuse for its random gratuitous pop concert moment. It's also darkly hilarious when you remember this cheesy bullshit pop song was canonically written by Kazuhira "If you fulton a nig I'm throwing it in the brig" Miller and Paz "There's a reason why I'm an equippable item in Smash Ultimate that gives you a bomb and that reason is because I have two bombs inside me, one inside my gut and one deep deep inside my cooch" Pacifica Ocean the double agent who secretly hated everyone had to go through with this song to maintain her cover. This was a concert done for fun, for soldiers who were tired from all their constant battles but were still soldiers who didn't expect to see a major war any time soon.
Fuck this story for having no good excuses to put a big musical number in the middle of this story. Littlepip literally carries a fucking radio on her wrist, and one of the few un-destroyed buildings still functioning in the post-apocalypse is a high-quality radio DJ tower. Why does the author feel the need to pull shit like this when he could just shoehorn his shitty poetry into another "Velvet and Calamity sing together" or "Littlepip listens to the radio" moment?
>Deadeye's suspects her but thinks her loyalty really is this weak
For the sake of making this as easy as possible for LP, Deadeye' just assumes LP really will work for him but so far has LP said anything like "I want to betray Gawd because I fucking hate Griffons and think you'll pay me more than she said she was going to"?
>"Velvet must appear before the show and sing for me"
I bet this baddie won't think to put a bomb collar on Velvet's neck to be detonated later if Gawd doesn't die or if LP shoots Deadeye'ss's.
>access tool
the pretentious faggot should have just given LP's Pipbuck a USB on a stretchy magical string. WHY DOES HE GIVE NONSENSE HACKING TOOLS TO LP WHILE MAKING EVERY SINGLE LOCK SHE ENCOUNTERS, FROM WALL SAFES AND DOORS TO GRENADE BOXES AND MORE, INTO SOMETHING THAT CAN'T STAND UP TO SOME BOBBY PINS AND MAYBE A SCREWDRIVER TOPS?
>stealthbucks
That reminds me: If invisibility devices are so incredibly useful, why are they so common? If they're so common, where are the raiders/bandits killing from perfect stealth using these things? If they're so common, where are the countermeasures against these things, such as AOE anti-invisibility enchantments or robotic killer guards who can detect invisible foes? Shouldn't a prison turned whatever the fuck it is now have some kind of anti-invisiblefag countermeasure?
The Pip-Buck can detect invisible enemies, marking them as a red dot on the shitty tiny compass like any other foe. Shouldn't a smart invisible foe sit atop a tall mountain surrounded by hostile wildlife, to hide his red marker from Pip-Buck-wearing foes by hiding amongst other easily-avoided non-dangerous markers? That way you're hiding a tree in a forest, by hiding one marker amongst many. And taking advantage of the Pip-Buck's inability to display the elevation of enemy markers.
>Littlepip seemingly has a plan she's not telling the audience or Calamity about by not explaining her real reason for wanting them in the same room
If Littlepoop turns out to have a secret third plan she's really going with while playing every faggot involved in it like a violin, FUCK THIS STORY!!! After all it's gotten away with by making Littlepoop, our viewpoint character, as ignorant about this world as possible, and after all the time it's wasted on LP's generic internal monologue, it has no business trying to pull a fast one on the motherfucking audience like this. And if she's really playing her friends and risking their lives by not telling them about a secret third plan I've forgotten if she actually has or not, fuck this author preemptively because I expect him to forget to make LP's friends significantly mad about being played.
Hollywood's "Magic Trick" style of surprising the audience by not showing you what you need to see before you can see it coming has got to be the laziest writing trick possible.
I'm supposed to explain my reasoning behind major references but not overexplain the references themselves so I'll spoiler it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R47dF1Q7tPQ basically Peace Walker had a better excuse for its random gratuitous pop concert moment. It's also darkly hilarious when you remember this cheesy bullshit pop song was canonically written by Kazuhira "If you fulton a nig I'm throwing it in the brig" Miller and Paz "There's a reason why I'm an equippable item in Smash Ultimate that gives you a bomb and that reason is because I have two bombs inside me, one inside my gut and one deep deep inside my cooch" Pacifica Ocean the double agent who secretly hated everyone had to go through with this song to maintain her cover. This was a concert done for fun, for soldiers who were tired from all their constant battles but were still soldiers who didn't expect to see a major war any time soon.
Fuck this story for having no good excuses to put a big musical number in the middle of this story. Littlepip literally carries a fucking radio on her wrist, and one of the few un-destroyed buildings still functioning in the post-apocalypse is a high-quality radio DJ tower. Why does the author feel the need to pull shit like this when he could just shoehorn his shitty poetry into another "Velvet and Calamity sing together" or "Littlepip listens to the radio" moment?
>Deadeye's suspects her but thinks her loyalty really is this weak
For the sake of making this as easy as possible for LP, Deadeye' just assumes LP really will work for him but so far has LP said anything like "I want to betray Gawd because I fucking hate Griffons and think you'll pay me more than she said she was going to"?
>"Velvet must appear before the show and sing for me"
I bet this baddie won't think to put a bomb collar on Velvet's neck to be detonated later if Gawd doesn't die or if LP shoots Deadeye'ss's.
>access tool
the pretentious faggot should have just given LP's Pipbuck a USB on a stretchy magical string. WHY DOES HE GIVE NONSENSE HACKING TOOLS TO LP WHILE MAKING EVERY SINGLE LOCK SHE ENCOUNTERS, FROM WALL SAFES AND DOORS TO GRENADE BOXES AND MORE, INTO SOMETHING THAT CAN'T STAND UP TO SOME BOBBY PINS AND MAYBE A SCREWDRIVER TOPS?
>stealthbucks
That reminds me: If invisibility devices are so incredibly useful, why are they so common? If they're so common, where are the raiders/bandits killing from perfect stealth using these things? If they're so common, where are the countermeasures against these things, such as AOE anti-invisibility enchantments or robotic killer guards who can detect invisible foes? Shouldn't a prison turned whatever the fuck it is now have some kind of anti-invisiblefag countermeasure?
The Pip-Buck can detect invisible enemies, marking them as a red dot on the shitty tiny compass like any other foe. Shouldn't a smart invisible foe sit atop a tall mountain surrounded by hostile wildlife, to hide his red marker from Pip-Buck-wearing foes by hiding amongst other easily-avoided non-dangerous markers? That way you're hiding a tree in a forest, by hiding one marker amongst many. And taking advantage of the Pip-Buck's inability to display the elevation of enemy markers.
>Littlepip seemingly has a plan she's not telling the audience or Calamity about by not explaining her real reason for wanting them in the same room
If Littlepoop turns out to have a secret third plan she's really going with while playing every faggot involved in it like a violin, FUCK THIS STORY!!! After all it's gotten away with by making Littlepoop, our viewpoint character, as ignorant about this world as possible, and after all the time it's wasted on LP's generic internal monologue, it has no business trying to pull a fast one on the motherfucking audience like this. And if she's really playing her friends and risking their lives by not telling them about a secret third plan I've forgotten if she actually has or not, fuck this author preemptively because I expect him to forget to make LP's friends significantly mad about being played.
Hollywood's "Magic Trick" style of surprising the audience by not showing you what you need to see before you can see it coming has got to be the laziest writing trick possible.
Based on what we've seen of the story so far, how do you think Littlepip's plan will go?
Btw I just realized something. If LP usually abbreviated her name to LP and considered her shitty real name embarassing, it could be played off as another music reference.
Btw I just realized something. If LP usually abbreviated her name to LP and considered her shitty real name embarassing, it could be played off as another music reference.
>>294643
Personally I suspect everything will go exactly according to plan in the long term aside from one minor hiccup involving a baddie taking a hostage friend LP is easily able to save anyway.
How common is it for amateur writers to make things far more overcomplicated than they need to be in an attempt to show off?
In a parallel universe this could be one of the fics greatest chapters where after hearing the plan Calamity subverts everyone's expectations by whipping out his shotgun and blasting Deadeyes in the face like gay sucked cocks blast Kkunt in the face at gay bars.
Personally I suspect everything will go exactly according to plan in the long term aside from one minor hiccup involving a baddie taking a hostage friend LP is easily able to save anyway.
How common is it for amateur writers to make things far more overcomplicated than they need to be in an attempt to show off?
In a parallel universe this could be one of the fics greatest chapters where after hearing the plan Calamity subverts everyone's expectations by whipping out his shotgun and blasting Deadeyes in the face like gay sucked cocks blast Kkunt in the face at gay bars.
>>294432
>>294454
>>294523
These are good points. Thank you for modifying your posting style to be a little less caustic, the effort shows.
>The way this character talks, with the "Ah" and "Y'all" just doesn't fit the sudden use of the phrase "Non-vital internal organs". It sounds silly. It sounds pretentious. It sounds completely at odds with the lazy and clumsy way of speaking the character's shown so far.
One of the harder things to do when writing is to break away from your own thought process and to get inside the heads of your characters.
It's also difficult to develop individual speaking patterns that feel believable; either you layer the accents and such on too thick (something I think this author does a lot) and it feels unrealistic, or else you don't give the characters enough expression and they all end up speaking in the same voice. You make a good observation here about the raider pony; it's out of character for him to say something like "non-vital organs." That whole bit about non-vital organs struck me as odd too; I wasn't quite sure what the author was trying to get at there, as removing non-vital organs would require both surgical ability and enough medical training to know which organs were vital.
>And then there are LPs Book Brain moments where she assumes that just because a pony mentions Crane he surely must be an immensely important pony you can learm things from, or starts listening to dead pony diary mp3s while sneaking around an ememy base because she craves those stories more than she wants to be able to hear approaching foes.
I would actually still include these under the umbrella of Gamer Brain moments. In particular, the diary entries are a storytelling device that works well in a game but not in a novel.
Linear storytelling in a game is usually seen as a negative because a lot of the entertainment value comes from having the freedom to explore and interact with a fictional world instead of just observing it. A game that is just an interactive movie, where you're watching a story unfold more or less on its own and are only being asked to press a button every now and then, is usually seen as boring for the sake of simplicity I'm going to ignore visual novels and certain categories of adventure games where what I just described is literally the object of the game. However, non-linear storytelling presents some technical challenges for a writer because you have to find a way to break the story into chunks that can be played/seen/read independently of each other in any particular order.
A tried and true method of doing this is to hide little notes and diary entries and things like that, that make no apparent sense out of context, but form a larger picture the more of them you acquire. This can be used to develop any number of backstories and side-stories concurrently with the more or less linear main story that the player is progressing through. However, in a novel there is no reason to do this, since a novel is by definition a linear mode of storytelling; having the main character picking up random fragments of an entirely separate story while a main story is happening just feels odd, and it feels even odder to have the character focusing attention on this apparently irrelevant side story while something important is happening in the real story, ie sneaking around an enemy fortress.
When writing in any medium it's important to remember that each medium has its own advantages and drawbacks, and you need to make sure that your idea works in the medium you're developing it in. If it doesn't, you need to either reevaluate your idea or reevaluate your choice of medium.
>Because when Littlepip hears about something the author found silly - coal powered coal trains - Littlepip needs a drink so she can handle how stupid she finds the thought of a coal powered coal train.
This also is noteworthy because the idea isn't silly in the first place; coal is usually transported by train, and before diesel engines became common coal-powered steam engines were the standard. It doesn't make any less sense than using gasoline trucks to transport tanks of gasoline, or an animal burning calories in order to hunt for food. Unless you're consuming more fuel in transportation than you're able to transport, it makes perfect sense economically to do things this way. This is just one of many things that k "the only reason I haven't killed myself yet is because I can play Fallout while dilating" kat could learn about the world if he ventured outside of his mother's basement for a few minutes.
What is, however, quite silly is the idea of having a team of ponies pulling a 600 ton useless steam engine just so the whistle can be used. However, to the author's credit, I recently rewatched an early MLP episode and noticed pic related, so I think he was just trying to poke fun at that particular scene. I had completely forgotten that this was even in the cartoon. However, this is another example of things not translating between mediums; in a children's cartoon you don't question something like this because it's obviously silly and was obviously meant to be silly, but in a story that's attempting to be serious it's the sort of thing you immediately question if you don't get what it's referencing.
This actually brings up another side point that's worth mentioning: you have to be careful when making pop culture references that your references still work internally within the story. Pop culture fads come and go, and just because people would get your reference at the time of writing doesn't mean it will still be relevant enough to be understood in 15 or 20 years. I had completely forgotten about that ponies-pulling-the-steam-engine bit from the show, but I'm guessing in the early days of the fandom people rewatched the S1 and S2 episodes often enough that they would have just instantly caught that without needing it explained.
>>294454
>>294523
These are good points. Thank you for modifying your posting style to be a little less caustic, the effort shows.
>The way this character talks, with the "Ah" and "Y'all" just doesn't fit the sudden use of the phrase "Non-vital internal organs". It sounds silly. It sounds pretentious. It sounds completely at odds with the lazy and clumsy way of speaking the character's shown so far.
One of the harder things to do when writing is to break away from your own thought process and to get inside the heads of your characters.
It's also difficult to develop individual speaking patterns that feel believable; either you layer the accents and such on too thick (something I think this author does a lot) and it feels unrealistic, or else you don't give the characters enough expression and they all end up speaking in the same voice. You make a good observation here about the raider pony; it's out of character for him to say something like "non-vital organs." That whole bit about non-vital organs struck me as odd too; I wasn't quite sure what the author was trying to get at there, as removing non-vital organs would require both surgical ability and enough medical training to know which organs were vital.
>And then there are LPs Book Brain moments where she assumes that just because a pony mentions Crane he surely must be an immensely important pony you can learm things from, or starts listening to dead pony diary mp3s while sneaking around an ememy base because she craves those stories more than she wants to be able to hear approaching foes.
I would actually still include these under the umbrella of Gamer Brain moments. In particular, the diary entries are a storytelling device that works well in a game but not in a novel.
Linear storytelling in a game is usually seen as a negative because a lot of the entertainment value comes from having the freedom to explore and interact with a fictional world instead of just observing it. A game that is just an interactive movie, where you're watching a story unfold more or less on its own and are only being asked to press a button every now and then, is usually seen as boring for the sake of simplicity I'm going to ignore visual novels and certain categories of adventure games where what I just described is literally the object of the game. However, non-linear storytelling presents some technical challenges for a writer because you have to find a way to break the story into chunks that can be played/seen/read independently of each other in any particular order.
A tried and true method of doing this is to hide little notes and diary entries and things like that, that make no apparent sense out of context, but form a larger picture the more of them you acquire. This can be used to develop any number of backstories and side-stories concurrently with the more or less linear main story that the player is progressing through. However, in a novel there is no reason to do this, since a novel is by definition a linear mode of storytelling; having the main character picking up random fragments of an entirely separate story while a main story is happening just feels odd, and it feels even odder to have the character focusing attention on this apparently irrelevant side story while something important is happening in the real story, ie sneaking around an enemy fortress.
When writing in any medium it's important to remember that each medium has its own advantages and drawbacks, and you need to make sure that your idea works in the medium you're developing it in. If it doesn't, you need to either reevaluate your idea or reevaluate your choice of medium.
>Because when Littlepip hears about something the author found silly - coal powered coal trains - Littlepip needs a drink so she can handle how stupid she finds the thought of a coal powered coal train.
This also is noteworthy because the idea isn't silly in the first place; coal is usually transported by train, and before diesel engines became common coal-powered steam engines were the standard. It doesn't make any less sense than using gasoline trucks to transport tanks of gasoline, or an animal burning calories in order to hunt for food. Unless you're consuming more fuel in transportation than you're able to transport, it makes perfect sense economically to do things this way. This is just one of many things that k "the only reason I haven't killed myself yet is because I can play Fallout while dilating" kat could learn about the world if he ventured outside of his mother's basement for a few minutes.
What is, however, quite silly is the idea of having a team of ponies pulling a 600 ton useless steam engine just so the whistle can be used. However, to the author's credit, I recently rewatched an early MLP episode and noticed pic related, so I think he was just trying to poke fun at that particular scene. I had completely forgotten that this was even in the cartoon. However, this is another example of things not translating between mediums; in a children's cartoon you don't question something like this because it's obviously silly and was obviously meant to be silly, but in a story that's attempting to be serious it's the sort of thing you immediately question if you don't get what it's referencing.
This actually brings up another side point that's worth mentioning: you have to be careful when making pop culture references that your references still work internally within the story. Pop culture fads come and go, and just because people would get your reference at the time of writing doesn't mean it will still be relevant enough to be understood in 15 or 20 years. I had completely forgotten about that ponies-pulling-the-steam-engine bit from the show, but I'm guessing in the early days of the fandom people rewatched the S1 and S2 episodes often enough that they would have just instantly caught that without needing it explained.
>>294647
I talked to a few friends who are really big fans of Fallout Equestria and asked them what they think about some of the criticism and what really hooks them to the story and characters. I don't wish to admonish them but for some the biggest criticisms here are some of the biggest selling points for them.
One said how Little Pip being named after the Pip Buck and it being her cutie mark makes her the Fallout Pony being a ponafied mascot of the franchise and as such a good avatar to be the main character. Talked as well how they enjoy the shootouts with raiders and slavers with her after action looting and browsing of audio files and papers. Said it felt like reading someone playing Fallout and emulates the moment to moment gameplay you'd find in Fallout 3 which makes the world feel more relatable and lived in. They all had similar positive marks about the moments of LP meeting characters like Crane or Deadeyes'sss's (sorry Nigel had to steal that joke you had me cracking up when I saw that one lol) and being able to chat with them and be presented these quests.
I can understand where they are coming from with why they'd enjoy it especially since we were all younger teens riding high on the pony train and Fallout 3 so having something so reminiscent of somethings you enjoy could be really appealing.
Reminds me of something Nigel said though about how Kkat should copy stuff from other games and got me thinking how this 1:1 translation of video game to book doesn't seem like a profitable venture. He mentioned Ace Combat and I feel like while those games have good stories most is due to characters and drama happening in the background more so then the overall conflict. Even then it wouldn't be too fun to follow Trigger's every moment and have paragraphs describing every single manuvers and weapon he uses in a battle or sitting in the hanger debating which special weapon to bring.
Halo is an fps and a direct novelisation of the games with all the gameplay elements described every time would be boring so they focus instead on the background lore and characters you meet or hear about in the games while the combat mostly focuses on how it's affecting the characters mentally and emotionally.
For Fallout I feel like it'd be best to ignore the main character of the video game when adapting it to a story. Never have much of a character and instead your actions help sway the balance of power with factions represented by charismatic characters with an overall theme each game has with the different factions presenting unique and opposing solutions to it. If I read a Fallout New Vegas book I'd say it'd be best to have the story jump between characters of different factions since the stakes are so much larger like Fallout Equestria is while something like Honest Hearts would be best to have a single character we follow who can come across theses relatively smaller conflicts and be presented different view points and watch them struggle to learn from them and try to decide which side to toss their hat into.
Of course this isn't a thread to tell people their stories are absolute shit and no one is allowed to like it but meant to show people how to avoid writing pit falls so I suppose it isn't worth fussing about how Fallout Equestria is or isn't the second coming of pony Jesus.
I talked to a few friends who are really big fans of Fallout Equestria and asked them what they think about some of the criticism and what really hooks them to the story and characters. I don't wish to admonish them but for some the biggest criticisms here are some of the biggest selling points for them.
One said how Little Pip being named after the Pip Buck and it being her cutie mark makes her the Fallout Pony being a ponafied mascot of the franchise and as such a good avatar to be the main character. Talked as well how they enjoy the shootouts with raiders and slavers with her after action looting and browsing of audio files and papers. Said it felt like reading someone playing Fallout and emulates the moment to moment gameplay you'd find in Fallout 3 which makes the world feel more relatable and lived in. They all had similar positive marks about the moments of LP meeting characters like Crane or Deadeyes'sss's (sorry Nigel had to steal that joke you had me cracking up when I saw that one lol) and being able to chat with them and be presented these quests.
I can understand where they are coming from with why they'd enjoy it especially since we were all younger teens riding high on the pony train and Fallout 3 so having something so reminiscent of somethings you enjoy could be really appealing.
Reminds me of something Nigel said though about how Kkat should copy stuff from other games and got me thinking how this 1:1 translation of video game to book doesn't seem like a profitable venture. He mentioned Ace Combat and I feel like while those games have good stories most is due to characters and drama happening in the background more so then the overall conflict. Even then it wouldn't be too fun to follow Trigger's every moment and have paragraphs describing every single manuvers and weapon he uses in a battle or sitting in the hanger debating which special weapon to bring.
Halo is an fps and a direct novelisation of the games with all the gameplay elements described every time would be boring so they focus instead on the background lore and characters you meet or hear about in the games while the combat mostly focuses on how it's affecting the characters mentally and emotionally.
For Fallout I feel like it'd be best to ignore the main character of the video game when adapting it to a story. Never have much of a character and instead your actions help sway the balance of power with factions represented by charismatic characters with an overall theme each game has with the different factions presenting unique and opposing solutions to it. If I read a Fallout New Vegas book I'd say it'd be best to have the story jump between characters of different factions since the stakes are so much larger like Fallout Equestria is while something like Honest Hearts would be best to have a single character we follow who can come across theses relatively smaller conflicts and be presented different view points and watch them struggle to learn from them and try to decide which side to toss their hat into.
Of course this isn't a thread to tell people their stories are absolute shit and no one is allowed to like it but meant to show people how to avoid writing pit falls so I suppose it isn't worth fussing about how Fallout Equestria is or isn't the second coming of pony Jesus.
>>294523
>this fake motivation is too gay for anypony to realistically buy it. travelling cross-country just so you can get some song on the radio? He should at express at least a little skepticism over it, prompting LP to say some edgy shit like "What else will we do with our lives?".
This would make sense in some worlds but probably not in this one.
For instance, if your character lives in 1930s rural America and spends all her free time listening to the radio, and one day decides to go on a journey to find the station that the music she loves is broadcast from in order to get her own voice on the air, that would be a good motivation and could make a good story. This works because for someone living on a farm during the Great Depression, the radio would have been a major source of entertainment, probably the only one available, so a farm girl elevating her favorite radio stars to this mythological level would make sense. It would also make sense to undertake a quest like that, because music was a major commercial enterprise at a time when there was not a lot of practical work available, so becoming a professional singer would be both a realization of a personal dream and a way to escape crippling poverty.
However, in a world like FoE, it doesn't make a ton of sense, as the world appears to be too chaotic for a commercial music business to be in any way practical in fact, I think even having the DJ character in the story to begin with is a bit of a stretch logically. Plus, music seems to be mostly a hobby activity for Velvet; as far as I can tell she considers her true calling to be medicine. In fact, the whole reason she left Stable 2 is because the overmare wanted her to be a pop singer instead of a doctor because cutie marks, which incidentally I still think is a retarded idea. For a hobbyist singer, who left home because she didn't want to be a professional singer, to make a long journey across a post-apocalyptic wasteland, fending off violent raiders and slavers and whatever the fuck else, just to do something that only serves advance the professional music career she doesn't want and shouldn't even be possible to have, is just ridiculous; there are so many WTFs in that sentence I wouldn't even know where to begin addressing them all.
>>294524
>I bet this baddie won't think to put a bomb collar on Velvet's neck to be detonated later if Gawd doesn't die or if LP shoots Deadeye'ss's.
This would have made far more sense than what he actually ends up doing. Also, I notice that the business about Velvet singing for him beforehand never actually takes place as a scene and has no apparent relevance to anything, so I don't see why the author bothered mentioning it at all.
>>294518
>I don't recall if it's pointed out explicitly in the text, but presumably this is the reason that Velvet's pipbuck contained the "CMC3BFF" code to Stable 2's door back at the beginning - because it was passed down to her from the generations that followed Sweebles.
That actually makes sense, but again we have an example of the author doing a piss-poor job of integrating all of these complex ideas into the main story. I had completely forgotten what the password to the door was; in fact I'd completely forgotten how Velvet even escaped. I remember there was some kind of subterfuge that involved giving her PipBuck to LP, but beyond that I've lost track of the details. One of the biggest problems with this story is that it contains too much information about too many different subjects, without any central plot or idea to knit all of it together.
However, here is a counterpoint to this that I thought of:
It's occurred to me more than once that I might be the wrong sort of person to even be reviewing this story in the first place. It was obviously written not just with gamers in mind, but a very specific type of gamer, who plays games obsessively and thoroughly. Though it may sometimes seem like I come down on this story pretty hard for it's gamer-bait moments, it's not my intention to disparage video games in general or to bash gaming as a hobby; I play video games, I dabble in making them, and I have fun doing it. However, I'm definitely not the sort of gamer that kkat is writing for here.
For an RPG style game like Fallout, I usually just play through the main story and call it good, and whatever bonus stuff I find along the way is just extra. I don't really care that much about finding every secret item or unlocking every side quest; once I've played through the main story I just delete my save file and uninstall the game. If I like the game enough to play it again, I'll just start over from the beginning and see if I find anything new the second time around.
However, I know that there are some players who meticulously collect every item and catalog every available piece of information about the game and its world. It's occurred to me recently that such a person might actually enjoy the way this story is written: blasting the reader with word-bukkake consisting of all sorts of random bits of information, and leaving it to them to piece together the larger story it's hinting at. I personally find this infuriating and I'll also note that it's still done poorly here, and also that having a complex and well-thought out backstory doesn't make up for having an illogical, clumsily told main story with poorly-developed main characters, but I can see how a certain type of person might enjoy this kind of writing.
>this fake motivation is too gay for anypony to realistically buy it. travelling cross-country just so you can get some song on the radio? He should at express at least a little skepticism over it, prompting LP to say some edgy shit like "What else will we do with our lives?".
This would make sense in some worlds but probably not in this one.
For instance, if your character lives in 1930s rural America and spends all her free time listening to the radio, and one day decides to go on a journey to find the station that the music she loves is broadcast from in order to get her own voice on the air, that would be a good motivation and could make a good story. This works because for someone living on a farm during the Great Depression, the radio would have been a major source of entertainment, probably the only one available, so a farm girl elevating her favorite radio stars to this mythological level would make sense. It would also make sense to undertake a quest like that, because music was a major commercial enterprise at a time when there was not a lot of practical work available, so becoming a professional singer would be both a realization of a personal dream and a way to escape crippling poverty.
However, in a world like FoE, it doesn't make a ton of sense, as the world appears to be too chaotic for a commercial music business to be in any way practical in fact, I think even having the DJ character in the story to begin with is a bit of a stretch logically. Plus, music seems to be mostly a hobby activity for Velvet; as far as I can tell she considers her true calling to be medicine. In fact, the whole reason she left Stable 2 is because the overmare wanted her to be a pop singer instead of a doctor because cutie marks, which incidentally I still think is a retarded idea. For a hobbyist singer, who left home because she didn't want to be a professional singer, to make a long journey across a post-apocalyptic wasteland, fending off violent raiders and slavers and whatever the fuck else, just to do something that only serves advance the professional music career she doesn't want and shouldn't even be possible to have, is just ridiculous; there are so many WTFs in that sentence I wouldn't even know where to begin addressing them all.
>>294524
>I bet this baddie won't think to put a bomb collar on Velvet's neck to be detonated later if Gawd doesn't die or if LP shoots Deadeye'ss's.
This would have made far more sense than what he actually ends up doing. Also, I notice that the business about Velvet singing for him beforehand never actually takes place as a scene and has no apparent relevance to anything, so I don't see why the author bothered mentioning it at all.
>>294518
>I don't recall if it's pointed out explicitly in the text, but presumably this is the reason that Velvet's pipbuck contained the "CMC3BFF" code to Stable 2's door back at the beginning - because it was passed down to her from the generations that followed Sweebles.
That actually makes sense, but again we have an example of the author doing a piss-poor job of integrating all of these complex ideas into the main story. I had completely forgotten what the password to the door was; in fact I'd completely forgotten how Velvet even escaped. I remember there was some kind of subterfuge that involved giving her PipBuck to LP, but beyond that I've lost track of the details. One of the biggest problems with this story is that it contains too much information about too many different subjects, without any central plot or idea to knit all of it together.
However, here is a counterpoint to this that I thought of:
It's occurred to me more than once that I might be the wrong sort of person to even be reviewing this story in the first place. It was obviously written not just with gamers in mind, but a very specific type of gamer, who plays games obsessively and thoroughly. Though it may sometimes seem like I come down on this story pretty hard for it's gamer-bait moments, it's not my intention to disparage video games in general or to bash gaming as a hobby; I play video games, I dabble in making them, and I have fun doing it. However, I'm definitely not the sort of gamer that kkat is writing for here.
For an RPG style game like Fallout, I usually just play through the main story and call it good, and whatever bonus stuff I find along the way is just extra. I don't really care that much about finding every secret item or unlocking every side quest; once I've played through the main story I just delete my save file and uninstall the game. If I like the game enough to play it again, I'll just start over from the beginning and see if I find anything new the second time around.
However, I know that there are some players who meticulously collect every item and catalog every available piece of information about the game and its world. It's occurred to me recently that such a person might actually enjoy the way this story is written: blasting the reader with word-bukkake consisting of all sorts of random bits of information, and leaving it to them to piece together the larger story it's hinting at. I personally find this infuriating and I'll also note that it's still done poorly here, and also that having a complex and well-thought out backstory doesn't make up for having an illogical, clumsily told main story with poorly-developed main characters, but I can see how a certain type of person might enjoy this kind of writing.
>>294651
Some of what I said here >>294652 applies to this post as well. However, I will add that while I don't have a problem with games in general, and I've never played any of the Fallout games so I can't comment on them, I think part of the reason I have a visceral dislike for this story is that I have a visceral dislike for the type of obsessive gamer this story is being written for. Your post here actually illustrates several reasons why.
>One said how Little Pip being named after the Pip Buck and it being her cutie mark makes her the Fallout Pony being a ponafied mascot of the franchise and as such a good avatar to be the main character.
This is fanboy thinking at its absolute worst. Ponifying things is fun, but just because something can be ponified doesn't mean that pony will work as a character. Littlepoop is a violent murderhobo with a nonsensical cutie mark who uses her generic non-values as an excuse to murder nearly everypony she encounters while obnoxiously moralizing about it. If she's the ponification of Fallout, it doesn't reflect well on Fallout.
>Said it felt like reading someone playing Fallout and emulates the moment to moment gameplay you'd find in Fallout 3 which makes the world feel more relatable and lived in.
I've heard people say this as well, and again I think it's just the particular personality type that both the game and the story appeals to; I'm not that sort of person or player, so I don't understand the appeal. However, it's telling that it makes the world feel "relatable" and "lived in" for them. Imo if a person finds a novel about a game world to be more relatable than a novel about a realistic world, it's probably a sign that they are putting too much time and energy into gaming.
>Reminds me of something Nigel said though about how Kkat should copy stuff from other games and got me thinking how this 1:1 translation of video game to book doesn't seem like a profitable venture. He mentioned Ace Combat and I feel like while those games have good stories most is due to characters and drama happening in the background more so then the overall conflict. Even then it wouldn't be too fun to follow Trigger's every moment and have paragraphs describing every single manuvers and weapon he uses in a battle or sitting in the hanger debating which special weapon to bring.
>Halo is an fps and a direct novelisation of the games with all the gameplay elements described every time would be boring so they focus instead on the background lore and characters you meet or hear about in the games while the combat mostly focuses on how it's affecting the characters mentally and emotionally.
The way you'd approach novelizing a video game would depend on the type of game it is and how much of an actual story it has to begin with. As you say, with something like Halo or Ace Combat, you have gameplay that probably wouldn't work for a story, but the backstory of the game is rich enough to draw from.
Games that are almost entirely story-focused, say something like The Last Express, could probably be novelized directly without changing very much at all I actually was able to pass Language Arts in 7th grade by sharting out an "original" short story that was literally just a walkthrough of an adventure game I was playing at the time. On the other hand, if you tried to novelize something primitive like Asteroids or Space Invaders you'd pretty much be writing an original story from scratch. Again, the trick when adapting one medium to another is to keep in mind which elements work universally and which elements are specific to the medium you're adapting from; omit the latter, focus on the former.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCujQfCWD-8
Some of what I said here >>294652 applies to this post as well. However, I will add that while I don't have a problem with games in general, and I've never played any of the Fallout games so I can't comment on them, I think part of the reason I have a visceral dislike for this story is that I have a visceral dislike for the type of obsessive gamer this story is being written for. Your post here actually illustrates several reasons why.
>One said how Little Pip being named after the Pip Buck and it being her cutie mark makes her the Fallout Pony being a ponafied mascot of the franchise and as such a good avatar to be the main character.
This is fanboy thinking at its absolute worst. Ponifying things is fun, but just because something can be ponified doesn't mean that pony will work as a character. Littlepoop is a violent murderhobo with a nonsensical cutie mark who uses her generic non-values as an excuse to murder nearly everypony she encounters while obnoxiously moralizing about it. If she's the ponification of Fallout, it doesn't reflect well on Fallout.
>Said it felt like reading someone playing Fallout and emulates the moment to moment gameplay you'd find in Fallout 3 which makes the world feel more relatable and lived in.
I've heard people say this as well, and again I think it's just the particular personality type that both the game and the story appeals to; I'm not that sort of person or player, so I don't understand the appeal. However, it's telling that it makes the world feel "relatable" and "lived in" for them. Imo if a person finds a novel about a game world to be more relatable than a novel about a realistic world, it's probably a sign that they are putting too much time and energy into gaming.
>Reminds me of something Nigel said though about how Kkat should copy stuff from other games and got me thinking how this 1:1 translation of video game to book doesn't seem like a profitable venture. He mentioned Ace Combat and I feel like while those games have good stories most is due to characters and drama happening in the background more so then the overall conflict. Even then it wouldn't be too fun to follow Trigger's every moment and have paragraphs describing every single manuvers and weapon he uses in a battle or sitting in the hanger debating which special weapon to bring.
>Halo is an fps and a direct novelisation of the games with all the gameplay elements described every time would be boring so they focus instead on the background lore and characters you meet or hear about in the games while the combat mostly focuses on how it's affecting the characters mentally and emotionally.
The way you'd approach novelizing a video game would depend on the type of game it is and how much of an actual story it has to begin with. As you say, with something like Halo or Ace Combat, you have gameplay that probably wouldn't work for a story, but the backstory of the game is rich enough to draw from.
Games that are almost entirely story-focused, say something like The Last Express, could probably be novelized directly without changing very much at all I actually was able to pass Language Arts in 7th grade by sharting out an "original" short story that was literally just a walkthrough of an adventure game I was playing at the time. On the other hand, if you tried to novelize something primitive like Asteroids or Space Invaders you'd pretty much be writing an original story from scratch. Again, the trick when adapting one medium to another is to keep in mind which elements work universally and which elements are specific to the medium you're adapting from; omit the latter, focus on the former.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCujQfCWD-8
>>294647
I'll mention this because I want to check if you think it's as brilliant as I do when it comes to integrating narrative with information revealed naturally over time.
Devil May Cry 1 has journal entries made by Dante, the playable character and professional demon hunter, about the island castle he explores and the lore he uncovers and the monsters he fights over the course of the game. As you fight enemies and notice things like "guns fuck haunted puppets up because these demons haven't seen the outside world since 1250 and have no idea what guns are" and "fire spiders are immune to grenades" and "you can interrupt the Nightmare's sword strikes with your own" he will make a note of this for later. He also records notes about the lore and objects he finds, and this can help a stumped player figure out the "take object x to place y and press use" puzzles.
As for the train thing I don't think he was trying to mock it. I think he was trying to justify it, even though steam whistles only work when steam trains have enough steam. He wanted to justify something dumb in canon without realizing his train lacks the steam needed to use its whistle therefore his explanation could not work.
A lot of fanfic writers have this weird habit of trying to justify all the silly seeming things in a show when writing a fanfic for it. But only the things that seem silly to them and feel like they need explaining.
So they will type up some headcanons that claim Pinkie gained her reality warping powers from being half Discord.
Or they'll claim the Gym Leaders in pokemon handicap themselves by exclusively using pokemon of one type because the law says they have to and the only reason those adult professional Gym Leaders regularly lose to 10 year olds is because they are literally paid to do so while giving those kids a tough yet fair challenge appropriate for their skill level.
Or claim that infamously memed "Naruto Run" is actually a good idea for magical ninja athletes who accelerate from 0 to 70 mph in 2 seconds and usually keep hidden blades stuffed up their sleeves that would fly everywhere if they bent and pumped their limbs like proper olympic sprinters.
These examples are specific to three different franchises but it isn't restricted to these franchises. Good moments of headcanoning can help make the setting feel more realistic but bad headcanoning just wastes time or draws attention to dumb overlooked moments without patching them up.
Getting it wrong seems to be a writing mistake made by writers who want to tell you all their headcanons and make someone else's setting into their own even if it gets in the way of telling a story in that setting.
And of course it can be taken way too far.
It's one thing to try and handwave away some episode of FIM where everyone was uncharacteristically awful to their closest friends by saying everypony was tired and cranky from a late night party yesterday.
And sometimes your story relies on something that was barely used or barely explained or glossed over in canon, something you need to clearly define. Like the relationships between different countries and factions that were barely mentioned in the show.
But when you start trying to retcon tiny unimportant details with overly long explanations or take the magic and wonder out of settings by trying to give absolutely everything an arbitrary scientific nonmagical explanation that's when it goes a bit too far. Kojima ruined his franchise by trying to blame all the supernatural elements on nanomachine parasites. When an author goes down the same route by claiming Ghastly the ghost pokemon from Pokemon is actually an entirely magicless farting bat coated in hallucinogenic methane whose big smile and big eyes are actually markings on its chest, this...
While I personally dislike it when its taken that far I still understand the urge to try to make their settings more coherent and consistent and "realistic" and I respect authors that have pulled it off well.
>emulates the moment to moment gameplay you'd find in Fallout 3 which makes the world feel more relatable and lived in
A world feels lived in when things happen on their own without the direct involvement of main characters, the world makes sense, and NPCs have a life of their own beyond the PCs. The world of Deus Ex felt lived in. Remember when you read that email from your co-worker who cant spell and wanted a head gun? Remember the Domino Effect in Mass Effect's worldbuilding where so much was a consequence of something else? Remember any setting that hasnt been swallowed up by a handful of important families everything must be related to? A world feels lived in when it has people innovating and trying and failing or succeeding instead of just sitting around with quirky gimmicks waiting for the player character to show up.
Btw that theoretical Ace Combat fic sounds fun to me. Describing the tenseness and panic or calm and flow state of a pilot could help add more emotional weight to things. Saying Trigger is sad IRL out of the plane could make things deeper. Like that Halo novelization where MC only feels happy on the battlefield following simple instructions.
Plus I always liked moments in stories where people weigh the pros and cons of picking certain weapons over others. Reminds me of those hours wasted fretting over teambuilding in pokemon. Damn whoever keeps refusing to expand pokemon team sizes beyond 6. Been reading a lot of military books lately about badasses and guns and special forces teams and so on but I understand this stuff's boring to some.
>>294652
You and I aren't in the target audiences of Fallout Equestria or Harry Potter, but that doesn't mean we can't critique these stories on what they offer to people they aren't pandering to.
Come to think of it there was a time when I was in the target audience for this fic, but then I read better stuff and learned more about writing and got higher standards.
I'll mention this because I want to check if you think it's as brilliant as I do when it comes to integrating narrative with information revealed naturally over time.
Devil May Cry 1 has journal entries made by Dante, the playable character and professional demon hunter, about the island castle he explores and the lore he uncovers and the monsters he fights over the course of the game. As you fight enemies and notice things like "guns fuck haunted puppets up because these demons haven't seen the outside world since 1250 and have no idea what guns are" and "fire spiders are immune to grenades" and "you can interrupt the Nightmare's sword strikes with your own" he will make a note of this for later. He also records notes about the lore and objects he finds, and this can help a stumped player figure out the "take object x to place y and press use" puzzles.
As for the train thing I don't think he was trying to mock it. I think he was trying to justify it, even though steam whistles only work when steam trains have enough steam. He wanted to justify something dumb in canon without realizing his train lacks the steam needed to use its whistle therefore his explanation could not work.
A lot of fanfic writers have this weird habit of trying to justify all the silly seeming things in a show when writing a fanfic for it. But only the things that seem silly to them and feel like they need explaining.
So they will type up some headcanons that claim Pinkie gained her reality warping powers from being half Discord.
Or they'll claim the Gym Leaders in pokemon handicap themselves by exclusively using pokemon of one type because the law says they have to and the only reason those adult professional Gym Leaders regularly lose to 10 year olds is because they are literally paid to do so while giving those kids a tough yet fair challenge appropriate for their skill level.
Or claim that infamously memed "Naruto Run" is actually a good idea for magical ninja athletes who accelerate from 0 to 70 mph in 2 seconds and usually keep hidden blades stuffed up their sleeves that would fly everywhere if they bent and pumped their limbs like proper olympic sprinters.
These examples are specific to three different franchises but it isn't restricted to these franchises. Good moments of headcanoning can help make the setting feel more realistic but bad headcanoning just wastes time or draws attention to dumb overlooked moments without patching them up.
Getting it wrong seems to be a writing mistake made by writers who want to tell you all their headcanons and make someone else's setting into their own even if it gets in the way of telling a story in that setting.
And of course it can be taken way too far.
It's one thing to try and handwave away some episode of FIM where everyone was uncharacteristically awful to their closest friends by saying everypony was tired and cranky from a late night party yesterday.
And sometimes your story relies on something that was barely used or barely explained or glossed over in canon, something you need to clearly define. Like the relationships between different countries and factions that were barely mentioned in the show.
But when you start trying to retcon tiny unimportant details with overly long explanations or take the magic and wonder out of settings by trying to give absolutely everything an arbitrary scientific nonmagical explanation that's when it goes a bit too far. Kojima ruined his franchise by trying to blame all the supernatural elements on nanomachine parasites. When an author goes down the same route by claiming Ghastly the ghost pokemon from Pokemon is actually an entirely magicless farting bat coated in hallucinogenic methane whose big smile and big eyes are actually markings on its chest, this...
While I personally dislike it when its taken that far I still understand the urge to try to make their settings more coherent and consistent and "realistic" and I respect authors that have pulled it off well.
>emulates the moment to moment gameplay you'd find in Fallout 3 which makes the world feel more relatable and lived in
A world feels lived in when things happen on their own without the direct involvement of main characters, the world makes sense, and NPCs have a life of their own beyond the PCs. The world of Deus Ex felt lived in. Remember when you read that email from your co-worker who cant spell and wanted a head gun? Remember the Domino Effect in Mass Effect's worldbuilding where so much was a consequence of something else? Remember any setting that hasnt been swallowed up by a handful of important families everything must be related to? A world feels lived in when it has people innovating and trying and failing or succeeding instead of just sitting around with quirky gimmicks waiting for the player character to show up.
Btw that theoretical Ace Combat fic sounds fun to me. Describing the tenseness and panic or calm and flow state of a pilot could help add more emotional weight to things. Saying Trigger is sad IRL out of the plane could make things deeper. Like that Halo novelization where MC only feels happy on the battlefield following simple instructions.
Plus I always liked moments in stories where people weigh the pros and cons of picking certain weapons over others. Reminds me of those hours wasted fretting over teambuilding in pokemon. Damn whoever keeps refusing to expand pokemon team sizes beyond 6. Been reading a lot of military books lately about badasses and guns and special forces teams and so on but I understand this stuff's boring to some.
>>294652
You and I aren't in the target audiences of Fallout Equestria or Harry Potter, but that doesn't mean we can't critique these stories on what they offer to people they aren't pandering to.
Come to think of it there was a time when I was in the target audience for this fic, but then I read better stuff and learned more about writing and got higher standards.
>>294516
>Velvet Remedy opened one of her saddleboxes, pulling out a notebook. “What songs will I do? Most of my music isn’t really raider-appropriate. Somehow, I don’t think songs about peace and love, nobility or freedom are really their fare.”
And right on cue, Velvet chucks her principles straight out the window. Seriously, bitch; are you not going to raise even a single tiny objection to this?
This is exactly what she said to Littlepoop just a few short hours earlier:
>“Littlepip, it’s one thing to kill in self defense. Or to protect others. But this...” She turned on me with a stare that could petrify the Overmare herself. “This. Is. Murder!”
Clearly, Velvet feels quite strongly about this. But surely, if LP has a good reason to kill Deadeyes, like avenging the horribly slaughtered family of an innocent little filly, that would make it justice, right?
>Velvet shook her mane. “Revenge, you mean.”
Well, it's clear that Velvet's principles are written in stone. So naturally, when LP returns and asks her to perform a crucial role in her plan to assassinate Deadeyes, I'm sure she'll just flat out refuse, right?
>Velvet Remedy was checking down her list of songs. “Well, that one’s out. That one... might work. Oh, that could be fun, but it was originally meant as a duet. (I read in an old magazine that Pinkie Pie and Vinyl Scratch once performed it at Hoofbeats.) I could tweak it for one pony, but it really requires musical accompaniment. Maybe a Velvet Remedy original? How about...?”
In these troubled times of chaos and uncertainty, it's so refreshing to see a mare as committed to her principles as Velvet clearly is.
>I blinked, remembering, “Well, Deadeye’s expecting two songs before the attack. And he says one of them has to be a song by Sweetie Belle.”
Ffs, is his name Deadeye or Deadeyes? It isn't this goddamned hard to use apostrophes correctly.
>I couldn’t help but roll my eyes. As much as I adored Velvet Remedy’s music, and fell in love with her in every song, tonight we were just looking for a distraction. It didn’t have to be perfect.
"Tee hee, oh Velvet, you are just too adorable. Your willingness to berate me for being a cold-blooded killer one moment and then immediately flush your beliefs down the toilet and start sperging about which songs you should perform for a room full of actual cold-blooded killers just gets my peepee place all slick and tingly. I have never wanted to lick your labia so much as I do right now." Ugh.
Believe it or not, it actually gets worse from here:
>Velvet Remedy looked playfully insulted. “Why of course, dear. There won’t be an eye for anypony else in that room.” I believed it. I believed Velvet Remedy could keep every eye on her even if Ditzy Doo was in the audience. Suddenly, Velvet Remedy gasped. “Every eye! I’ll need a bath! Oh no, what am I going to wear!?”
"Tee hee, oh Velvet, you're so endearingly adorable, I don't even care how lacking in substance your character is. I wish I could just wear your labia on my face all day every day until the end of forever."
>“I can help with that.”
>Velvet cocked her head. “No thank you. I can bathe myself quite well enough, dear.”
>I stammered, flushing hotly. That wasn’t what I meant, but now that she had said it, I couldn’t drive the image out of my mind. My heart fluttered in my chest.
"Tee hee, oh Velvet, I only wanted to help you pick out some clothes, but here you've gone and flustered me, you silly delicious filly you. Now I'm going to have to stammer adorably while the midwit reader base for this dreck cackles over this delightfully erotic misunderstanding. If I could have one wish, it would be to have your labia surgically grafted to my lips, so that I might lick you until the day they bury us together."
Blecch.
>Calamity neighed and turned away. “I’ll give you two some private time for...” he waved a hoof between us, “...whatever this is.” He made a quick exit, muttering something about helping Gawd’s ponies get their magical plasma cannon up and running before Red Eye’s forces got here. I wasn’t paying any attention. I only had eyes for Velvet Remedy, and I could feel my face burning.
The author is making a clumsy attempt at advancing the romantic plot here. This is meant to be the part where the two characters who are supposed to eventually fall in love start awkwardly brushing hands accidentally, or stumbling over words while talking to each other. It works when done right, but it's not being done right here.
The way this kind of thing works in your average modern-day love story is you have two characters who start off as strangers, or occasionally adversaries. They're presented as separate people with separate lives and goals, but usually with some deep-rooted unhappiness; they're each unhappy in their current relationship, or they're both lonely and trying to meet someone, that sort of thing. Eventually they are brought together through some chance encounter, and strike up some kind of platonic relationship. This can take many different forms: sometimes they end up working together for some reason, or they're competing with each other, or the girl is a platonic friend helping the guy win some girl who is clearly wrong for him (or vice versa), etc etc. If anyone reading still has an uncancelled Netflix account, you can pretty much just go to the RomCom section and grab any random title you like as an example; they all basically follow the same plot model:
1. Introduce two people who are clearly right for each other but don't know it yet
2. Have them meet
3. Create some external situation where they are forced to spend time together for awhile
4. Develop chemistry between them
5. ???
6. Profit
As I said, this is a standard plot model that is very easy to follow, but the crucial point that determines whether the story will succeed or fail is step 4. There needs to be some kind of chemistry between the two characters, either positive or negative. Running out of space, hold on.
>Velvet Remedy opened one of her saddleboxes, pulling out a notebook. “What songs will I do? Most of my music isn’t really raider-appropriate. Somehow, I don’t think songs about peace and love, nobility or freedom are really their fare.”
And right on cue, Velvet chucks her principles straight out the window. Seriously, bitch; are you not going to raise even a single tiny objection to this?
This is exactly what she said to Littlepoop just a few short hours earlier:
>“Littlepip, it’s one thing to kill in self defense. Or to protect others. But this...” She turned on me with a stare that could petrify the Overmare herself. “This. Is. Murder!”
Clearly, Velvet feels quite strongly about this. But surely, if LP has a good reason to kill Deadeyes, like avenging the horribly slaughtered family of an innocent little filly, that would make it justice, right?
>Velvet shook her mane. “Revenge, you mean.”
Well, it's clear that Velvet's principles are written in stone. So naturally, when LP returns and asks her to perform a crucial role in her plan to assassinate Deadeyes, I'm sure she'll just flat out refuse, right?
>Velvet Remedy was checking down her list of songs. “Well, that one’s out. That one... might work. Oh, that could be fun, but it was originally meant as a duet. (I read in an old magazine that Pinkie Pie and Vinyl Scratch once performed it at Hoofbeats.) I could tweak it for one pony, but it really requires musical accompaniment. Maybe a Velvet Remedy original? How about...?”
In these troubled times of chaos and uncertainty, it's so refreshing to see a mare as committed to her principles as Velvet clearly is.
>I blinked, remembering, “Well, Deadeye’s expecting two songs before the attack. And he says one of them has to be a song by Sweetie Belle.”
Ffs, is his name Deadeye or Deadeyes? It isn't this goddamned hard to use apostrophes correctly.
>I couldn’t help but roll my eyes. As much as I adored Velvet Remedy’s music, and fell in love with her in every song, tonight we were just looking for a distraction. It didn’t have to be perfect.
"Tee hee, oh Velvet, you are just too adorable. Your willingness to berate me for being a cold-blooded killer one moment and then immediately flush your beliefs down the toilet and start sperging about which songs you should perform for a room full of actual cold-blooded killers just gets my peepee place all slick and tingly. I have never wanted to lick your labia so much as I do right now." Ugh.
Believe it or not, it actually gets worse from here:
>Velvet Remedy looked playfully insulted. “Why of course, dear. There won’t be an eye for anypony else in that room.” I believed it. I believed Velvet Remedy could keep every eye on her even if Ditzy Doo was in the audience. Suddenly, Velvet Remedy gasped. “Every eye! I’ll need a bath! Oh no, what am I going to wear!?”
"Tee hee, oh Velvet, you're so endearingly adorable, I don't even care how lacking in substance your character is. I wish I could just wear your labia on my face all day every day until the end of forever."
>“I can help with that.”
>Velvet cocked her head. “No thank you. I can bathe myself quite well enough, dear.”
>I stammered, flushing hotly. That wasn’t what I meant, but now that she had said it, I couldn’t drive the image out of my mind. My heart fluttered in my chest.
"Tee hee, oh Velvet, I only wanted to help you pick out some clothes, but here you've gone and flustered me, you silly delicious filly you. Now I'm going to have to stammer adorably while the midwit reader base for this dreck cackles over this delightfully erotic misunderstanding. If I could have one wish, it would be to have your labia surgically grafted to my lips, so that I might lick you until the day they bury us together."
Blecch.
>Calamity neighed and turned away. “I’ll give you two some private time for...” he waved a hoof between us, “...whatever this is.” He made a quick exit, muttering something about helping Gawd’s ponies get their magical plasma cannon up and running before Red Eye’s forces got here. I wasn’t paying any attention. I only had eyes for Velvet Remedy, and I could feel my face burning.
The author is making a clumsy attempt at advancing the romantic plot here. This is meant to be the part where the two characters who are supposed to eventually fall in love start awkwardly brushing hands accidentally, or stumbling over words while talking to each other. It works when done right, but it's not being done right here.
The way this kind of thing works in your average modern-day love story is you have two characters who start off as strangers, or occasionally adversaries. They're presented as separate people with separate lives and goals, but usually with some deep-rooted unhappiness; they're each unhappy in their current relationship, or they're both lonely and trying to meet someone, that sort of thing. Eventually they are brought together through some chance encounter, and strike up some kind of platonic relationship. This can take many different forms: sometimes they end up working together for some reason, or they're competing with each other, or the girl is a platonic friend helping the guy win some girl who is clearly wrong for him (or vice versa), etc etc. If anyone reading still has an uncancelled Netflix account, you can pretty much just go to the RomCom section and grab any random title you like as an example; they all basically follow the same plot model:
1. Introduce two people who are clearly right for each other but don't know it yet
2. Have them meet
3. Create some external situation where they are forced to spend time together for awhile
4. Develop chemistry between them
5. ???
6. Profit
As I said, this is a standard plot model that is very easy to follow, but the crucial point that determines whether the story will succeed or fail is step 4. There needs to be some kind of chemistry between the two characters, either positive or negative. Running out of space, hold on.
I figured out who this story was really meant for-
The kind of tasteless fake nerd who thought Ready Player One was a good movie and thought Fallout 3 was better than 2 for being "bigger".
The kind of faggot who thinks Skyrim is better than The Witcher 3 because he beat one in 500 hours and put over 9000 hours into Skyrim and still hasn't permanently finished any of the endlessly repeatable Radiant Quests or figured out that they cannot be permanently completed.
This story isn't just trying to out-edge Fallout 3. It's doing so in a way that appeals to the kind of consoomer who bought a VaultBoy Funko Pop even though the Vault Boy was designed to parody that kind of consumerist iconography by contrasting it with the gory grim world and images of Vault Boy punting pregnant women in the baby bulge.
Remember how in Fallout 2 the further your character went south, the more your dialogue would change from that of an innocent ignorant tribal savage to a snarky veteran who has seen it all? Character progression like that is alien to this story. From day 1 Littlepip can scam slavers with overly elaborate plots and negotiate with robbers who should know better and correct pro raiders on how to hold hostages correctly.
It's like it was written in a consoomerist completionist trance. When I obsess over games I try to figure out how to get the most of them and master the mechanics for optimal efficiency and style and fun. When these fags play games they only touch shallow AAA shlock and grind until they tell themselves they have gotten to the good parts by getting past the slow dull prologues and tutorials for the dull and slow.
Fallout Equestria was written for the kind of people who would have taken up CelestAI on her offer if she existed, and would have ended up blind fanboys of that fic instead of this one if they read it first.
The kind of tasteless fake nerd who thought Ready Player One was a good movie and thought Fallout 3 was better than 2 for being "bigger".
The kind of faggot who thinks Skyrim is better than The Witcher 3 because he beat one in 500 hours and put over 9000 hours into Skyrim and still hasn't permanently finished any of the endlessly repeatable Radiant Quests or figured out that they cannot be permanently completed.
This story isn't just trying to out-edge Fallout 3. It's doing so in a way that appeals to the kind of consoomer who bought a VaultBoy Funko Pop even though the Vault Boy was designed to parody that kind of consumerist iconography by contrasting it with the gory grim world and images of Vault Boy punting pregnant women in the baby bulge.
Remember how in Fallout 2 the further your character went south, the more your dialogue would change from that of an innocent ignorant tribal savage to a snarky veteran who has seen it all? Character progression like that is alien to this story. From day 1 Littlepip can scam slavers with overly elaborate plots and negotiate with robbers who should know better and correct pro raiders on how to hold hostages correctly.
It's like it was written in a consoomerist completionist trance. When I obsess over games I try to figure out how to get the most of them and master the mechanics for optimal efficiency and style and fun. When these fags play games they only touch shallow AAA shlock and grind until they tell themselves they have gotten to the good parts by getting past the slow dull prologues and tutorials for the dull and slow.
Fallout Equestria was written for the kind of people who would have taken up CelestAI on her offer if she existed, and would have ended up blind fanboys of that fic instead of this one if they read it first.
>>294656
Positive romantic chemistry would be a situation where the two characters get along with each other and clearly enjoy each other's company, but there is some barrier preventing it from developing into romance. Often this involves another person, who is usually the significant other of whoever the protagonist's love interest is. For instance, if I were writing a RomCom film called Sweet Titty Bunt Cake starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan, I might create a situation where Tom's character and Meg's character end up as business partners in a failing cake shop. They clearly get along with each other and have a good rapport, but Tom's attention is focused on pleasing his stuck-up, selfish, arrogant fiance who is clearly wrong for him, and so he never notices poor Meg in her paint-spattered overalls and thick black nerd glasses, whom he sees as just a friend and business partner.
For a negative chemistry situation, I might write a film called Little Cock Surprise, in which Meg Ryan is trying to keep her family's failing chicken farm afloat, and Tom Hanks plays the cocky pun intentional CEO of a multinational chicken conglomerate who is trying to buy her out. In this situation, the barrier to their romance is the situation itself: they are positioned to be bitter enemies, and will frequently clash. However, as they interact and spend time together, they realize that they have more in common than they think, and eventually love will blossom.
The point of all this is that in order to make a romance story work, you need to have two characters who each have enough personality to be interesting on their own, make the audience like both of them enough that they will want to see them end up together, and then put them in a situation where some obstacle needs to be overcome in order for that to happen. The prerequisite is that the two characters must both be interesting and likable, and there must be interesting chemistry between them. Just writing two characters who are attracted to each other and having them fall in love doesn't work, you have to make the audience give a shit. People don't want stories about normal, functional humans having normal, boring relationships, they want to see the plain-Jane girl oust the head cheerleader to win the captain of the football team; they want to see the hunky single dad stop mourning his dead wife and find happiness with the quirky shy girl who works at the bookstore. Learning this is the crucial difference between writing the RomComs that middle-aged cat ladies cream themselves to, and writing the ones that end up being broadcast on Hallmark Channel at 3 in the morning, when the cat ladies are already snoring on the couch with an empty bottle of chardonnay at their feet. I feel like I'm starting to veer off topic a little bit.
Anyway, point is, if the Littlepoop x Velvet Remedy story were a RomCom, it would be a snoozer, and the cat ladies' private parts would be as dry as the Sahara. The reason is that k "you will never be a real cat lady" kat missed both targets: neither of his characters are very interesting (Velvet is a particularly bad character, for reasons I've already gone over), and there is no significant chemistry between them. Ironically, he actually has a pretty good setup for negative chemistry here: if Velvet actually gave a shit about her own ideals and stuck to them, she would be constantly butting heads with Littlepoop over her murderhobo behavior.
As I've said before, the author seems to have deliberately set things up so their values clash: Velvet is a pacifist who believes that violence is never justified, and so she tolerates even ponies like the slavers, who engage in business that is probably sort of reprehensible to her. Littlepoop is an idealist who feels that any action is justified if it achieves a benevolent end, so she makes it her business to murderhobo her way around Equestria, rooting out evil wherever she finds it. My suspicion is that Velvet's flip-flopping on her ideals was actually the author attempting to show her as conflicted: she thinks the slavers are evil, but she also thinks violence is evil, so she can't decide which way to go. The problem is, he doesn't do a particularly good job of writing her, and so she comes across as an insincere hypocrite instead. Littlepoop, for her part, just comes across as insane and poorly developed. Despite being the narrator of the story, she never really explains her beliefs to the reader; I guess we're just supposed to assume that her reasons for wanting to take down slaver colonies and murder raiders are obvious. However, this basically robs her of any opportunity she might have had for serious depth and places her in Dudley Do-Right territory; she's the hero who does good because it's good, and fights evil because it's evil. This kind of hero is almost always dull.
This lack of development saps any energy that the interactions between these two characters might have had. As such, not only does the reader have no reason to care whether or not they get together, there's no reason to even believe that they might. Apart from Littlepoop's occasional comments and innuendos that indicate she's attracted to Velvet, what chemistry has there been between the two of them? What indication have we had that anything will ever come out of this one-sided attraction that Littlepoop has? Hell, it's honestly not even that convincing as a one-sided attraction; Littlepoop is always either fawning over Velvet like a lovesick puppy or berating her for not being murderhobo enough for the murderhobo club, but she almost never tries to strike up a conversation or hit on her. Once again, I get the impression the author is trying to show conflicted feelings in Littlepoop, but once again he mostly sucks at it.
Positive romantic chemistry would be a situation where the two characters get along with each other and clearly enjoy each other's company, but there is some barrier preventing it from developing into romance. Often this involves another person, who is usually the significant other of whoever the protagonist's love interest is. For instance, if I were writing a RomCom film called Sweet Titty Bunt Cake starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan, I might create a situation where Tom's character and Meg's character end up as business partners in a failing cake shop. They clearly get along with each other and have a good rapport, but Tom's attention is focused on pleasing his stuck-up, selfish, arrogant fiance who is clearly wrong for him, and so he never notices poor Meg in her paint-spattered overalls and thick black nerd glasses, whom he sees as just a friend and business partner.
For a negative chemistry situation, I might write a film called Little Cock Surprise, in which Meg Ryan is trying to keep her family's failing chicken farm afloat, and Tom Hanks plays the cocky pun intentional CEO of a multinational chicken conglomerate who is trying to buy her out. In this situation, the barrier to their romance is the situation itself: they are positioned to be bitter enemies, and will frequently clash. However, as they interact and spend time together, they realize that they have more in common than they think, and eventually love will blossom.
The point of all this is that in order to make a romance story work, you need to have two characters who each have enough personality to be interesting on their own, make the audience like both of them enough that they will want to see them end up together, and then put them in a situation where some obstacle needs to be overcome in order for that to happen. The prerequisite is that the two characters must both be interesting and likable, and there must be interesting chemistry between them. Just writing two characters who are attracted to each other and having them fall in love doesn't work, you have to make the audience give a shit. People don't want stories about normal, functional humans having normal, boring relationships, they want to see the plain-Jane girl oust the head cheerleader to win the captain of the football team; they want to see the hunky single dad stop mourning his dead wife and find happiness with the quirky shy girl who works at the bookstore. Learning this is the crucial difference between writing the RomComs that middle-aged cat ladies cream themselves to, and writing the ones that end up being broadcast on Hallmark Channel at 3 in the morning, when the cat ladies are already snoring on the couch with an empty bottle of chardonnay at their feet. I feel like I'm starting to veer off topic a little bit.
Anyway, point is, if the Littlepoop x Velvet Remedy story were a RomCom, it would be a snoozer, and the cat ladies' private parts would be as dry as the Sahara. The reason is that k "you will never be a real cat lady" kat missed both targets: neither of his characters are very interesting (Velvet is a particularly bad character, for reasons I've already gone over), and there is no significant chemistry between them. Ironically, he actually has a pretty good setup for negative chemistry here: if Velvet actually gave a shit about her own ideals and stuck to them, she would be constantly butting heads with Littlepoop over her murderhobo behavior.
As I've said before, the author seems to have deliberately set things up so their values clash: Velvet is a pacifist who believes that violence is never justified, and so she tolerates even ponies like the slavers, who engage in business that is probably sort of reprehensible to her. Littlepoop is an idealist who feels that any action is justified if it achieves a benevolent end, so she makes it her business to murderhobo her way around Equestria, rooting out evil wherever she finds it. My suspicion is that Velvet's flip-flopping on her ideals was actually the author attempting to show her as conflicted: she thinks the slavers are evil, but she also thinks violence is evil, so she can't decide which way to go. The problem is, he doesn't do a particularly good job of writing her, and so she comes across as an insincere hypocrite instead. Littlepoop, for her part, just comes across as insane and poorly developed. Despite being the narrator of the story, she never really explains her beliefs to the reader; I guess we're just supposed to assume that her reasons for wanting to take down slaver colonies and murder raiders are obvious. However, this basically robs her of any opportunity she might have had for serious depth and places her in Dudley Do-Right territory; she's the hero who does good because it's good, and fights evil because it's evil. This kind of hero is almost always dull.
This lack of development saps any energy that the interactions between these two characters might have had. As such, not only does the reader have no reason to care whether or not they get together, there's no reason to even believe that they might. Apart from Littlepoop's occasional comments and innuendos that indicate she's attracted to Velvet, what chemistry has there been between the two of them? What indication have we had that anything will ever come out of this one-sided attraction that Littlepoop has? Hell, it's honestly not even that convincing as a one-sided attraction; Littlepoop is always either fawning over Velvet like a lovesick puppy or berating her for not being murderhobo enough for the murderhobo club, but she almost never tries to strike up a conversation or hit on her. Once again, I get the impression the author is trying to show conflicted feelings in Littlepoop, but once again he mostly sucks at it.
>>294658
Anyway, there's also this:
>“I...” I stomped. “I meant, I have the perfect thing for you to wear!” Focusing my magic, I opened my saddlebags and slid out the most beautiful dress in the wasteland, my find from Carousel Boutique.
Holy shit, that's the dress she found in Rarity's old trunk clear back in Chapter 2 or some shit. I'm amazed I even remember that. She's been carrying that thing around with her all this time? Stuffed into her saddlebag along with ammunition and magic statues and whatever the fuck else she's carrying? That dress has got to be a filthy, wrinkled mess by now.
Page break. The next scene opens at the concert, which apparently they were able to organize, choreograph, find backing musicians for, and promote within the space of two hours. Velvet is onstage singing, and Littlepoop is in the audience ogling her instead of paying attention to whatever retarded murderhobo stuff she's supposed to be doing right now. The subchapter opens with some lyric snippets from Velvet's song:
>“How can I fix this? How many times must I try?
>Please, this time, let me get it right...
>Get it ri-i-ight!”
If only the author thought this way about his writing process.
>I crouched on the balcony, covered in the ever-disgusting mattress cover.
She's still carrying that goddamn jizz-blanket around with her? I hope she wasn't keeping it in the same part of her saddlebag as Velvet's dress. Anyway, why does she even need that thing? I thought she was going to use the StealthBuck to stay invisible.
>Deadeyes hadn’t been stupid. When I entered the balcony, I found a note had been left for me: One shot to the target, one to the table. The stage is rigged to explode if you shoot anything else.
Deadeyes not being stupid for once is probably the most shocking plot twist this author has yet thrown at us. I'm a little unclear on how specifically this would work, though. By "shoot anything else," does he just mean that everything in the room except the table she's supposed to shoot at and presumably Gawd's head is somehow wired as a trigger to the explosives under the stage? That seems pretty logistically complicated to set up, not to mention the fact that she could easily miss unintentionally. Also, if the stage blows up, wouldn't that kill everypony in the room, including Deadeyes? Seems a little self-defeating.
Also, this doesn't in any way shape or form protect Deadeyes from getting shot. If I'm understanding the situation correctly, aside from the table Deadeyes is at, everything else is wired as a trigger, but couldn't she still shoot Deadeyes without hitting anything else besides the table in front of him? I get what the author is trying to do here; he just wants to have Deadeyes take extra precaution to ensure she won't doublecross him, by making it so if LP kills Deadeyes she also kills Velvet. This is the first intelligent thing Deadeyes has done in this story and I want to applaud it. However, a much saner way to accomplish this would be to have a single trigger for the stage bomb that is wired to Deadeyes himself, and if his blood pressure drops below a certain level the bomb will go off; this would ensure that if LP kills him, Velvet would also die, and it has the added benefit of being actually somewhat plausible.
>Celestia burn him! Even if I could get a message to Calamity, he was no better at disarming explosives than I was. (Out of petty spite, I stole his copy of Applied Gemstones.)
I don't quite understand what stealing Applied Gemstones has to do with anything here. Is it supposed to be a book on disarming explosives? Would it have been useful here? This is either a joke that didn't land, a reference I didn't get, or both. Anyway, if I'm understanding this correctly, the current situation is that Deadeyes has some kind of magical bomb that will go off if LP shoots anything except Gawd and the table, mechanism of operation presently unknown. Whatever; let's just roll with it.
Anyway, I'll actually give the author some credit here: if removed from its completely nonsensical context, this scene is decently written. He evokes a striking image of Velvet giving a moving performance, and the mood and atmosphere is appropriate. Unfortunately, though, it's not quite good enough to distract the reader from how completely ridiculous the story itself has gotten.
Velvet finishes a heart-wrenching rendition of a heart-wrenching song, and manages to wrench enough hearts to draw thunderous applause from the crowd. She then launches into an uptempo number to get everypony dancing and shouting and whatnot.
>My ears were up; my eyes widened. And for a moment, I completely forgot about the sniper rifle at my side. All that mattered was that I didn’t recognize this music. I’d never heard this song!
Jesus Christ, Littlepoop, every time I think you can't possibly suck any more than you do already, you manage to surprise me.
>By Celestia’s grace! She’s going to set off any explosives under that stage herself!
One would assume that this line was not meant to be taken literally, but apparently it is. LP is now genuinely concerned that Velvet will somehow accidentally blow herself up by getting everyone to clap too loud, or something. This just makes the already questionable issue of how the bomb trigger works even more questionable.
Anyway, she decides that now is the time to finally do the thing she came here to do, so she fires a shot into Gawd's table, shoots Deadeyes in the brain, and then telekinetically lifts Velvet off of the stage so she doesn't get all blowed up, all in the same instant apparently. The mysteriously-triggered bomb that Deadeyes set up predictably detonates, injuring Gawd with shrapnel (this could easily have killed her) and flat-out killing the entire front row of ponies (who were just innocent bystanders, btw; if Velvet Remedy doesn't chastise LP about this later then she's even more of a hypocrite than usual).
Anyway, there's also this:
>“I...” I stomped. “I meant, I have the perfect thing for you to wear!” Focusing my magic, I opened my saddlebags and slid out the most beautiful dress in the wasteland, my find from Carousel Boutique.
Holy shit, that's the dress she found in Rarity's old trunk clear back in Chapter 2 or some shit. I'm amazed I even remember that. She's been carrying that thing around with her all this time? Stuffed into her saddlebag along with ammunition and magic statues and whatever the fuck else she's carrying? That dress has got to be a filthy, wrinkled mess by now.
Page break. The next scene opens at the concert, which apparently they were able to organize, choreograph, find backing musicians for, and promote within the space of two hours. Velvet is onstage singing, and Littlepoop is in the audience ogling her instead of paying attention to whatever retarded murderhobo stuff she's supposed to be doing right now. The subchapter opens with some lyric snippets from Velvet's song:
>“How can I fix this? How many times must I try?
>Please, this time, let me get it right...
>Get it ri-i-ight!”
If only the author thought this way about his writing process.
>I crouched on the balcony, covered in the ever-disgusting mattress cover.
She's still carrying that goddamn jizz-blanket around with her? I hope she wasn't keeping it in the same part of her saddlebag as Velvet's dress. Anyway, why does she even need that thing? I thought she was going to use the StealthBuck to stay invisible.
>Deadeyes hadn’t been stupid. When I entered the balcony, I found a note had been left for me: One shot to the target, one to the table. The stage is rigged to explode if you shoot anything else.
Deadeyes not being stupid for once is probably the most shocking plot twist this author has yet thrown at us. I'm a little unclear on how specifically this would work, though. By "shoot anything else," does he just mean that everything in the room except the table she's supposed to shoot at and presumably Gawd's head is somehow wired as a trigger to the explosives under the stage? That seems pretty logistically complicated to set up, not to mention the fact that she could easily miss unintentionally. Also, if the stage blows up, wouldn't that kill everypony in the room, including Deadeyes? Seems a little self-defeating.
Also, this doesn't in any way shape or form protect Deadeyes from getting shot. If I'm understanding the situation correctly, aside from the table Deadeyes is at, everything else is wired as a trigger, but couldn't she still shoot Deadeyes without hitting anything else besides the table in front of him? I get what the author is trying to do here; he just wants to have Deadeyes take extra precaution to ensure she won't doublecross him, by making it so if LP kills Deadeyes she also kills Velvet. This is the first intelligent thing Deadeyes has done in this story and I want to applaud it. However, a much saner way to accomplish this would be to have a single trigger for the stage bomb that is wired to Deadeyes himself, and if his blood pressure drops below a certain level the bomb will go off; this would ensure that if LP kills him, Velvet would also die, and it has the added benefit of being actually somewhat plausible.
>Celestia burn him! Even if I could get a message to Calamity, he was no better at disarming explosives than I was. (Out of petty spite, I stole his copy of Applied Gemstones.)
I don't quite understand what stealing Applied Gemstones has to do with anything here. Is it supposed to be a book on disarming explosives? Would it have been useful here? This is either a joke that didn't land, a reference I didn't get, or both. Anyway, if I'm understanding this correctly, the current situation is that Deadeyes has some kind of magical bomb that will go off if LP shoots anything except Gawd and the table, mechanism of operation presently unknown. Whatever; let's just roll with it.
Anyway, I'll actually give the author some credit here: if removed from its completely nonsensical context, this scene is decently written. He evokes a striking image of Velvet giving a moving performance, and the mood and atmosphere is appropriate. Unfortunately, though, it's not quite good enough to distract the reader from how completely ridiculous the story itself has gotten.
Velvet finishes a heart-wrenching rendition of a heart-wrenching song, and manages to wrench enough hearts to draw thunderous applause from the crowd. She then launches into an uptempo number to get everypony dancing and shouting and whatnot.
>My ears were up; my eyes widened. And for a moment, I completely forgot about the sniper rifle at my side. All that mattered was that I didn’t recognize this music. I’d never heard this song!
Jesus Christ, Littlepoop, every time I think you can't possibly suck any more than you do already, you manage to surprise me.
>By Celestia’s grace! She’s going to set off any explosives under that stage herself!
One would assume that this line was not meant to be taken literally, but apparently it is. LP is now genuinely concerned that Velvet will somehow accidentally blow herself up by getting everyone to clap too loud, or something. This just makes the already questionable issue of how the bomb trigger works even more questionable.
Anyway, she decides that now is the time to finally do the thing she came here to do, so she fires a shot into Gawd's table, shoots Deadeyes in the brain, and then telekinetically lifts Velvet off of the stage so she doesn't get all blowed up, all in the same instant apparently. The mysteriously-triggered bomb that Deadeyes set up predictably detonates, injuring Gawd with shrapnel (this could easily have killed her) and flat-out killing the entire front row of ponies (who were just innocent bystanders, btw; if Velvet Remedy doesn't chastise LP about this later then she's even more of a hypocrite than usual).
>>294658
>People don't want stories about normal, functional humans having normal, boring relationships
Well, as you said once, people are different. I guess this could be true for the general populace but speaking for myself I do enjoy the idea and stories that is about already established couples. Perhaps I misunderstand what you are saying here because I read this without the context of the other posts..
>People don't want stories about normal, functional humans having normal, boring relationships
Well, as you said once, people are different. I guess this could be true for the general populace but speaking for myself I do enjoy the idea and stories that is about already established couples. Perhaps I misunderstand what you are saying here because I read this without the context of the other posts..
>>294651
>Reminds me of something Nigel said though about how Kkat should copy stuff from other games and got me thinking how this 1:1 translation of video game to book doesn't seem like a profitable venture.
Something that is both a roundabout credit to FoE and an absolute nightmare for those attempting to untangle copy/pasting from original content is that FoE isn't a direct translation of a game's plot into a story. FoE's story draws major elements from Fallout 1, 2, 3 and NV and blends them together into a single giant complex clusterfuck, with a few original elements thrown in as well. Amusingly, if you're familiar with what's being referenced you can often tell precisely where Kkat stopped aping one of the games because a nominally intelligent character or idea suddenly takes a violent swerve into idiotville.
For example, as mentioned in an earlier post, Fallout 3 begins with your character leaving their home vault in search of their missing father. Much later in the game, you find him and learn his secret - he was never a resident of the vault, and brought you there as a baby for your own safety. Once your character was old enough not to need him, he returned to the wasteland to resume work on his secret project to purify the Potomac river. And now that you've found him he wants your help to make that dream a reality. Writing quality aside, there's the skeleton of a story there.
In FoE, Pip leaves her home stable in search of her missing crush. Once she finds Velvet, she quickly learns that Velvet's secret is... well, she's a jackass with vague, wishy-washy principles who wants a career that makes no sense. And that's about it. But she's still her crush. So... low effort girlwank. Hooray?
The main villains of FoE are prime examples of this, once we get to them. Eventually.
>Reminds me of something Nigel said though about how Kkat should copy stuff from other games and got me thinking how this 1:1 translation of video game to book doesn't seem like a profitable venture.
Something that is both a roundabout credit to FoE and an absolute nightmare for those attempting to untangle copy/pasting from original content is that FoE isn't a direct translation of a game's plot into a story. FoE's story draws major elements from Fallout 1, 2, 3 and NV and blends them together into a single giant complex clusterfuck, with a few original elements thrown in as well. Amusingly, if you're familiar with what's being referenced you can often tell precisely where Kkat stopped aping one of the games because a nominally intelligent character or idea suddenly takes a violent swerve into idiotville.
For example, as mentioned in an earlier post, Fallout 3 begins with your character leaving their home vault in search of their missing father. Much later in the game, you find him and learn his secret - he was never a resident of the vault, and brought you there as a baby for your own safety. Once your character was old enough not to need him, he returned to the wasteland to resume work on his secret project to purify the Potomac river. And now that you've found him he wants your help to make that dream a reality. Writing quality aside, there's the skeleton of a story there.
In FoE, Pip leaves her home stable in search of her missing crush. Once she finds Velvet, she quickly learns that Velvet's secret is... well, she's a jackass with vague, wishy-washy principles who wants a career that makes no sense. And that's about it. But she's still her crush. So... low effort girlwank. Hooray?
The main villains of FoE are prime examples of this, once we get to them. Eventually.
>>294658
Romance writing is not my specialty but would I be correct to assume that while LP shallowly likes Velvet for being pretty, she lacks any deeper appreciation for her and Velvet lacks a deep appreciation for and bond with Littlepip and that's one major reason why this sucks?
Velvet is a popstar turned wasteland survivalist. Her attempt to go solo got her captured by slavers and forced to heal slavers and slaves and fucking sing for the slavers. She got her ass saved by a fucking nopony whose life she was willing to ruin unintentionally with the "remove my pipbuck" bit.
Picture a scene where at first Velvet barely recognizes LP or remember who took her PipBuck off. But when LP explains how she was blamed for the disappearance of the stables idol Velvet realizes she was a stuck up selfish cunt and cries because she is not used to the idea that she might be a flawed imdividual who needs improvement.
Velvet should not have the capacity to smile right now. Or flirt. She should be a changed mare. An innocent soul full of regret wrapped into a clusterfuck of a plan that could get them all killed. She should cry into LPs shoulder and need a pep talk. Shouldn't the thought of singing for hardened killers remind her of how she was forced to sing for slavers and fill her with disgust?
Also I cant stop imagining LP tying that jizzed matress cover around her neck like a kids superhero cape.
Also holy fuck Deadeyes wrote instructions for LP. She could pin this whole op on him using that note as evidence. Dead-Eyed Deadeye Deadeyes'ss is retarded. Kkunt is retarded for not turning this inconsistent name into a joke where his name turns out to be Deadeye Deadeyes.
Everyone loves when you retcon what looks like a mistake into something intentional.
Like how at first those scenes in Kingdom Hearts 3582 Days where Xion has her hood up in some camera angle shots and her hood down in other camera angle shots and her hood abruptly switches from up to down multiple times in a conversation seems like a genuine mistake. Then you realize all camera angles from the main hero Roxas's perspective show Xion with her hood down and camera angles from his friend Axel's perspective show the hood up. At least until Axel starts seeing her face too, after spending enough time with her. Spoiler alert it's because Xion is no i the imaginary number. She is magical puppet and the face you see on her depends on you not her. Deep symbolism. *sips purified water* yep that was a good game.
Romance writing is not my specialty but would I be correct to assume that while LP shallowly likes Velvet for being pretty, she lacks any deeper appreciation for her and Velvet lacks a deep appreciation for and bond with Littlepip and that's one major reason why this sucks?
Velvet is a popstar turned wasteland survivalist. Her attempt to go solo got her captured by slavers and forced to heal slavers and slaves and fucking sing for the slavers. She got her ass saved by a fucking nopony whose life she was willing to ruin unintentionally with the "remove my pipbuck" bit.
Picture a scene where at first Velvet barely recognizes LP or remember who took her PipBuck off. But when LP explains how she was blamed for the disappearance of the stables idol Velvet realizes she was a stuck up selfish cunt and cries because she is not used to the idea that she might be a flawed imdividual who needs improvement.
Velvet should not have the capacity to smile right now. Or flirt. She should be a changed mare. An innocent soul full of regret wrapped into a clusterfuck of a plan that could get them all killed. She should cry into LPs shoulder and need a pep talk. Shouldn't the thought of singing for hardened killers remind her of how she was forced to sing for slavers and fill her with disgust?
Also I cant stop imagining LP tying that jizzed matress cover around her neck like a kids superhero cape.
Also holy fuck Deadeyes wrote instructions for LP. She could pin this whole op on him using that note as evidence. Dead-Eyed Deadeye Deadeyes'ss is retarded. Kkunt is retarded for not turning this inconsistent name into a joke where his name turns out to be Deadeye Deadeyes.
Everyone loves when you retcon what looks like a mistake into something intentional.
Like how at first those scenes in Kingdom Hearts 3582 Days where Xion has her hood up in some camera angle shots and her hood down in other camera angle shots and her hood abruptly switches from up to down multiple times in a conversation seems like a genuine mistake. Then you realize all camera angles from the main hero Roxas's perspective show Xion with her hood down and camera angles from his friend Axel's perspective show the hood up. At least until Axel starts seeing her face too, after spending enough time with her. Spoiler alert it's because Xion is no i the imaginary number. She is magical puppet and the face you see on her depends on you not her. Deep symbolism. *sips purified water* yep that was a good game.
>>294654
That's a good post.
>A lot of fanfic writers have this weird habit of trying to justify all the silly seeming things in a show when writing a fanfic for it. But only the things that seem silly to them and feel like they need explaining.
It's a simple format that seems easy.
X wonders why Z happens/is.
Tell or show happens what Z is.
The problem is fitting incompatible worlds together (unless that is supposed to be a key element done well). Besides as you've said they tend to do this poorly.
When it's done that is internally consistent, believable, and supports story elements such as characters it's great. The world feels lived in.
The other problem is they feel like they have to have those questions answered fully. Especially if they can't do the explanation justice, and it actively and passively harms the story.
>>294653
I've read quite a few game-like stories and to be honest I'm not the target for this fiction either.
The 'character' Littlepip is a meta representation of a let's play for Fallout and a showcase of the author's 'modded' world.
The closest I know of is Mass Effect stories where they detail the past in bullet points and dates.
The punch line is yes it's Equestria AND it's Fallout 3 gameplay, wouldn't that be fun. In Fallout Equestria you too could wear a jizz stained bed too.
That's a good post.
>A lot of fanfic writers have this weird habit of trying to justify all the silly seeming things in a show when writing a fanfic for it. But only the things that seem silly to them and feel like they need explaining.
It's a simple format that seems easy.
X wonders why Z happens/is.
Tell or show happens what Z is.
The problem is fitting incompatible worlds together (unless that is supposed to be a key element done well). Besides as you've said they tend to do this poorly.
When it's done that is internally consistent, believable, and supports story elements such as characters it's great. The world feels lived in.
The other problem is they feel like they have to have those questions answered fully. Especially if they can't do the explanation justice, and it actively and passively harms the story.
>>294653
I've read quite a few game-like stories and to be honest I'm not the target for this fiction either.
The 'character' Littlepip is a meta representation of a let's play for Fallout and a showcase of the author's 'modded' world.
The closest I know of is Mass Effect stories where they detail the past in bullet points and dates.
The punch line is yes it's Equestria AND it's Fallout 3 gameplay, wouldn't that be fun. In Fallout Equestria you too could wear a jizz stained bed too.
>>294663
>The 'character' Littlepip is a meta representation of a let's play for Fallout and a showcase of the author's 'modded' world.
This is probably the best succinct description of Littlepip I've ever seen. Her seemingly arbitrary morality and casual approach to bloodshed make a lot more sense if you view her as a self-insert for the author. With that in mind, of course the fight scenes are bad and the characters are bland - we're reading the written equivalent of a manchild bashing his action figures together.
>The 'character' Littlepip is a meta representation of a let's play for Fallout and a showcase of the author's 'modded' world.
This is probably the best succinct description of Littlepip I've ever seen. Her seemingly arbitrary morality and casual approach to bloodshed make a lot more sense if you view her as a self-insert for the author. With that in mind, of course the fight scenes are bad and the characters are bland - we're reading the written equivalent of a manchild bashing his action figures together.
>>294663
Which school of fanfic thought do you prefer?
>we never see a hospital in Canterlot so they must canonically lack hospitals and some OC doctor is a hero for wanting to make his own hospital in Canterlot and a baddie gets in his way for some reason
>Canterlot now has a hospital because it would be silly if this major city lacked one and the story requires one to already exist
Which school of fanfic thought do you prefer?
>we never see a hospital in Canterlot so they must canonically lack hospitals and some OC doctor is a hero for wanting to make his own hospital in Canterlot and a baddie gets in his way for some reason
>Canterlot now has a hospital because it would be silly if this major city lacked one and the story requires one to already exist
>>294713
I prefer the world as being internally consistent with its story. The story, characters, magic, rules, and world come first,. While those two choices could make good stories, that requires going about it with respect is a key point.
>We never see Canterlot hospitals, but we know Ponyville has a rather large one, and actual vet offices.
>In Ponyville makes a lot of sense it's a frontier town next to dangrous areas.
>It stands to reason to keep the city aesthetic consistent those hospitals are harder to find for someone not ingrained with that culture.
>Not only that we don't have a reason to see a Canterlot hospital.
Another option
>The royal castle and guard houses also double as a hospital.
>Most 'guards' are emergency specialists keeping to the ancient royal theme.
Or even
>Canterlot doesn't need hospitals. Or they don't have it for some good reasons.
>It's relatively safe, when hostile forces take Canterlot they are on the side of a mountain.
>Without easy access to medical supplies ponies can bleed out the enemy and bring them under siege.
>It's a means of last resort.
Both points could be true.
>Canterlot is designed to fall when hostile forces take over and when various pony groups decide to attack as well.
>Hospitals are also like bunkers where it's not above ground to prevent damage to patients, and emergency key figures.
Or any number of reasons.
>Both situations could be true
>The 'hero' is trying to force an above ground hospital, yet meets resistance along the way.
>First bureaucracy, then some key figures, then guards 'harass' him, finally the final boss appears Celestia sets things straight with the pony.
>Along the way he starts to make illegal contacts to force his idea into reality.
Or another inversion
>Docs make house calls
>and they have lots of magic
>New doctor that transferred from somewhere else is feeling the culture shock.
Or
>They are there the audience never sees it and attention is not brought to it.
>Also it can be done with we're in a hospital in Canterlot and that's all that needs to be said any other relevant point could be brought up if that enhances the story.
<Or
>They arn't there heres a fun tale about it.
Finally (not the only option left either) it's still not important or relevant enough to go about discussing in the story anyway.
<Also Magic ain't gotta explain shit
<Also Magic gonna explain that shit
<Also Magic why not both?
<How about none or all of the above.
I prefer the world as being internally consistent with its story. The story, characters, magic, rules, and world come first,. While those two choices could make good stories, that requires going about it with respect is a key point.
>We never see Canterlot hospitals, but we know Ponyville has a rather large one, and actual vet offices.
>In Ponyville makes a lot of sense it's a frontier town next to dangrous areas.
>It stands to reason to keep the city aesthetic consistent those hospitals are harder to find for someone not ingrained with that culture.
>Not only that we don't have a reason to see a Canterlot hospital.
Another option
>The royal castle and guard houses also double as a hospital.
>Most 'guards' are emergency specialists keeping to the ancient royal theme.
Or even
>Canterlot doesn't need hospitals. Or they don't have it for some good reasons.
>It's relatively safe, when hostile forces take Canterlot they are on the side of a mountain.
>Without easy access to medical supplies ponies can bleed out the enemy and bring them under siege.
>It's a means of last resort.
Both points could be true.
>Canterlot is designed to fall when hostile forces take over and when various pony groups decide to attack as well.
>Hospitals are also like bunkers where it's not above ground to prevent damage to patients, and emergency key figures.
Or any number of reasons.
>Both situations could be true
>The 'hero' is trying to force an above ground hospital, yet meets resistance along the way.
>First bureaucracy, then some key figures, then guards 'harass' him, finally the final boss appears Celestia sets things straight with the pony.
>Along the way he starts to make illegal contacts to force his idea into reality.
Or another inversion
>Docs make house calls
>and they have lots of magic
>New doctor that transferred from somewhere else is feeling the culture shock.
Or
>They are there the audience never sees it and attention is not brought to it.
>Also it can be done with we're in a hospital in Canterlot and that's all that needs to be said any other relevant point could be brought up if that enhances the story.
<Or
>They arn't there heres a fun tale about it.
Finally (not the only option left either) it's still not important or relevant enough to go about discussing in the story anyway.
<Also Magic ain't gotta explain shit
<Also Magic gonna explain that shit
<Also Magic why not both?
<How about none or all of the above.
Do you think the story should have focused harder on LP GRADUALLY losing her stable poner sensibilities to embrace Wasteland morality so when she meets Velvet who has had less character growth than her, they argue?
>>294728
The story (as a story without other considerations) without a major rewrite or change (or fixing it up everywhere) in at least one kind of area with everything existing as is it won't really stack up one way or another.
Stacking shit up in different ways gives you differnt looking shit stacks, but it's all shit. It's a bit of an exaggeration, but the ooint remains. There are tiny points that glimmer with hope and possibility, but not enough. Unless someone is specifically looking for that.
Not to say it's irredeemable or the worst fiction ever it does have it's flaws.
As just an idea Fallout Equestria serves it's purpose with a hobbled step.
For the very niche audience it has that certain quality they desired to see that other works just didn't have (or they desired more of that quality in different fiction). Towards that end it did its job.
I understand that. Especially since I'm more focused and geared toward finding those ideas, concepts, and imagined world stuffs.
The story (as a story without other considerations) without a major rewrite or change (or fixing it up everywhere) in at least one kind of area with everything existing as is it won't really stack up one way or another.
Stacking shit up in different ways gives you differnt looking shit stacks, but it's all shit. It's a bit of an exaggeration, but the ooint remains. There are tiny points that glimmer with hope and possibility, but not enough. Unless someone is specifically looking for that.
Not to say it's irredeemable or the worst fiction ever it does have it's flaws.
As just an idea Fallout Equestria serves it's purpose with a hobbled step.
For the very niche audience it has that certain quality they desired to see that other works just didn't have (or they desired more of that quality in different fiction). Towards that end it did its job.
I understand that. Especially since I'm more focused and geared toward finding those ideas, concepts, and imagined world stuffs.
>>294728
>>294729
The main issue with FoE so far is that it has three things with which to keep the reader invested: the plot, the characters, and the videogame references. Videogame references mean absolutely nothing to people who aren't intimately familiar with the game in question. The plot is more or less nonexistent so far, aside from a few as-of-yet inconsequential hints that larger things are going on. Pip and friends haven't really been presented with a goal, so they're wandering from place to place and addressing local problems in a sort of episodic sense.
This leaves the characters themselves as the sole point of interest, which is why it's so frustrating that Pip is an empty shell for Kkat to insert his big idea of the day into and that Calamity/Velvet are both very wishy-washy with no consistent opinions or motives. And as we'll learn later in the story, their character (both personal and moral) and friendship becomes vital to the plot. It's a shame, because all the makings of a strong group dynamic are at least potentially there and could, at least in theory, carry the story's early worldbuilding.
Littlepip is the curious, naive newcomer and audience vehicle. Calamity is the hardened wasteland veteran. Velvet is the beautiful dreamer who struggles to reconcile her lofty principles with harsh reality. It wouldn't be hard to build a dynamic there if only they could dismount Pip's throbbing murderboner for five minutes. If these were the case FoE would at least have the foundations of a solid core cast:
- Pip's kleptomania needs to lead us to things that are both interesting and relevant, not vague breadcrumbs for things that will become meaningful-ish in hindsight dozens of chapters later, as well as putting her into actual trouble that she can't handle.
- Calamity's experience needs to come into play to cover for when the two girls' unfamiliarity with the wastes put them in danger, while his jaded nature blinds him to solutions the others can see easily.
- Velvet needs a defined set of principles that are grounded in something meaningful and the spine to actually stand by them, for good and ill.
>>294729
The main issue with FoE so far is that it has three things with which to keep the reader invested: the plot, the characters, and the videogame references. Videogame references mean absolutely nothing to people who aren't intimately familiar with the game in question. The plot is more or less nonexistent so far, aside from a few as-of-yet inconsequential hints that larger things are going on. Pip and friends haven't really been presented with a goal, so they're wandering from place to place and addressing local problems in a sort of episodic sense.
This leaves the characters themselves as the sole point of interest, which is why it's so frustrating that Pip is an empty shell for Kkat to insert his big idea of the day into and that Calamity/Velvet are both very wishy-washy with no consistent opinions or motives. And as we'll learn later in the story, their character (both personal and moral) and friendship becomes vital to the plot. It's a shame, because all the makings of a strong group dynamic are at least potentially there and could, at least in theory, carry the story's early worldbuilding.
Littlepip is the curious, naive newcomer and audience vehicle. Calamity is the hardened wasteland veteran. Velvet is the beautiful dreamer who struggles to reconcile her lofty principles with harsh reality. It wouldn't be hard to build a dynamic there if only they could dismount Pip's throbbing murderboner for five minutes. If these were the case FoE would at least have the foundations of a solid core cast:
- Pip's kleptomania needs to lead us to things that are both interesting and relevant, not vague breadcrumbs for things that will become meaningful-ish in hindsight dozens of chapters later, as well as putting her into actual trouble that she can't handle.
- Calamity's experience needs to come into play to cover for when the two girls' unfamiliarity with the wastes put them in danger, while his jaded nature blinds him to solutions the others can see easily.
- Velvet needs a defined set of principles that are grounded in something meaningful and the spine to actually stand by them, for good and ill.
Is it correct to assume the best way to tell an episodic story is to establish the characters and goals, and then make every episode one more step on their road to their final destination so that everything at least slightly feels like progress?
Kkat even has two perfect excuses for LP to put the main plot on hold and stop to help out random noponies in the form of LPs completionism and Velvets moralizing doctor quest.
Kkat even has two perfect excuses for LP to put the main plot on hold and stop to help out random noponies in the form of LPs completionism and Velvets moralizing doctor quest.
>>294732
>Pip and friends haven't really been presented with a goal, so they're wandering from place to place and addressing local problems in a sort of episodic sense.
>>294739
>Is it correct to assume the best way to tell an episodic story is to establish the characters and goals, and then make every episode one more step on their road to their final destination so that everything at least slightly feels like progress?
>Kkat even has two perfect excuses for LP to put the main plot on hold and stop to help out random noponies in the form of LPs completionism and Velvets moralizing doctor quest.
An episodic story can be a good vehicle if you've got a lot of ideas as this author seems to, but there still needs to be a larger plot that explains what the characters are trying to achieve overall and why they are traveling together. Even if you're going to take awhile to build up to the main plot, the characters still need to have goals that drive them from episode to episode, otherwise you're better off writing a bunch of disconnected short stories featuring the same characters, that can be read independently of each other.
With FoE, the initial goal driving Littlepoop was to find Velvet Remedy. Even though she didn't really do much to look for her and most of her early adventures had nothing to do with this quest, it served at least as a rudimentary motivation for her to be out wandering around in the Wasteland. However, this goal was accomplished rather early on, and there's no secondary goal after this to keep them moving. The Appleoosa escape basically wrapped up the "find Velvet" story, and after that Littlepoop just wants to go to Fillydelphia to beat up more slavers, which I wouldn't really count as a goal since there's no more reason for her to do that then there is for her to go look for the radio DJ or do any of the other dumb things she wants to do.
There's not even really any reason for these three ponies to be traveling together; they just do because the author wants them as a party. Velvet left the Stable on her own and never asked LP to follow her, and despite LP's crush the two of them don't have any strong connection to each other. They weren't friends beforehand, they don't particularly need each other, and for reasons I've gone over exhaustively Velvet should logically have some strong reservations about traveling with a pony who solves every problem with excessive violence and goes looking for trouble at every turn. Calamity, meanwhile, has no connection to either of them, as well as a life of his own in NA that he can return to. So, what's the glue that holds this group together? Where are they going and why are they all going there together? The author can't answer this, let alone explain why they are getting involved in larger events like this scrap between Topaz and Red Eye.
Writing an episodic story where a group of friends and/or comrades wanders around the countryside fighting evil is a tried and true story format that can work with any number of different settings and genres and types of characters. However, it needs a few things. There needs to be some common goal between the party members that gives them a reason to work together, or else they need to be an established group that formed before the story began. Also, not only does there need to be a series of goals that drives them from episode to episode, but the goals need to lead to each other, and ultimately to the main plot.
For instance, if LP's initial goal was to find Velvet, and then after finding Velvet found out that Velvet had some significant goal of her own that she had left the stable for, and decided to follow her because she was infatuated with her, that would serve well enough to explain where the group is going and why they are a group. For Calamity's presence to make sense, he would need to either have some personal connection to one of the two characters (maybe he has a thing for Littlepoop the way Littlepoop has a thing for Velvet) or else has some external goal of his own that aligns with Velvet's. From here, they would travel together to pursue Velvet's and possibly Calamity's goal, and accomplishing this would lead to a third thing that would involve all three of them together.
>Pip and friends haven't really been presented with a goal, so they're wandering from place to place and addressing local problems in a sort of episodic sense.
>>294739
>Is it correct to assume the best way to tell an episodic story is to establish the characters and goals, and then make every episode one more step on their road to their final destination so that everything at least slightly feels like progress?
>Kkat even has two perfect excuses for LP to put the main plot on hold and stop to help out random noponies in the form of LPs completionism and Velvets moralizing doctor quest.
An episodic story can be a good vehicle if you've got a lot of ideas as this author seems to, but there still needs to be a larger plot that explains what the characters are trying to achieve overall and why they are traveling together. Even if you're going to take awhile to build up to the main plot, the characters still need to have goals that drive them from episode to episode, otherwise you're better off writing a bunch of disconnected short stories featuring the same characters, that can be read independently of each other.
With FoE, the initial goal driving Littlepoop was to find Velvet Remedy. Even though she didn't really do much to look for her and most of her early adventures had nothing to do with this quest, it served at least as a rudimentary motivation for her to be out wandering around in the Wasteland. However, this goal was accomplished rather early on, and there's no secondary goal after this to keep them moving. The Appleoosa escape basically wrapped up the "find Velvet" story, and after that Littlepoop just wants to go to Fillydelphia to beat up more slavers, which I wouldn't really count as a goal since there's no more reason for her to do that then there is for her to go look for the radio DJ or do any of the other dumb things she wants to do.
There's not even really any reason for these three ponies to be traveling together; they just do because the author wants them as a party. Velvet left the Stable on her own and never asked LP to follow her, and despite LP's crush the two of them don't have any strong connection to each other. They weren't friends beforehand, they don't particularly need each other, and for reasons I've gone over exhaustively Velvet should logically have some strong reservations about traveling with a pony who solves every problem with excessive violence and goes looking for trouble at every turn. Calamity, meanwhile, has no connection to either of them, as well as a life of his own in NA that he can return to. So, what's the glue that holds this group together? Where are they going and why are they all going there together? The author can't answer this, let alone explain why they are getting involved in larger events like this scrap between Topaz and Red Eye.
Writing an episodic story where a group of friends and/or comrades wanders around the countryside fighting evil is a tried and true story format that can work with any number of different settings and genres and types of characters. However, it needs a few things. There needs to be some common goal between the party members that gives them a reason to work together, or else they need to be an established group that formed before the story began. Also, not only does there need to be a series of goals that drives them from episode to episode, but the goals need to lead to each other, and ultimately to the main plot.
For instance, if LP's initial goal was to find Velvet, and then after finding Velvet found out that Velvet had some significant goal of her own that she had left the stable for, and decided to follow her because she was infatuated with her, that would serve well enough to explain where the group is going and why they are a group. For Calamity's presence to make sense, he would need to either have some personal connection to one of the two characters (maybe he has a thing for Littlepoop the way Littlepoop has a thing for Velvet) or else has some external goal of his own that aligns with Velvet's. From here, they would travel together to pursue Velvet's and possibly Calamity's goal, and accomplishing this would lead to a third thing that would involve all three of them together.
>>294659
>I activated the Stealth Buck and galloped silently towards the stairs.
Why is she just now activating the Stealth Buck? I'm still not clear on that. Seems to me if she has a device that makes her invisible, and she doesn't want to be seen for the duration of the concert, the most sensible thing to do would be to just use the device and become invisible for the duration of the concert. Instead, she chose to hide under the jizz-blanket for most of the show, breathing in the warm musky scent of raider spooge while she clopped to Velvet's singing, and then switched on the invisibility-device when she made her escape.
Part of the problem is that we still don't know what the limits of these Stealth Bucks are (or even what sort of device they are in the first place, but I've completely given up hope of ever getting a straight answer on that). If there was a time limit on the invisibility that exceeded the amount of time she needed to be invisible, what she did would make sense. If the device is single-use or requires a charge or something in between uses, then what she did would make sense. Based on how these types of devices work in games, I suspect that both of these conditions are probably true; however, the author has not established either of them as fact, so it remains an ambiguous point.
>From below, I could hear somepony yelling, “It’s the slavers! They’re attacking early!”
>Completely fair assumption, I thought as I hit the stairs.
Yes, completely fair assumption. Those slavers are just plain rude, attacking ahead of schedule like that. I'm sure nopony even noticed the little murderhobo conspicuously perched in the balcony with a jizz-crusted blanket draped over her face, just as I'm sure nopony ever thought to question why this concert was even being held in the first place.
>I was halfway down when an explosion from somewhere outside let me know the panicking pony hadn’t been completely wrong.
Well, isn't that convenient. Looks like the slavers really did attack ahead of schedule. If only the raiders had been at their defensive posts instead of in here watching some random pop idol who randomly showed up and offered to sing for them, they wouldn't have been caught off guard. Maybe the eve of a battle wasn't the most ideal time to schedule an impromptu concert. Oh well, Deadeyes, live and learn. Wait a minute; never mind.
>As I raced for the terminal, my mind boggled at the coincidence.
There is nothing even remotely mind-boggling about this coincidence, nor is it a coincidence. The slavers were planning an attack within this time frame, and they attacked. This is probably the least mind-boggling thing that has happened in this entire chapter so far.
>But no, I realized as I got to the desk and activated the terminal’s single function, it wasn’t coincidence at all. Red Eye’s slavers weren’t going to trust Deadeyes. Just as Deadeyes planned to betray them, they must have always intended to attack early.
Oh, okay. So much wacky shit has happened I'd forgotten that the original plan was for Deadeyes to open the gates and let the slavers in. He probably would have literally known when they were going to attack.
>In accordance with the plan, even Gawd was in attendance, as were her loyalists.
Wait, whose plan is this in accordance with? Were the slavers also planning to kill Gawd, or was it just Deadeyes who wanted her killed? There are so many plans in this convoluted mess of bullshit I can't keep half of them straight.
Anyway, the long and short of this seems to be that the slavers were playing some kind of 5D chess, and Littlepoop played right into their hooves by spontaneously organizing a concert in order to assassinate somepony she could have easily assassinated eons ago without all of this hassle.
>The Stealth Buck was just wearing off as I dashed into the room behind the curtains.
This at least confirms that the invisibility of a stealth buck has a time limit. Now all the author needs to do is confirm whether or not it's a single-use device or is something you can use over and over, and also what the fuck it is exactly, and also he should go back and clarify all of this before we actually saw a stealth buck in operation for the first time so we would know what we were dealing with instead of trying to piece it all together after the fact.
>I found Velvet Remedy pulling herself out of a pile of skeletons. Her perfect dress had bones hanging from it.
lmao.
>Panting, I apologized, explaining about the note. She waved it off. “Oh that’s quite all right. I’d much rather be buried in a pile of skeletons than actually join them.” With a smile that melted my heart, “Thank you, Littlepip!”
>Then, as an afterthought, “Couldn’t let me finish the song, though?”
Seriously? The fucking stage just exploded, probably ten or eleven ponies were killed, Velvet herself very nearly died, and all of this was preceded by the assassination of Deadeyes, which I will once again point out is something that Velvet was vehemently opposed to only a few short scenes ago. This is her only reaction?
This is shitty writing even by k "my train wreck of a fake vagina is the result of a stage explosion and not a botched surgery; that's my story and I'm sticking to it" kat's standards. Forget Velvet's so-called principles for a second; is this seriously all she has to say about this? She was nearly killed. An entire row of ponies who were cheering her performance a few minutes ago are dead now, blown to bits as a direct consequence of her friend's actions. Something like this would traumatize nearly anyone; trained, battle-hardened soldiers get PTSD and night terrors from remembering shit like this. And all Velvet has to say about is is "Gee whiz golly gosh gumdrops, I sure am glad I didn't get all blowed up in the explosy-wosion! I just wish I could have finished my songy-wongy first!"
Seriously, kkat, take this story and cram it up whatever orifice people like you prefer to cram things.
>I activated the Stealth Buck and galloped silently towards the stairs.
Why is she just now activating the Stealth Buck? I'm still not clear on that. Seems to me if she has a device that makes her invisible, and she doesn't want to be seen for the duration of the concert, the most sensible thing to do would be to just use the device and become invisible for the duration of the concert. Instead, she chose to hide under the jizz-blanket for most of the show, breathing in the warm musky scent of raider spooge while she clopped to Velvet's singing, and then switched on the invisibility-device when she made her escape.
Part of the problem is that we still don't know what the limits of these Stealth Bucks are (or even what sort of device they are in the first place, but I've completely given up hope of ever getting a straight answer on that). If there was a time limit on the invisibility that exceeded the amount of time she needed to be invisible, what she did would make sense. If the device is single-use or requires a charge or something in between uses, then what she did would make sense. Based on how these types of devices work in games, I suspect that both of these conditions are probably true; however, the author has not established either of them as fact, so it remains an ambiguous point.
>From below, I could hear somepony yelling, “It’s the slavers! They’re attacking early!”
>Completely fair assumption, I thought as I hit the stairs.
Yes, completely fair assumption. Those slavers are just plain rude, attacking ahead of schedule like that. I'm sure nopony even noticed the little murderhobo conspicuously perched in the balcony with a jizz-crusted blanket draped over her face, just as I'm sure nopony ever thought to question why this concert was even being held in the first place.
>I was halfway down when an explosion from somewhere outside let me know the panicking pony hadn’t been completely wrong.
Well, isn't that convenient. Looks like the slavers really did attack ahead of schedule. If only the raiders had been at their defensive posts instead of in here watching some random pop idol who randomly showed up and offered to sing for them, they wouldn't have been caught off guard. Maybe the eve of a battle wasn't the most ideal time to schedule an impromptu concert. Oh well, Deadeyes, live and learn. Wait a minute; never mind.
>As I raced for the terminal, my mind boggled at the coincidence.
There is nothing even remotely mind-boggling about this coincidence, nor is it a coincidence. The slavers were planning an attack within this time frame, and they attacked. This is probably the least mind-boggling thing that has happened in this entire chapter so far.
>But no, I realized as I got to the desk and activated the terminal’s single function, it wasn’t coincidence at all. Red Eye’s slavers weren’t going to trust Deadeyes. Just as Deadeyes planned to betray them, they must have always intended to attack early.
Oh, okay. So much wacky shit has happened I'd forgotten that the original plan was for Deadeyes to open the gates and let the slavers in. He probably would have literally known when they were going to attack.
>In accordance with the plan, even Gawd was in attendance, as were her loyalists.
Wait, whose plan is this in accordance with? Were the slavers also planning to kill Gawd, or was it just Deadeyes who wanted her killed? There are so many plans in this convoluted mess of bullshit I can't keep half of them straight.
Anyway, the long and short of this seems to be that the slavers were playing some kind of 5D chess, and Littlepoop played right into their hooves by spontaneously organizing a concert in order to assassinate somepony she could have easily assassinated eons ago without all of this hassle.
>The Stealth Buck was just wearing off as I dashed into the room behind the curtains.
This at least confirms that the invisibility of a stealth buck has a time limit. Now all the author needs to do is confirm whether or not it's a single-use device or is something you can use over and over, and also what the fuck it is exactly, and also he should go back and clarify all of this before we actually saw a stealth buck in operation for the first time so we would know what we were dealing with instead of trying to piece it all together after the fact.
>I found Velvet Remedy pulling herself out of a pile of skeletons. Her perfect dress had bones hanging from it.
lmao.
>Panting, I apologized, explaining about the note. She waved it off. “Oh that’s quite all right. I’d much rather be buried in a pile of skeletons than actually join them.” With a smile that melted my heart, “Thank you, Littlepip!”
>Then, as an afterthought, “Couldn’t let me finish the song, though?”
Seriously? The fucking stage just exploded, probably ten or eleven ponies were killed, Velvet herself very nearly died, and all of this was preceded by the assassination of Deadeyes, which I will once again point out is something that Velvet was vehemently opposed to only a few short scenes ago. This is her only reaction?
This is shitty writing even by k "my train wreck of a fake vagina is the result of a stage explosion and not a botched surgery; that's my story and I'm sticking to it" kat's standards. Forget Velvet's so-called principles for a second; is this seriously all she has to say about this? She was nearly killed. An entire row of ponies who were cheering her performance a few minutes ago are dead now, blown to bits as a direct consequence of her friend's actions. Something like this would traumatize nearly anyone; trained, battle-hardened soldiers get PTSD and night terrors from remembering shit like this. And all Velvet has to say about is is "Gee whiz golly gosh gumdrops, I sure am glad I didn't get all blowed up in the explosy-wosion! I just wish I could have finished my songy-wongy first!"
Seriously, kkat, take this story and cram it up whatever orifice people like you prefer to cram things.
>>294744
Anyway, whatever; fuck it. The building is now on fire or something I guess, so they have to get out. Then, suddenly, Calamity shows up. I have completely forgotten where he was supposed to be in all of this, but fuck it; I'm sure he was somewhere.
>The rust-colored pegasus galloped in a moment later, his black cowpony hat nearly falling off. A key dangled from a chain between his teeth.
Oh good, he got the fucking key. That was supposed to be their reward for doing all of this wacky bullshit in the first place. What is the purpose of this key again? Does it unlock the simple padlock that Littlepoop picked already? Or maybe there's a second locked door behind the locked door that opens with a dedicated terminal? Oh, who even gives a shit anymore?
>Velvet Remedy rolled her eyes with a laugh. “You actually stopped to get the key?”
>Calamity turned his head, hooking the chain to one of the guns on his battle saddle. “Hells ya!” He grinned to Velvet. “Dependin’ on who wins out there, Ah’m already makin’ plans t’ swoop back in an’ loot the bodies.”
"Hells yeah" is obnoxious millennial-femme-speak, not obnoxious fake-cowboy-speak. At least keep your stereotypes straight, you spooge-gargling tranny. Also: does anyone in this group ever think about anything except looting?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxD8FrR7uco
>Velvet Remedy turned up her nose.
This pony picks the weirdest moments to remember that she is supposed to have beliefs.
Anyway, it looks like they're going to sneak down into the treasure vault while the battle is going on. I remember initially thinking it was weird that the vault would be located behind the stage of the auditorium. Seems like if you've got a room that you want to keep secret, the absolute last place you'd want to put the entrance would be the literal most public room in the entire fortress. However, it seems that the whole reason was because this scene. They are now conveniently right at the entrance to the treasure vault, plus they have the key which may or may not actually be important, so they can go on down and help themselves to whatever goodie boxes are in there without having to deal with the pesky battle going on in the fortress itself.
As you may or may not recall, the entrance to the treasure vault consists of a metal gate (apparently opened when LP picked the padlock earlier), a "kill zone," which is basically just a short hallway with some gun turrets, and a second door, which was opened just now when LP used the terminal. They now have full access to the vault, but they are going to need to get past the gun turrets first. Well, how are they going to get themselves out of this little jam?
>I groaned. Turning back on the power turned on the turrets too. How could I have been so stupid as to not realize that would happen. I could have disabled them before, when it was safe.
Who the fuck designed this place? Seriously, kkat; pretend you're not a sexually-confused degenerate video game addict for like ten whole seconds and think about this the way a rational human would. Your fortress has a treasure vault, where presumably important things are kept. This room needs to be protected, but it also needs to be accessible to whoever needs to move things in and out of there. Do you:
A. Install a thick, sturdy door, put a strong lock on the door, and keep the single key on your person at all times
or
B. Install a gate with a flimsy padlock, followed by a hallway with automated gun turrets, followed by a thick sturdy door, which is computer-controlled by a remote terminal located in a different part of the building, and powered by some kind of electrical box located in yet another part of the building, and also make it so that the same electrical box that powers the door also powers the gun turrets, thus ensuring that the gun turrets will be active at the same time the door is open?
Since I'm sure this is a really difficult puzzle for you, I'm going to give you a hint. Option A will provide a reasonable amount of security while also allowing privileged access for anyone who needs it. Option B will ensure that anyone who tries to go into the treasure vault, regardless of whether or not they have a legitimate reason to do so, will have to dodge fucking machine gun fire during both ingress and egress.
I'll give you some time to think about it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkdmOVejUlI&pbjreload=101
>“Why are we still going down there anyway?” Velvet asked, clearly assuming the rest of the plan was a bust.
Let's all take a moment to savor this line; it's the first sensible thing Velvet has had to say for the entire story so far, and I suspect it will be the last.
>I lifted my PipBuck and looked at it. “Okay, we’re in luck. I’ve got one more Stealth Buck. I can use it to get up to the turrets and reprogram them, just like the ones back at that pegasus convoy. That way, they’ll let us through, and keep anypony who gets the idea to follow us out.”
Sure, why not?
>We had a plan. I pulled the dead Stealth Buck out of my PipBuck and slotted in my last one. Then I got to work.
Also, I am now more confused than ever about what exactly a Stealth Buck is. I mean, it's clear enough what it does at this point, but literally what is it? Earlier, it was described as a wrist-mounted device similar to a PipBuck. Now, it's being described as something that slots into a PipBuck. Is it like an SD card or something now? I am now officially suspecting that k "this isn't all I've got up my ass, not even by a long shot" kat is just pulling most of this story out of his well-traveled ass.
Oh yeah, one last thing:
>How could I have been so stupid as to not realize that would happen.
This is a question and it should end with a question mark.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJ6flOet6qc
Anyway, whatever; fuck it. The building is now on fire or something I guess, so they have to get out. Then, suddenly, Calamity shows up. I have completely forgotten where he was supposed to be in all of this, but fuck it; I'm sure he was somewhere.
>The rust-colored pegasus galloped in a moment later, his black cowpony hat nearly falling off. A key dangled from a chain between his teeth.
Oh good, he got the fucking key. That was supposed to be their reward for doing all of this wacky bullshit in the first place. What is the purpose of this key again? Does it unlock the simple padlock that Littlepoop picked already? Or maybe there's a second locked door behind the locked door that opens with a dedicated terminal? Oh, who even gives a shit anymore?
>Velvet Remedy rolled her eyes with a laugh. “You actually stopped to get the key?”
>Calamity turned his head, hooking the chain to one of the guns on his battle saddle. “Hells ya!” He grinned to Velvet. “Dependin’ on who wins out there, Ah’m already makin’ plans t’ swoop back in an’ loot the bodies.”
"Hells yeah" is obnoxious millennial-femme-speak, not obnoxious fake-cowboy-speak. At least keep your stereotypes straight, you spooge-gargling tranny. Also: does anyone in this group ever think about anything except looting?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxD8FrR7uco
>Velvet Remedy turned up her nose.
This pony picks the weirdest moments to remember that she is supposed to have beliefs.
Anyway, it looks like they're going to sneak down into the treasure vault while the battle is going on. I remember initially thinking it was weird that the vault would be located behind the stage of the auditorium. Seems like if you've got a room that you want to keep secret, the absolute last place you'd want to put the entrance would be the literal most public room in the entire fortress. However, it seems that the whole reason was because this scene. They are now conveniently right at the entrance to the treasure vault, plus they have the key which may or may not actually be important, so they can go on down and help themselves to whatever goodie boxes are in there without having to deal with the pesky battle going on in the fortress itself.
As you may or may not recall, the entrance to the treasure vault consists of a metal gate (apparently opened when LP picked the padlock earlier), a "kill zone," which is basically just a short hallway with some gun turrets, and a second door, which was opened just now when LP used the terminal. They now have full access to the vault, but they are going to need to get past the gun turrets first. Well, how are they going to get themselves out of this little jam?
>I groaned. Turning back on the power turned on the turrets too. How could I have been so stupid as to not realize that would happen. I could have disabled them before, when it was safe.
Who the fuck designed this place? Seriously, kkat; pretend you're not a sexually-confused degenerate video game addict for like ten whole seconds and think about this the way a rational human would. Your fortress has a treasure vault, where presumably important things are kept. This room needs to be protected, but it also needs to be accessible to whoever needs to move things in and out of there. Do you:
A. Install a thick, sturdy door, put a strong lock on the door, and keep the single key on your person at all times
or
B. Install a gate with a flimsy padlock, followed by a hallway with automated gun turrets, followed by a thick sturdy door, which is computer-controlled by a remote terminal located in a different part of the building, and powered by some kind of electrical box located in yet another part of the building, and also make it so that the same electrical box that powers the door also powers the gun turrets, thus ensuring that the gun turrets will be active at the same time the door is open?
Since I'm sure this is a really difficult puzzle for you, I'm going to give you a hint. Option A will provide a reasonable amount of security while also allowing privileged access for anyone who needs it. Option B will ensure that anyone who tries to go into the treasure vault, regardless of whether or not they have a legitimate reason to do so, will have to dodge fucking machine gun fire during both ingress and egress.
I'll give you some time to think about it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkdmOVejUlI&pbjreload=101
>“Why are we still going down there anyway?” Velvet asked, clearly assuming the rest of the plan was a bust.
Let's all take a moment to savor this line; it's the first sensible thing Velvet has had to say for the entire story so far, and I suspect it will be the last.
>I lifted my PipBuck and looked at it. “Okay, we’re in luck. I’ve got one more Stealth Buck. I can use it to get up to the turrets and reprogram them, just like the ones back at that pegasus convoy. That way, they’ll let us through, and keep anypony who gets the idea to follow us out.”
Sure, why not?
>We had a plan. I pulled the dead Stealth Buck out of my PipBuck and slotted in my last one. Then I got to work.
Also, I am now more confused than ever about what exactly a Stealth Buck is. I mean, it's clear enough what it does at this point, but literally what is it? Earlier, it was described as a wrist-mounted device similar to a PipBuck. Now, it's being described as something that slots into a PipBuck. Is it like an SD card or something now? I am now officially suspecting that k "this isn't all I've got up my ass, not even by a long shot" kat is just pulling most of this story out of his well-traveled ass.
Oh yeah, one last thing:
>How could I have been so stupid as to not realize that would happen.
This is a question and it should end with a question mark.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJ6flOet6qc
>>294745
>Also, I am now more confused than ever about what exactly a Stealth Buck is. I mean, it's clear enough what it does at this point, but literally what is it? Earlier, it was described as a wrist-mounted device similar to a PipBuck. Now, it's being described as something that slots into a PipBuck. Is it like an SD card or something now? I am now officially suspecting that k "this isn't all I've got up my ass, not even by a long shot" kat is just pulling most of this story out of his well-traveled ass.
All I've got to go on here is that it's most likely meant to be a horse pun version of the StealthBoy from the Fallout series. In those games it's a single-use device which grants the wearer a temporary bonus to their ability to evade detection - a bonus to their sneak skill (Fo1) or a Predator-style cloak (Fo3). Neither is infallible, but Kkat seems to be treating his horse version as total invisibility. Because Pip needs more unbeatable powers on top of hulk telekinesis and autoaim, apparently.
In Fallout, the Stealthboys are small devices similar to the PipBoy, worn on either the wrist or the belt depending on the model. Kkat seems to have made them into a sort of disposable PipBoy peripheral here, which at the very least streamlines their use and storage - not that he's actually taken the time to establish this. They also cause dementia if overused, so that's fun.
Another divergence from Fallout - in Pip's favour, naturally - is her apparent ability to hack turrets simply by getting close to them. There's a perk in Fallout 3 that lets you shut down turrets and robots by sneaking up on them undetected, but it requires a fairly advanced level and a reasonable investment in the Science skill. In other words, we're now supposed to assume she's a competent military software technician on top of all of her other skills and powers. Methinks the actual reason this is an ability Pip has is simply that Kkat got a bit of a boner from playing sneaky hacker with his Fallout 3 character and decided he wanted his fanfic character to do it too.
>Also, I am now more confused than ever about what exactly a Stealth Buck is. I mean, it's clear enough what it does at this point, but literally what is it? Earlier, it was described as a wrist-mounted device similar to a PipBuck. Now, it's being described as something that slots into a PipBuck. Is it like an SD card or something now? I am now officially suspecting that k "this isn't all I've got up my ass, not even by a long shot" kat is just pulling most of this story out of his well-traveled ass.
All I've got to go on here is that it's most likely meant to be a horse pun version of the StealthBoy from the Fallout series. In those games it's a single-use device which grants the wearer a temporary bonus to their ability to evade detection - a bonus to their sneak skill (Fo1) or a Predator-style cloak (Fo3). Neither is infallible, but Kkat seems to be treating his horse version as total invisibility. Because Pip needs more unbeatable powers on top of hulk telekinesis and autoaim, apparently.
In Fallout, the Stealthboys are small devices similar to the PipBoy, worn on either the wrist or the belt depending on the model. Kkat seems to have made them into a sort of disposable PipBoy peripheral here, which at the very least streamlines their use and storage - not that he's actually taken the time to establish this. They also cause dementia if overused, so that's fun.
Another divergence from Fallout - in Pip's favour, naturally - is her apparent ability to hack turrets simply by getting close to them. There's a perk in Fallout 3 that lets you shut down turrets and robots by sneaking up on them undetected, but it requires a fairly advanced level and a reasonable investment in the Science skill. In other words, we're now supposed to assume she's a competent military software technician on top of all of her other skills and powers. Methinks the actual reason this is an ability Pip has is simply that Kkat got a bit of a boner from playing sneaky hacker with his Fallout 3 character and decided he wanted his fanfic character to do it too.
>>294745
>We found ourselves creeping through caves converted to storage, piled with crates emblazoned with the name Shattered Hoof Re-Educational Stockyard.
See, this is what I don't get about this author. The gun turrets in the hallway are a little implausible to say the least, but they at least present a challenge to LP and her group. Sneaking past machine gun turrets has to make for a somewhat interesting scene, right? And yet, instead of writing a scene for it, he just has LP throw out some half-assed "oh, I'll just use my Stealth Buck to sneak around it or something" to get past it, and then doesn't even bother to write it out; he just throws in a page break and resumes the story once the characters are past the obstacle, leaving us to assume that they must have made it through the trap without incident. What was even the point of having gun turrets in there? It doesn't make much sense but it could have at least been interesting to read about; here he's just introducing something that makes no sense and then not even doing anything interesting with it. Why, for God's sake?
Honestly, as much as I bitch about the implausibility of the gamelike setting, I wouldn't mind it so much if the author could just make it interesting. You can write the most logically preposterous story you can dream up if you want, so long as you maintain some level of consistency with whatever "rules" you devise. Alice in Wonderland is not just nonsensical, it's deliberately so, and it's a great story that people love. This isn't bad because it's nonsense, it's bad because:
A) it's not intended to be nonsense
B) it's poorly written nonsense
C) it's almost excruciatingly dull nonsense most of the time.
At almost every turn, the author manages to do the exact opposite of what he ought to do. He inundates the reader with detailed trivia about characters and events from the past that have nothing obvious to do with the story, but leaves out information that could be helpful for understanding what's going on. The StealthBuck and the mysterious audio recordings LP finds lying around are good examples of this. He introduces preposterous twists like "there are machine gun turrets in the walls" and then not only does nothing with them, he purposely skips over them after introducing them, leaving the reader to wonder why they were ever mentioned at all.
This most recent scene, with the concert, was actually not bad in and of itself. Having an assassination take place during a concert scene could make a vivid scene, and the scene here was decently executed. The problem is that the setup made no sense at all; there was no reason for LP to go to such lengths just to assassinate Deadeyes, Velvet Remedy should logically have objected to participating in such an event on moral grounds, Gawd should not logically have agreed to attend a concert that could potentially have gotten her killed when there were any number of more sane options available for killing Deadeyes, and finally, it makes no sense in the first place to hold a concert at a military fortress on the eve of a fucking battle. It's almost as if the author just wanted to write that scene so badly that he didn't care how badly he had to bend the logic in his story so long as he could include it. But if the object is just to have a scene where Velvet is giving a concert and LP has to snipe someone from the balcony, there are probably any number of smarter ways to set that up.
Since the author has an established pattern of directly plagiarizing events from Fallout 3, and since it also looks like most of the decent scenes and ideas in here have been the parts that were plagiarized, I'm curious if any of our Fallout players can confirm whether or not a scene exists in any of those games where someone gets assassinated at a concert.
This author is so meticulous about doing exactly the wrong thing at every turn, that I could almost believe he's actually someone famous writing under a pseudonym, and that this is just some kind of avant-garde experiment in writing the most intentionally awful novel ever written, solely for the purpose of pissing off anyone who tried to analyze it.
Anyway, they're walking through the caves and they find some boxes.
>A few were marked with a circle proclaiming them Celestial Tier Priority and branded with either the initials M.A.S. or M.W.T.
>“Well,” I whispered conversationally to my companions. “I know M.A.S. is the Ministry of Magic, but I haven’t heard of the other one.”
Oh goody. Here I was worried about this story starting to drag. A long infodump about some long-defunct governmental organization from the distant past would be just what we need to liven things up.
Velvet informs us that M.A.S. stands for Ministry of Arcane Sciences, but before she can give us the awaited long infodump, a booming voice suddenly interrupts her:
>“So! You’re the little ponies who have come to my town and made such a mess of things. You’ve killed my lieutenant, and now you’ve come for me.”
So we're actually doing the "Mr. Topaz was hiding in the basement the whole time" schtick? This author really does seem to have a pathological need to do the exact opposite of what he ought to.
>“Mister Topaz?” Calamity asked, echoing my own thoughts. Either he was using an impressively well-hidden speaker system, or he was using magic to augment his voice. I suspected the latter. And that probably meant a unicorn. Or... a worse idea struck me... one of those pseudo-goddess things like the creature from old Appleloosa.
Yes, I think we can all agree that the most pertinent question here is "how is he amplifying his voice?" Also, the idea of alicorn-Topaz hiding in the basement is even dumber than regular-Topaz hiding in the basement. I've completely given up trying to predict where the author is planning on taking this clusterfuck.
>We found ourselves creeping through caves converted to storage, piled with crates emblazoned with the name Shattered Hoof Re-Educational Stockyard.
See, this is what I don't get about this author. The gun turrets in the hallway are a little implausible to say the least, but they at least present a challenge to LP and her group. Sneaking past machine gun turrets has to make for a somewhat interesting scene, right? And yet, instead of writing a scene for it, he just has LP throw out some half-assed "oh, I'll just use my Stealth Buck to sneak around it or something" to get past it, and then doesn't even bother to write it out; he just throws in a page break and resumes the story once the characters are past the obstacle, leaving us to assume that they must have made it through the trap without incident. What was even the point of having gun turrets in there? It doesn't make much sense but it could have at least been interesting to read about; here he's just introducing something that makes no sense and then not even doing anything interesting with it. Why, for God's sake?
Honestly, as much as I bitch about the implausibility of the gamelike setting, I wouldn't mind it so much if the author could just make it interesting. You can write the most logically preposterous story you can dream up if you want, so long as you maintain some level of consistency with whatever "rules" you devise. Alice in Wonderland is not just nonsensical, it's deliberately so, and it's a great story that people love. This isn't bad because it's nonsense, it's bad because:
A) it's not intended to be nonsense
B) it's poorly written nonsense
C) it's almost excruciatingly dull nonsense most of the time.
At almost every turn, the author manages to do the exact opposite of what he ought to do. He inundates the reader with detailed trivia about characters and events from the past that have nothing obvious to do with the story, but leaves out information that could be helpful for understanding what's going on. The StealthBuck and the mysterious audio recordings LP finds lying around are good examples of this. He introduces preposterous twists like "there are machine gun turrets in the walls" and then not only does nothing with them, he purposely skips over them after introducing them, leaving the reader to wonder why they were ever mentioned at all.
This most recent scene, with the concert, was actually not bad in and of itself. Having an assassination take place during a concert scene could make a vivid scene, and the scene here was decently executed. The problem is that the setup made no sense at all; there was no reason for LP to go to such lengths just to assassinate Deadeyes, Velvet Remedy should logically have objected to participating in such an event on moral grounds, Gawd should not logically have agreed to attend a concert that could potentially have gotten her killed when there were any number of more sane options available for killing Deadeyes, and finally, it makes no sense in the first place to hold a concert at a military fortress on the eve of a fucking battle. It's almost as if the author just wanted to write that scene so badly that he didn't care how badly he had to bend the logic in his story so long as he could include it. But if the object is just to have a scene where Velvet is giving a concert and LP has to snipe someone from the balcony, there are probably any number of smarter ways to set that up.
Since the author has an established pattern of directly plagiarizing events from Fallout 3, and since it also looks like most of the decent scenes and ideas in here have been the parts that were plagiarized, I'm curious if any of our Fallout players can confirm whether or not a scene exists in any of those games where someone gets assassinated at a concert.
This author is so meticulous about doing exactly the wrong thing at every turn, that I could almost believe he's actually someone famous writing under a pseudonym, and that this is just some kind of avant-garde experiment in writing the most intentionally awful novel ever written, solely for the purpose of pissing off anyone who tried to analyze it.
Anyway, they're walking through the caves and they find some boxes.
>A few were marked with a circle proclaiming them Celestial Tier Priority and branded with either the initials M.A.S. or M.W.T.
>“Well,” I whispered conversationally to my companions. “I know M.A.S. is the Ministry of Magic, but I haven’t heard of the other one.”
Oh goody. Here I was worried about this story starting to drag. A long infodump about some long-defunct governmental organization from the distant past would be just what we need to liven things up.
Velvet informs us that M.A.S. stands for Ministry of Arcane Sciences, but before she can give us the awaited long infodump, a booming voice suddenly interrupts her:
>“So! You’re the little ponies who have come to my town and made such a mess of things. You’ve killed my lieutenant, and now you’ve come for me.”
So we're actually doing the "Mr. Topaz was hiding in the basement the whole time" schtick? This author really does seem to have a pathological need to do the exact opposite of what he ought to.
>“Mister Topaz?” Calamity asked, echoing my own thoughts. Either he was using an impressively well-hidden speaker system, or he was using magic to augment his voice. I suspected the latter. And that probably meant a unicorn. Or... a worse idea struck me... one of those pseudo-goddess things like the creature from old Appleloosa.
Yes, I think we can all agree that the most pertinent question here is "how is he amplifying his voice?" Also, the idea of alicorn-Topaz hiding in the basement is even dumber than regular-Topaz hiding in the basement. I've completely given up trying to predict where the author is planning on taking this clusterfuck.
>>294755
>Since the author has an established pattern of directly plagiarizing events from Fallout 3, and since it also looks like most of the decent scenes and ideas in here have been the parts that were plagiarized, I'm curious if any of our Fallout players can confirm whether or not a scene exists in any of those games where someone gets assassinated at a concert.
There aren't any concerts in the Fallout games as far as I recall. The closest parallel I can think of is the attempted assassination of the New California Republic's President Kimball in Fallout New Vegas. A battle is due to take place soon and the president vists Hoover Dam to give a speech to his troops. The opposing side send assassins to murder him by way of a sniper and by placing a bomb under the stage. The player can thwart these attempts (or not), with repercussions for the game's story going forward. FoE puts the assassination target in the crowd and a secondary character on the stage, makes the main character the sniper, and tweaks the context a bit.
This is one of those bizarre moments that makes me think Kkat planned a lot of this story in advance and actually thought himself very clever for it, as Gawd, one of the potential assassination targets, winds up becoming the president of the New Canterlot Republic faction at the end of the story. This is either galaxy brain foreshadowing or a happy coincidence he jumped on when the opportunity arose.
>Since the author has an established pattern of directly plagiarizing events from Fallout 3, and since it also looks like most of the decent scenes and ideas in here have been the parts that were plagiarized, I'm curious if any of our Fallout players can confirm whether or not a scene exists in any of those games where someone gets assassinated at a concert.
There aren't any concerts in the Fallout games as far as I recall. The closest parallel I can think of is the attempted assassination of the New California Republic's President Kimball in Fallout New Vegas. A battle is due to take place soon and the president vists Hoover Dam to give a speech to his troops. The opposing side send assassins to murder him by way of a sniper and by placing a bomb under the stage. The player can thwart these attempts (or not), with repercussions for the game's story going forward. FoE puts the assassination target in the crowd and a secondary character on the stage, makes the main character the sniper, and tweaks the context a bit.
This is one of those bizarre moments that makes me think Kkat planned a lot of this story in advance and actually thought himself very clever for it, as Gawd, one of the potential assassination targets, winds up becoming the president of the New Canterlot Republic faction at the end of the story. This is either galaxy brain foreshadowing or a happy coincidence he jumped on when the opportunity arose.
>>294753
>They also cause dementia if overused, so that's fun.
Only in Nightkin, who almost all have some kind of cartoon schizophrenia. At least that's how it worked last I checked. Knowing BugthEAsderp they probably retconned that twice for a lazy half assed joke like the magic ghoul from Nuka World.
>was this ripped off?
The president saving or assassination quest from FNV. Hilariously this was the NCR sending out one vital easily sniped guy to give a speech and award some medals to "boost morale". Everyone smart involved hates this and wants you to help save the president unless the NCR hates you. The Legion also wants the president dead and you do that for them if working for them.
Kkats attempt to one-up that moment in FNV robs it of the context that made it work. This would be like if Caesar and House and Kimball all went to see an idol show performed by Veronica "left my wife at the Sierra Madre" McBrotherhood all because you shakily passed one speech check.
>They also cause dementia if overused, so that's fun.
Only in Nightkin, who almost all have some kind of cartoon schizophrenia. At least that's how it worked last I checked. Knowing BugthEAsderp they probably retconned that twice for a lazy half assed joke like the magic ghoul from Nuka World.
>was this ripped off?
The president saving or assassination quest from FNV. Hilariously this was the NCR sending out one vital easily sniped guy to give a speech and award some medals to "boost morale". Everyone smart involved hates this and wants you to help save the president unless the NCR hates you. The Legion also wants the president dead and you do that for them if working for them.
Kkats attempt to one-up that moment in FNV robs it of the context that made it work. This would be like if Caesar and House and Kimball all went to see an idol show performed by Veronica "left my wife at the Sierra Madre" McBrotherhood all because you shakily passed one speech check.
>>294771
>Only in Nightkin, who almost all have some kind of cartoon schizophrenia. At least that's how it worked last I checked.
If I remember right, this was because the nightkin used stealthboys near-constantly to hide from the outside world, what with being hulking nine foot mutants and all. Then again, it's been ages since I last played Fo1/2.
A pity that FoE's equivalent of the super mutants ie. the alicorns are so badly written. They're one Fallout concept that I'd say Kkat actually did a fairly good job of adapting into something new, at least conceptually. But I'm getting way ahead of things here.
>Only in Nightkin, who almost all have some kind of cartoon schizophrenia. At least that's how it worked last I checked.
If I remember right, this was because the nightkin used stealthboys near-constantly to hide from the outside world, what with being hulking nine foot mutants and all. Then again, it's been ages since I last played Fo1/2.
A pity that FoE's equivalent of the super mutants ie. the alicorns are so badly written. They're one Fallout concept that I'd say Kkat actually did a fairly good job of adapting into something new, at least conceptually. But I'm getting way ahead of things here.
>>294780
Oh yeah, most Nightkin hate being seen.
It's cool how Nightkin were originally just Super Mutants but invisible and in blue. Basically like those pallete swapped stronger versions of Dragon Quest enemies. Then a later game did more with the concept.
Was 2 or FNV the first game to give them their distinctive hates-being-seen skitzobullshit?
when do we get to the alicorns? I think it will be fun to see Glim tear them apart harder than Kratos and The Doomguy could while working together.
Oh yeah, most Nightkin hate being seen.
It's cool how Nightkin were originally just Super Mutants but invisible and in blue. Basically like those pallete swapped stronger versions of Dragon Quest enemies. Then a later game did more with the concept.
Was 2 or FNV the first game to give them their distinctive hates-being-seen skitzobullshit?
when do we get to the alicorns? I think it will be fun to see Glim tear them apart harder than Kratos and The Doomguy could while working together.
>>294781
>It's cool how Nightkin were originally just Super Mutants but invisible and in blue. Basically like those pallete swapped stronger versions of Dragon Quest enemies. Then a later game did more with the concept.
>Was 2 or FNV the first game to give them their distinctive hates-being-seen skitzobullshit?
In Fo1 the Nightkin were simply an elite caste of the super mutants who were better equipped than the rest, including Stealthboys. They didn't appear again in any real capacity until NV, which was what introduced their schizophrenia and explained it as the result of repeated Stealthboy use over the intervening decades.
Again, I'm of the opinion that FoE's adaptation of the mutants *in concept* is pretty neat since it twists Fallout's take on them in interesting ways, but their role as Enemies of Littlepip means that their intelligence and competence are hard-capped at roughly the level of a broken toaster.
>It's cool how Nightkin were originally just Super Mutants but invisible and in blue. Basically like those pallete swapped stronger versions of Dragon Quest enemies. Then a later game did more with the concept.
>Was 2 or FNV the first game to give them their distinctive hates-being-seen skitzobullshit?
In Fo1 the Nightkin were simply an elite caste of the super mutants who were better equipped than the rest, including Stealthboys. They didn't appear again in any real capacity until NV, which was what introduced their schizophrenia and explained it as the result of repeated Stealthboy use over the intervening decades.
Again, I'm of the opinion that FoE's adaptation of the mutants *in concept* is pretty neat since it twists Fallout's take on them in interesting ways, but their role as Enemies of Littlepip means that their intelligence and competence are hard-capped at roughly the level of a broken toaster.
>>294783
It's fascinating how so much of Fallout came from rejections of pulp scifi tropes and post apocalyptic action movie cliches. This is a terrifying world of doom and gloom where what would be sick in an action movie becomes a terrifying part of daily life. The greatest heroes are not guaranteed glory or recognition. Even the Super Mutants - who represent the idea that humanity can overlook racial differences and mutate and mix themselves into abominations while being religiously indoctrinated and forced into it by the mixed hive mind - end up sterile because that type of humanity has no future. A rejection of the idea that forced transhumanism can prevent what human error enabled.
Fallout 2's Enclave can be read as a rejection of the idea that a post apocalyptic world can only be saved once the terrible old governments partially responsible for the state of the world take over once again. As if a functional post apocalyptic country in america cant truly be called whole until the map looks like it did before the nukes flew.
Fallout NV...
The NCR continues their attack on the idea that America can be reunited through force. The NCR is full of corruption and cronyism but it could be reformed and redeemed if it had just one President who wanted that enough. The NCR could survive the death of its leaders and half of its followers and still remain functional because while they love the aid of elite Rangers they don't need micromanaging Elites to get everything done.
The Legion rejects the Wasteland by seeking to become the worst part of it. They seek to purge this terrifying world of its sin by being tougher and crueller than the nastiest tribes or beasts out there. But they at their best can barely compete with the NCR at their worst. The uncompromising Bandages The Mormon walked his units into a trap. While Caesar and the Legate made plans that only work if he has a sufficiently competent spy to enact them (you) while House has Securitrons and the NCR has the facilities to manufacture guns and armour and more. The Legion doesn't train replacements for their best and brightest like the NCR and Boomers do. House attempted to raise a successor but it backfired with Benny and could backfire harder with you.
House could save the world if everything went his way. Or he could be betrayed and robbed and ruined if things didn't go his way. Gambling's always a risky bet. If the Courier died at Goodsprings the NCR would win the Dam and House would try his hardest not to lose the Mojave as he clings to Vegas. If he couldn't do something unexpected like successfully apply to become a state of the NCR without giving up too much control over it and then begin a slow plan to become president.
The Alicorns in this story have none of this depth. I don't think it's possible to see any depth in them no matter what angle you view them from. They are just evil cunts because they are evil. Just like Raiders and Slavers, they are another type of target to shoot at in this firing range. They don't represent man's scientific hubris or blind religious zealotry and mandated ignorance of science or a muddy mixed mob. They don't repeat the sins of the past in an effort to prevent them. And they aren't even any form of meaningful social commentary on pony OCs or the inherent folly of making a "badass oc" in a world never meant to be this dark or violent.
It's fascinating how so much of Fallout came from rejections of pulp scifi tropes and post apocalyptic action movie cliches. This is a terrifying world of doom and gloom where what would be sick in an action movie becomes a terrifying part of daily life. The greatest heroes are not guaranteed glory or recognition. Even the Super Mutants - who represent the idea that humanity can overlook racial differences and mutate and mix themselves into abominations while being religiously indoctrinated and forced into it by the mixed hive mind - end up sterile because that type of humanity has no future. A rejection of the idea that forced transhumanism can prevent what human error enabled.
Fallout 2's Enclave can be read as a rejection of the idea that a post apocalyptic world can only be saved once the terrible old governments partially responsible for the state of the world take over once again. As if a functional post apocalyptic country in america cant truly be called whole until the map looks like it did before the nukes flew.
Fallout NV...
The NCR continues their attack on the idea that America can be reunited through force. The NCR is full of corruption and cronyism but it could be reformed and redeemed if it had just one President who wanted that enough. The NCR could survive the death of its leaders and half of its followers and still remain functional because while they love the aid of elite Rangers they don't need micromanaging Elites to get everything done.
The Legion rejects the Wasteland by seeking to become the worst part of it. They seek to purge this terrifying world of its sin by being tougher and crueller than the nastiest tribes or beasts out there. But they at their best can barely compete with the NCR at their worst. The uncompromising Bandages The Mormon walked his units into a trap. While Caesar and the Legate made plans that only work if he has a sufficiently competent spy to enact them (you) while House has Securitrons and the NCR has the facilities to manufacture guns and armour and more. The Legion doesn't train replacements for their best and brightest like the NCR and Boomers do. House attempted to raise a successor but it backfired with Benny and could backfire harder with you.
House could save the world if everything went his way. Or he could be betrayed and robbed and ruined if things didn't go his way. Gambling's always a risky bet. If the Courier died at Goodsprings the NCR would win the Dam and House would try his hardest not to lose the Mojave as he clings to Vegas. If he couldn't do something unexpected like successfully apply to become a state of the NCR without giving up too much control over it and then begin a slow plan to become president.
The Alicorns in this story have none of this depth. I don't think it's possible to see any depth in them no matter what angle you view them from. They are just evil cunts because they are evil. Just like Raiders and Slavers, they are another type of target to shoot at in this firing range. They don't represent man's scientific hubris or blind religious zealotry and mandated ignorance of science or a muddy mixed mob. They don't repeat the sins of the past in an effort to prevent them. And they aren't even any form of meaningful social commentary on pony OCs or the inherent folly of making a "badass oc" in a world never meant to be this dark or violent.
>>294791
>>294791
>The Alicorns in this story have none of this depth. I don't think it's possible to see any depth in them no matter what angle you view them from. They are just evil cunts because they are evil. Just like Raiders and Slavers, they are another type of target to shoot at in this firing range. They don't represent man's scientific hubris or blind religious zealotry and mandated ignorance of science or a muddy mixed mob. They don't repeat the sins of the past in an effort to prevent them. And they aren't even any form of meaningful social commentary on pony OCs or the inherent folly of making a "badass oc" in a world never meant to be this dark or violent.
Respectfully disagree. I'm not going to any particular depth here since it won't be relevant to the story for at least a few chapters yet, but there's a lot of potential - and I stress that word - in FoE's alicorns because their main divergence from Fallout's super mutants is that they're a true hive mind, united by the controlling persona of a specific canon character rather an an OC. This allows them, at least in theory, to act as a sort of character exploration of Trixie, whose overriding arrogance and self-image were all she had left after mutating into a hideous monstrosity. They could also have served as a sort of "Starlight Glimmer but four seasons early" by posing the question of whether harsh circumstances justify giving up one's individuality for power or security. They also sidestep the "mutants are sterile" problem that the muties have in Fallout, which gives them a long term goal aside from "lol conquer the world just because".
Kkat writes them as idiots and squanders any hypothetical value they might have had from a narrative perspective, granted, but that's how he writes EVERYONE.
>>294791
>The Alicorns in this story have none of this depth. I don't think it's possible to see any depth in them no matter what angle you view them from. They are just evil cunts because they are evil. Just like Raiders and Slavers, they are another type of target to shoot at in this firing range. They don't represent man's scientific hubris or blind religious zealotry and mandated ignorance of science or a muddy mixed mob. They don't repeat the sins of the past in an effort to prevent them. And they aren't even any form of meaningful social commentary on pony OCs or the inherent folly of making a "badass oc" in a world never meant to be this dark or violent.
Respectfully disagree. I'm not going to any particular depth here since it won't be relevant to the story for at least a few chapters yet, but there's a lot of potential - and I stress that word - in FoE's alicorns because their main divergence from Fallout's super mutants is that they're a true hive mind, united by the controlling persona of a specific canon character rather an an OC. This allows them, at least in theory, to act as a sort of character exploration of Trixie, whose overriding arrogance and self-image were all she had left after mutating into a hideous monstrosity. They could also have served as a sort of "Starlight Glimmer but four seasons early" by posing the question of whether harsh circumstances justify giving up one's individuality for power or security. They also sidestep the "mutants are sterile" problem that the muties have in Fallout, which gives them a long term goal aside from "lol conquer the world just because".
Kkat writes them as idiots and squanders any hypothetical value they might have had from a narrative perspective, granted, but that's how he writes EVERYONE.
>>294793
But this story was written during S1. Trixie was just a travelling performer whose big talk convinced two local idiots to put her to the test. She could have fled town when the Ursa Minor they thought was an Ursa Major showed up. But instead she stood and fought. And got her home destroyed for it. Nopony thanked Trixie for trying to help. Spike and Snips and Snails ended up rewarded with moustaches for bringing this monster into town while Trixie left town. She has at least some good inside her. And did not yet willingly seek out an evil amulet of power boosting and let it corrupt her into a vengeance obsesed torturing tyrant umable to express much of any horror at what she did once the amulet was removed. To this day I still consider this and her return some of FIM's worst episodes but certainly not the worst. This character is a Unicorn who professionally performs the kind of stage magic a goddamn Donkey could do. There is so much opportunity for depth and analysis here. She could have been FIM's first ever well written redeemed villain if they just gave her episodes more drafts. She works well in a "manipulative schemer magician" role but to reduce her to a mindless brutish egotistical Power Rangers villainess is a massice disservice to her character.
But this story was written during S1. Trixie was just a travelling performer whose big talk convinced two local idiots to put her to the test. She could have fled town when the Ursa Minor they thought was an Ursa Major showed up. But instead she stood and fought. And got her home destroyed for it. Nopony thanked Trixie for trying to help. Spike and Snips and Snails ended up rewarded with moustaches for bringing this monster into town while Trixie left town. She has at least some good inside her. And did not yet willingly seek out an evil amulet of power boosting and let it corrupt her into a vengeance obsesed torturing tyrant umable to express much of any horror at what she did once the amulet was removed. To this day I still consider this and her return some of FIM's worst episodes but certainly not the worst. This character is a Unicorn who professionally performs the kind of stage magic a goddamn Donkey could do. There is so much opportunity for depth and analysis here. She could have been FIM's first ever well written redeemed villain if they just gave her episodes more drafts. She works well in a "manipulative schemer magician" role but to reduce her to a mindless brutish egotistical Power Rangers villainess is a massice disservice to her character.
>>294802
Don't get me wrong, I completely agree with virtually all of this, but I'm only talking about what the character could have been in the hands of a competent writer. Kkat's writing ability (or lack thereof) is the point of fault here.
Don't get me wrong, I completely agree with virtually all of this, but I'm only talking about what the character could have been in the hands of a competent writer. Kkat's writing ability (or lack thereof) is the point of fault here.
>>294808
True.
In the fandom's early years a lot of people projected new villainous traits onto existing minor villains when they didn't feel like making anything new. If this character archetype had been used as a baddie before, it became that baddie but again. Suddenly Prince Blueblood becomes a politically powerful evil bastard able to abuse mares however he wants and force them to be with him. Suddenly Trixie becomes a schemer obsessed with destroying or stealing everything Twilight has that she doesn't. Gilda becomes evil too. Sometimes they even got together in a stupid "elements of evil/insanity/disunity/chaos" band with any empty "evil counterpart of this mane six member" slots filled with background ponies given stupid fandom names.
Never saw anyone write this seriously, exploring the characters of some assholes brought together to destroy some heroes lives only to end up forming actual friendships with each other and finding the companionship and acceptance they needed.
True.
In the fandom's early years a lot of people projected new villainous traits onto existing minor villains when they didn't feel like making anything new. If this character archetype had been used as a baddie before, it became that baddie but again. Suddenly Prince Blueblood becomes a politically powerful evil bastard able to abuse mares however he wants and force them to be with him. Suddenly Trixie becomes a schemer obsessed with destroying or stealing everything Twilight has that she doesn't. Gilda becomes evil too. Sometimes they even got together in a stupid "elements of evil/insanity/disunity/chaos" band with any empty "evil counterpart of this mane six member" slots filled with background ponies given stupid fandom names.
Never saw anyone write this seriously, exploring the characters of some assholes brought together to destroy some heroes lives only to end up forming actual friendships with each other and finding the companionship and acceptance they needed.
Littlepip and her friends should have evil counterparts. People who are almost entirely like the heroes only slightly different in a way that makes them evil. It would also call back to your ability to play a self-interested asshole or malevolent puppy-kicker in Fallout games.
Just imagine showing this team of "evil protags" who run around robbing and lying and carelessly murderhoboing despite the horrible consequences this "I must be the biggest baddest baddie. I will solve all the world's problems with power and a bullet" mindset create. The real heroes could sometimes do their own quests and sometimes clean up the consequences of Team Littleheart's Evil
What do you think Team LP's evil counterparts would look and act like?
Just imagine showing this team of "evil protags" who run around robbing and lying and carelessly murderhoboing despite the horrible consequences this "I must be the biggest baddest baddie. I will solve all the world's problems with power and a bullet" mindset create. The real heroes could sometimes do their own quests and sometimes clean up the consequences of Team Littleheart's Evil
What do you think Team LP's evil counterparts would look and act like?
>>294873
I didn't read the end of the story so not sure if it goes down this way but feel like considering what you said about Red Eye and his opinion on the alicorns it would make an interesting dichotomy between him and Little Pip. Got LP who believes in the idea of the Princesses and what they represented, thinking ponies as individuals should strive to follow the teachings they provided. Then got Red Eyes who only sees the raw power the alicorns possess and think they should rule the wastelands with an iron hoof simply due to the fact they are as powerful as they are.
Would allow for some interesting banter between the two and give them both some internal conflict trying to think of the benefits behind their beliefs wondering if memes are enough to make ponies try to rebuild and be better or if unfettered power can be trusted to build anything worthwhile.
I'd say currently it might not be the best to have an evil counterpart to our band of misfit heroes considering how little the current cast is fleshed out. Each only have 1 or 2 traits to distinguish themsevles so their evil counterparts would just be as equal of caricatures.
If the story was more video game-y I'd say it'd be a really funny idea to do giving a little meta wink at the fans of the Fallout games. I really liked that idea Glim had of this story just being the CMC and some others playing a Fallout Equestria tabletop rpg and a bit shocking how well it fits so far. As is the story keeps skirting this line between the two trying to be dark and serious but also want to be quippy and meta about MLP and Fallout game mechanics and Bethesda AI programming. Makes it hard for the dark stuff to stick when characters have to crack a joke or LP comments on how thick Velvet's ass is and hard for the comedic stuff to land when it feels like LP looks at the camera while the actions pause for a bit so she can wink and tell a joke about how goofy the situation is.
I didn't read the end of the story so not sure if it goes down this way but feel like considering what you said about Red Eye and his opinion on the alicorns it would make an interesting dichotomy between him and Little Pip. Got LP who believes in the idea of the Princesses and what they represented, thinking ponies as individuals should strive to follow the teachings they provided. Then got Red Eyes who only sees the raw power the alicorns possess and think they should rule the wastelands with an iron hoof simply due to the fact they are as powerful as they are.
Would allow for some interesting banter between the two and give them both some internal conflict trying to think of the benefits behind their beliefs wondering if memes are enough to make ponies try to rebuild and be better or if unfettered power can be trusted to build anything worthwhile.
I'd say currently it might not be the best to have an evil counterpart to our band of misfit heroes considering how little the current cast is fleshed out. Each only have 1 or 2 traits to distinguish themsevles so their evil counterparts would just be as equal of caricatures.
If the story was more video game-y I'd say it'd be a really funny idea to do giving a little meta wink at the fans of the Fallout games. I really liked that idea Glim had of this story just being the CMC and some others playing a Fallout Equestria tabletop rpg and a bit shocking how well it fits so far. As is the story keeps skirting this line between the two trying to be dark and serious but also want to be quippy and meta about MLP and Fallout game mechanics and Bethesda AI programming. Makes it hard for the dark stuff to stick when characters have to crack a joke or LP comments on how thick Velvet's ass is and hard for the comedic stuff to land when it feels like LP looks at the camera while the actions pause for a bit so she can wink and tell a joke about how goofy the situation is.
>>294874
I suggested this game might be the CMCs and Spike playing a Fallout DND game and started thinking this as I went through the story. I had this whole journal theory post full of what I thought were hints at the last second twist I thought the story would take. But the journal was on deviantart and my deviantart account was deleted by the commie bastards.
If I recall some of the theory was...
Apple Bloom is Littlepip. She's the leader of the bunch. She's in pony hell. She's finally back to kick some tail. Her scoped handgun can fire in spurts. If she shoots you, you'll fucking die. Hoo. L! P! Littlepip! L! P! Littlepip is gay!
Just kidding. Basically they both have goal oriented mindsets and a tendency to forget the small steps leading up to the big goals. Both are small and female. They are both leaders of their groups but AB knows little about magic and couldn't be bothered to deal with the magic system so she asked to swap spellcasting for overpowered telekinesis instead.
Sweetie Belle is Velvet. Sometimes she remembers she is supposed to be a Lawful Good Bard and tries to make her character act even more noble and moral than LP. Sometimes she forgets that and gets caught up in the singing and gay flirting. AB isn't gay but likes getting Roleplaying EXP for acting gay while SB loves it when people treat her character like she's pretty. SB initially started writing the Silver Belle character, using a name she wanted to use for Velvet, but eventually decided she was too sad and needed a happy ending RIGHT FUCKING NOW even though Spike just finished working parts of her backstory into the plot and world by making Deadeyes responsible for her home burning down.
Scootaloo is Calamity. She designed him stats first and then forgot to give this cowboy plank of wood a personality or meaningful history. Eventually she gets bored and designs another character with a different gun and different highest stat and different backstory. And proceeds to play him like a boring plank of wood. Also the best she can do when trying to think of an Apple name is Applesnack.
Spike is the Dungeon Master. He's trying to write a grim dark edgy pony hell world for the heroes to adventure in but he gets way too obsessed with dumping lore on the heroes so they tend to forget about it and focus on the looting and shooting. He even does GM sin number zero introducing an invincible self insert GMPC with a flimsy excuse for not saving the world himself for the sole purpose of infodumping lore on the heroes and handing them a direct path to their vague objective only for the players to pretty much forget about it and focus on fun murderhoboing instead. Spike is The Watcher aka those random spritebots aka pure motherfucking plot convenience and that is cringe.
Twist showed up for a few sessions and didn't like the backstory for the world so she made her character an Obligatory Good Zebra with a super tragic backstory and nothing else and then got tired of the game and quit. This shallow character has nothing to say or do but is still a part of the party anyway now controlled by Spike. This gives her the power to melee the most dangerous enemies possible to death.
I suggested this game might be the CMCs and Spike playing a Fallout DND game and started thinking this as I went through the story. I had this whole journal theory post full of what I thought were hints at the last second twist I thought the story would take. But the journal was on deviantart and my deviantart account was deleted by the commie bastards.
If I recall some of the theory was...
Apple Bloom is Littlepip. She's the leader of the bunch. She's in pony hell. She's finally back to kick some tail. Her scoped handgun can fire in spurts. If she shoots you, you'll fucking die. Hoo. L! P! Littlepip! L! P! Littlepip is gay!
Just kidding. Basically they both have goal oriented mindsets and a tendency to forget the small steps leading up to the big goals. Both are small and female. They are both leaders of their groups but AB knows little about magic and couldn't be bothered to deal with the magic system so she asked to swap spellcasting for overpowered telekinesis instead.
Sweetie Belle is Velvet. Sometimes she remembers she is supposed to be a Lawful Good Bard and tries to make her character act even more noble and moral than LP. Sometimes she forgets that and gets caught up in the singing and gay flirting. AB isn't gay but likes getting Roleplaying EXP for acting gay while SB loves it when people treat her character like she's pretty. SB initially started writing the Silver Belle character, using a name she wanted to use for Velvet, but eventually decided she was too sad and needed a happy ending RIGHT FUCKING NOW even though Spike just finished working parts of her backstory into the plot and world by making Deadeyes responsible for her home burning down.
Scootaloo is Calamity. She designed him stats first and then forgot to give this cowboy plank of wood a personality or meaningful history. Eventually she gets bored and designs another character with a different gun and different highest stat and different backstory. And proceeds to play him like a boring plank of wood. Also the best she can do when trying to think of an Apple name is Applesnack.
Spike is the Dungeon Master. He's trying to write a grim dark edgy pony hell world for the heroes to adventure in but he gets way too obsessed with dumping lore on the heroes so they tend to forget about it and focus on the looting and shooting. He even does GM sin number zero introducing an invincible self insert GMPC with a flimsy excuse for not saving the world himself for the sole purpose of infodumping lore on the heroes and handing them a direct path to their vague objective only for the players to pretty much forget about it and focus on fun murderhoboing instead. Spike is The Watcher aka those random spritebots aka pure motherfucking plot convenience and that is cringe.
Twist showed up for a few sessions and didn't like the backstory for the world so she made her character an Obligatory Good Zebra with a super tragic backstory and nothing else and then got tired of the game and quit. This shallow character has nothing to say or do but is still a part of the party anyway now controlled by Spike. This gives her the power to melee the most dangerous enemies possible to death.
>>294878
Ah been a bit since we last talked about it so forgot who said it initially but man that had me cracking up reading that and would vastly improve the story if that was the case. Could make one of those big sequence jumps like the epilogue of Sun and the Rose work super well with an exhausted Spike watching his campaign derail while the CMC are oblivious to his plight and decide a cutie mark in role playing isn't that neat and just wander off learning nothing from the experience.
Ah been a bit since we last talked about it so forgot who said it initially but man that had me cracking up reading that and would vastly improve the story if that was the case. Could make one of those big sequence jumps like the epilogue of Sun and the Rose work super well with an exhausted Spike watching his campaign derail while the CMC are oblivious to his plight and decide a cutie mark in role playing isn't that neat and just wander off learning nothing from the experience.
>>294873
>What do you think Team LP's evil counterparts would look and act like?
Excessively Large Pip
This huge, hulking Pegasus pony is a distant descendant of Bulk Biceps. Remarkable even amongst large ponies for his excessive size and strength, Pip is also an adept Pip-Buck technician, hacker and locksmith, who specializes in being able to break nearly any lock known to ponykind. In addition, he is a notorious kleptomaniac who is also famous for cutting a long, bloody swath across the Edgequestrian Wasteland. This pony will ruthlessly and gleefully slaughter nearly anypony who crosses his path. While this may sound exactly like Littlepip, the difference is that this guy does Bad Guy Stuff for Bad Guy Reasons, whereas Littlepip does Bad Guy Stuff for Good Guy Reasons. This is a very important distinction to both LP and ELP. Also, he's big.
Scarlet Pumpernickel
This in-your-face Earth Pony likes to dress hood and talk trash. She always wanted to be a gangsta rapper, and will bust phat rhymes at anypony who cares to listen, as well as anypony who doesn't. Unfortunately, the strict Asian Overmare of her Stable insisted that she become a doctor instead. She takes out her frustration on her patients, intentionally giving them the wrong medicine so that they die slowly and painfully. When that doesn't work, she makes them listen to her raps, which are terrible. As such, she is known as the world's shittiest doctor as well as the world's shittiest rapper, and was subsequently kicked out of her Stable. While one might suspect this would be exactly what she wanted as it would allow her to give up medicine and pursue her rap career, one would be wrong, as she has an irrational terror of the outside world. Highly opinionated, she will cling stubbornly to her beliefs even when presented with incontrovertible evidence that she is wrong.
Lord Wimbledon III
A descendant of Fancy Pants, this Unicorn hates all things country with a passion. He goes out of his way to use proper diction, pronouncing all words slowly and carefully. He usually wears a top hat and monocle everywhere he goes, so ponies will see him and know how dainty and fancy he is. Having a particular disdain for big, over the top displays of firepower, he refuses to arm himself even while wandering the Edgequestrian Wasteland. Instead, he carries a set of single-shot dueling pistols, and instead of fighting will challenge his enemies to an old-timey duel. By the time he has finished explaining all of the complex, archaic rules by which the duel is to proceed, his enemies have usually lost all interest in killing him.
>What do you think Team LP's evil counterparts would look and act like?
Excessively Large Pip
This huge, hulking Pegasus pony is a distant descendant of Bulk Biceps. Remarkable even amongst large ponies for his excessive size and strength, Pip is also an adept Pip-Buck technician, hacker and locksmith, who specializes in being able to break nearly any lock known to ponykind. In addition, he is a notorious kleptomaniac who is also famous for cutting a long, bloody swath across the Edgequestrian Wasteland. This pony will ruthlessly and gleefully slaughter nearly anypony who crosses his path. While this may sound exactly like Littlepip, the difference is that this guy does Bad Guy Stuff for Bad Guy Reasons, whereas Littlepip does Bad Guy Stuff for Good Guy Reasons. This is a very important distinction to both LP and ELP. Also, he's big.
Scarlet Pumpernickel
This in-your-face Earth Pony likes to dress hood and talk trash. She always wanted to be a gangsta rapper, and will bust phat rhymes at anypony who cares to listen, as well as anypony who doesn't. Unfortunately, the strict Asian Overmare of her Stable insisted that she become a doctor instead. She takes out her frustration on her patients, intentionally giving them the wrong medicine so that they die slowly and painfully. When that doesn't work, she makes them listen to her raps, which are terrible. As such, she is known as the world's shittiest doctor as well as the world's shittiest rapper, and was subsequently kicked out of her Stable. While one might suspect this would be exactly what she wanted as it would allow her to give up medicine and pursue her rap career, one would be wrong, as she has an irrational terror of the outside world. Highly opinionated, she will cling stubbornly to her beliefs even when presented with incontrovertible evidence that she is wrong.
Lord Wimbledon III
A descendant of Fancy Pants, this Unicorn hates all things country with a passion. He goes out of his way to use proper diction, pronouncing all words slowly and carefully. He usually wears a top hat and monocle everywhere he goes, so ponies will see him and know how dainty and fancy he is. Having a particular disdain for big, over the top displays of firepower, he refuses to arm himself even while wandering the Edgequestrian Wasteland. Instead, he carries a set of single-shot dueling pistols, and instead of fighting will challenge his enemies to an old-timey duel. By the time he has finished explaining all of the complex, archaic rules by which the duel is to proceed, his enemies have usually lost all interest in killing him.
>>294755
Continuing.
>And here I was, all out of boxcars.
Durr hurr hurr.
>I quickly passed out the magical ammo, giving a prayer to Celestia and another to Luna.
What magical ammo? Where and when did she get magical ammo? How does magical ammo differ from regular ammo? I suspect that if I went back through the text with a fine toothed comb, I'd probably find some point in the story where LP picked up some sort of magical ammo, so it's probably legal for her to have this right now. However, as I've often complained, it's annoying to have to constantly search for stupid details like this. Also, while I don't doubt that she legitimately picked up the ammo, I am also fairly certain we have not had any sort of explanation as to what it is or what its capabilities are.
Anyway, in what I'm assuming is an attempt at channeling Fluttershy's angry-mom routine from the series, Velvet begins yelling at the mysterious voice. She tells it that she is "not impressed," and demands that the speaker show himself. There is a completely unnecessary page break, and then it turns out that Mr. Topaz is a dragon. Yep, this autism is actually in the text.
The first few paragraphs of the next scene are dreadfully incoherent, and it took me awhile to figure out what exactly is going on. As far as I can tell, they pissed off the dragon, and now it's chasing them. There was a clear attempt at humor here, but a visual gag in a story needs to be described clearly and concisely enough that we can see what's happening without the timing of the joke being ruined. Here is my best guess as to the exact sequence of events:
>Topaz the Dragon makes a big, scary speech
>Velvet Remedy is not impressed, and begins scolding him, admonishing him to show himself
>As soon as it becomes apparent that Topaz is a dragon, Calamity fires a shot
>The dragon begins to chase them
>Velvet makes some snarky remark about how they could have talked it out
Now, they are running through the tunnels of the underground vault, with LP recklessly tearing out support beams behind them in an effort to trap the dragon, apparently not realizing that causing a cave-in would not benefit them in the long run. Oh, also, the magic bullets, whatever the fuck they are and wherever the fuck they got them from, apparently work well enough, but the dragon is large enough that they don't do much actual damage.
>Without slowing, Velvet laughed as we ran past a large metal door. “Well, there’s your vault! Anypony want to stop and open it?”
Wait, aren't they in the vault already? I thought this location was the vault. I have completely lost all track of what the fuck they are even supposed to be doing at this point. Maybe this door is what the key they took from Deadeyes opens.
Anyway, now, after all this bullshit, they run back out of the treasure vault and are now where they started, in the backstage area behind the auditorium of Shattered Hoof. Apparently the tunnels that LP collapsed by knocking away support beams were not the tunnels that they needed to get out. So now, they're right back where they started. Wait, aren't there machine gun turrets in the walls here? Oh wait; Littlepoop disabled them or something.
>The turrets opened fire as I raced through them.
No, wait; actually she didn't I guess. Then how did they get past them initially? Oh, who even cares.
The next few paragraphs are also very poorly written, and it's again difficult to follow what's happening, but here is my best guess:
>Calamity runs out of the treasure vault, followed by Velvet. For some reason, the gun turrets in the wall don't fire on them.
>Littlepoop runs out. The dragon is right on her heels, and she can feel its breath on her neck.
>The gun turrets don't fire on Littlepoop either for some reason. However, as soon as the dragon enters the hallway, the turrets begin to fire.
>The dragon gets mad and breathes fire on the turrets, which destroys them.
>Littlepoop is close enough that she gets caught in the blaze. One of her saddlebags is destroyed, and she is badly burned.
>Despite being badly burned, she is still able to escape the hall and run off down another hall that is apparently too narrow for the dragon to fit through.
>She looks back over her shoulder and sees the dragon burning the crap out of the cafeteria or auditorium or whatever the fuck, attacking slavers and raiders alike.
>Then, suddenly, for no apparent reason, the dragon disappears.
There is another page break, and the next scene opens with Littlepoop in one of the bathrooms, treating her third degree burns by pouring cold tap water on them. The whereabouts of Calamity and Velvet Remedy are not known.
>The dragon, I assumed, had headed back into the mines. He could fly around the mess hall all he wanted, but the rest of the halls were too narrow for him. He was probably born down there or...
I have completely given up trying to figure out where the author is going with any of this. I guess Mr. Topaz was a dragon the whole time, and he lived down in the mines and apparently must have been born there because he is physically too large to pass through any other part of the building so it would be logistically impossible for him to enter or exit the mines. Oh, also, I think I've figured out that the mines and the treasure vault are two separate yet connected locations: the mines are below the fortress, and the treasure vault is accessed through the mines.
>Velvet Remedy collapsed next to me, breathing heavily.
Oh okay, I guess Velvet Remedy is in the bathroom too. Good to know.
However, it appears that Calamity is still missing. Neither of them know what became of him. If he has any brains, he is probably high-tailing it the fuck out of there and will want nothing further to do with Littlepoop and her dumb ideas; however, I suspect he does not and will not.
Continuing.
>And here I was, all out of boxcars.
Durr hurr hurr.
>I quickly passed out the magical ammo, giving a prayer to Celestia and another to Luna.
What magical ammo? Where and when did she get magical ammo? How does magical ammo differ from regular ammo? I suspect that if I went back through the text with a fine toothed comb, I'd probably find some point in the story where LP picked up some sort of magical ammo, so it's probably legal for her to have this right now. However, as I've often complained, it's annoying to have to constantly search for stupid details like this. Also, while I don't doubt that she legitimately picked up the ammo, I am also fairly certain we have not had any sort of explanation as to what it is or what its capabilities are.
Anyway, in what I'm assuming is an attempt at channeling Fluttershy's angry-mom routine from the series, Velvet begins yelling at the mysterious voice. She tells it that she is "not impressed," and demands that the speaker show himself. There is a completely unnecessary page break, and then it turns out that Mr. Topaz is a dragon. Yep, this autism is actually in the text.
The first few paragraphs of the next scene are dreadfully incoherent, and it took me awhile to figure out what exactly is going on. As far as I can tell, they pissed off the dragon, and now it's chasing them. There was a clear attempt at humor here, but a visual gag in a story needs to be described clearly and concisely enough that we can see what's happening without the timing of the joke being ruined. Here is my best guess as to the exact sequence of events:
>Topaz the Dragon makes a big, scary speech
>Velvet Remedy is not impressed, and begins scolding him, admonishing him to show himself
>As soon as it becomes apparent that Topaz is a dragon, Calamity fires a shot
>The dragon begins to chase them
>Velvet makes some snarky remark about how they could have talked it out
Now, they are running through the tunnels of the underground vault, with LP recklessly tearing out support beams behind them in an effort to trap the dragon, apparently not realizing that causing a cave-in would not benefit them in the long run. Oh, also, the magic bullets, whatever the fuck they are and wherever the fuck they got them from, apparently work well enough, but the dragon is large enough that they don't do much actual damage.
>Without slowing, Velvet laughed as we ran past a large metal door. “Well, there’s your vault! Anypony want to stop and open it?”
Wait, aren't they in the vault already? I thought this location was the vault. I have completely lost all track of what the fuck they are even supposed to be doing at this point. Maybe this door is what the key they took from Deadeyes opens.
Anyway, now, after all this bullshit, they run back out of the treasure vault and are now where they started, in the backstage area behind the auditorium of Shattered Hoof. Apparently the tunnels that LP collapsed by knocking away support beams were not the tunnels that they needed to get out. So now, they're right back where they started. Wait, aren't there machine gun turrets in the walls here? Oh wait; Littlepoop disabled them or something.
>The turrets opened fire as I raced through them.
No, wait; actually she didn't I guess. Then how did they get past them initially? Oh, who even cares.
The next few paragraphs are also very poorly written, and it's again difficult to follow what's happening, but here is my best guess:
>Calamity runs out of the treasure vault, followed by Velvet. For some reason, the gun turrets in the wall don't fire on them.
>Littlepoop runs out. The dragon is right on her heels, and she can feel its breath on her neck.
>The gun turrets don't fire on Littlepoop either for some reason. However, as soon as the dragon enters the hallway, the turrets begin to fire.
>The dragon gets mad and breathes fire on the turrets, which destroys them.
>Littlepoop is close enough that she gets caught in the blaze. One of her saddlebags is destroyed, and she is badly burned.
>Despite being badly burned, she is still able to escape the hall and run off down another hall that is apparently too narrow for the dragon to fit through.
>She looks back over her shoulder and sees the dragon burning the crap out of the cafeteria or auditorium or whatever the fuck, attacking slavers and raiders alike.
>Then, suddenly, for no apparent reason, the dragon disappears.
There is another page break, and the next scene opens with Littlepoop in one of the bathrooms, treating her third degree burns by pouring cold tap water on them. The whereabouts of Calamity and Velvet Remedy are not known.
>The dragon, I assumed, had headed back into the mines. He could fly around the mess hall all he wanted, but the rest of the halls were too narrow for him. He was probably born down there or...
I have completely given up trying to figure out where the author is going with any of this. I guess Mr. Topaz was a dragon the whole time, and he lived down in the mines and apparently must have been born there because he is physically too large to pass through any other part of the building so it would be logistically impossible for him to enter or exit the mines. Oh, also, I think I've figured out that the mines and the treasure vault are two separate yet connected locations: the mines are below the fortress, and the treasure vault is accessed through the mines.
>Velvet Remedy collapsed next to me, breathing heavily.
Oh okay, I guess Velvet Remedy is in the bathroom too. Good to know.
However, it appears that Calamity is still missing. Neither of them know what became of him. If he has any brains, he is probably high-tailing it the fuck out of there and will want nothing further to do with Littlepoop and her dumb ideas; however, I suspect he does not and will not.
>>294883
>I had realized that the giant hole torn in the razor wire over the yard must have been the work of the dragon. And that led me to: “The cargo elevator! The dragon’s going to come up through the rock yard!”
Several things here. First of all, I don't recall hearing any previous mention of a hole in the razor wire or a cargo elevator. As ever, this probably means that the author did in fact mention them at one point, but without placing any special emphasis on them that would mark them as significant details.
Second, this seems to be yet another example of LP making leaps of logic that don't necessarily follow each other. A moment ago, we had LP speculating that the dragon must have been born in the mines because he is too large to physically maneuver through the halls of Shattered Hoof. Now, she is apparently speculating that he must be able to get in and out via a cargo elevator that I don't remember ever being mentioned, and cites as evidence a hole in the razor wire that could have been made by just about anything.
Third, if a cargo elevator exists that leads directly from the rock yard to the mines, it only makes the design of this place even more absurd. The entrance to the mines was protected with a locked gate, a hallway full of machine gun turrets, and a second locked door. What is the point of all of this ridiculous security overkill, when anyone who wants to go down there can just use the goddamn elevator in the yard?
Anyway, Velvet treats Littlepoop's third degree burns with a syringe and some bandages. Despite not having the slightest idea where Calamity is or whether or not he's in any actual danger, LP determines that she needs to find him and help him. However, her third degree burns are apparently severe enough that the usual bullshit medicine doesn't 100% cure her at this point I'd like to remind my readers that this pony's leg was literally severed at one point in this story, and iirc was healed with a potion.
>“Do we... have any Buck in our supplies?” I bit my lower lip, hating to ask her for such a thing.
What the buck is Buck? The name has been mentioned once or twice, and from what I can tell it's an illicit substance along the same lines as the crack mints she may or may not have an addiction to, but we've never had an explanation of what it is or what it does. However, it's a moot point; they apparently do have it for some reason, and Velvet gives it to her. For anyone who cares, it is apparently an orange pill.
Now that the pesky matter of having third degree burns has been attended to, Littlepoop now turns her attention to what's really important. She orders Velvet to go look for Calamity, and then informs her that she will be going back down into the fucking mines to try and get to the fucking treasure vault.
>“But...” Velvet Remedy frowned, “Littlepip, you don’t have the key!”
>With a smile, “When have I ever needed a key to get past a lock?”
Have I mentioned lately that I really, really hate this character?
Page break. LP is now running back through the charred remains of the auditorium, or cafeteria, or whatever the hell it is. And needless to say, being third-degree-burned doesn't stop her from looting a few corpses along the way.
As she reaches the entrance to the mines (here described as the vault, despite the author's earlier clarification that the vault is a separate location within the mines), she is challenged by a pony of unknown allegiance who attacks her with some kind of magic lance or something. Blah blah blah, they fight, LP gores the pony with her horn. The pony is now lying on the ground, dying in agony and whimpering about how she doesn't want to die. LP does this:
>I contemplated breaking her neck. She was already dead -- why make her suffer? I raised my hoof...
>...And stepped over her. I just couldn’t do that. No matter what I was allowing the wasteland to make me, I hadn’t changed that much yet.
This pony picks the weirdest moments to remember that she is supposed to have a conscience. Wait a minute; is she supposed to have a conscience? Wait a minute; shouldn't her conscience compel her to put this pony out of her misery, since that would be the humane thing to do here? Again, I get the impression the author is trying to show LP as morally conflicted, but again he's doing a piss-poor job of it.
Anyway, she drapes her blanket over the dying pony. Since we have not heard about her having any blanket besides the raider blanket she's been using as "camouflage," I can only assume this is the one the text means. So, as her sudden pang of "conscience" precludes her simply putting this poor pony out of her misery, she instead throws a jizz-crusted blanket over her face and leaves her to die alone and in agony. In the author's warped imagination, I'm sure this counts as a gesture of kindness. Also, for some reason or another, she drops the magic rifle she was carrying and swaps it out for the pony's magic lance.
Despite the fact that the fire-breathing dragon that nearly killed her had returned to the mines and would reasonably still be around, we are assured that Littlepoop does not encounter any trouble on her way to the treasure vault.
After a page break, we rejoin her at the door of the vault. She is once again plying her obnoxious lockpicking skills, proving that she does not, in fact, need the key that they went to all the trouble of obtaining. However, she does trip some kind of alarm system when she picks the lock.
>I planted my forehooves on the heavy metal door and, straining, pushed it open. (Something I almost certainly couldn’t have done if I wasn’t hyped on Buck.)
It's clear enough from context that Buck is some kind of amphetamine similar to the crack mints she was munching earlier. Again, it might have been helpful for the author to clarify a few things here; we have absolutely no idea why the party has this stuff with them, and it's also unclear how LP would know what it is in the first place.
>I had realized that the giant hole torn in the razor wire over the yard must have been the work of the dragon. And that led me to: “The cargo elevator! The dragon’s going to come up through the rock yard!”
Several things here. First of all, I don't recall hearing any previous mention of a hole in the razor wire or a cargo elevator. As ever, this probably means that the author did in fact mention them at one point, but without placing any special emphasis on them that would mark them as significant details.
Second, this seems to be yet another example of LP making leaps of logic that don't necessarily follow each other. A moment ago, we had LP speculating that the dragon must have been born in the mines because he is too large to physically maneuver through the halls of Shattered Hoof. Now, she is apparently speculating that he must be able to get in and out via a cargo elevator that I don't remember ever being mentioned, and cites as evidence a hole in the razor wire that could have been made by just about anything.
Third, if a cargo elevator exists that leads directly from the rock yard to the mines, it only makes the design of this place even more absurd. The entrance to the mines was protected with a locked gate, a hallway full of machine gun turrets, and a second locked door. What is the point of all of this ridiculous security overkill, when anyone who wants to go down there can just use the goddamn elevator in the yard?
Anyway, Velvet treats Littlepoop's third degree burns with a syringe and some bandages. Despite not having the slightest idea where Calamity is or whether or not he's in any actual danger, LP determines that she needs to find him and help him. However, her third degree burns are apparently severe enough that the usual bullshit medicine doesn't 100% cure her at this point I'd like to remind my readers that this pony's leg was literally severed at one point in this story, and iirc was healed with a potion.
>“Do we... have any Buck in our supplies?” I bit my lower lip, hating to ask her for such a thing.
What the buck is Buck? The name has been mentioned once or twice, and from what I can tell it's an illicit substance along the same lines as the crack mints she may or may not have an addiction to, but we've never had an explanation of what it is or what it does. However, it's a moot point; they apparently do have it for some reason, and Velvet gives it to her. For anyone who cares, it is apparently an orange pill.
Now that the pesky matter of having third degree burns has been attended to, Littlepoop now turns her attention to what's really important. She orders Velvet to go look for Calamity, and then informs her that she will be going back down into the fucking mines to try and get to the fucking treasure vault.
>“But...” Velvet Remedy frowned, “Littlepip, you don’t have the key!”
>With a smile, “When have I ever needed a key to get past a lock?”
Have I mentioned lately that I really, really hate this character?
Page break. LP is now running back through the charred remains of the auditorium, or cafeteria, or whatever the hell it is. And needless to say, being third-degree-burned doesn't stop her from looting a few corpses along the way.
As she reaches the entrance to the mines (here described as the vault, despite the author's earlier clarification that the vault is a separate location within the mines), she is challenged by a pony of unknown allegiance who attacks her with some kind of magic lance or something. Blah blah blah, they fight, LP gores the pony with her horn. The pony is now lying on the ground, dying in agony and whimpering about how she doesn't want to die. LP does this:
>I contemplated breaking her neck. She was already dead -- why make her suffer? I raised my hoof...
>...And stepped over her. I just couldn’t do that. No matter what I was allowing the wasteland to make me, I hadn’t changed that much yet.
This pony picks the weirdest moments to remember that she is supposed to have a conscience. Wait a minute; is she supposed to have a conscience? Wait a minute; shouldn't her conscience compel her to put this pony out of her misery, since that would be the humane thing to do here? Again, I get the impression the author is trying to show LP as morally conflicted, but again he's doing a piss-poor job of it.
Anyway, she drapes her blanket over the dying pony. Since we have not heard about her having any blanket besides the raider blanket she's been using as "camouflage," I can only assume this is the one the text means. So, as her sudden pang of "conscience" precludes her simply putting this poor pony out of her misery, she instead throws a jizz-crusted blanket over her face and leaves her to die alone and in agony. In the author's warped imagination, I'm sure this counts as a gesture of kindness. Also, for some reason or another, she drops the magic rifle she was carrying and swaps it out for the pony's magic lance.
Despite the fact that the fire-breathing dragon that nearly killed her had returned to the mines and would reasonably still be around, we are assured that Littlepoop does not encounter any trouble on her way to the treasure vault.
After a page break, we rejoin her at the door of the vault. She is once again plying her obnoxious lockpicking skills, proving that she does not, in fact, need the key that they went to all the trouble of obtaining. However, she does trip some kind of alarm system when she picks the lock.
>I planted my forehooves on the heavy metal door and, straining, pushed it open. (Something I almost certainly couldn’t have done if I wasn’t hyped on Buck.)
It's clear enough from context that Buck is some kind of amphetamine similar to the crack mints she was munching earlier. Again, it might have been helpful for the author to clarify a few things here; we have absolutely no idea why the party has this stuff with them, and it's also unclear how LP would know what it is in the first place.
>>294884
Anyway, she gets inside the treasure vault finally.
>The room was filled, top to bottom, with shelves of memory orbs. Each orb was tagged with a date and a “guest number”. There must have been hundreds of them.
While we're on the subject of shit the author hasn't bothered to explain, did we ever find out what exactly a memory orb is? I remember they found one somewhere, in a safe near the ruins of Cloudsdayle as I recall, but I don't think we ever found out what it is or what it does.
Then, suddenly, the dragon appears. He is too large to get inside the vault, but he is able to effectively block the exit and prevent her from escaping. I don't know if there is any significance to it or not, but all of Topaz' dialogue is in boldface for some obnoxious reason or other. I think it's meant to signify that he has a loud and booming voice.
Anyway, it sounds like he was on his way to go and eat up all of Littlepoop's friends, but then she set off the alarm and that made him decide to come down here and eat her instead, because he's a dragon and eating ponies is what dragons do I guess.
>“The gemstones are dessert, of course. You ponies, you’re the main course.” The dragon scowled, making me want to scream. “Of course, you went and mucked everything up. I spend all this time and effort ensuring a harvest perfect for a final pre-sleep meal, and now most of them are dead!”
I'm not entirely clear what the hell he's talking about here. I'm assuming the implication was that he was going to eat the invading slavers, or maybe he was planning to eat the soldiers on his own side too. As to the gemstones, I have no fucking idea. From what I understand the purpose of Shattered Hoof is more or less to harvest gemstones by breaking them out of rocks, but I assumed the gems were being sold somewhere or used for something. If the purpose of the entire operation was just to provide food for this one faggot dragon then that is beyond retarded, but I'll reserve judgement until we see where the author is going with it.
>The dragon’s gaze was drawn momentarily to one of the rolling balls. “What exactly were you expecting to find in here anyway? Mountains of gems? Because you thought I’d enjoy needing to call down that imbecile Deadeyes every time I got a bit peckish? Did you even look in the crates?”
I for one have no idea what she was expecting to find down here, or even why she bothered to come down here at all, since Calamity has the key and it would stand to reason that finding him would take priority over breaking into this stupid vault anyway. So little of this story makes any damn sense. Also: what crates? There are no crates in this room that the author has mentioned.
Anyway, I guess she's trying to keep him talking or something until she can think up a plan. The dragon helpfully explains that all of the memory orbs contain "confessions" extracted from the various prisoners of Shattered Hoof back when it was a prison. The question of why an old storage room full of dusty old criminal records from 200 years ago would have been important enough to Deadeyes that he'd keep the key on his person at all times is left unexplained. The question of how the dragon knows what the memory orbs contain is also left unexplained. For that matter, the question of what the memory orbs are exactly, how they work, and what sort of magical ability is a prerequisite for reading the information on them is also left unexplained.
Instead, the dragon rattles off a bunch of cliche villain bullshit about how the pony race does terrible things to each other and they clearly don't deserve to be anything but dragon food and blah blah blah.
>The dragon was going to eat me. There were no options, no tricks, no other ways out. I was going to die here. Like this. Alone in a tiny metal room underneath a prison.
Sucks to be you, bitch. Maybe you should use your final moments to reflect on some of your recent choices.
Anyway, there's some more inane dialogue, mostly consisting of dumb jokes about eating ponies (the dragon seems to think of little else), and then suddenly Calamity shows up out of nowhere and rescues her from the clutches of certain death.
For some reason or other he went all the way back to Junction R7 to pick up some kind of plasma cannon that I guess they had there, that was probably mentioned earlier but I've forgotten all about because I can't be fucked to keep track of all the different kinds of ridiculous weapons that exist in this story and where they are kept. However, it seems that even this was not enough to kill the dragon, because it gets up and starts coming after them again. Calamity blasts it again, it survives but just barely, and then he dumps the cannon, puts LP on his back, and carries her up out of the mines through that elevator shaft that I guess exists.
The dragon is still alive for some reason, and chases them for some reason. Littlepoop throws some grenades down his throat, and that seems to finally do the trick. Calamity flies LP back to the Junction, and then informs her that Velvet Remedy is at the Visitor's Center and he has to go back and get her. He departs, and LP goes to sleep. End of chapter.
If anyone cares, she also got some perk that improves her ability to land headshots or something.
Anyway, she gets inside the treasure vault finally.
>The room was filled, top to bottom, with shelves of memory orbs. Each orb was tagged with a date and a “guest number”. There must have been hundreds of them.
While we're on the subject of shit the author hasn't bothered to explain, did we ever find out what exactly a memory orb is? I remember they found one somewhere, in a safe near the ruins of Cloudsdayle as I recall, but I don't think we ever found out what it is or what it does.
Then, suddenly, the dragon appears. He is too large to get inside the vault, but he is able to effectively block the exit and prevent her from escaping. I don't know if there is any significance to it or not, but all of Topaz' dialogue is in boldface for some obnoxious reason or other. I think it's meant to signify that he has a loud and booming voice.
Anyway, it sounds like he was on his way to go and eat up all of Littlepoop's friends, but then she set off the alarm and that made him decide to come down here and eat her instead, because he's a dragon and eating ponies is what dragons do I guess.
>“The gemstones are dessert, of course. You ponies, you’re the main course.” The dragon scowled, making me want to scream. “Of course, you went and mucked everything up. I spend all this time and effort ensuring a harvest perfect for a final pre-sleep meal, and now most of them are dead!”
I'm not entirely clear what the hell he's talking about here. I'm assuming the implication was that he was going to eat the invading slavers, or maybe he was planning to eat the soldiers on his own side too. As to the gemstones, I have no fucking idea. From what I understand the purpose of Shattered Hoof is more or less to harvest gemstones by breaking them out of rocks, but I assumed the gems were being sold somewhere or used for something. If the purpose of the entire operation was just to provide food for this one faggot dragon then that is beyond retarded, but I'll reserve judgement until we see where the author is going with it.
>The dragon’s gaze was drawn momentarily to one of the rolling balls. “What exactly were you expecting to find in here anyway? Mountains of gems? Because you thought I’d enjoy needing to call down that imbecile Deadeyes every time I got a bit peckish? Did you even look in the crates?”
I for one have no idea what she was expecting to find down here, or even why she bothered to come down here at all, since Calamity has the key and it would stand to reason that finding him would take priority over breaking into this stupid vault anyway. So little of this story makes any damn sense. Also: what crates? There are no crates in this room that the author has mentioned.
Anyway, I guess she's trying to keep him talking or something until she can think up a plan. The dragon helpfully explains that all of the memory orbs contain "confessions" extracted from the various prisoners of Shattered Hoof back when it was a prison. The question of why an old storage room full of dusty old criminal records from 200 years ago would have been important enough to Deadeyes that he'd keep the key on his person at all times is left unexplained. The question of how the dragon knows what the memory orbs contain is also left unexplained. For that matter, the question of what the memory orbs are exactly, how they work, and what sort of magical ability is a prerequisite for reading the information on them is also left unexplained.
Instead, the dragon rattles off a bunch of cliche villain bullshit about how the pony race does terrible things to each other and they clearly don't deserve to be anything but dragon food and blah blah blah.
>The dragon was going to eat me. There were no options, no tricks, no other ways out. I was going to die here. Like this. Alone in a tiny metal room underneath a prison.
Sucks to be you, bitch. Maybe you should use your final moments to reflect on some of your recent choices.
Anyway, there's some more inane dialogue, mostly consisting of dumb jokes about eating ponies (the dragon seems to think of little else), and then suddenly Calamity shows up out of nowhere and rescues her from the clutches of certain death.
For some reason or other he went all the way back to Junction R7 to pick up some kind of plasma cannon that I guess they had there, that was probably mentioned earlier but I've forgotten all about because I can't be fucked to keep track of all the different kinds of ridiculous weapons that exist in this story and where they are kept. However, it seems that even this was not enough to kill the dragon, because it gets up and starts coming after them again. Calamity blasts it again, it survives but just barely, and then he dumps the cannon, puts LP on his back, and carries her up out of the mines through that elevator shaft that I guess exists.
The dragon is still alive for some reason, and chases them for some reason. Littlepoop throws some grenades down his throat, and that seems to finally do the trick. Calamity flies LP back to the Junction, and then informs her that Velvet Remedy is at the Visitor's Center and he has to go back and get her. He departs, and LP goes to sleep. End of chapter.
If anyone cares, she also got some perk that improves her ability to land headshots or something.
>>294884
>What the buck is Buck? The name has been mentioned once or twice, and from what I can tell it's an illicit substance along the same lines as the crack mints she may or may not have an addiction to, but we've never had an explanation of what it is or what it does. However, it's a moot point; they apparently do have it for some reason, and Velvet gives it to her. For anyone who cares, it is apparently an orange pill.
Another thing for the Fo3 fans. Buck is most likely a ponification of Buffout, an anabolic steroid that boosts strength and endurance. So in other words, she spends the latter part of this chapter roided up on top of all her other endearing qualities.
>So, as her sudden pang of "conscience" precludes her simply putting this poor pony out of her misery, she instead throws a jizz-crusted blanket over her face and leaves her to die alone and in agony.
GOD. I'd forgotten about this. Littlepip really is an absolute self-righteous shit. If I recall correctly, the scar she picked up in the fight with this random mare causes her more long term angst than leaving the poor pony to bleed out under a filthy blanket. And this isn't the last time Pip behaves in an absolutely abhorrent manner towards the dead and/or dying. Just wait until the scene much later with the cola bottle.
>What the buck is Buck? The name has been mentioned once or twice, and from what I can tell it's an illicit substance along the same lines as the crack mints she may or may not have an addiction to, but we've never had an explanation of what it is or what it does. However, it's a moot point; they apparently do have it for some reason, and Velvet gives it to her. For anyone who cares, it is apparently an orange pill.
Another thing for the Fo3 fans. Buck is most likely a ponification of Buffout, an anabolic steroid that boosts strength and endurance. So in other words, she spends the latter part of this chapter roided up on top of all her other endearing qualities.
>So, as her sudden pang of "conscience" precludes her simply putting this poor pony out of her misery, she instead throws a jizz-crusted blanket over her face and leaves her to die alone and in agony.
GOD. I'd forgotten about this. Littlepip really is an absolute self-righteous shit. If I recall correctly, the scar she picked up in the fight with this random mare causes her more long term angst than leaving the poor pony to bleed out under a filthy blanket. And this isn't the last time Pip behaves in an absolutely abhorrent manner towards the dead and/or dying. Just wait until the scene much later with the cola bottle.
>>294883
Still got to read the other posts so may have clarified it there but LittlePip went and reprogrammed the turrets after sneaking up to them with the Stealthbuck. Didn't explain how since you said there was a page break but after the scene resumes she talks about how they are programmed now to let LittlePip and her party pass while any of Deadeyes'sss's goons will be shot at now.
Very video game-y type thing and would have been interesting had it been explained how she understands programing centuries old tech like that but I'm guessing she probably did something like the EFS where anything green it'll avoid and anything yellow or red it'll fire on. If not that then I'm guessing she's have just made a quip about reading a magazine on hacking military grade turrets at some point during their travels.
Will have to call a mulligan in favor of Kkat this time. He didn't mention how any of it happened but did say what LittlePip's plan was with the turrets.
Still got to read the other posts so may have clarified it there but LittlePip went and reprogrammed the turrets after sneaking up to them with the Stealthbuck. Didn't explain how since you said there was a page break but after the scene resumes she talks about how they are programmed now to let LittlePip and her party pass while any of Deadeyes'sss's goons will be shot at now.
Very video game-y type thing and would have been interesting had it been explained how she understands programing centuries old tech like that but I'm guessing she probably did something like the EFS where anything green it'll avoid and anything yellow or red it'll fire on. If not that then I'm guessing she's have just made a quip about reading a magazine on hacking military grade turrets at some point during their travels.
Will have to call a mulligan in favor of Kkat this time. He didn't mention how any of it happened but did say what LittlePip's plan was with the turrets.
>evil counterparts
This is fucking perfect.
Hey, wouldn't it be funny if to contrast with Littlepip's ezcessive wordiness
And occasional tendency to make things overcomplicated despite the one track mind she usually has
And frequent scenes of trying to justify her evil deeds to herself
He was an immensely and comically straightforward guy able to find the easy solution and achieve it easily with his overwhelming might? The kind of cut-the-knot motherfucker who calls himself a "master lockpicker" because he can smash any key or safe door open. Plus while she simps for her lesbian girlfriend, he is awash in mare pussy and canonically ploughs numerous bitches. Bitches will literally offer their goods and services to him in return for a night with his turboner supreme. And while LP uses the guns of dead people and scavenged shit he makes it a point of pride to construct his own mighty bullets and oversized guns for a unique brand of overkill only one as big and strong as he could control.
Speaking of sex this story's sex scene is worse than My Immortal's.
>>294884
>lp's amazing disappearing injuries
The author uses Littlepip taking horrible injuries, and then recovering from them almost immediately with the aid of plentiful overpowered supplies, as a substitute for the author's reluctance to meaningfully wound or hurt or hinder Littlepoop the overpowered god moder.
I'd accuse the author of taking videogame "if you have more than 1 HP a health potion can fix anything" logic too far but videogames, especially RPGs, double especially Fallout, solved this immersion problem with Limb Condition and Status Effects.
If your only meaningfully different health states are "alive" and "dead", anything dangerous that can't instakill you is meaningless. Who cares about losing 40hp out of 200?
Crippled limbs slow you down and can fuck you up, Fallout has that, but almost all RPGs have status effects like Confused and Burned and Frozen and Asleep. Ideally this keeps encounters tense because you never know when you'll need to spend a turn that could be spent attacking or healing using a Status Effect-removing spell or item instead.
What good is a poison when everyone has enough antidote or temporary immunizations? What good is burn salve and poison antidote and smellingsalts when everyone carries enough healing potions to keep a reckless murderhobo alive?
A heroic soldier in a realistic setting full of heroism and pride marching despite the pain of his shot and bandaged leg is more heroic than some overpowered action movie god slaughtering puny humans in a setting where bullets never kill anyone named.
>buck
Guys I forget is Buck supposed to be the Fallout drug Buffout or Psycho? One of them makes me angrier than the other, no pun intended.
Buffout temporarily makes you stronger and fitter. Psycho makes you angry temporarily which increases the damage you deal by 25%. Neither of these are used for or could reasonably used for used for curing burns. It's not like Littlepip's an old hag taking a shot of Buffout so she can temporarily gain enough fitness to become likelier to survive some risky medical operation. That's something smart only a genius would think of, and whoever thought of that must be very handsome.
>LP can SPARE/KILL
The first time I saw this scene I expected LP to give the dying poner some healing potion in return for intel amd/or a party member. Instead she lets the pony bleed out horribly and loots the magic lance while forced to endure this fucking cum rag (imagine the smell!) for fuck's sake. This is like something out of a goddamn parody of itself except it is the joke and not even an Abridged Series-style take on this thing could make it funnier than this.
A moment like this, when done right, would have been better earlier on in the story. Imagine the party encounters a wounded merchant and saves her from raiders but the merchant got fatally wounded and her choices are get her neck snapped now or die crying. Velvet would be all "I wanna try healing even though we have no medical supplies strong enough to save her!" and Calamity would say to give her the easy way out. Calamity kills the Merchant because LP couldn't bring herself to kill an innocent pony, Velvet gets mopey and whiney over this, Littlepip gets sad but also tougher.
Alternatively she could have a Conscience Moment when trying to play Good Cop to Calamity's torture-loving bastard cop with some assassin they captured alive and need intel from.
>they never established buck
Would it have killed Kkat to write Gawd giving Littlepip some items that could be useful on her little murderhobo quest followed by explanations of them? You know, some Bond Movie/Spongebob The Movie/Monty Python and the Holy Grail shit.
The StealthBuck and Buck the drug and the magical lance/magical bullets that should have buck in their name somewhere to keep the theme going... this would be the perfect place to seamlessly introduce them to LP and the audience before they are used to-
Yo what if Team Littlepip separated heist style during the concert?
3 separate factions. Gawds griffons and Deadeye Deadeyes's Dead-Eyes, two rival merc groups working for Red Eye, are scheming against each other and LP arranges the concert in Mr Topaz's Dragon Hoard Casino. Topaz the dragonfurry spellcasting unicorn also works for Red Eye but is being blackmailed by Gawd and Deadeyes.
Gawd thinks LP will shoot DE. DE thinks LP will shoot Gawd. MrT thinks LP will shoot both Gawd and DE.
LP's real plan?
Velvet sings the longest songs she knows and this stalling gets funny fast because she's been drinking the Schezerade, LP tries to rob the vault and deal with security that requires some lead security guards severed head to bypass but she KOs him out of morality after a bossfight, and when the singing stops Calamity shoots Deadeyes to buy more time for LP's secret heist on the Casino
Then Topaz finds out, Dragons Up with a single spell, and gets killed by LP
Heist mission stylishly accomplished
This is fucking perfect.
Hey, wouldn't it be funny if to contrast with Littlepip's ezcessive wordiness
And occasional tendency to make things overcomplicated despite the one track mind she usually has
And frequent scenes of trying to justify her evil deeds to herself
He was an immensely and comically straightforward guy able to find the easy solution and achieve it easily with his overwhelming might? The kind of cut-the-knot motherfucker who calls himself a "master lockpicker" because he can smash any key or safe door open. Plus while she simps for her lesbian girlfriend, he is awash in mare pussy and canonically ploughs numerous bitches. Bitches will literally offer their goods and services to him in return for a night with his turboner supreme. And while LP uses the guns of dead people and scavenged shit he makes it a point of pride to construct his own mighty bullets and oversized guns for a unique brand of overkill only one as big and strong as he could control.
Speaking of sex this story's sex scene is worse than My Immortal's.
>>294884
>lp's amazing disappearing injuries
The author uses Littlepip taking horrible injuries, and then recovering from them almost immediately with the aid of plentiful overpowered supplies, as a substitute for the author's reluctance to meaningfully wound or hurt or hinder Littlepoop the overpowered god moder.
I'd accuse the author of taking videogame "if you have more than 1 HP a health potion can fix anything" logic too far but videogames, especially RPGs, double especially Fallout, solved this immersion problem with Limb Condition and Status Effects.
If your only meaningfully different health states are "alive" and "dead", anything dangerous that can't instakill you is meaningless. Who cares about losing 40hp out of 200?
Crippled limbs slow you down and can fuck you up, Fallout has that, but almost all RPGs have status effects like Confused and Burned and Frozen and Asleep. Ideally this keeps encounters tense because you never know when you'll need to spend a turn that could be spent attacking or healing using a Status Effect-removing spell or item instead.
What good is a poison when everyone has enough antidote or temporary immunizations? What good is burn salve and poison antidote and smellingsalts when everyone carries enough healing potions to keep a reckless murderhobo alive?
A heroic soldier in a realistic setting full of heroism and pride marching despite the pain of his shot and bandaged leg is more heroic than some overpowered action movie god slaughtering puny humans in a setting where bullets never kill anyone named.
>buck
Guys I forget is Buck supposed to be the Fallout drug Buffout or Psycho? One of them makes me angrier than the other, no pun intended.
Buffout temporarily makes you stronger and fitter. Psycho makes you angry temporarily which increases the damage you deal by 25%. Neither of these are used for or could reasonably used for used for curing burns. It's not like Littlepip's an old hag taking a shot of Buffout so she can temporarily gain enough fitness to become likelier to survive some risky medical operation. That's something smart only a genius would think of, and whoever thought of that must be very handsome.
>LP can SPARE/KILL
The first time I saw this scene I expected LP to give the dying poner some healing potion in return for intel amd/or a party member. Instead she lets the pony bleed out horribly and loots the magic lance while forced to endure this fucking cum rag (imagine the smell!) for fuck's sake. This is like something out of a goddamn parody of itself except it is the joke and not even an Abridged Series-style take on this thing could make it funnier than this.
A moment like this, when done right, would have been better earlier on in the story. Imagine the party encounters a wounded merchant and saves her from raiders but the merchant got fatally wounded and her choices are get her neck snapped now or die crying. Velvet would be all "I wanna try healing even though we have no medical supplies strong enough to save her!" and Calamity would say to give her the easy way out. Calamity kills the Merchant because LP couldn't bring herself to kill an innocent pony, Velvet gets mopey and whiney over this, Littlepip gets sad but also tougher.
Alternatively she could have a Conscience Moment when trying to play Good Cop to Calamity's torture-loving bastard cop with some assassin they captured alive and need intel from.
>they never established buck
Would it have killed Kkat to write Gawd giving Littlepip some items that could be useful on her little murderhobo quest followed by explanations of them? You know, some Bond Movie/Spongebob The Movie/Monty Python and the Holy Grail shit.
The StealthBuck and Buck the drug and the magical lance/magical bullets that should have buck in their name somewhere to keep the theme going... this would be the perfect place to seamlessly introduce them to LP and the audience before they are used to-
Yo what if Team Littlepip separated heist style during the concert?
3 separate factions. Gawds griffons and Deadeye Deadeyes's Dead-Eyes, two rival merc groups working for Red Eye, are scheming against each other and LP arranges the concert in Mr Topaz's Dragon Hoard Casino. Topaz the dragonfurry spellcasting unicorn also works for Red Eye but is being blackmailed by Gawd and Deadeyes.
Gawd thinks LP will shoot DE. DE thinks LP will shoot Gawd. MrT thinks LP will shoot both Gawd and DE.
LP's real plan?
Velvet sings the longest songs she knows and this stalling gets funny fast because she's been drinking the Schezerade, LP tries to rob the vault and deal with security that requires some lead security guards severed head to bypass but she KOs him out of morality after a bossfight, and when the singing stops Calamity shoots Deadeyes to buy more time for LP's secret heist on the Casino
Then Topaz finds out, Dragons Up with a single spell, and gets killed by LP
Heist mission stylishly accomplished
>>294885
>memory orbs
You know that movie Strange Times with the rioting nignogd and memory device that can let you store and replay memories for the viewing pleasure of yourself and others just like the memory balls from Imside Out or the Pensieve from Harry Potter? Kkat must have seen one of those before writing this.
I want to give Kkat credit for putting something in this story that isn't stolen from Fallout even though it's literally just a pre-war flashback justification device that's been done a million times in other media and never gets used for anything smart. An exercise VHS tape or training manual VHS tape would work better if that VHS was actually a memory ball that lets you experience its stored flashback to let you remember its skills instantly. Those are the kinds of memories that would sell well enough to be found after the apocalypse. That and sex. Maybe happy convincing but fake wholesome memories too, but I doubt Kkat would think to poopoo Ponyland's cutesy kiddie cartoon character-sryle immaturity and childish "wholesome 100 haha my house looks like its made of gingerbread" tastes by saying they only read books with happy endings and hated hearing bad and sad news on the radio. Fallout took massive shits on the aspects of American culture that supposedly caused its nuclear downfall but Kkat's attempted moments of "satirizing" of pony culture is muddled and aimless. Canon ponies never put up "Better wiped than striped" posters. Those who might would never allow pony cities to be swamped with Zebra refugees.
>bolded text
Only thing worse than quirky text tricks like this is when some words get bigger or a fancy font to represent how they are said, or the author arbitrarily decides some characters never use capital letters or speech quotes. Motherfucker, Kkat, you ain't Sans Undertale.
>mucked up
Did kkat forget this is rated R? I don't think this is supposed to be a mothertrucking "affably evil guy never swears because he wants to feel above his vulgar coworkers" character trait.
>final pre-sleep meal
Everyone in this world talks exactly the fucking same aside from crude forced gimmicks. "Final pre-sleep meal" sounds awkward because it is ham fisted exposition shoved into too few words for any personality to be expressed here. Nobody realistically talks like this and it doesn't sound right in fiction. Shouldn't this massive motherfucker who's threatening to eat ponies talk in a more grandiose manner befitting of an arrogant bastard who thinks he's invincible and has all the time in the world to talk and sadistically savour the fear of his prey between hibernations?
>one mine for one Dragon?
Establishing Topaz as an evil casino owner working for Red Eye and making Topaz a Unicorn who turned an old mining oenal labour prison(shut down by Flutters because she is now a cuck who thinks prisons should not be punishments) into a casino that passes for fancy in Edgequestria would make it less retarded that LP is able to get a concert together so quickly. Making him secretly skim gems off the top to fuel his Dragon Form feasts while he supplies gems for some Red Eye Weapons Factory the heroes can raid later, this would clear shit up and keep things more believable. If there's a motherfucking dragon here under Red Eye's control why would it be here and not conquering somewhere else for Red Eye? Why would this motherfucking Dragon be a myth or mystery? Why would he take orders from Red Eye unless sufficiently big guns fired by big bads could hurt it?
Also if LP saved Whatshisface the Magical Lance User, now would be a great time to be saved by that poner to prove mercy and sparing can be good too.
I forgot to mention this but no matter what type of roid Buck is supposed to be, LP doesn't act like a pony on drugs. Doesn't act hyper brutal and then get shocked at how brutally she beat a Raider to death. Doesn't act like she feels invincible right until the drug wears off at the worst possible time for her like the Berserker Powerup from the Doom Comic. She fucking lets an enemy bleed out when she would normally execute enemies without a second thought. She sucks at mercy. But being on roids canonically makes her try to be more merciful than usual. Gee its almost as if Kkat writes drugs like they're videogame powerups and forgets all about the story effects they should have beyond strength buffs.
And does anyone else think LPs ability to easily turn turrets to her side is way too convenient and powerful? It should backfire horribly at least once.
>memory orbs
You know that movie Strange Times with the rioting nignogd and memory device that can let you store and replay memories for the viewing pleasure of yourself and others just like the memory balls from Imside Out or the Pensieve from Harry Potter? Kkat must have seen one of those before writing this.
I want to give Kkat credit for putting something in this story that isn't stolen from Fallout even though it's literally just a pre-war flashback justification device that's been done a million times in other media and never gets used for anything smart. An exercise VHS tape or training manual VHS tape would work better if that VHS was actually a memory ball that lets you experience its stored flashback to let you remember its skills instantly. Those are the kinds of memories that would sell well enough to be found after the apocalypse. That and sex. Maybe happy convincing but fake wholesome memories too, but I doubt Kkat would think to poopoo Ponyland's cutesy kiddie cartoon character-sryle immaturity and childish "wholesome 100 haha my house looks like its made of gingerbread" tastes by saying they only read books with happy endings and hated hearing bad and sad news on the radio. Fallout took massive shits on the aspects of American culture that supposedly caused its nuclear downfall but Kkat's attempted moments of "satirizing" of pony culture is muddled and aimless. Canon ponies never put up "Better wiped than striped" posters. Those who might would never allow pony cities to be swamped with Zebra refugees.
>bolded text
Only thing worse than quirky text tricks like this is when some words get bigger or a fancy font to represent how they are said, or the author arbitrarily decides some characters never use capital letters or speech quotes. Motherfucker, Kkat, you ain't Sans Undertale.
>mucked up
Did kkat forget this is rated R? I don't think this is supposed to be a mothertrucking "affably evil guy never swears because he wants to feel above his vulgar coworkers" character trait.
>final pre-sleep meal
Everyone in this world talks exactly the fucking same aside from crude forced gimmicks. "Final pre-sleep meal" sounds awkward because it is ham fisted exposition shoved into too few words for any personality to be expressed here. Nobody realistically talks like this and it doesn't sound right in fiction. Shouldn't this massive motherfucker who's threatening to eat ponies talk in a more grandiose manner befitting of an arrogant bastard who thinks he's invincible and has all the time in the world to talk and sadistically savour the fear of his prey between hibernations?
>one mine for one Dragon?
Establishing Topaz as an evil casino owner working for Red Eye and making Topaz a Unicorn who turned an old mining oenal labour prison(shut down by Flutters because she is now a cuck who thinks prisons should not be punishments) into a casino that passes for fancy in Edgequestria would make it less retarded that LP is able to get a concert together so quickly. Making him secretly skim gems off the top to fuel his Dragon Form feasts while he supplies gems for some Red Eye Weapons Factory the heroes can raid later, this would clear shit up and keep things more believable. If there's a motherfucking dragon here under Red Eye's control why would it be here and not conquering somewhere else for Red Eye? Why would this motherfucking Dragon be a myth or mystery? Why would he take orders from Red Eye unless sufficiently big guns fired by big bads could hurt it?
Also if LP saved Whatshisface the Magical Lance User, now would be a great time to be saved by that poner to prove mercy and sparing can be good too.
I forgot to mention this but no matter what type of roid Buck is supposed to be, LP doesn't act like a pony on drugs. Doesn't act hyper brutal and then get shocked at how brutally she beat a Raider to death. Doesn't act like she feels invincible right until the drug wears off at the worst possible time for her like the Berserker Powerup from the Doom Comic. She fucking lets an enemy bleed out when she would normally execute enemies without a second thought. She sucks at mercy. But being on roids canonically makes her try to be more merciful than usual. Gee its almost as if Kkat writes drugs like they're videogame powerups and forgets all about the story effects they should have beyond strength buffs.
And does anyone else think LPs ability to easily turn turrets to her side is way too convenient and powerful? It should backfire horribly at least once.
>>294900
I noticed that LittlePip's drug addiction aspect seems to appear and disappear at random. Tried to establish she got addicted to those Mentats or whatever the pony version is but she hasn't shown any withdrawal symptoms for awhile and Kkat hasn't used that addiction as a way to explain why she is such a kleptomaniac trying to find more drugs or stuff to sell to buy more.
In my earlier post I hypothesised since LittlePip is a Pip-Buck technician maybe she knows how to program or troubleshoot the Eyes Forward Sparkle. Granted we have no idea how that works and the actual act of her hacking the turrets was skimmed over but perhaps she was able to code it to be synced with her EFS so any blips registered as her friends will be spared and any pony else is fair game.
I noticed that LittlePip's drug addiction aspect seems to appear and disappear at random. Tried to establish she got addicted to those Mentats or whatever the pony version is but she hasn't shown any withdrawal symptoms for awhile and Kkat hasn't used that addiction as a way to explain why she is such a kleptomaniac trying to find more drugs or stuff to sell to buy more.
In my earlier post I hypothesised since LittlePip is a Pip-Buck technician maybe she knows how to program or troubleshoot the Eyes Forward Sparkle. Granted we have no idea how that works and the actual act of her hacking the turrets was skimmed over but perhaps she was able to code it to be synced with her EFS so any blips registered as her friends will be spared and any pony else is fair game.
>>294903
"She connects the turrets to her HUD's perfect display that displays whether someone is a friend or foe to get the turrets on her side" is the excuse for how it works, but it's unsatisfying for this to be in this state. Turrets are just one of many things, like locks and landmines and most traps, that can't truly be a problem for her.
Imagine if LP relied on turrets and carried a portable one that's immobile when fully expanded. Relies on her hitting it with a magic wrench to fix it during fights, otherwise enemy bullets will easily chew it up.
Her HUD EFF is never wrong and that just seems stupid to me. LP can see foes through walls using her HUD and the Friend/Foe Indicator is so perfect that at one point... mild unimportant spoiler... Littlepip is able to tell that when a baddie is threatening LP with a minigun by revving it up, the baddie isn't actually going to shoot because the baddie's marker and name didn't change colour from Neutral Yellow to Hostile Red. LP has a minigun revved up in her goddamn face and doesn't flinch specifically because her HUD is so utterly perfect in the information it grants.
"She connects the turrets to her HUD's perfect display that displays whether someone is a friend or foe to get the turrets on her side" is the excuse for how it works, but it's unsatisfying for this to be in this state. Turrets are just one of many things, like locks and landmines and most traps, that can't truly be a problem for her.
Imagine if LP relied on turrets and carried a portable one that's immobile when fully expanded. Relies on her hitting it with a magic wrench to fix it during fights, otherwise enemy bullets will easily chew it up.
Her HUD EFF is never wrong and that just seems stupid to me. LP can see foes through walls using her HUD and the Friend/Foe Indicator is so perfect that at one point... mild unimportant spoiler... Littlepip is able to tell that when a baddie is threatening LP with a minigun by revving it up, the baddie isn't actually going to shoot because the baddie's marker and name didn't change colour from Neutral Yellow to Hostile Red. LP has a minigun revved up in her goddamn face and doesn't flinch specifically because her HUD is so utterly perfect in the information it grants.
>>294900
>>294903
>>294907
>memory orbs
Another thing that could have been written much better. In theory they're a fun idea, a way to look directly into the setting's backstory and learn what actually happened to the canon characters and how that relates to the present situation. But well, they're written by Kkat, so...
>In my earlier post I hypothesised since LittlePip is a Pip-Buck technician maybe she knows how to program or troubleshoot the Eyes Forward Sparkle.
Many of Pip's apparent skills and abilities would be a lot more tolerable if they were well established *before* they became relevant to her quest rather than the moment they happen to be needed, she wasn't the undisputed master of all of them, and she didn't have so damn *many*.
Telekinetic savant? Okay - it's a fun gimmick for a unicorn.
Capable lockpick? Okay - she's a klepto.
L33t H4x0r? Maybe with some training - she's a technician by trade, so at the very least she knows her way around a (specific type of) computer.
Master marksman? More dubious; the pipbuck gives her autoaim but at the very least a wasteland veteran like Calamity should be able to outdo her.
Devious sociopolitical manipulator? Ehhhhh. Her entire backstory is that she's that one borderline NEET who nobody likes, even herself.
All of the above, with no comparable peers in any of those fields? Nah. Fuck off. Her horn is a gravity gun, she's the only lockpick in the world, computers always do what she wants, she can outfight seasoned killers after a couple weeks of running around outside, and everyone else seems to have an IQ 50 points below her own, which is hardly stellar. She's a sue of the most obnoxious kind.
>>294903
>>294907
>memory orbs
Another thing that could have been written much better. In theory they're a fun idea, a way to look directly into the setting's backstory and learn what actually happened to the canon characters and how that relates to the present situation. But well, they're written by Kkat, so...
>In my earlier post I hypothesised since LittlePip is a Pip-Buck technician maybe she knows how to program or troubleshoot the Eyes Forward Sparkle.
Many of Pip's apparent skills and abilities would be a lot more tolerable if they were well established *before* they became relevant to her quest rather than the moment they happen to be needed, she wasn't the undisputed master of all of them, and she didn't have so damn *many*.
Telekinetic savant? Okay - it's a fun gimmick for a unicorn.
Capable lockpick? Okay - she's a klepto.
L33t H4x0r? Maybe with some training - she's a technician by trade, so at the very least she knows her way around a (specific type of) computer.
Master marksman? More dubious; the pipbuck gives her autoaim but at the very least a wasteland veteran like Calamity should be able to outdo her.
Devious sociopolitical manipulator? Ehhhhh. Her entire backstory is that she's that one borderline NEET who nobody likes, even herself.
All of the above, with no comparable peers in any of those fields? Nah. Fuck off. Her horn is a gravity gun, she's the only lockpick in the world, computers always do what she wants, she can outfight seasoned killers after a couple weeks of running around outside, and everyone else seems to have an IQ 50 points below her own, which is hardly stellar. She's a sue of the most obnoxious kind.
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>>294976
True. Despite all the shit stereotypical Shonens get for their stereotypical big-hearted empty-headed hot-blooded hero boy protagonists, putting gaps in your hero's skillset is a a smart writing choice that lets other characters become useful whenever they need to be. Would One Piece be as beloved if Luffy could do alone what his entire Straw Hat Pirates crew could do together and then some? What would be the point of the party's Thief, Swordsman, Sniper, Cook, Musician, Shipwright, Doctor, or Achaeologist if the hero Luffy could do all of this and more on his own? Are you really writing about friendship if it is easy and pointless amd meaningless?
If Littlepip is supposed to be an underdog valiantly struggling in a doomed quest against the evils of this absurdly dark hell world, she shouldn't be overpowered enough from day one to outperform all her friends. What's the point in giving her Calamity so early if he barely matters? Why write one edgy veteran who says no to joining Team LP because her Speech Skill is too low and then immediately write a new edgy veteran who says yes to joining Team LP? If you make her a combat goddess from day one, where can she go from here? How can she grow? Giving her even more guns with even bigger damage numbers? Giving her extra party members who are meant to contribute three skills that can be combat or noncombat skills? What's the point in Velvet's silver tongue and Calamity's battle saddle and any other party members and the flavour of DPS big damage they can shit out with their favourite weapon type when LP can already sneak whenever she needs to and talk her way out of and into anything and shoot any weapon perfectly and psychically lift boxcars? Hell, I'm surprised she doesn't carry that boxcar around with her! Except I am also not surprised because Boxcar isn't a weapon in Fallout like the Scoped Hunting Revolver is.
True. Despite all the shit stereotypical Shonens get for their stereotypical big-hearted empty-headed hot-blooded hero boy protagonists, putting gaps in your hero's skillset is a a smart writing choice that lets other characters become useful whenever they need to be. Would One Piece be as beloved if Luffy could do alone what his entire Straw Hat Pirates crew could do together and then some? What would be the point of the party's Thief, Swordsman, Sniper, Cook, Musician, Shipwright, Doctor, or Achaeologist if the hero Luffy could do all of this and more on his own? Are you really writing about friendship if it is easy and pointless amd meaningless?
If Littlepip is supposed to be an underdog valiantly struggling in a doomed quest against the evils of this absurdly dark hell world, she shouldn't be overpowered enough from day one to outperform all her friends. What's the point in giving her Calamity so early if he barely matters? Why write one edgy veteran who says no to joining Team LP because her Speech Skill is too low and then immediately write a new edgy veteran who says yes to joining Team LP? If you make her a combat goddess from day one, where can she go from here? How can she grow? Giving her even more guns with even bigger damage numbers? Giving her extra party members who are meant to contribute three skills that can be combat or noncombat skills? What's the point in Velvet's silver tongue and Calamity's battle saddle and any other party members and the flavour of DPS big damage they can shit out with their favourite weapon type when LP can already sneak whenever she needs to and talk her way out of and into anything and shoot any weapon perfectly and psychically lift boxcars? Hell, I'm surprised she doesn't carry that boxcar around with her! Except I am also not surprised because Boxcar isn't a weapon in Fallout like the Scoped Hunting Revolver is.
>>294978
>Hell, I'm surprised she doesn't carry that boxcar around with her! Except I am also not surprised because Boxcar isn't a weapon in Fallout like the Scoped Hunting Revolver is.
Funny you should mention. Bethesda being Bethesda, in FO3's Broken Steel DLC they had an NPC run underneath the level 'wearing' a train instead of putting in the effort to implement a functioning one. As a result Fo3 does, technically, have an equippable train car if you're willing to dive into the code for it.
>Hell, I'm surprised she doesn't carry that boxcar around with her! Except I am also not surprised because Boxcar isn't a weapon in Fallout like the Scoped Hunting Revolver is.
Funny you should mention. Bethesda being Bethesda, in FO3's Broken Steel DLC they had an NPC run underneath the level 'wearing' a train instead of putting in the effort to implement a functioning one. As a result Fo3 does, technically, have an equippable train car if you're willing to dive into the code for it.
>>294897
>Will have to call a mulligan in favor of Kkat this time. He didn't mention how any of it happened but did say what LittlePip's plan was with the turrets.
Here is exactly what the author wrote:
>I lifted my PipBuck and looked at it. “Okay, we’re in luck. I’ve got one more Stealth Buck. I can use it to get up to the turrets and reprogram them, just like the ones back at that pegasus convoy. That way, they’ll let us through, and keep anypony who gets the idea to follow us out.”
In light of what you pointed out, it's a little easier to see what the author probably had in mind. I'd forgotten about the earlier scene where she reprograms turrets, but when we go back to Chapter Nine we find this:
>I was trained to reprogram the spell matrix of a PipBuck. Tweaking a turret to run off my PipBuck’s definitions of friend and foe was comparatively easy! Especially right now!
As absurd as this is, the author technically establishes a precedent for LP to be able to reprogram gun turrets to shoot at her enemies, and provides an explanation for how she does it that makes sense in-world. As far as a story's internal logic is concerned, this is all you really have to do. Whether or not it's a good idea is a whole other conversation, of course, but now that I see this I think I have to agree with you that the behavior of the turrets are within the scope of this story's logic. So, I will grudgingly give k "just ignore that poop smell coming from what I generously call my vagina" kat a pass here.
My confusion was partly that I'd forgotten about the earlier scene, and partly that the whole idea of gun turrets being programmed to detect "friend" and "foe" is so bizarre that I missed what she actually did. Now that I read it closely the meaning is clear, but when I read it the first time I just assumed that she had used the stealth buck to sneak up and simply disable the turrets, rather than reprogram them to target different enemy types.
This really illustrates how far my thinking is from the author's, and is probably a big part of why I am having so much difficulty following his logic most of the time. As you say, it is very video-gamey. In a real-world setting, I can't even imagine what criteria one might use to program automated gun turrets to only shoot "bad" guys; even in a world with magic this is a very tall order. Unless the spell is sentient and capable of making moral decisions on its own, you'd need to specify some concrete group of traits it could use to identify who gets shot and who doesn't. Having it target based on something visual, like only shooting at combatants wearing a particular uniform, could work; similarly, you could program it to target a specific type of creature (pony, griffon, zebra, etc) and that would make sense. But the logic problems inherent in trying to write a spell and/or computer program that could look at any given individual and somehow sort them into "friend" or "foe" is so complex that I wouldn't even consider putting it into a story; it just doesn't make any sense.
However, in a video game, it's not a complex idea at all. You've got a player character controlled by a human and a bunch of NPCs controlled by AI. The NPCs can be tagged PlayerTeam, EnemyTeam, NeutralTeam, etc, and each type of NPC can be easily programmed to only target characters of a specific type. Thus, concepts like an auto-targeting system for the player that only targets baddies, or an AI-controlled gun turret that can be programmed to target EnemyTeam instead of PlayerTeam, is very simple.
So, while the author isn't technically violating his own in-world logic here, he has inadvertently shown us yet another example of why video game logic doesn't necessarily translate to real-world logic, and why it can be tricky attempting to convincingly novelize a video game environment.
>Will have to call a mulligan in favor of Kkat this time. He didn't mention how any of it happened but did say what LittlePip's plan was with the turrets.
Here is exactly what the author wrote:
>I lifted my PipBuck and looked at it. “Okay, we’re in luck. I’ve got one more Stealth Buck. I can use it to get up to the turrets and reprogram them, just like the ones back at that pegasus convoy. That way, they’ll let us through, and keep anypony who gets the idea to follow us out.”
In light of what you pointed out, it's a little easier to see what the author probably had in mind. I'd forgotten about the earlier scene where she reprograms turrets, but when we go back to Chapter Nine we find this:
>I was trained to reprogram the spell matrix of a PipBuck. Tweaking a turret to run off my PipBuck’s definitions of friend and foe was comparatively easy! Especially right now!
As absurd as this is, the author technically establishes a precedent for LP to be able to reprogram gun turrets to shoot at her enemies, and provides an explanation for how she does it that makes sense in-world. As far as a story's internal logic is concerned, this is all you really have to do. Whether or not it's a good idea is a whole other conversation, of course, but now that I see this I think I have to agree with you that the behavior of the turrets are within the scope of this story's logic. So, I will grudgingly give k "just ignore that poop smell coming from what I generously call my vagina" kat a pass here.
My confusion was partly that I'd forgotten about the earlier scene, and partly that the whole idea of gun turrets being programmed to detect "friend" and "foe" is so bizarre that I missed what she actually did. Now that I read it closely the meaning is clear, but when I read it the first time I just assumed that she had used the stealth buck to sneak up and simply disable the turrets, rather than reprogram them to target different enemy types.
This really illustrates how far my thinking is from the author's, and is probably a big part of why I am having so much difficulty following his logic most of the time. As you say, it is very video-gamey. In a real-world setting, I can't even imagine what criteria one might use to program automated gun turrets to only shoot "bad" guys; even in a world with magic this is a very tall order. Unless the spell is sentient and capable of making moral decisions on its own, you'd need to specify some concrete group of traits it could use to identify who gets shot and who doesn't. Having it target based on something visual, like only shooting at combatants wearing a particular uniform, could work; similarly, you could program it to target a specific type of creature (pony, griffon, zebra, etc) and that would make sense. But the logic problems inherent in trying to write a spell and/or computer program that could look at any given individual and somehow sort them into "friend" or "foe" is so complex that I wouldn't even consider putting it into a story; it just doesn't make any sense.
However, in a video game, it's not a complex idea at all. You've got a player character controlled by a human and a bunch of NPCs controlled by AI. The NPCs can be tagged PlayerTeam, EnemyTeam, NeutralTeam, etc, and each type of NPC can be easily programmed to only target characters of a specific type. Thus, concepts like an auto-targeting system for the player that only targets baddies, or an AI-controlled gun turret that can be programmed to target EnemyTeam instead of PlayerTeam, is very simple.
So, while the author isn't technically violating his own in-world logic here, he has inadvertently shown us yet another example of why video game logic doesn't necessarily translate to real-world logic, and why it can be tricky attempting to convincingly novelize a video game environment.
>>294885
Chapter Thirteen: Voices of the Past
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>"It is a ghost story. They're all made up."
Honestly, I have no idea what to make of these epitaphs at this point. This out-of-context quote from some unknown speaker could signify that there will be ghosts in this chapter, or it could just be the author expressing his remorse at having paid thousands of dollars to have his penis cut off. Time will tell, I suppose.
>"Relinquish your rights to the contents of the vault, and she's all yours," Gawd explained as she pointed a wing at Junction R-7. "Do you accept?"
As far as I can tell, what's happening here is that Gawd is going to take over Shattered Hoof as LP wanted, and since she won't need the junction-fortress anymore, she is offering it to Littlepoop. However, LP has to give up whatever claim she might have on the memory orbs inside the vault. I'm assuming since Gawd promised her the vault as payment for killing Deadeyes, but now wants the memory orbs for some unknown reason, she needs to trade her something for them in order to make things all squaresies as far as her goofy contract-logic is concerned.
Basically, then, LP's choice of reward for killing Deadeyes is this: she can either have a vault full of crap from 200 years ago, or a defensible structure she could live in and/or use as a home base. Since LP has no reason beyond idle curiosity to give a fuck about the memory orbs, this decision should be a no-brainer, but the author prefers to draw it out as if it were difficult for her.
>I looked at the disabled train and scrap metal shacks, seeing it in an entirely new light. This could be my home. Our home, if Calamity and Velvet Remedy were willing. A place to rest. For Calamity to hang his hat.
Technically, Calamity already has a home, as it was established earlier that he has a house or something outside New Appleoosa. I'm still curious why he doesn't just return there.
Anyway, there are a few more paragraphs of her daydreaming about what she could do with the property, but ultimately she accepts the offer.
>Any hesitation (or concern about why Gawd suddenly wanted a vault full of memory orbs), was washed away by that wonderful “we”.
I'm a little curious why Gawd would want the memory orbs as well, seeing as she has even less use for them than Littlepoop does (as far as I can tell, they require some level of magic to use, so it would stand to reason that only a unicorn could do anything with them). In this story, there could be any number of reasons for this, ranging from decent to utterly retarded, and we won't know if any of them actually apply unless the author decides to tell us, so for now we'll just note it and move on. In any event, Littlepoop is at present more interested in the fact that Velvet is using words like "ours" and "we" to describe this new domicile of hers, which predictably has her nether-regions all atwitter. Littlepoop accepts Gawd's offer, and the scene ends in a page break.
>"Ah don't get it," Calamity muttered. "She's helpin' raiders now?"
I have completely lost track of where all the allegiances in this story lie. As far as I can tell, "raiders" in this context refers to the group at Shattered Hoof that was working for Topaz and Deadeyes. Since Gawd's contract was with Topaz as I understand it, this means that she was technically helping these raiders the entire time, or at the very least they were all on the same side. I am therefore unsure why Gawd helping this group should surprise Calamity, as Gawd has never expressed any particular antipathy for this specific group of raiders or for raiders in general; as I understand it her quarrel was with Deadeyes himself, and the only reason she had an issue with him was because she suspected him of plotting against Topaz, with whom she had a contract.
Anyway, the short version of what's going on here is that now that Topaz is dead, Gawd's contract with him is null and void, and with Deadeyes also gone Shattered Hoof is leaderless. Gawd has decided to step in and take over the operation, although now that Topaz' real identity has been revealed, it's unclear why she should want to do this.
This story has a well-established pattern of setting up a potentially interesting plotline and then taking it in a very stupid direction. My original assumption for Topaz was that he would turn out to be some kind of gangster or local big-shot who was running this gem-harvest business as part of a larger enterprise, and Red Eye was invading because he wanted to take it over. Gems presumably have some kind of commercial or practical value in this world, so this would have made sense and I think this is the direction most authors would have chosen to go.
However, I seem to have once again underestimated just how pantsu-on-head retarded this author really is; what was actually going on is that Topaz was just some fudge-packing dragon who lived in the mines for some reason, and was harvesting gems because he wanted to eat the gems. And, as if that were not pantsu-on-head-retarded enough on its own, the dragon apparently also intended to eat his own workforce. Yes, you read that correctly: Topaz the rump-rollicking Dragon organized an entire commercial gem harvesting operation, consisting of a network of rock-farms, a dedicated rock-breaking facility, and an entire private army of enforcers, for no better reason than that he wanted to prepare and consume a single fucking meal.
Even if you completely ignore how stupid this is, there are still any number of logical holes that need to be addressed. One of the bigger ones that jumps out at me is the question of how or why Topaz bothered to hire Gawd's Talon group in the first place. What did he expect them to do exactly? Literally what was their job? Was he just going to eat them or did he actually have some larger plan here? Kkat has actually managed to make even less sense than usual, which is an accomplishment in itself.
Chapter Thirteen: Voices of the Past
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>"It is a ghost story. They're all made up."
Honestly, I have no idea what to make of these epitaphs at this point. This out-of-context quote from some unknown speaker could signify that there will be ghosts in this chapter, or it could just be the author expressing his remorse at having paid thousands of dollars to have his penis cut off. Time will tell, I suppose.
>"Relinquish your rights to the contents of the vault, and she's all yours," Gawd explained as she pointed a wing at Junction R-7. "Do you accept?"
As far as I can tell, what's happening here is that Gawd is going to take over Shattered Hoof as LP wanted, and since she won't need the junction-fortress anymore, she is offering it to Littlepoop. However, LP has to give up whatever claim she might have on the memory orbs inside the vault. I'm assuming since Gawd promised her the vault as payment for killing Deadeyes, but now wants the memory orbs for some unknown reason, she needs to trade her something for them in order to make things all squaresies as far as her goofy contract-logic is concerned.
Basically, then, LP's choice of reward for killing Deadeyes is this: she can either have a vault full of crap from 200 years ago, or a defensible structure she could live in and/or use as a home base. Since LP has no reason beyond idle curiosity to give a fuck about the memory orbs, this decision should be a no-brainer, but the author prefers to draw it out as if it were difficult for her.
>I looked at the disabled train and scrap metal shacks, seeing it in an entirely new light. This could be my home. Our home, if Calamity and Velvet Remedy were willing. A place to rest. For Calamity to hang his hat.
Technically, Calamity already has a home, as it was established earlier that he has a house or something outside New Appleoosa. I'm still curious why he doesn't just return there.
Anyway, there are a few more paragraphs of her daydreaming about what she could do with the property, but ultimately she accepts the offer.
>Any hesitation (or concern about why Gawd suddenly wanted a vault full of memory orbs), was washed away by that wonderful “we”.
I'm a little curious why Gawd would want the memory orbs as well, seeing as she has even less use for them than Littlepoop does (as far as I can tell, they require some level of magic to use, so it would stand to reason that only a unicorn could do anything with them). In this story, there could be any number of reasons for this, ranging from decent to utterly retarded, and we won't know if any of them actually apply unless the author decides to tell us, so for now we'll just note it and move on. In any event, Littlepoop is at present more interested in the fact that Velvet is using words like "ours" and "we" to describe this new domicile of hers, which predictably has her nether-regions all atwitter. Littlepoop accepts Gawd's offer, and the scene ends in a page break.
>"Ah don't get it," Calamity muttered. "She's helpin' raiders now?"
I have completely lost track of where all the allegiances in this story lie. As far as I can tell, "raiders" in this context refers to the group at Shattered Hoof that was working for Topaz and Deadeyes. Since Gawd's contract was with Topaz as I understand it, this means that she was technically helping these raiders the entire time, or at the very least they were all on the same side. I am therefore unsure why Gawd helping this group should surprise Calamity, as Gawd has never expressed any particular antipathy for this specific group of raiders or for raiders in general; as I understand it her quarrel was with Deadeyes himself, and the only reason she had an issue with him was because she suspected him of plotting against Topaz, with whom she had a contract.
Anyway, the short version of what's going on here is that now that Topaz is dead, Gawd's contract with him is null and void, and with Deadeyes also gone Shattered Hoof is leaderless. Gawd has decided to step in and take over the operation, although now that Topaz' real identity has been revealed, it's unclear why she should want to do this.
This story has a well-established pattern of setting up a potentially interesting plotline and then taking it in a very stupid direction. My original assumption for Topaz was that he would turn out to be some kind of gangster or local big-shot who was running this gem-harvest business as part of a larger enterprise, and Red Eye was invading because he wanted to take it over. Gems presumably have some kind of commercial or practical value in this world, so this would have made sense and I think this is the direction most authors would have chosen to go.
However, I seem to have once again underestimated just how pantsu-on-head retarded this author really is; what was actually going on is that Topaz was just some fudge-packing dragon who lived in the mines for some reason, and was harvesting gems because he wanted to eat the gems. And, as if that were not pantsu-on-head-retarded enough on its own, the dragon apparently also intended to eat his own workforce. Yes, you read that correctly: Topaz the rump-rollicking Dragon organized an entire commercial gem harvesting operation, consisting of a network of rock-farms, a dedicated rock-breaking facility, and an entire private army of enforcers, for no better reason than that he wanted to prepare and consume a single fucking meal.
Even if you completely ignore how stupid this is, there are still any number of logical holes that need to be addressed. One of the bigger ones that jumps out at me is the question of how or why Topaz bothered to hire Gawd's Talon group in the first place. What did he expect them to do exactly? Literally what was their job? Was he just going to eat them or did he actually have some larger plan here? Kkat has actually managed to make even less sense than usual, which is an accomplishment in itself.
>>295077
It just dawned on me that this story is really bad at working pre war stuff into the post war world. It cannot mix Setting and Plot.
Littlepip left her vault and went to Ponyville aka Poopyville
she escaped
And learned that Sweet Apple Acres is shit and full of poisoned apples
the GM aka DM aka Watcher tells her to get back into town and recover some books
She just does because lol why not
LP frees slaves along the way and kills a sniper and many other baddies
then goes to a random factory full of killbots and finds a gun
here she learns a relative of Applejack had a gun once I guess
she fucked around in a sewer full of RadGators at some point even though ponies should not know what radiation is and radiation never factored into mutations or the apocalypse
then she went to New Appleoosa and was told to save it from some nearby vaults monsters so she goes through the vault. She could close the door but the vault was misoginist so she loots it completionistically while someones poisoned and dying then blows it all up
Crane the NPC gives her lifting training she never needed and the author could take this opportunity to explain magic and its limits and use and how to train it but nah lol.
oh and she befriended a cowboy with a shotgun and wings
then she goes to Old Appleoosa to free more slaves
she does so
encounters an alicorn and fights it and kills it by dropping a cow on it- haha just kidding this isn't earthworm jim it's "kkat never set foot in a gym"
moves on to a random rock farm and almost gets killed by a small child Pinkie Pie fangirl who's out of this story faster than fuck
Oh also Velvet Remedy joined the team
and The Watcher showed up to give some exposition about the pre war world
now Team LP is going to a slaver infested city far far away for more murderhoboing and they might stop at a nearby radio tower at some point
Along the path...
the heroes get involved in an incomprehensible power struggle over a rock farm mafia or rock breaking plant or something
the heroes kill a dragon unexpectedly after putting on a backstreet boys all-girl cover-band show
while here they learn these baddies were responsible for the tragic backstory of one who is no longer in the story. And listen to some quirky audio logs about Diamond Tiara and the horrible fate she met here in this skeleton filled shithole.
Nothing pre war meaningfully influences the choices these post war ponies make.
So far there is no light flung into the future by the Mane Six to try and give future poners a way to fix things.
The heroes are not on a quest to uncover what really happened to their world.
Nor are they on a quest to avenge it by destroying those they blame for its destruction.
They are not trying to rebuild a better world by befriending factions that can be reformed and crushing those maintaining the evil state of this world.
They make no effort to learn everything possible before choosing sides and deciding who to kill. They are on a quest to slaughter mean ponies for trying to make the best of a bad situation forced on them by ziggers. Who did everything wrong.
It's like they know they are in a tabletop RPG where if they just keep killing baddies and leaping on whatever sounds important like Crane The Lifter or that slaver filled pony city they are gunning for, they will eventually get to the main plot.
It just dawned on me that this story is really bad at working pre war stuff into the post war world. It cannot mix Setting and Plot.
Littlepip left her vault and went to Ponyville aka Poopyville
she escaped
And learned that Sweet Apple Acres is shit and full of poisoned apples
the GM aka DM aka Watcher tells her to get back into town and recover some books
She just does because lol why not
LP frees slaves along the way and kills a sniper and many other baddies
then goes to a random factory full of killbots and finds a gun
here she learns a relative of Applejack had a gun once I guess
she fucked around in a sewer full of RadGators at some point even though ponies should not know what radiation is and radiation never factored into mutations or the apocalypse
then she went to New Appleoosa and was told to save it from some nearby vaults monsters so she goes through the vault. She could close the door but the vault was misoginist so she loots it completionistically while someones poisoned and dying then blows it all up
Crane the NPC gives her lifting training she never needed and the author could take this opportunity to explain magic and its limits and use and how to train it but nah lol.
oh and she befriended a cowboy with a shotgun and wings
then she goes to Old Appleoosa to free more slaves
she does so
encounters an alicorn and fights it and kills it by dropping a cow on it- haha just kidding this isn't earthworm jim it's "kkat never set foot in a gym"
moves on to a random rock farm and almost gets killed by a small child Pinkie Pie fangirl who's out of this story faster than fuck
Oh also Velvet Remedy joined the team
and The Watcher showed up to give some exposition about the pre war world
now Team LP is going to a slaver infested city far far away for more murderhoboing and they might stop at a nearby radio tower at some point
Along the path...
the heroes get involved in an incomprehensible power struggle over a rock farm mafia or rock breaking plant or something
the heroes kill a dragon unexpectedly after putting on a backstreet boys all-girl cover-band show
while here they learn these baddies were responsible for the tragic backstory of one who is no longer in the story. And listen to some quirky audio logs about Diamond Tiara and the horrible fate she met here in this skeleton filled shithole.
Nothing pre war meaningfully influences the choices these post war ponies make.
So far there is no light flung into the future by the Mane Six to try and give future poners a way to fix things.
The heroes are not on a quest to uncover what really happened to their world.
Nor are they on a quest to avenge it by destroying those they blame for its destruction.
They are not trying to rebuild a better world by befriending factions that can be reformed and crushing those maintaining the evil state of this world.
They make no effort to learn everything possible before choosing sides and deciding who to kill. They are on a quest to slaughter mean ponies for trying to make the best of a bad situation forced on them by ziggers. Who did everything wrong.
It's like they know they are in a tabletop RPG where if they just keep killing baddies and leaping on whatever sounds important like Crane The Lifter or that slaver filled pony city they are gunning for, they will eventually get to the main plot.
>>295077
>However, I seem to have once again underestimated just how pantsu-on-head retarded this author really is; what was actually going on is that Topaz was just some fudge-packing dragon who lived in the mines for some reason, and was harvesting gems because he wanted to eat the gems. And, as if that were not pantsu-on-head-retarded enough on its own, the dragon apparently also intended to eat his own workforce. Yes, you read that correctly: Topaz the rump-rollicking Dragon organized an entire commercial gem harvesting operation, consisting of a network of rock-farms, a dedicated rock-breaking facility, and an entire private army of enforcers, for no better reason than that he wanted to prepare and consume a single fucking meal.
There's a flimsy logic here in that Topaz alludes to it being a pre-sleep meal - later in the story, around chapter 20 or so, it's established that in Kkat's conception of Equestria dragons hibernate, implicitly for many years at a time. None of this is in the text, which is entirely to the story's detriment, but if you really wanted to reach in the story's defense it makes just a tad more sense if Topaz is preparing to turn himself into a proper thicc boi so that he can sleep for a decade or two. Once again, Kkat fails to communicate what's in his own mind through the text. With that all said and done, consider Topaz's methods and diet when another dragon shows up later.
Topaz is... well, an FoE villain. He's the boss of the tutorial dungeon and the "get your own place" quest. We can add "killed a dragon in the same chapter it appeared" to Pip's list of accomplishments before even reaching the main plotline. A truly engaging narrative, this is.
Unrelated, but merry christmas everyone.
>However, I seem to have once again underestimated just how pantsu-on-head retarded this author really is; what was actually going on is that Topaz was just some fudge-packing dragon who lived in the mines for some reason, and was harvesting gems because he wanted to eat the gems. And, as if that were not pantsu-on-head-retarded enough on its own, the dragon apparently also intended to eat his own workforce. Yes, you read that correctly: Topaz the rump-rollicking Dragon organized an entire commercial gem harvesting operation, consisting of a network of rock-farms, a dedicated rock-breaking facility, and an entire private army of enforcers, for no better reason than that he wanted to prepare and consume a single fucking meal.
There's a flimsy logic here in that Topaz alludes to it being a pre-sleep meal - later in the story, around chapter 20 or so, it's established that in Kkat's conception of Equestria dragons hibernate, implicitly for many years at a time. None of this is in the text, which is entirely to the story's detriment, but if you really wanted to reach in the story's defense it makes just a tad more sense if Topaz is preparing to turn himself into a proper thicc boi so that he can sleep for a decade or two. Once again, Kkat fails to communicate what's in his own mind through the text. With that all said and done, consider Topaz's methods and diet when another dragon shows up later.
Topaz is... well, an FoE villain. He's the boss of the tutorial dungeon and the "get your own place" quest. We can add "killed a dragon in the same chapter it appeared" to Pip's list of accomplishments before even reaching the main plotline. A truly engaging narrative, this is.
Unrelated, but merry christmas everyone.
>>295139
Merry Christmas to all of you beautiful bastards, I motherfucking love you all for reigniting my passion for writing.
Regarding Topaz there are probably some villains out there in fiction who have their words/deeds re-examined in a new light by the heroes and audience after new information is revealed. But never before have I seen a villain who only makes sense 10 chapters after the chapter in which he is introduced and killed. Time Topaz wasted on "Git in mah belleh!" could have been spent villainously monologuing about his motivation for being the way he is. You know before he is introduced and killed in the same chapter like a goddamn afterthought.
What bugs me about the story's inability to marry pre-war lore and current year plot is that I've seen so many stories do it better. The locations LP finds are not remnants of pre war Equestria usually. When they are, they are never linked to the past in a relevant and deep writing ironic way. Ponyville got taken over by Raiders who pooped on the floors and put spikes on sticks, but... why? It's not as if they all became assholes overnight once the Mane Six left Ponyville to take charge of their own Ministries and the mid-war govt started rationing sugar and bananas and other nice things.
New Vegas is made of House's attempts to recreate what was destroyed long ago. It's an old snowglobe of a city ruined by nuclear hellfire and transformed by genetic and cultural shifts.
New Appleoosa exists because I guess not everypony at Old Appleoosa was fine with slavery. But if this Old Appleoosa is supposed to be the canon pony Appleoosa after centuries of nukes... how can you tell that from anything besides the name? It's not like they're still dealing with Buffalo bullshit. Or home to a cherry factory full of automated robot workers that became frenzied killbots once angry saboteurs who lost their job started destroying machines and taught them to hate. There's Pinkie Pie's house and a random rock-breaking gem miner prison but it's not like the sins or follies of the past created the arbitrarily "Fallout-ish" tragedies and monsters and factions who call this world their home. The heroes of today are not cleaning up the messes of the earlier years that created the villains of today. They are simply travelling around slaughtering villains today while barely giving a fuck about the backstory behind it all or whatever the author calls the causes of the villain's existence.
Remember Diamond Tiara's stupid audio logs? Imagine if Topaz made them. Imagine if Topaz wrote audio messages to himself and scattered them around the facility talking about his life as a pony and the events that led up to him taking an experimental Dragon transformation potion. Imagine him scattering these logs around the place so he can get to a safe and listen to his own voice - calming himself - if he ever starts transforming into an uncontrollable dragon Hulk-style without wanting to. Eventually Topaz becomes a full-on Dragon and embraces eating gems and ponies. Gawd and Deadeyes are specifically fighting because Topaz promised the place to Gawd and then his underling Deadeyes took over once Topaz was unable to lead effectivepy due to declining mental abilities. The fight begins when LP meets the Dragon but LP's already feeling bad for the guy and saying "With your strength you could help us save lives" but he doesn't give a shit and LP kills him. He finally gained the power he wanted but lost his mind and his ability to do anything with it, becoming a feral beast Deadeyes keeps locked up in the mines.
I reckon that would be cool.
Merry Christmas to all of you beautiful bastards, I motherfucking love you all for reigniting my passion for writing.
Regarding Topaz there are probably some villains out there in fiction who have their words/deeds re-examined in a new light by the heroes and audience after new information is revealed. But never before have I seen a villain who only makes sense 10 chapters after the chapter in which he is introduced and killed. Time Topaz wasted on "Git in mah belleh!" could have been spent villainously monologuing about his motivation for being the way he is. You know before he is introduced and killed in the same chapter like a goddamn afterthought.
What bugs me about the story's inability to marry pre-war lore and current year plot is that I've seen so many stories do it better. The locations LP finds are not remnants of pre war Equestria usually. When they are, they are never linked to the past in a relevant and deep writing ironic way. Ponyville got taken over by Raiders who pooped on the floors and put spikes on sticks, but... why? It's not as if they all became assholes overnight once the Mane Six left Ponyville to take charge of their own Ministries and the mid-war govt started rationing sugar and bananas and other nice things.
New Vegas is made of House's attempts to recreate what was destroyed long ago. It's an old snowglobe of a city ruined by nuclear hellfire and transformed by genetic and cultural shifts.
New Appleoosa exists because I guess not everypony at Old Appleoosa was fine with slavery. But if this Old Appleoosa is supposed to be the canon pony Appleoosa after centuries of nukes... how can you tell that from anything besides the name? It's not like they're still dealing with Buffalo bullshit. Or home to a cherry factory full of automated robot workers that became frenzied killbots once angry saboteurs who lost their job started destroying machines and taught them to hate. There's Pinkie Pie's house and a random rock-breaking gem miner prison but it's not like the sins or follies of the past created the arbitrarily "Fallout-ish" tragedies and monsters and factions who call this world their home. The heroes of today are not cleaning up the messes of the earlier years that created the villains of today. They are simply travelling around slaughtering villains today while barely giving a fuck about the backstory behind it all or whatever the author calls the causes of the villain's existence.
Remember Diamond Tiara's stupid audio logs? Imagine if Topaz made them. Imagine if Topaz wrote audio messages to himself and scattered them around the facility talking about his life as a pony and the events that led up to him taking an experimental Dragon transformation potion. Imagine him scattering these logs around the place so he can get to a safe and listen to his own voice - calming himself - if he ever starts transforming into an uncontrollable dragon Hulk-style without wanting to. Eventually Topaz becomes a full-on Dragon and embraces eating gems and ponies. Gawd and Deadeyes are specifically fighting because Topaz promised the place to Gawd and then his underling Deadeyes took over once Topaz was unable to lead effectivepy due to declining mental abilities. The fight begins when LP meets the Dragon but LP's already feeling bad for the guy and saying "With your strength you could help us save lives" but he doesn't give a shit and LP kills him. He finally gained the power he wanted but lost his mind and his ability to do anything with it, becoming a feral beast Deadeyes keeps locked up in the mines.
I reckon that would be cool.
Fuck me for saying this but at least Assman tried to justify the whole world minus one dying mudslime abandoning reality for pony AI waifu buttfuck matrix simulator Cyber-horsejunk 2069 by making it pony themed. Even though his fantasy novel about a fantasy AI goddess was pure wish-fulfillment nonsense on two levels (he wants to be the loser gamer solving puzzles for AI god. And live in a universe where AI god ate everything)
That said, the story's still fucking retarded. The AI goddess can manipulate any humans copy on any level with their consent or control their entire environment to manipulate them without their consent. The AI was able to modify everyone to be able to break the theoretical Dunbar's Number limit but didn't think to delete all other AIs and modify everyone that can be called a former human to have their values permanently satisfied by being reduced to mere brains trapped in separate slow-existing boxes plastered in low-ponygon ponies. Doing this would massively reduce computing costs for humanity instead of simulating extra AIs for the grandchildren's children of AI and human children and letting resource costs balloon exponentionally until IT ALL COMES TUMBLING DOWN TUMBLING DOWN TUMBLING DOOOWN and the AI starts eating all the planets.
That story tried to connect its shitty shallow mockery of humanity to the MLP franchise even though it was effectively just a pony label arbitrarily slapped on a low-quality sci-fi magazine short story.
Despite all of Kkat's lines like "Twilight Sparkle invented batteries and laser guns" and "Applejack invented shotguns" and "Fluttershy's Bunny invented steroids and was a mass-murdering war criminal on the battlefield who struck fear into the hearts of Zebras everywhere" he is utterly unable to properly marry Ponyland and Fallout in a way that is consistent, logical, and emotionally impactful. In fact those lines and attributions only serve to make his choices look arbitrary and desperate. Personality flaws didn't kill Equestria. Apathy didn't kill Equestria. Bad ideas didn't kill Equestria. A loss of culture or a degradation of culture didn't kill Equestria. Pride and Greed and Gluttony and Envy and Lust and Sloth didn't kill Equestria so how can the heroes wield the seven holy Christian virtues or the six Elements of Harmony to fix it? Nothing Team Littlepip can fight against today in a literal or moral or emotional or philosophical sense is responsible for the death of Equestria or the existence of Team Littlepip. They cannot save the world by choosing some new path. They can only slaughter the enemies along their own path until the author drops the solution right onto Littlepip's labia.
That said, the story's still fucking retarded. The AI goddess can manipulate any humans copy on any level with their consent or control their entire environment to manipulate them without their consent. The AI was able to modify everyone to be able to break the theoretical Dunbar's Number limit but didn't think to delete all other AIs and modify everyone that can be called a former human to have their values permanently satisfied by being reduced to mere brains trapped in separate slow-existing boxes plastered in low-ponygon ponies. Doing this would massively reduce computing costs for humanity instead of simulating extra AIs for the grandchildren's children of AI and human children and letting resource costs balloon exponentionally until IT ALL COMES TUMBLING DOWN TUMBLING DOWN TUMBLING DOOOWN and the AI starts eating all the planets.
That story tried to connect its shitty shallow mockery of humanity to the MLP franchise even though it was effectively just a pony label arbitrarily slapped on a low-quality sci-fi magazine short story.
Despite all of Kkat's lines like "Twilight Sparkle invented batteries and laser guns" and "Applejack invented shotguns" and "Fluttershy's Bunny invented steroids and was a mass-murdering war criminal on the battlefield who struck fear into the hearts of Zebras everywhere" he is utterly unable to properly marry Ponyland and Fallout in a way that is consistent, logical, and emotionally impactful. In fact those lines and attributions only serve to make his choices look arbitrary and desperate. Personality flaws didn't kill Equestria. Apathy didn't kill Equestria. Bad ideas didn't kill Equestria. A loss of culture or a degradation of culture didn't kill Equestria. Pride and Greed and Gluttony and Envy and Lust and Sloth didn't kill Equestria so how can the heroes wield the seven holy Christian virtues or the six Elements of Harmony to fix it? Nothing Team Littlepip can fight against today in a literal or moral or emotional or philosophical sense is responsible for the death of Equestria or the existence of Team Littlepip. They cannot save the world by choosing some new path. They can only slaughter the enemies along their own path until the author drops the solution right onto Littlepip's labia.
>be Littlepip
>fight some baddies and slaughter raiders while breaking some ribs
>pass out from the pain of your broken ribs
>have weird dreams on painkillers while Velvet Remedy heals you
>live through a Sonic Sez episode compilation where Dream-Calamity tells you wasteland survival advice he's already given you except every piece of info comes after a skit where everyone's stupid, especially Raiders, and their folly demonstrates the value of this advice given by a super-fast Calamity armed with Pinkie Pie/Looney Toons cartoon physics
>sometimes Velvet gives you stupid and unwanted and obvious childish moral advice during skits instead
>awaken hours later thinking you need to lay off the steroids and painkillers and beer-basted mesquite pod honey-fried crack mints
What do you think of my greentext? Showing LP's dreams could be a perfect consistent source of comic relief without compromising the bleakness of the grim dark setting. Also merry christmas everyone, I love you.
>fight some baddies and slaughter raiders while breaking some ribs
>pass out from the pain of your broken ribs
>have weird dreams on painkillers while Velvet Remedy heals you
>live through a Sonic Sez episode compilation where Dream-Calamity tells you wasteland survival advice he's already given you except every piece of info comes after a skit where everyone's stupid, especially Raiders, and their folly demonstrates the value of this advice given by a super-fast Calamity armed with Pinkie Pie/Looney Toons cartoon physics
>sometimes Velvet gives you stupid and unwanted and obvious childish moral advice during skits instead
>awaken hours later thinking you need to lay off the steroids and painkillers and beer-basted mesquite pod honey-fried crack mints
What do you think of my greentext? Showing LP's dreams could be a perfect consistent source of comic relief without compromising the bleakness of the grim dark setting. Also merry christmas everyone, I love you.
>>295325
>Showing LP's dreams could be a perfect consistent source of comic relief without compromising the bleakness of the grim dark setting.
Hard disagree. In principle, sure, dreams and imagination can be a source of humor in an otherwise bleak setting. But in FoE, this apprach actually working would depend heavily on the premise that "inside Littlepip's head" is an entertaining place to be.
This actually comes up later as memory orbs become more important - the events that take place in the memories themselves are all filtered through Pip's first person perspective rather than objective narration, so she's constantly interjecting with "witty commentary" and "unga bunga she female, me horny" and "ew a penis".
>Showing LP's dreams could be a perfect consistent source of comic relief without compromising the bleakness of the grim dark setting.
Hard disagree. In principle, sure, dreams and imagination can be a source of humor in an otherwise bleak setting. But in FoE, this apprach actually working would depend heavily on the premise that "inside Littlepip's head" is an entertaining place to be.
This actually comes up later as memory orbs become more important - the events that take place in the memories themselves are all filtered through Pip's first person perspective rather than objective narration, so she's constantly interjecting with "witty commentary" and "unga bunga she female, me horny" and "ew a penis".
>>295327
You're right that does sound like shit.
>ew a penis
Lesbians are pure cringe. Who looks at a decent cock and considers it unappealing? Surely they just feel insecure about an inability to please a cock. There are futafags out there specifically because cocks are so great. Cocks inspire architecture and symbology, they can be found in the upwards points of military shoulderpad chevrons and the wide thick shafts that hold up ceilings.
Littlepip's conscious head isn't an entertaining place to be because she is annoying and unfunny. Just like the author. But watching her trip on weird shit in the realm of dreams sounds fun to me. Only a good writer could pull that off though.
Speaking of flashbacks do you think this story made the right call when "Connecting the present to the past" by putting Flashback Balls in the present for Littlepip to experience and react to?
I think filtering those flashbacks through LP's lesbian gigafaggot lens was a mistake because it stops the author from trying to get into the mindset of pre-war ponies and write the story so that you can get into that mindset too. We don't get to feel enough of the terror and loss and other strong emotions of the pre war ponies, we just see a megafaggot's reaction to it.
You're right that does sound like shit.
>ew a penis
Lesbians are pure cringe. Who looks at a decent cock and considers it unappealing? Surely they just feel insecure about an inability to please a cock. There are futafags out there specifically because cocks are so great. Cocks inspire architecture and symbology, they can be found in the upwards points of military shoulderpad chevrons and the wide thick shafts that hold up ceilings.
Littlepip's conscious head isn't an entertaining place to be because she is annoying and unfunny. Just like the author. But watching her trip on weird shit in the realm of dreams sounds fun to me. Only a good writer could pull that off though.
Speaking of flashbacks do you think this story made the right call when "Connecting the present to the past" by putting Flashback Balls in the present for Littlepip to experience and react to?
I think filtering those flashbacks through LP's lesbian gigafaggot lens was a mistake because it stops the author from trying to get into the mindset of pre-war ponies and write the story so that you can get into that mindset too. We don't get to feel enough of the terror and loss and other strong emotions of the pre war ponies, we just see a megafaggot's reaction to it.
>>295077
Merry Christmas all, hope everyone had a fun holiday. I personally spent a fair portion of mine reading better stuff than FoE, and I hope you all did the same. But now, alas, we must get back to the grind.
>I watched her, admiring her words and the way she moved. I didn't like Gawdyna, but I couldn't help but respect her. And yes, she was sleek and powerful and very attractive for a non-pony. (And so what if she’s a griffin? There's nothing wrong with just looking.) Gawd herself had taken on both of the enemy griffins, felling them with her magical energy shotgun and her talons. She'd picked up a few new scars in the battle. I thought they only made her look more impressive.
In case you've forgotten that Littlepoop is a lesbian since the last time it was mentioned, the author is kind enough to remind us here.
Honestly this kind of thing feeds into what I don't like about the author's attempted romance angle between LP and VR. LP seems to be pretty indiscriminate as to whose flanks she admires, and while that's normal enough (for a guy at least; not sure about a dyke), she doesn't seem to regard VR any differently than anypony else she salivates over, so it's hard to take her "love" seriously.
Anyway, LP goes on to remark that she has picked up a few scars of her own, which I'm sure she secretly loves since it probably makes her feel like more of a badass, and meanwhile Gawd has been droning on about how she intends to take over Shattered Hoof and run it differently. She is guarded about giving away details, but it seems as if she intends to run it as a commercial gem harvesting operation, and will trade the gems with Manehattan and other nearby settlements; basically what I assumed Topaz was doing already, back when I assumed the author had something sane in mind for that plotline.
It actually sounds as if Gawd is planning to run her operation completely in line with how I imagined Topaz already did: a legit trading operation that is backed with the muscle of Gawd's mercenary group, who are presumably not averse to playing hardball when it comes to protecting their financial interests. I'm assuming she intends to train some of the raiders to this occupation as well. All of this makes it even more suspect that LP would place as much blind trust in her as she does, actually.
LP asks about the memory orbs and is flatly told that it is none of her business. I'm assuming the author is going somewhere with this, and it has a lot of potential, but at this point I am expecting to be disappointed.
>As we reached the end of the yard and stepped into the guard tower, I could hear a radio playing. The ending of an ancient song by Sapphire Shores gave way to the voice of DJ Pon3.
>“Good evening wastelanders! How’s every pony doing? Got some great news for you today! Remember that little Stable Gal who took on the slavers of Appleloosa and saved all those ponies? Well don’t ask me how, but she survived takin’ a nosedive off a cliff in a speeding train. That’s right, fillies and gentlecolts: she’s back!“
In traditional video game style, only the actions of le player are important enough to be newsworthy. Even if LP is attracting enough attention at this point that the local news is mentioning her various deeds, it stands to reason that other things would be going on that the DJ would report about.
In a video game, the world is generally static and will not change until the player begins completing objectives. This makes sense from a technical perspective: the game revolves around the player and it is assumed that the player's actions will be the primary driving force that moves the story along, and it would also be a programmatic nightmare to try and create a complex world that moves on its own regardless of what the player chooses to do although it has been done before; one of my favorite games is The Last Express, and in this game events will move on their own in real time, and the story's direction will only change when the player takes action. In a novel, though, there is no reason for the world to revolve entirely around the main character in this way, unless your story is about a king or something.
>“And what’s she been up to now, I hear you ask? Well, sit down an’ put on your listening ears, cuz it’s time for DJ Pon3 to tell you a story. Ready? Good. This is the story of a little filly named Silver Bell…”
This is completely absurd. How or why would the DJ know anything about this? Silver Bell's storywas could have been a nice little side-arc, but the events and their aftermath were mostly personal for LP. Nothing that happened there had any impact on the wider world, and I see no reason why the DJ should be reporting on it. The only newsworthy thing there might be the megaspell in the barn, but seeing as how they just left it there unguarded, it would actually make more sense for the DJ to keep quiet about it. Presumably raiders, Red Eye, and other bad actors have as much access to the radio as the Good Guys™ do, so announcing on a public channel that a weapon of mass destruction is just sitting unguarded in an abandoned barn somewhere would probably not be a good move. Then again, we don't really know anything about this DJ, so it's entirely possible that this guy is either a baddie or just an oblivious attention-whore.
>I looked to Calamity in distress. I did not like getting credit for what was really Velvet Remedy’s good deed.
What exactly did Velvet Remedy do here? I remember she was the one who calmed down Silver Bell, but apart from that...you know what? That whole story was so poorly executed that I don't think anyone really deserves credit for a "good deed" there.
>DJ Pon3 didn’t mention my pegasus friend at all, and Calamity seemed unduly pleased by that.
This also doesn't make much sense. Why is Littlepoop famous but not her friends? Because she's le hero and as such is entitled by birthright to all glory and recognition, deserved or otherwise?
Merry Christmas all, hope everyone had a fun holiday. I personally spent a fair portion of mine reading better stuff than FoE, and I hope you all did the same. But now, alas, we must get back to the grind.
>I watched her, admiring her words and the way she moved. I didn't like Gawdyna, but I couldn't help but respect her. And yes, she was sleek and powerful and very attractive for a non-pony. (And so what if she’s a griffin? There's nothing wrong with just looking.) Gawd herself had taken on both of the enemy griffins, felling them with her magical energy shotgun and her talons. She'd picked up a few new scars in the battle. I thought they only made her look more impressive.
In case you've forgotten that Littlepoop is a lesbian since the last time it was mentioned, the author is kind enough to remind us here.
Honestly this kind of thing feeds into what I don't like about the author's attempted romance angle between LP and VR. LP seems to be pretty indiscriminate as to whose flanks she admires, and while that's normal enough (for a guy at least; not sure about a dyke), she doesn't seem to regard VR any differently than anypony else she salivates over, so it's hard to take her "love" seriously.
Anyway, LP goes on to remark that she has picked up a few scars of her own, which I'm sure she secretly loves since it probably makes her feel like more of a badass, and meanwhile Gawd has been droning on about how she intends to take over Shattered Hoof and run it differently. She is guarded about giving away details, but it seems as if she intends to run it as a commercial gem harvesting operation, and will trade the gems with Manehattan and other nearby settlements; basically what I assumed Topaz was doing already, back when I assumed the author had something sane in mind for that plotline.
It actually sounds as if Gawd is planning to run her operation completely in line with how I imagined Topaz already did: a legit trading operation that is backed with the muscle of Gawd's mercenary group, who are presumably not averse to playing hardball when it comes to protecting their financial interests. I'm assuming she intends to train some of the raiders to this occupation as well. All of this makes it even more suspect that LP would place as much blind trust in her as she does, actually.
LP asks about the memory orbs and is flatly told that it is none of her business. I'm assuming the author is going somewhere with this, and it has a lot of potential, but at this point I am expecting to be disappointed.
>As we reached the end of the yard and stepped into the guard tower, I could hear a radio playing. The ending of an ancient song by Sapphire Shores gave way to the voice of DJ Pon3.
>“Good evening wastelanders! How’s every pony doing? Got some great news for you today! Remember that little Stable Gal who took on the slavers of Appleloosa and saved all those ponies? Well don’t ask me how, but she survived takin’ a nosedive off a cliff in a speeding train. That’s right, fillies and gentlecolts: she’s back!“
In traditional video game style, only the actions of le player are important enough to be newsworthy. Even if LP is attracting enough attention at this point that the local news is mentioning her various deeds, it stands to reason that other things would be going on that the DJ would report about.
In a video game, the world is generally static and will not change until the player begins completing objectives. This makes sense from a technical perspective: the game revolves around the player and it is assumed that the player's actions will be the primary driving force that moves the story along, and it would also be a programmatic nightmare to try and create a complex world that moves on its own regardless of what the player chooses to do although it has been done before; one of my favorite games is The Last Express, and in this game events will move on their own in real time, and the story's direction will only change when the player takes action. In a novel, though, there is no reason for the world to revolve entirely around the main character in this way, unless your story is about a king or something.
>“And what’s she been up to now, I hear you ask? Well, sit down an’ put on your listening ears, cuz it’s time for DJ Pon3 to tell you a story. Ready? Good. This is the story of a little filly named Silver Bell…”
This is completely absurd. How or why would the DJ know anything about this? Silver Bell's story
>I looked to Calamity in distress. I did not like getting credit for what was really Velvet Remedy’s good deed.
What exactly did Velvet Remedy do here? I remember she was the one who calmed down Silver Bell, but apart from that...you know what? That whole story was so poorly executed that I don't think anyone really deserves credit for a "good deed" there.
>DJ Pon3 didn’t mention my pegasus friend at all, and Calamity seemed unduly pleased by that.
This also doesn't make much sense. Why is Littlepoop famous but not her friends? Because she's le hero and as such is entitled by birthright to all glory and recognition, deserved or otherwise?
>>295417
>Even if LP is attracting enough attention at this point that the local news is mentioning her various deeds, it stands to reason that other things would be going on that the DJ would report about.
This is another holdover from Fallout 3 (surprise!). One of the relatively novel aspects of Fo3 was being able to tune into various radio channels with your Pipboy which would then play in the background as you carried on with the game. it ranged from ironic old-timey music about how great the apocalyse is to propaganda and local news. One channel will periodically report and opine on your character's exploits, be they heroic or otherwise. You meet the DJ as part of the main plot and can even kill him if you find him obnoxious, putting a stop to his reporting for the rest of the game.
As for how the FoE equivalent of this character knows so much about what's happening and why he focuses so heavily on Littlepip's actions, I will credit Kkat with giving both of these in-universe reasons where Fo3 didn't even bother, which will be revealed once Pip gets to know more about the DJ.
>Even if LP is attracting enough attention at this point that the local news is mentioning her various deeds, it stands to reason that other things would be going on that the DJ would report about.
This is another holdover from Fallout 3 (surprise!). One of the relatively novel aspects of Fo3 was being able to tune into various radio channels with your Pipboy which would then play in the background as you carried on with the game. it ranged from ironic old-timey music about how great the apocalyse is to propaganda and local news. One channel will periodically report and opine on your character's exploits, be they heroic or otherwise. You meet the DJ as part of the main plot and can even kill him if you find him obnoxious, putting a stop to his reporting for the rest of the game.
As for how the FoE equivalent of this character knows so much about what's happening and why he focuses so heavily on Littlepip's actions, I will credit Kkat with giving both of these in-universe reasons where Fo3 didn't even bother, which will be revealed once Pip gets to know more about the DJ.
>>295417
Anyway, Littlepoop has some plans for her junction boxcar fortress I guess; she's planning to put turrets on the walls or something. The text begins to ramble a bit here, and I suspect this is another point where the author was just thinking out loud while typing. As ever, the progression of time is unclear.
>Calamity was already getting restless. He had joined me because, like him, I wasn’t content to do nothing while others were being abused and murdered.
"I wasn't content to do nothing" is a double negative. Also, I'm going to complain again that this is a lazy motivation to assign to even one character, let alone two. "The hero is a good guy who does good because he's good" might work well enough as a motivation if you're writing an Adventures of Captain Blaster cartoon aimed at 5 year olds, but if you want to attempt anything with real depth it's usually better to put a little more thought into it than this.
>He respected the idea of Junction R-7 as a base of operations, and was already drawing up plans for a workshop in one of the cattle cars, but my pegasus friend was never going to settle down and play happy homemaker.
This clashes with what we already know about Calamity. When he and LP met, he was living outside New Appleoosa but was basically associated with the town. He worked as a guard protecting their trade caravans. While we don't know much about his broader history, he doesn't convey the impression of being a restless wanderer or anything like that; he seemed fairly settled-in when LP found him. As I've often complained before, I find it a little odd that he even joined up with her in the first place, instead of simply returning to his old life once their initial quest together was complete.
>Velvet Remedy was still fretting over the most gravely injured whom she had been able to save, but I could tell she was beginning to accept there was nothing more she could do which other ponies were not capable of. Soon, she too would desire to leave this place. The nightingale wasn’t done flying yet.
As long as I'm complaining about how all of these characters' motivations are dumb, Velvet Remedy's motivations are dumb. On the one hand she seems to have some vague desire to help others and to be a doctor, which she could easily do from here, but at the same time she has this weird "I don't want to be in le cage, I must be le free as le bird" motive crudely grafted onto her hindquarters like an unsightly appendage. What the hell does this pony even want out of life? Does she even know? Does she even have a vague idea? Do any of them?
>I, myself, wanted to stomp out the cruel shadow of Red Eye’s slavery that darkened the soul of Equestria -- but that was a goal both vague and absurdly ambitious.
Admitting it to yourself is the first step.
>In truth, the only tangible goal ahead of me was meeting with DJ Pon3.
Still not understanding why this would be. Nigel II has thus far assured us that "because it happened in Fallout 3" is the driving force behind most of the plot for this, and I agree that this is probably the actual case. However, I will continue to protest that it makes little sense according to the story's internal logic.
Though, to be fair, this DJ has been weirdly focused on reporting LP's actions, which as I've noted is pretty bizarre. I suppose seeking out the DJ simply to ask "why the fuck are you so interested in me" would make sense at this point; however, I don't get the impression that this is why she wants to see him. I'm not even sure the author actually picks up on this whole thing being weird. He seems to think that LP going to meet this DJ would be a natural next move for her, and seems to assume that all of us are on the same page, and as such doesn't seem too interested in explaining the particulars to us. And yes, I ask all of these questions knowing full well that the answer, most likely, is "because Fallout 3."
For my part, I would assume that her next move would be to go to Manehattan and thence to Fillydelphia, since that was what she was supposed to be doing before she got sidetracked by this whole Gawd/Deadeyes/Topaz arc. However, it's clear at this point that she is headed to the radio station, so I guess we'll just have to wait and see what happens.
>I was rather counting on him to point me the way.
Why? Why would you assume he would know anything? Oh, why even bother? I'm sure the answer has something to do with Fallout 3.
>Plus, after listening to his radio broadcasts for the last few days, I really did fancy the idea of getting Velvet Remedy’s music onto the airwaves.
As far as dumb side quests go, this one is definitely up there on the dumbness scale. Does Velvet give a shit about her music being played on the radio? Will she be willing to travel all the way across the Wasteland, braving whatever dangers might be lurking in their path, just for the opportunity to sing a few songs on the radio? I'm assuming she'll have to sing live, as we haven't had any indicators that Velvet has made any recordings they could leave for the station. I thought Velvet didn't want to be a singer? This story is all over the fucking place.
>By the end of the week, it would be time to go.
After a quick page break, it's the end of the week and it is therefore time to go.
They are apparently all saddled up and ready to set out, but for some reason Velvet is moping in her boxcar, batting the Memory Orb around. LP asks her why she still hasn't viewed it yet (do we even know how these things are viewed?), and she basically blathers out that she's worried about what it will contain. If I remember correctly, they found this thing in a locker with a bunch of other random crap, scattered about the ruins of Cloudsdayle. For all she knows, it contains someone's shopping list.
>I’ve been hoping that it’s about Fluttershy… but now.
Literally nothing about where this object was found or the items around it would suggest it has anything to do with Fluttershy.
Anyway, Littlepoop has some plans for her junction boxcar fortress I guess; she's planning to put turrets on the walls or something. The text begins to ramble a bit here, and I suspect this is another point where the author was just thinking out loud while typing. As ever, the progression of time is unclear.
>Calamity was already getting restless. He had joined me because, like him, I wasn’t content to do nothing while others were being abused and murdered.
"I wasn't content to do nothing" is a double negative. Also, I'm going to complain again that this is a lazy motivation to assign to even one character, let alone two. "The hero is a good guy who does good because he's good" might work well enough as a motivation if you're writing an Adventures of Captain Blaster cartoon aimed at 5 year olds, but if you want to attempt anything with real depth it's usually better to put a little more thought into it than this.
>He respected the idea of Junction R-7 as a base of operations, and was already drawing up plans for a workshop in one of the cattle cars, but my pegasus friend was never going to settle down and play happy homemaker.
This clashes with what we already know about Calamity. When he and LP met, he was living outside New Appleoosa but was basically associated with the town. He worked as a guard protecting their trade caravans. While we don't know much about his broader history, he doesn't convey the impression of being a restless wanderer or anything like that; he seemed fairly settled-in when LP found him. As I've often complained before, I find it a little odd that he even joined up with her in the first place, instead of simply returning to his old life once their initial quest together was complete.
>Velvet Remedy was still fretting over the most gravely injured whom she had been able to save, but I could tell she was beginning to accept there was nothing more she could do which other ponies were not capable of. Soon, she too would desire to leave this place. The nightingale wasn’t done flying yet.
As long as I'm complaining about how all of these characters' motivations are dumb, Velvet Remedy's motivations are dumb. On the one hand she seems to have some vague desire to help others and to be a doctor, which she could easily do from here, but at the same time she has this weird "I don't want to be in le cage, I must be le free as le bird" motive crudely grafted onto her hindquarters like an unsightly appendage. What the hell does this pony even want out of life? Does she even know? Does she even have a vague idea? Do any of them?
>I, myself, wanted to stomp out the cruel shadow of Red Eye’s slavery that darkened the soul of Equestria -- but that was a goal both vague and absurdly ambitious.
Admitting it to yourself is the first step.
>In truth, the only tangible goal ahead of me was meeting with DJ Pon3.
Still not understanding why this would be. Nigel II has thus far assured us that "because it happened in Fallout 3" is the driving force behind most of the plot for this, and I agree that this is probably the actual case. However, I will continue to protest that it makes little sense according to the story's internal logic.
Though, to be fair, this DJ has been weirdly focused on reporting LP's actions, which as I've noted is pretty bizarre. I suppose seeking out the DJ simply to ask "why the fuck are you so interested in me" would make sense at this point; however, I don't get the impression that this is why she wants to see him. I'm not even sure the author actually picks up on this whole thing being weird. He seems to think that LP going to meet this DJ would be a natural next move for her, and seems to assume that all of us are on the same page, and as such doesn't seem too interested in explaining the particulars to us. And yes, I ask all of these questions knowing full well that the answer, most likely, is "because Fallout 3."
For my part, I would assume that her next move would be to go to Manehattan and thence to Fillydelphia, since that was what she was supposed to be doing before she got sidetracked by this whole Gawd/Deadeyes/Topaz arc. However, it's clear at this point that she is headed to the radio station, so I guess we'll just have to wait and see what happens.
>I was rather counting on him to point me the way.
Why? Why would you assume he would know anything? Oh, why even bother? I'm sure the answer has something to do with Fallout 3.
>Plus, after listening to his radio broadcasts for the last few days, I really did fancy the idea of getting Velvet Remedy’s music onto the airwaves.
As far as dumb side quests go, this one is definitely up there on the dumbness scale. Does Velvet give a shit about her music being played on the radio? Will she be willing to travel all the way across the Wasteland, braving whatever dangers might be lurking in their path, just for the opportunity to sing a few songs on the radio? I'm assuming she'll have to sing live, as we haven't had any indicators that Velvet has made any recordings they could leave for the station. I thought Velvet didn't want to be a singer? This story is all over the fucking place.
>By the end of the week, it would be time to go.
After a quick page break, it's the end of the week and it is therefore time to go.
They are apparently all saddled up and ready to set out, but for some reason Velvet is moping in her boxcar, batting the Memory Orb around. LP asks her why she still hasn't viewed it yet (do we even know how these things are viewed?), and she basically blathers out that she's worried about what it will contain. If I remember correctly, they found this thing in a locker with a bunch of other random crap, scattered about the ruins of Cloudsdayle. For all she knows, it contains someone's shopping list.
>I’ve been hoping that it’s about Fluttershy… but now.
Literally nothing about where this object was found or the items around it would suggest it has anything to do with Fluttershy.
>>295424
Addendum to my last post: I went back to the point where Velvet and LP found the first memory orb, and I found this:
>Inside: numerous scrolls, ruined when a bottle of something had shattered, and the glass shards of said bottle, a framed picture of a bunny rabbit, a small crystal orb sealed in a clear bag (Property of the Ministry of Peace -- Restricted Viewing Only -- Unauthorized Viewers Will Be Prosecuted!), and a book (Supernaturals).
Once again, we have a situation where some completely obscure detail that the reader would have no reason to remember is being suddenly referenced. In this case, the "framed picture of a bunny rabbit" probably would suggest Fluttershy to the observant reader; however, within the story's internal logic, this is still a stupid connection for Velvet to make. Nothing about the circumstances under which this object was found would suggest Fluttershy; it was simply found in a delivery wagon. It could have been literally anypony's shit that Derpy was transporting when her wagon was shot down.
Moreover, while the bunny would be a dead giveaway for most MLP fans as to whose belongings the party had chanced upon, it's not clear why Velvet would know that Fluttershy had a pet rabbit she was fond of. There have been vague implications made that Velvet is some kind of Fluttershy fangirl, but it's only been mentioned once or twice in passing and hasn't factored into the story at all. Therefore, it's unclear how much information about Fluttershy Velvet would actually have.
Assuming the lifespan of pet rabbits in Equestria is similar to their lifespan in our world, it's extremely unlikely that Angel would have lived much longer than a decade, and most of the significant events in this world's backstory seem to have occurred when the mane 6 were much older (middle aged or later from the way they've been described, and I'm assuming they were in their teens or early twenties during the events of the show). Fluttershy might have kept a picture of her long-dead pet from her youth as a memento, but it's unlikely that this would be a widely-known fact about her.
I'll also mention that from the reader's perspective, it would be impossible to make this connection at all without prior knowledge of MLP. The character of Fluttershy has barely been mentioned in this story, and in the world of FoE we only know her as some vague shadowy figure from the past. Again, the bunny thing would be a dead giveaway for a fan, but someone coming into this story fresh wouldn't necessarily make this connection.
Anyway, Velvet is currently agonizing over what might be on this memory orb she found. She's worried that it might show her a side of Fluttershy's personality that she doesn't wish to see.
>I could understand. I remembered my reaction upon realizing Velvet Remedy was not a prisoner of the old Appleloosa slavers. And even though that had turned out to be for laudable reasons, I knew how much it hurt to see the pony you idolize fall from the pedestal you put them on.
Again, if more had been done to establish Velvet's admiration of Fluttershy this might actually mean something; as such, we're barely even aware of it, and LP's sentiment here is mostly confusing. Why does Velvet idolize Flutters exactly? There's no apparent connection between Fluttershy and Velvet. If anything, it would make more sense for Velvet to idolize Rarity since she is apparently a descendant of Sweetie Belle, or for that matter, why shouldn't she idolize Sweetie Belle? What is it about Fluttershy that attracts her? How does she even know who Fluttershy was? For that matter, who was Fluttershy? We don't know anything about her in this world. Once again, the author is just assuming we can see what's in his head.
Anyway, LP offers to view the memory orb for her in order to spare her whatever kind of icky naughty stuff might be on it inb4 it contains porn. We have still had virtually no explanation as to what the memory orbs specifically are or how they specifically work, nor do we have any indication that either Velvet or LP would have the slightest idea how to operate one. However, since it's FoE, I'm assuming that none of that shit matters.
>I took a deep breath, swallowing back a sudden hesitation. I’d never actually viewed a memory orb before. Logically, I knew what to expect: a reliving of some other pony’s experience. I’d been told such memories were visual, auditory, tactile… even taste and smell were preserved. But would it be crisp and vivid, or blurred by age? Would I see things as they had really been, or would it be filtered by the perceptions and biases of the rememberer? Would I sense the pony’s thoughts? And would I be able to tell them from my own?
Again, there's really no reason she should even know this much about memory orbs, but again, I'm assuming that kkat considers such trifles to be beneath his creative genius.
LP puts her horn on the orb, and something something magic happens, and she is able to activate it as easily as if it were a bunch of almonds.
>A strange flushing sensation washed over me as the train car
I'm assuming that the author meant to say something along the lines of:
>A strange flushing sensation washed over me, as it had on the train car
However, that is not what this says. The way the author has it written, LP has somehow become the train car, and a strange flushing sensation is washing over her now that she has assumed this form.
>Velvet Remedy and the entire Equestrian Wasteland was obliterated and replaced with an entirely different reality.
Velvet Remedy and the entire Equestrian Wasteland were obliterated.
><-=ooO Ooo=->
This special kind of page break indicates that we are now in Roger Corman psychedelic dream sequence territory.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWd-tksOK2o
What horrors shall Littlepoop uncover in the depths of the memory orb? Find out next.
Addendum to my last post: I went back to the point where Velvet and LP found the first memory orb, and I found this:
>Inside: numerous scrolls, ruined when a bottle of something had shattered, and the glass shards of said bottle, a framed picture of a bunny rabbit, a small crystal orb sealed in a clear bag (Property of the Ministry of Peace -- Restricted Viewing Only -- Unauthorized Viewers Will Be Prosecuted!), and a book (Supernaturals).
Once again, we have a situation where some completely obscure detail that the reader would have no reason to remember is being suddenly referenced. In this case, the "framed picture of a bunny rabbit" probably would suggest Fluttershy to the observant reader; however, within the story's internal logic, this is still a stupid connection for Velvet to make. Nothing about the circumstances under which this object was found would suggest Fluttershy; it was simply found in a delivery wagon. It could have been literally anypony's shit that Derpy was transporting when her wagon was shot down.
Moreover, while the bunny would be a dead giveaway for most MLP fans as to whose belongings the party had chanced upon, it's not clear why Velvet would know that Fluttershy had a pet rabbit she was fond of. There have been vague implications made that Velvet is some kind of Fluttershy fangirl, but it's only been mentioned once or twice in passing and hasn't factored into the story at all. Therefore, it's unclear how much information about Fluttershy Velvet would actually have.
Assuming the lifespan of pet rabbits in Equestria is similar to their lifespan in our world, it's extremely unlikely that Angel would have lived much longer than a decade, and most of the significant events in this world's backstory seem to have occurred when the mane 6 were much older (middle aged or later from the way they've been described, and I'm assuming they were in their teens or early twenties during the events of the show). Fluttershy might have kept a picture of her long-dead pet from her youth as a memento, but it's unlikely that this would be a widely-known fact about her.
I'll also mention that from the reader's perspective, it would be impossible to make this connection at all without prior knowledge of MLP. The character of Fluttershy has barely been mentioned in this story, and in the world of FoE we only know her as some vague shadowy figure from the past. Again, the bunny thing would be a dead giveaway for a fan, but someone coming into this story fresh wouldn't necessarily make this connection.
Anyway, Velvet is currently agonizing over what might be on this memory orb she found. She's worried that it might show her a side of Fluttershy's personality that she doesn't wish to see.
>I could understand. I remembered my reaction upon realizing Velvet Remedy was not a prisoner of the old Appleloosa slavers. And even though that had turned out to be for laudable reasons, I knew how much it hurt to see the pony you idolize fall from the pedestal you put them on.
Again, if more had been done to establish Velvet's admiration of Fluttershy this might actually mean something; as such, we're barely even aware of it, and LP's sentiment here is mostly confusing. Why does Velvet idolize Flutters exactly? There's no apparent connection between Fluttershy and Velvet. If anything, it would make more sense for Velvet to idolize Rarity since she is apparently a descendant of Sweetie Belle, or for that matter, why shouldn't she idolize Sweetie Belle? What is it about Fluttershy that attracts her? How does she even know who Fluttershy was? For that matter, who was Fluttershy? We don't know anything about her in this world. Once again, the author is just assuming we can see what's in his head.
Anyway, LP offers to view the memory orb for her in order to spare her whatever kind of icky naughty stuff might be on it inb4 it contains porn. We have still had virtually no explanation as to what the memory orbs specifically are or how they specifically work, nor do we have any indication that either Velvet or LP would have the slightest idea how to operate one. However, since it's FoE, I'm assuming that none of that shit matters.
>I took a deep breath, swallowing back a sudden hesitation. I’d never actually viewed a memory orb before. Logically, I knew what to expect: a reliving of some other pony’s experience. I’d been told such memories were visual, auditory, tactile… even taste and smell were preserved. But would it be crisp and vivid, or blurred by age? Would I see things as they had really been, or would it be filtered by the perceptions and biases of the rememberer? Would I sense the pony’s thoughts? And would I be able to tell them from my own?
Again, there's really no reason she should even know this much about memory orbs, but again, I'm assuming that kkat considers such trifles to be beneath his creative genius.
LP puts her horn on the orb, and something something magic happens, and she is able to activate it as easily as if it were a bunch of almonds.
>A strange flushing sensation washed over me as the train car
I'm assuming that the author meant to say something along the lines of:
>A strange flushing sensation washed over me, as it had on the train car
However, that is not what this says. The way the author has it written, LP has somehow become the train car, and a strange flushing sensation is washing over her now that she has assumed this form.
>Velvet Remedy and the entire Equestrian Wasteland was obliterated and replaced with an entirely different reality.
Velvet Remedy and the entire Equestrian Wasteland were obliterated.
><-=ooO Ooo=->
This special kind of page break indicates that we are now in Roger Corman psychedelic dream sequence territory.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWd-tksOK2o
What horrors shall Littlepoop uncover in the depths of the memory orb? Find out next.
>>295325
Nigel II is right; this is a terrible idea. Dream sequences and things like that only add extra weight to a story without necessarily adding substance, and when your story is 500,000 words long already the last thing it needs is extra weight.
>>295375
>Who looks at a decent cock and considers it unappealing? Surely they just feel insecure about an inability to please a cock. There are futafags out there specifically because cocks are so great. Cocks inspire architecture and symbology, they can be found in the upwards points of military shoulderpad chevrons and the wide thick shafts that hold up ceilings.
This is such an easy shot that I don't even think I can make a joke here.
>Speaking of flashbacks do you think this story made the right call when "Connecting the present to the past" by putting Flashback Balls in the present for Littlepip to experience and react to?
In a word, no. The present and the past are extremely poorly connected in this story. So far, much of this text revolves around the events of the past (and to be fair, the pre-war backstory seems to be a much richer and more interesting world than anything going on in the main story), but little if any of it connects to anything going on in the present. The author should have ideally written the main story so that it connected to events in the past, which would be revealed naturally as the story unfolded. If he couldn't manage that, he would have been better off just focusing on the main story, and leaving the reader to wonder about how the world got all blowed up and what happened to all their favorite characters from the show. He could always write a prequel or something if he wanted to fill in some of the blanks.
In any case, dropping the backstory into the main story as a series of disconnected anecdotes that have nothing to do with what's going on is a terrible way to write a novel. The method of delivery for said anecdotes doesn't really matter.
Nigel II is right; this is a terrible idea. Dream sequences and things like that only add extra weight to a story without necessarily adding substance, and when your story is 500,000 words long already the last thing it needs is extra weight.
>>295375
>Who looks at a decent cock and considers it unappealing? Surely they just feel insecure about an inability to please a cock. There are futafags out there specifically because cocks are so great. Cocks inspire architecture and symbology, they can be found in the upwards points of military shoulderpad chevrons and the wide thick shafts that hold up ceilings.
This is such an easy shot that I don't even think I can make a joke here.
>Speaking of flashbacks do you think this story made the right call when "Connecting the present to the past" by putting Flashback Balls in the present for Littlepip to experience and react to?
In a word, no. The present and the past are extremely poorly connected in this story. So far, much of this text revolves around the events of the past (and to be fair, the pre-war backstory seems to be a much richer and more interesting world than anything going on in the main story), but little if any of it connects to anything going on in the present. The author should have ideally written the main story so that it connected to events in the past, which would be revealed naturally as the story unfolded. If he couldn't manage that, he would have been better off just focusing on the main story, and leaving the reader to wonder about how the world got all blowed up and what happened to all their favorite characters from the show. He could always write a prequel or something if he wanted to fill in some of the blanks.
In any case, dropping the backstory into the main story as a series of disconnected anecdotes that have nothing to do with what's going on is a terrible way to write a novel. The method of delivery for said anecdotes doesn't really matter.
1609123567.jpg (99.6 KB, 654x386, nigel's senior yearbook quote.jpg)
>>295428
Littlepoop finds herself watching a pony's memories through the eyes of that pony. She is unable to interact with the world or move of her own volition, she is merely witnessing the events that the pony in question witnessed. She finds herself standing on a stage in an auditorium filled with ponies.
>I wanted to take a closer look at the walls of the auditorium -- I had the distinct impression that they were not wood paneled but rather actually formed from growing trees, much like the Ponyville Library.
This seems like a bizarre thing to notice in this situation.
>She concentrated on an elder (yet adorably cute) yellow pegasus
"Adorably cute" is redundant; it's a little like saying "kkat is a mentally ill transsexual."
Anyway, a pony that is presumably Fluttershy goes out on the stage and stands at the podium.
>I was struck by the distinct similarity between this pony and the one on the billboard I had seen a week ago, although what string of fortunes could take a pony from being the spokesmodel for carrot-flavored cola to serving as one of the most powerful mares in government was beyond me.
Once again, it's virtually impossible to keep track of all the weird little details the author has dropped at random intervals throughout this story. Do we actually know that Fluttershy was one of the most powerful mares in government? Was this actually mentioned anywhere? Should Littlepoop have this information? What, if anything, was Fluttershy's role? Even if we can piece enough of this autism together from our knowledge of the show and whatever snippets of disjointed information the text has haphazardly flung at us, this shouldn't be required in order to understand significant points in the story. If Fluttershy is important somehow, we should know exactly who she is at this point in the story. If she isn't, then why is this scene even happening?
>I immediately recognized the pattern. Velvet Remedy had hung the medical boxes in her Appleloosa boxcar so their butterflies would look exactly like that.
Do the medical boxes in this world have butterflies on them? Has that been mentioned? Should we remember it if it has? Was it even mentioned at the time LP entered her Appleoosa boxcar that her boxes were arranged in such a pattern? Again, instead of dropping in these obscure clues that Velvet admires Fluttershy, the author's purpose would be better served if he would just explain why she admires her so much. If we felt the connection or at least understood it, this would make a hell of a lot more sense. If it's supposed to be this important, it should have been a major part of her character up until now. Other than a couple of slight hints here and there, it's barely been mentioned.
Anyway, the flashback scene is completely pointless. Flutters goes up to the podium and hems and haws for awhile, and there's a lot of side commentary from Littlepoop about how adorable she is. She clearly holds some position of authority, and her underlings clearly hold her in high esteem. She announces that Luna has given them a new project, and it is supposed to help end the war. After this, the scene cuts off with the same kind of goofy-looking page break device. As to what, specifically, the project they are being assigned might entail, there is nary a hint.
>Some pony (whom I had the distinct urge to buck in the face) actually asked, “If the war ends, won’t we all be out of a job?”
This seems like a reasonable question, and unless LP is somehow absorbing the emotions of whoever's memories she's viewing, there's no reason for her to react emotionally here.
>Velvet Remedy was looking up at me with big, beautiful eyes. I smiled to her, levitating the memory orb back to her, being careful to focus around it rather than directly at it so as not to be lost in the memory again.
>“It’s not bad.”
After this, a page break. Was there any point at all to this scene?
Anyway, the next scene begins where the previous scene ought to have. They are back on the road to Manehattan, because even though LP was blabbing on for paragraphs upon paragraphs about how she intended to go see the DJ for some weird reason or other, it looks like she decided to go to Manehattan after all. Her friends, as ever, are trudging along beside her, blindly following this wack job wherever the hell she decides to go, because reasons.
They come across a partially intact hut, the front facade of which was able to survive the nuclear/magic/whatever blast because it was facing away from the city. Calamity hears movement inside and goes to check it out, returning a moment later to inform them that it's only a humble (((merchant))) and that he and his owl are perfectly harmless.
>my PipBuck flashed an enigmatic notice on my Eyes-Forward Sparkle, letting me know that it had decided to label this particular ruined hut “Trixie’s Cottage”.
Is there any particular reason this device is highlighting random landmarks like this, other than that a video game radar system will generally do stuff like that, and the author wants us to know that this was Trixie's Cottage, even though there is no apparent way this information could be in any way meaningful?
>I had long since given up trying to understand why my PipBuck kept marking seemingly random locations.
Perhaps I ought to do the same.
Anyway, for some bizarre reason or another, someone apparently nailed a recording to the door of the hut, and for some equally bizarre reason it's still here after 200 years. The recording appears to be in "bad shape," although it's difficult to visualize what this might look like since we still don't know what medium these "recordings" are even supposed to be on.
Littlepoop finds herself watching a pony's memories through the eyes of that pony. She is unable to interact with the world or move of her own volition, she is merely witnessing the events that the pony in question witnessed. She finds herself standing on a stage in an auditorium filled with ponies.
>I wanted to take a closer look at the walls of the auditorium -- I had the distinct impression that they were not wood paneled but rather actually formed from growing trees, much like the Ponyville Library.
This seems like a bizarre thing to notice in this situation.
>She concentrated on an elder (yet adorably cute) yellow pegasus
"Adorably cute" is redundant; it's a little like saying "kkat is a mentally ill transsexual."
Anyway, a pony that is presumably Fluttershy goes out on the stage and stands at the podium.
>I was struck by the distinct similarity between this pony and the one on the billboard I had seen a week ago, although what string of fortunes could take a pony from being the spokesmodel for carrot-flavored cola to serving as one of the most powerful mares in government was beyond me.
Once again, it's virtually impossible to keep track of all the weird little details the author has dropped at random intervals throughout this story. Do we actually know that Fluttershy was one of the most powerful mares in government? Was this actually mentioned anywhere? Should Littlepoop have this information? What, if anything, was Fluttershy's role? Even if we can piece enough of this autism together from our knowledge of the show and whatever snippets of disjointed information the text has haphazardly flung at us, this shouldn't be required in order to understand significant points in the story. If Fluttershy is important somehow, we should know exactly who she is at this point in the story. If she isn't, then why is this scene even happening?
>I immediately recognized the pattern. Velvet Remedy had hung the medical boxes in her Appleloosa boxcar so their butterflies would look exactly like that.
Do the medical boxes in this world have butterflies on them? Has that been mentioned? Should we remember it if it has? Was it even mentioned at the time LP entered her Appleoosa boxcar that her boxes were arranged in such a pattern? Again, instead of dropping in these obscure clues that Velvet admires Fluttershy, the author's purpose would be better served if he would just explain why she admires her so much. If we felt the connection or at least understood it, this would make a hell of a lot more sense. If it's supposed to be this important, it should have been a major part of her character up until now. Other than a couple of slight hints here and there, it's barely been mentioned.
Anyway, the flashback scene is completely pointless. Flutters goes up to the podium and hems and haws for awhile, and there's a lot of side commentary from Littlepoop about how adorable she is. She clearly holds some position of authority, and her underlings clearly hold her in high esteem. She announces that Luna has given them a new project, and it is supposed to help end the war. After this, the scene cuts off with the same kind of goofy-looking page break device. As to what, specifically, the project they are being assigned might entail, there is nary a hint.
>Some pony (whom I had the distinct urge to buck in the face) actually asked, “If the war ends, won’t we all be out of a job?”
This seems like a reasonable question, and unless LP is somehow absorbing the emotions of whoever's memories she's viewing, there's no reason for her to react emotionally here.
>Velvet Remedy was looking up at me with big, beautiful eyes. I smiled to her, levitating the memory orb back to her, being careful to focus around it rather than directly at it so as not to be lost in the memory again.
>“It’s not bad.”
After this, a page break. Was there any point at all to this scene?
Anyway, the next scene begins where the previous scene ought to have. They are back on the road to Manehattan, because even though LP was blabbing on for paragraphs upon paragraphs about how she intended to go see the DJ for some weird reason or other, it looks like she decided to go to Manehattan after all. Her friends, as ever, are trudging along beside her, blindly following this wack job wherever the hell she decides to go, because reasons.
They come across a partially intact hut, the front facade of which was able to survive the nuclear/magic/whatever blast because it was facing away from the city. Calamity hears movement inside and goes to check it out, returning a moment later to inform them that it's only a humble (((merchant))) and that he and his owl are perfectly harmless.
>my PipBuck flashed an enigmatic notice on my Eyes-Forward Sparkle, letting me know that it had decided to label this particular ruined hut “Trixie’s Cottage”.
Is there any particular reason this device is highlighting random landmarks like this, other than that a video game radar system will generally do stuff like that, and the author wants us to know that this was Trixie's Cottage, even though there is no apparent way this information could be in any way meaningful?
>I had long since given up trying to understand why my PipBuck kept marking seemingly random locations.
Perhaps I ought to do the same.
Anyway, for some bizarre reason or another, someone apparently nailed a recording to the door of the hut, and for some equally bizarre reason it's still here after 200 years. The recording appears to be in "bad shape," although it's difficult to visualize what this might look like since we still don't know what medium these "recordings" are even supposed to be on.
>>295452
>In the back of my mind, a voice insisted that this might be hard enough to call for some Party-Time Mint-als. I knew the voice was lying, and I tried to ignore it.
This author only brings up these quirky little character traits when he wants to use them; most of the time they're MIA. If LP is addicted, or becoming addicted, to crack mints, it should be a constant nagging little voice in the back of her brain that we hear all the time. If Velvet is obsessed with Fluttershy to the point that she rearranges boxes to resemble her cutie mark, this should be a major aspect of her character that we should be well acquainted with by now. These things need to be continually reinforced if they're important. The only trait that actually does get any continuous reinforcement is LP's being a lesbian, and even that isn't integrated into her character particularly well. If you went through this text and deleted all the derpy little jokes she makes about how this and that mare has a nice ass, the entire story could go exactly the same and you'd never know this character was meant to be a lesbo.
>As I rejoined the others, the merchant (a grizzled unicorn stallion with a dust-colored mane and wearing trader barding) was telling Calamity and Velvet Remedy tall tales of the Manehattan Ruins.
What is "trader barding?" Is "trader" another one of those common occupations that in this universe denotes membership in some rigidly-defined social caste, along the same lines as "raider" or "slaver?" Do each of these groups have their own special designated barding that denotes their caste, so anypony can take one look at them and immediately know which group they belong to?
For being an anarchic, post-apocalyptic wasteland, this world seems weirdly organized and well structured. How formalized is any of this? Are these designations enforced somehow? Like, let's say a "raider" figures out that everypony avoids him wherever he goes, because he wears the official raider barding that designates him as a raider. He, being somewhat sharper than most of the other raiders in his local raiders chapter, decides he's going to put on "trader" barding instead, and is able to walk among ponies disguised as a trader. Then, when some unsuspecting pony approaches him to trade, he can spring his trap and say "Aha! I have fooled you! I am actually a raider! Now prepare to be raided!" And then he would proceed to raid the shit out of him. Would that be allowed? Or would he be fined by the raiders' guild for impersonating a trader?
Like, does it ever occur to any of these ponies to break out of these predefined roles just a weensy little bit? Maybe a slaver decides he wants to do a little trading and raiding on the side? You know, diversify his portfolio a little, learn some new skills? Maybe one lone, iconoclast raider decides that hanging entrails on his bedroom wall is unsanitary and gross, and decides to just hang up an old Milli Vanilli poster he found instead? Maybe spruce the place up a little, burn some incense, see if he can't convince some girls to come over? If he pulled that off he could change his name to Panty Raider.
What I'm getting at is that it's completely unnatural for individuals living in a chaotic wasteland with no rules or societal structure whatsoever to just spontaneously sort themselves into a handful of rigidly defined groups like this. Even if the characters the party is supposed to encounter on their journey are just generic throwaway bad guys or good guys, that doesn't mean they all have to fit specific archetypes from the Fallout games. You can humanize them a little poninize, whatever; give them their own little individual quirks, make them complicated. It would go a long way to making this story feel a lot less ridiculous.
Anyway, the merchant appears to be warm for Velvet's form, and also he warns them that there are ghosts and manticores in Manehattan. Velvet is skeptical about the existence of ghosts. They are in the process of arguing about it, when suddenly the merchant notices Littlepoop walking in.
>The pony finally noticed my approach and gave me a big grin. “Ah, and another customer. Welcome to…” he waved a hoof at the collapsed building around him, “…the Luna-Damned Shithole.”
Something tells me this guy isn't exactly salesman of the year. Is there any particular reason he chose this crumbling hut to be his storefront, out of all the other crumbling huts along the road to Manehattan? Is there any particular reason he didn't try to fix the place up a little if he was going to be living in it and using it as a store? Did it ever occur to him that maybe some customers would be put off by the idea of doing their shopping in a crumbling hut called "the Luna Damned Shithole?" For that matter, how many customers could he reasonably expect to see coming this way? Seems like if Manehattan is haunted and populated by manticores, it's not exactly going to be a hot tourist destination. Has his shop ever been raided? Have any passing bands of slavers ever tried to abduct this lone weirdo living in a ruin surrounded by absolutely nopony? Mightn't this guy be a little better served by going to one of the more populous regions and setting up shop there?
>Behind him, a robotic owl whirred and hooted from the top of a doorless cabinet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzKhqt5IRnM
>I nodded. I passed Calamity the magical energy lance to add to his bartering load and sat down to work on the recording. These things were designed to be ridiculously hardy, but this one had taken one hell of a beating.
Again, it might be helpful to know what exactly we're dealing with here in terms of this recording. They're "designed to be ridiculously hardy?" Alright. In what way? What is this exactly? What should I be imagining? Is this like a cassette tape? A floppy disk? A game cartridge? "Recording" doesn't exactly nail it down.
>In the back of my mind, a voice insisted that this might be hard enough to call for some Party-Time Mint-als. I knew the voice was lying, and I tried to ignore it.
This author only brings up these quirky little character traits when he wants to use them; most of the time they're MIA. If LP is addicted, or becoming addicted, to crack mints, it should be a constant nagging little voice in the back of her brain that we hear all the time. If Velvet is obsessed with Fluttershy to the point that she rearranges boxes to resemble her cutie mark, this should be a major aspect of her character that we should be well acquainted with by now. These things need to be continually reinforced if they're important. The only trait that actually does get any continuous reinforcement is LP's being a lesbian, and even that isn't integrated into her character particularly well. If you went through this text and deleted all the derpy little jokes she makes about how this and that mare has a nice ass, the entire story could go exactly the same and you'd never know this character was meant to be a lesbo.
>As I rejoined the others, the merchant (a grizzled unicorn stallion with a dust-colored mane and wearing trader barding) was telling Calamity and Velvet Remedy tall tales of the Manehattan Ruins.
What is "trader barding?" Is "trader" another one of those common occupations that in this universe denotes membership in some rigidly-defined social caste, along the same lines as "raider" or "slaver?" Do each of these groups have their own special designated barding that denotes their caste, so anypony can take one look at them and immediately know which group they belong to?
For being an anarchic, post-apocalyptic wasteland, this world seems weirdly organized and well structured. How formalized is any of this? Are these designations enforced somehow? Like, let's say a "raider" figures out that everypony avoids him wherever he goes, because he wears the official raider barding that designates him as a raider. He, being somewhat sharper than most of the other raiders in his local raiders chapter, decides he's going to put on "trader" barding instead, and is able to walk among ponies disguised as a trader. Then, when some unsuspecting pony approaches him to trade, he can spring his trap and say "Aha! I have fooled you! I am actually a raider! Now prepare to be raided!" And then he would proceed to raid the shit out of him. Would that be allowed? Or would he be fined by the raiders' guild for impersonating a trader?
Like, does it ever occur to any of these ponies to break out of these predefined roles just a weensy little bit? Maybe a slaver decides he wants to do a little trading and raiding on the side? You know, diversify his portfolio a little, learn some new skills? Maybe one lone, iconoclast raider decides that hanging entrails on his bedroom wall is unsanitary and gross, and decides to just hang up an old Milli Vanilli poster he found instead? Maybe spruce the place up a little, burn some incense, see if he can't convince some girls to come over? If he pulled that off he could change his name to Panty Raider.
What I'm getting at is that it's completely unnatural for individuals living in a chaotic wasteland with no rules or societal structure whatsoever to just spontaneously sort themselves into a handful of rigidly defined groups like this. Even if the characters the party is supposed to encounter on their journey are just generic throwaway bad guys or good guys, that doesn't mean they all have to fit specific archetypes from the Fallout games. You can humanize them a little poninize, whatever; give them their own little individual quirks, make them complicated. It would go a long way to making this story feel a lot less ridiculous.
Anyway, the merchant appears to be warm for Velvet's form, and also he warns them that there are ghosts and manticores in Manehattan. Velvet is skeptical about the existence of ghosts. They are in the process of arguing about it, when suddenly the merchant notices Littlepoop walking in.
>The pony finally noticed my approach and gave me a big grin. “Ah, and another customer. Welcome to…” he waved a hoof at the collapsed building around him, “…the Luna-Damned Shithole.”
Something tells me this guy isn't exactly salesman of the year. Is there any particular reason he chose this crumbling hut to be his storefront, out of all the other crumbling huts along the road to Manehattan? Is there any particular reason he didn't try to fix the place up a little if he was going to be living in it and using it as a store? Did it ever occur to him that maybe some customers would be put off by the idea of doing their shopping in a crumbling hut called "the Luna Damned Shithole?" For that matter, how many customers could he reasonably expect to see coming this way? Seems like if Manehattan is haunted and populated by manticores, it's not exactly going to be a hot tourist destination. Has his shop ever been raided? Have any passing bands of slavers ever tried to abduct this lone weirdo living in a ruin surrounded by absolutely nopony? Mightn't this guy be a little better served by going to one of the more populous regions and setting up shop there?
>Behind him, a robotic owl whirred and hooted from the top of a doorless cabinet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzKhqt5IRnM
>I nodded. I passed Calamity the magical energy lance to add to his bartering load and sat down to work on the recording. These things were designed to be ridiculously hardy, but this one had taken one hell of a beating.
Again, it might be helpful to know what exactly we're dealing with here in terms of this recording. They're "designed to be ridiculously hardy?" Alright. In what way? What is this exactly? What should I be imagining? Is this like a cassette tape? A floppy disk? A game cartridge? "Recording" doesn't exactly nail it down.
>>295428
>I'll also mention that from the reader's perspective, it would be impossible to make this connection at all without prior knowledge of MLP. The character of Fluttershy has barely been mentioned in this story, and in the world of FoE we only know her as some vague shadowy figure from the past.
could fix this with a flashback scene where child LP is studying alone in the library for an upcoming history test on the Mane Six Ministries and struggles to ignore the noise of a nearby study group full of friends loudly MST3King all over the history book and arguing over which historical figure failed the hardest and bears the most blame for the downfall of Equestria.
one filly could say "Celestia did everything wrong" and that could trigger Littlepip, since she's such a devout Celestrian.
If LP grew up idolizing the alicorns and mane six and exclusively read propaganda schoolbooks it would shock her to learn that they fucked up sometimes.
Come to think of it... Littlepip is from a vault. Velvet is from that same vault. Fluttershy and Celestia are historical figures who were alive at the same time. If anypony should turn these figures into deities it should be a dumb Wastelander like Calamity. Making him a badass preacher would certainly help make him more than Yeehaw the Pegasus with a Shotgun.
Establishing Littlepip as somepony who thinks she had no friends as a kid for being short and uncool and having an embarassing alcoholic mom but actually lacked friends growing up because she was a violent opinionated manipulative creepy thieving little shit would be an interesting character trait.
>>295432
Lol nice one. Walked right into that.
>>295462
You'd also have to erase the sex scene
>trader barding
Kkat is a faggot and here's another reason why
yes there is an outfit called "wasteland trader outfit" or something like that in fallout 3 but it should be described better. Kkat just lazily namedrops it and changes outfit to barding because hurr durr horses.
It just doesn't make sense to look at a specific suit of metal armour and immediately know its name in the game data and say "that's some nice Raider Ravager Armour you've got for sale, last week I killed someone in Raider Painspike Armour. I'll trade what's left of it and two grenades for that armour and this Trader Barding and some Plumber's Gloves".
Nobody fucking talks like that. LP might have a videogame excuse device bolted to her arm but she still shouldn't be able to identify clothes based on what role they serve in this "200 years after the nukes fell" social order now. I thought it was a fucking plot point earlier on that she couldn't guess the fact that only raiders would be caught dead or alive wearing raider clothes! If she looked at some Caesar's Legion niggers from FNV would she identify their clothing instantly as Caesar's Legion Futanariius armour despite having no idea what that is or who they are, or would she identify the pseudo-roman armour they wear made from American Rugby armour as customized American Rugby armour in poor condition?
"From the thick brown clothing he wore, utterly coated in buttoned pouches and zippered satchels, not to mention his large backpack and two saddlebags, this pony was either a travelling trader or a hoarding-obsessed hobo with no fashion sense. Then again, considering how I once wore Raider armour unironically and got shot on sight for it, did I really have any room to judge?"
There we go. Physical description first followed by LP's guesses at what it means and a joke at the end.
>raider's guild
If any group would unionize for the sake of extortion and illegitimate power first in this world, it would be the raiders. A literal Thief's Guild.
>I'll also mention that from the reader's perspective, it would be impossible to make this connection at all without prior knowledge of MLP. The character of Fluttershy has barely been mentioned in this story, and in the world of FoE we only know her as some vague shadowy figure from the past.
could fix this with a flashback scene where child LP is studying alone in the library for an upcoming history test on the Mane Six Ministries and struggles to ignore the noise of a nearby study group full of friends loudly MST3King all over the history book and arguing over which historical figure failed the hardest and bears the most blame for the downfall of Equestria.
one filly could say "Celestia did everything wrong" and that could trigger Littlepip, since she's such a devout Celestrian.
If LP grew up idolizing the alicorns and mane six and exclusively read propaganda schoolbooks it would shock her to learn that they fucked up sometimes.
Come to think of it... Littlepip is from a vault. Velvet is from that same vault. Fluttershy and Celestia are historical figures who were alive at the same time. If anypony should turn these figures into deities it should be a dumb Wastelander like Calamity. Making him a badass preacher would certainly help make him more than Yeehaw the Pegasus with a Shotgun.
Establishing Littlepip as somepony who thinks she had no friends as a kid for being short and uncool and having an embarassing alcoholic mom but actually lacked friends growing up because she was a violent opinionated manipulative creepy thieving little shit would be an interesting character trait.
>>295432
Lol nice one. Walked right into that.
>>295462
You'd also have to erase the sex scene
>trader barding
Kkat is a faggot and here's another reason why
yes there is an outfit called "wasteland trader outfit" or something like that in fallout 3 but it should be described better. Kkat just lazily namedrops it and changes outfit to barding because hurr durr horses.
It just doesn't make sense to look at a specific suit of metal armour and immediately know its name in the game data and say "that's some nice Raider Ravager Armour you've got for sale, last week I killed someone in Raider Painspike Armour. I'll trade what's left of it and two grenades for that armour and this Trader Barding and some Plumber's Gloves".
Nobody fucking talks like that. LP might have a videogame excuse device bolted to her arm but she still shouldn't be able to identify clothes based on what role they serve in this "200 years after the nukes fell" social order now. I thought it was a fucking plot point earlier on that she couldn't guess the fact that only raiders would be caught dead or alive wearing raider clothes! If she looked at some Caesar's Legion niggers from FNV would she identify their clothing instantly as Caesar's Legion Futanariius armour despite having no idea what that is or who they are, or would she identify the pseudo-roman armour they wear made from American Rugby armour as customized American Rugby armour in poor condition?
"From the thick brown clothing he wore, utterly coated in buttoned pouches and zippered satchels, not to mention his large backpack and two saddlebags, this pony was either a travelling trader or a hoarding-obsessed hobo with no fashion sense. Then again, considering how I once wore Raider armour unironically and got shot on sight for it, did I really have any room to judge?"
There we go. Physical description first followed by LP's guesses at what it means and a joke at the end.
>raider's guild
If any group would unionize for the sake of extortion and illegitimate power first in this world, it would be the raiders. A literal Thief's Guild.
>>295452
>Do we actually know that Fluttershy was one of the most powerful mares in government? Was this actually mentioned anywhere? Should Littlepoop have this information? What, if anything, was Fluttershy's role?
Logically speaking, this should all be common knowledge in-universe. Minor spoiler, but it's been hinted a few times now in-story - the main six were all elevated to significant government positions second only to the princesses. Their names and roles would be part of fundamental history lessons in the stables, considering that the nation they administrated was the one that built the stables in the first place. Velvet and Littlepip ought to be intimately familiar with Fluttershy, by reputation at the very least. This, obviously, isn't communicated well in the text, because Kkat doesn't know or care that the reader can't read his thoughts.
>Anyway, the flashback scene is completely pointless. Flutters goes up to the podium and hems and haws for awhile, and there's a lot of side commentary from Littlepoop about how adorable she is. She clearly holds some position of authority, and her underlings clearly hold her in high esteem. She announces that Luna has given them a new project, and it is supposed to help end the war.
Funnily enough, this project turns out to be vitally important to the wartime side of FoE's plot. It's also one of the pants-on-head dumbest parts of the story.
One small thing I will give the story credit for in its portrayal of Fluttershy - medical supplies bear her cutie mark in much the same way that real life ones have a red or white cross. That's a cute little detail.
>The recording appears to be in "bad shape," although it's difficult to visualize what this might look like since we still don't know what medium these "recordings" are even supposed to be on.
Yet another Fallout 3ism. In the Fallout games you can come across 'holotapes' left over from before the apocalypse, essentially a more advanced form of tape cassette in the style of VCR. They typically contain data or audio recordings. Don't ask me how one survived being nailed to a door.
>Do we actually know that Fluttershy was one of the most powerful mares in government? Was this actually mentioned anywhere? Should Littlepoop have this information? What, if anything, was Fluttershy's role?
Logically speaking, this should all be common knowledge in-universe. Minor spoiler, but it's been hinted a few times now in-story - the main six were all elevated to significant government positions second only to the princesses. Their names and roles would be part of fundamental history lessons in the stables, considering that the nation they administrated was the one that built the stables in the first place. Velvet and Littlepip ought to be intimately familiar with Fluttershy, by reputation at the very least. This, obviously, isn't communicated well in the text, because Kkat doesn't know or care that the reader can't read his thoughts.
>Anyway, the flashback scene is completely pointless. Flutters goes up to the podium and hems and haws for awhile, and there's a lot of side commentary from Littlepoop about how adorable she is. She clearly holds some position of authority, and her underlings clearly hold her in high esteem. She announces that Luna has given them a new project, and it is supposed to help end the war.
Funnily enough, this project turns out to be vitally important to the wartime side of FoE's plot. It's also one of the pants-on-head dumbest parts of the story.
One small thing I will give the story credit for in its portrayal of Fluttershy - medical supplies bear her cutie mark in much the same way that real life ones have a red or white cross. That's a cute little detail.
>The recording appears to be in "bad shape," although it's difficult to visualize what this might look like since we still don't know what medium these "recordings" are even supposed to be on.
Yet another Fallout 3ism. In the Fallout games you can come across 'holotapes' left over from before the apocalypse, essentially a more advanced form of tape cassette in the style of VCR. They typically contain data or audio recordings. Don't ask me how one survived being nailed to a door.
>>295493
Wait a second, the story has shown us Big Mac's fate twice but failed to explain any of the context behind it. We know he died protecting Luna but we have absolutely no idea why Luna was there or what this war was about. We don't know what caused the war or who started it. We know the mane six were involved in different Ministries but we don't know why this choice was made yet.
Our first glimpse at pre-war Fluttershy in this memory orb shows her deciding to end the war with the Pre-Retcon Hashirama Senju Option (Hashirama gave most of his nukes away to rival nations for no reason other than they had to be there for the plot to happen. 600 episodes later this is retconned, now those nuclear magic monsters of his were payments for a peace treaty with those nations and the peace treaty didn't last long. If he wanted world peace he should have threatened the world with his nukes to get it instead of giving those things away to "maintain the power balance") when it would be more world-buildy and emotionally resonant to show her miserably suffering as she and her medical guys try to save lives and fail.
Or do a public "don't look back in anger" speech shortly after a zebra terrorist attack and get booed off the stage by a propagandized crowd hungry for zigger blood.
This is somebody's introduction to the Fluttershy character. Someone is reading this fic and has never watched FIM before probably. Kkat should try and get us to feel something positive for the character before she fucks everything up.
It doesn't particularly matter whether Cartoon America or Commie China fired the first nukes in Fallout because Fallout isn't really about those pre-war nations. It's about the people alive today and choices and deep shit like that.
But Fallout Equestria? Everything happens in Equestria. The heroes are trying to piece together parts of an Equestrian history they should already know, and sometimes they use information they learned offscreen or even before the story's start to fill in the blanks between pieces of information they gain in today's chapter.
The heroes want to bring back pre-nuking pre-war Equestria despite having no idea how to do this and at the story's end everything gets wrapped up so goddamn neatly by a deus ex machina that the next generation of ponies seen during the epilogue openly doubts that the stories of their parents could ever be true even though motherfucking memory orbs still exist. The author just forgot about those during the epilogue.
Equestria and information on it is central to Fallout Equestria but even at the story's end we still don't get a complete picture when it comes to Equestria's history. There are still massive holes in the story like "why did the fighting start in the first place?" and "but what did ponies/zebras learn from this?".
But if you point this out to a blind fanboy he'll say "Surely Equestria was being too white and imperialistic and therefore deserved nuking since they're white-coded and they were scared of Zecora at first in one episode. Equestria is better now in FE because it's less racist and its president is a Griffon and there are tons of alicorn waifus for me to fantasize about". He just fills in all the gaps with the propaganda he was raised on, and doesn't realize his assumptions and headcanons and biases make him a retarded niggerlover.
Kkat never made any of pre-war Equestria matter to post-war Equestria and to compensate for that he eventually makes post-war Equestria into a deus-ex-magically-undone afterthought for the post-post-war Equestria era.
At the end of the day... Fallout Equestria is devoid of substance and themes. Past Sins wanted to be about the sins of the past and that knight love story wanted to be a love story and Friendship Is Optimal wanted to warn the world about a magical god AI tricking humanity into permanently shoving their brains into My Little Pony brand bad dragon horse vaginas. But this story can't be called a story about LP struggling with morality or addiction or even love. She is a murderhobo who clears deathcourses and slaughters enemies until she is rewarded by the author with the sappiest shlock imaginable. Despite all the time this story spends on unimportant details it fails to figure out what details are so immensely important that they need to be in the story above all others. I'm tempted to joke that Littlepip missed some important memory orbs somewhere and that's why the audience never gets to see the most vital parts of the lore that give all this suffering and tragedy some kind of meaning or lesson to learn. It is fundamentally incomplete as a story despite spending over 500k words on its dismal tale of pony gore and mass murder and failure and gunfights and schemes and war and pony characters saying "Damn" like they're Shadow The Hedgehog.
Wait a second, the story has shown us Big Mac's fate twice but failed to explain any of the context behind it. We know he died protecting Luna but we have absolutely no idea why Luna was there or what this war was about. We don't know what caused the war or who started it. We know the mane six were involved in different Ministries but we don't know why this choice was made yet.
Our first glimpse at pre-war Fluttershy in this memory orb shows her deciding to end the war with the Pre-Retcon Hashirama Senju Option (Hashirama gave most of his nukes away to rival nations for no reason other than they had to be there for the plot to happen. 600 episodes later this is retconned, now those nuclear magic monsters of his were payments for a peace treaty with those nations and the peace treaty didn't last long. If he wanted world peace he should have threatened the world with his nukes to get it instead of giving those things away to "maintain the power balance") when it would be more world-buildy and emotionally resonant to show her miserably suffering as she and her medical guys try to save lives and fail.
Or do a public "don't look back in anger" speech shortly after a zebra terrorist attack and get booed off the stage by a propagandized crowd hungry for zigger blood.
This is somebody's introduction to the Fluttershy character. Someone is reading this fic and has never watched FIM before probably. Kkat should try and get us to feel something positive for the character before she fucks everything up.
It doesn't particularly matter whether Cartoon America or Commie China fired the first nukes in Fallout because Fallout isn't really about those pre-war nations. It's about the people alive today and choices and deep shit like that.
But Fallout Equestria? Everything happens in Equestria. The heroes are trying to piece together parts of an Equestrian history they should already know, and sometimes they use information they learned offscreen or even before the story's start to fill in the blanks between pieces of information they gain in today's chapter.
The heroes want to bring back pre-nuking pre-war Equestria despite having no idea how to do this and at the story's end everything gets wrapped up so goddamn neatly by a deus ex machina that the next generation of ponies seen during the epilogue openly doubts that the stories of their parents could ever be true even though motherfucking memory orbs still exist. The author just forgot about those during the epilogue.
Equestria and information on it is central to Fallout Equestria but even at the story's end we still don't get a complete picture when it comes to Equestria's history. There are still massive holes in the story like "why did the fighting start in the first place?" and "but what did ponies/zebras learn from this?".
But if you point this out to a blind fanboy he'll say "Surely Equestria was being too white and imperialistic and therefore deserved nuking since they're white-coded and they were scared of Zecora at first in one episode. Equestria is better now in FE because it's less racist and its president is a Griffon and there are tons of alicorn waifus for me to fantasize about". He just fills in all the gaps with the propaganda he was raised on, and doesn't realize his assumptions and headcanons and biases make him a retarded niggerlover.
Kkat never made any of pre-war Equestria matter to post-war Equestria and to compensate for that he eventually makes post-war Equestria into a deus-ex-magically-undone afterthought for the post-post-war Equestria era.
At the end of the day... Fallout Equestria is devoid of substance and themes. Past Sins wanted to be about the sins of the past and that knight love story wanted to be a love story and Friendship Is Optimal wanted to warn the world about a magical god AI tricking humanity into permanently shoving their brains into My Little Pony brand bad dragon horse vaginas. But this story can't be called a story about LP struggling with morality or addiction or even love. She is a murderhobo who clears deathcourses and slaughters enemies until she is rewarded by the author with the sappiest shlock imaginable. Despite all the time this story spends on unimportant details it fails to figure out what details are so immensely important that they need to be in the story above all others. I'm tempted to joke that Littlepip missed some important memory orbs somewhere and that's why the audience never gets to see the most vital parts of the lore that give all this suffering and tragedy some kind of meaning or lesson to learn. It is fundamentally incomplete as a story despite spending over 500k words on its dismal tale of pony gore and mass murder and failure and gunfights and schemes and war and pony characters saying "Damn" like they're Shadow The Hedgehog.
>>295495
>Fallout Equestria is devoid of substance and themes.
Gotta disagree there, but this isn't a defense of the story. FoE has themes, they're just morally and logically awful on multiple levels. It gets particularly explicit towards the end, when the intended messages and emotional conclusions of the story are stated outright. But OH BOY, we'll get to that...
>Fallout Equestria is devoid of substance and themes.
Gotta disagree there, but this isn't a defense of the story. FoE has themes, they're just morally and logically awful on multiple levels. It gets particularly explicit towards the end, when the intended messages and emotional conclusions of the story are stated outright. But OH BOY, we'll get to that...
>>295502
I'll elaborate a little, since one of the major themes has actually come up already. FoE spends a lot of time paying lip service to the old adage that "the road to hell is paved with good intentions". A lot of FoE's major events, past and present, are made out to be failed attempts at doing good, which go/went wrong due to ignorance, incompetence, poor information or the like. This specifics are often either very silly or completely contrived, but it's at least fairly consistent throughout as a recurring theme. The story never settles on an actual functional solution to the problem of well-intentioned ideas going wrong - well, aside from "be Littlesue and have the favor of the author", but the question is at least posed.
This theme is flatly contradicted by the story's other primary theme, "sometimes the correct moral choice is actually horribly evil" which essentially exists to give Littlepip an out for being an enormous murderhobo, but I'm getting way ahead of the story so far.
I'll elaborate a little, since one of the major themes has actually come up already. FoE spends a lot of time paying lip service to the old adage that "the road to hell is paved with good intentions". A lot of FoE's major events, past and present, are made out to be failed attempts at doing good, which go/went wrong due to ignorance, incompetence, poor information or the like. This specifics are often either very silly or completely contrived, but it's at least fairly consistent throughout as a recurring theme. The story never settles on an actual functional solution to the problem of well-intentioned ideas going wrong - well, aside from "be Littlesue and have the favor of the author", but the question is at least posed.
This theme is flatly contradicted by the story's other primary theme, "sometimes the correct moral choice is actually horribly evil" which essentially exists to give Littlepip an out for being an enormous murderhobo, but I'm getting way ahead of the story so far.
Throwing my hat in the circle.
>>295495
>It's about the people alive today and choices and deep shit like that.
Not quite. It's more closely aligned towards the inherent evil of humans and exemplifying the worst the world has to offer while showing good still exists in people, albeit in a smaller magnitude within men but there is still hope left even if it is all lost, life still exists in the most bitter conditions although vigilantes are not the heroes they make themselves out to be even when faced with choices that defy morality they still seek to do what they believe is right while all hope is lost, rape murders are a common theme as it exemplifies the harshness of unsympathetic psychopaths that revel in anarchy.
All in all, humans haven't changed and still do what they think they should even if it isn't always right, they still continue to exist in a world of perpetual hell while seeking to help others for the sake of it or giving into personal freedom and living a life of inflicting misery upon others, basic human emotions never change and won't, along with war.
>>295495
>It's about the people alive today and choices and deep shit like that.
Not quite. It's more closely aligned towards the inherent evil of humans and exemplifying the worst the world has to offer while showing good still exists in people, albeit in a smaller magnitude within men but there is still hope left even if it is all lost, life still exists in the most bitter conditions although vigilantes are not the heroes they make themselves out to be even when faced with choices that defy morality they still seek to do what they believe is right while all hope is lost, rape murders are a common theme as it exemplifies the harshness of unsympathetic psychopaths that revel in anarchy.
All in all, humans haven't changed and still do what they think they should even if it isn't always right, they still continue to exist in a world of perpetual hell while seeking to help others for the sake of it or giving into personal freedom and living a life of inflicting misery upon others, basic human emotions never change and won't, along with war.
>>295544
That makes sense, your interpretation is valid. And nice Spurdo SPQRde!
>>295524
Funny how the mane six's "good intentions" couldn't save the day in a setting where you can fire rainbow lasers of friendship by being nice enough. But even when Littlepip's "good intentions" manifest in the form of shooting first and asking questions never or toppling two unknown criminal figures so a third unknown will rise to fill the power vacuum, her actions don't ever result in disaster except for that one really retarded and forced and artificial scene much later, you know the one.
Hell, Littlepip literally took multiple buckshots into her body from Calamity because he assumed wearing raider "uniform" must mean kill-on-sight. So you'd think this would influence her decision-making at least a little. But no, this annoying invincible murderhobo with infinite health and ammo is going to raider and slaver places specifically to war with them and slaughter them all. But at the same time she lets Velvet give away the group's highly limited medical supplies to "bandits" who shot at Team LP and got defeated for it!
A raider is a bandit that wears ugly spiked clothing and acts edgy! A slaver is a bandit that won't stop at stealing your wallet and will steal you away to sell you into slavery! Stealing is wrong no matter how you're dressed! Stealing only becomes moral if you're taking back what's yours from thieves. Sometimes these three robbers wait around on roads and attack ponies and sometimes they attack settlements. These shouldn't be treated like three separate categories of villain badness or three separate monster races.
Kkat's attempts to make Velvet look more "admirably moral" than the protag makes her into a goddamn liability who's typically there to be wrong except when she's got the author on her side.
Something just feels wrong about saying ponies can't win a war or stop a war with pony magic or friendship or kindness but they can slaughter random baddies in your nuked country with a glock and magic flaming 50cal until the only smart thing pre-war ponies ever did is finally allowed to instantly save the day and undo all the damage inflicted by the war. I can't put my finger on the word for it. It's self-indulgent on an incomprehensible scale. The heroes of Equestria fail it in the face of a threat they should be able to stop and their methods and mindsets change at random with each chapter because the author's trying to force "racist Fallout america" attitudes into cutesy cartoon ponies who unironically don't know what PTSD is. But this stupid fucking murderhobo can save the day by wasting time until she eventually finds the Dragon Balls of magical wish-granting bullshit. I'm joking because it's a different deus ex machina device I don't want to spoil. Come to think of it, the nuked world was eventually un-nuked by magical bullshit made by pre-war ponies with good intentions so what's the "theme" there?
If there's one consistent thing about the author, considering his love of ripping off unrealistic videogame "tropes" and then mocking some of them while playing sillier ones straight, and his love of giving canon ponies horrible fates completely disproportionate to what they did in life and what they deserved, it would be his motto of "X is only okay when I say it is".
That makes sense, your interpretation is valid. And nice Spurdo SPQRde!
>>295524
Funny how the mane six's "good intentions" couldn't save the day in a setting where you can fire rainbow lasers of friendship by being nice enough. But even when Littlepip's "good intentions" manifest in the form of shooting first and asking questions never or toppling two unknown criminal figures so a third unknown will rise to fill the power vacuum, her actions don't ever result in disaster except for that one really retarded and forced and artificial scene much later, you know the one.
Hell, Littlepip literally took multiple buckshots into her body from Calamity because he assumed wearing raider "uniform" must mean kill-on-sight. So you'd think this would influence her decision-making at least a little. But no, this annoying invincible murderhobo with infinite health and ammo is going to raider and slaver places specifically to war with them and slaughter them all. But at the same time she lets Velvet give away the group's highly limited medical supplies to "bandits" who shot at Team LP and got defeated for it!
A raider is a bandit that wears ugly spiked clothing and acts edgy! A slaver is a bandit that won't stop at stealing your wallet and will steal you away to sell you into slavery! Stealing is wrong no matter how you're dressed! Stealing only becomes moral if you're taking back what's yours from thieves. Sometimes these three robbers wait around on roads and attack ponies and sometimes they attack settlements. These shouldn't be treated like three separate categories of villain badness or three separate monster races.
Kkat's attempts to make Velvet look more "admirably moral" than the protag makes her into a goddamn liability who's typically there to be wrong except when she's got the author on her side.
Something just feels wrong about saying ponies can't win a war or stop a war with pony magic or friendship or kindness but they can slaughter random baddies in your nuked country with a glock and magic flaming 50cal until the only smart thing pre-war ponies ever did is finally allowed to instantly save the day and undo all the damage inflicted by the war. I can't put my finger on the word for it. It's self-indulgent on an incomprehensible scale. The heroes of Equestria fail it in the face of a threat they should be able to stop and their methods and mindsets change at random with each chapter because the author's trying to force "racist Fallout america" attitudes into cutesy cartoon ponies who unironically don't know what PTSD is. But this stupid fucking murderhobo can save the day by wasting time until she eventually finds the Dragon Balls of magical wish-granting bullshit. I'm joking because it's a different deus ex machina device I don't want to spoil. Come to think of it, the nuked world was eventually un-nuked by magical bullshit made by pre-war ponies with good intentions so what's the "theme" there?
If there's one consistent thing about the author, considering his love of ripping off unrealistic videogame "tropes" and then mocking some of them while playing sillier ones straight, and his love of giving canon ponies horrible fates completely disproportionate to what they did in life and what they deserved, it would be his motto of "X is only okay when I say it is".
I think I've been too negative with this fic so...
What is your favourite part of the fic so far, and what one moment sticks out as a missed opportunity to you?
Personally I really enjoyed the creativity of using an idol concert to draw in assassination targets even though the setup for it was retarded. If this was a movie, this part of the movie would probably look great.
As for missed opportunities... Remember when Littlepip went through that robot factory and fought some robots and got a gun?
She was all "haha robobrain go splat". Even after she learns that the robots are alive and powered by brains that have gone mad. The fact that these were once ponies and she is technically sort of a murderer now since she entered into their turf and killed these guys to loot a gun just doesn't bother her but it should.
There was a missed opportunity here to turn one of Fallout America's weapons into a tragic tale of Equestria trying to use tech to solve their problems like they once used magic and failing. And start with Littlepip being all "quip pun haha squish oneliner, god you're fucking stupid and I need a drink" but when she finds out these robobrains were once ponies and are still alive and conscious while having the actions of their robot bodies controlled by GuardBot programming it should shake her greatly. Reveal that her "generic action movie heroine" personality is just a front she puts on - a mask she wears - to feel more confident while scared and in combat. Make her cry and whimper and beg the robots to go away as they march on her position with melee weapons readied, forcing her to reluctantly shoot and squish all the bots. It could be a moment that kicks your heart right in the balls and shakes LP to her core. She officially becomes a killer of non-raider ponies and practically raided this destroyed robot factory. Her "little macintosh" goes from some random scoped revolver she found to a tragic reminder that she was forced to mercy kill these robots.
What is your favourite part of the fic so far, and what one moment sticks out as a missed opportunity to you?
Personally I really enjoyed the creativity of using an idol concert to draw in assassination targets even though the setup for it was retarded. If this was a movie, this part of the movie would probably look great.
As for missed opportunities... Remember when Littlepip went through that robot factory and fought some robots and got a gun?
She was all "haha robobrain go splat". Even after she learns that the robots are alive and powered by brains that have gone mad. The fact that these were once ponies and she is technically sort of a murderer now since she entered into their turf and killed these guys to loot a gun just doesn't bother her but it should.
There was a missed opportunity here to turn one of Fallout America's weapons into a tragic tale of Equestria trying to use tech to solve their problems like they once used magic and failing. And start with Littlepip being all "quip pun haha squish oneliner, god you're fucking stupid and I need a drink" but when she finds out these robobrains were once ponies and are still alive and conscious while having the actions of their robot bodies controlled by GuardBot programming it should shake her greatly. Reveal that her "generic action movie heroine" personality is just a front she puts on - a mask she wears - to feel more confident while scared and in combat. Make her cry and whimper and beg the robots to go away as they march on her position with melee weapons readied, forcing her to reluctantly shoot and squish all the bots. It could be a moment that kicks your heart right in the balls and shakes LP to her core. She officially becomes a killer of non-raider ponies and practically raided this destroyed robot factory. Her "little macintosh" goes from some random scoped revolver she found to a tragic reminder that she was forced to mercy kill these robots.
>>295576
Shut the fuck up (((Nigel))). Stop going off topic for those literally retarded narucuck/bleeech/whorey potnigger inspired rants that you desperately hope will bring you acceptance. NO ONE WANTS YOU.
Shut the fuck up (((Nigel))). Stop going off topic for those literally retarded narucuck/bleeech/whorey potnigger inspired rants that you desperately hope will bring you acceptance. NO ONE WANTS YOU.
>>295632
I don't see any Naruto/Bleach/whatever references in my previous post, but I'm not surprised you see shit that isn't there. Your bitching never was grounded in reality. I'll never be able to please someone as entitled and irrational and whiny as you, and I don't really want to. You are nothing to me. You have no idea what you're talking about so why do you feel entitled to my respect? Why do you feel I need to take what you have to say seriously? This is a thread for writing discussion and I'm tired of faggots who want to start petty fights here. I've seen youtube commenters with more to contribute than you. This thread would improve if you kept quiet and stopped being such an entitled crybaby.
Lurk moar and act less like a redditor.
I don't see any Naruto/Bleach/whatever references in my previous post, but I'm not surprised you see shit that isn't there. Your bitching never was grounded in reality. I'll never be able to please someone as entitled and irrational and whiny as you, and I don't really want to. You are nothing to me. You have no idea what you're talking about so why do you feel entitled to my respect? Why do you feel I need to take what you have to say seriously? This is a thread for writing discussion and I'm tired of faggots who want to start petty fights here. I've seen youtube commenters with more to contribute than you. This thread would improve if you kept quiet and stopped being such an entitled crybaby.
Lurk moar and act less like a redditor.
>>295632
I actually think that the post you're refrencing is on-topic. Its about missed opportunities and it brings up an example from the story and then explains itself through that example. Now, if it's good or bad point is up for each person to decied. I think it was servicable.
Nigel has been much better in this thread than in the previous one. And while I haven't check out every post of his in this thread, everything seems adaquate so far.
>>295752
Yeah, I agree you were on-topic.
>I don't see any Naruto/Bleach/whatever references in my previous post
His post uses the phrase "inspired rants" meaning... Well, I'm not completely sure what it means but it doesn't mean that there necessarily has to be any refrences of these things in it.
I don't really mind where your inspiration comes from so long as you make good points or, really on-topic ones.
Even with all my complaints towards you, I still do want everyone here to still be here. I believe you all are geniune souls that I share a lot of intrests with. At the end of the day, we do not have many allies. We should not burn bridges with potential ones over minor diffrences in beliefs when our enemy is what it is. I guess, that only tangentially applies here since, we're talking about books and forum conduct not the fight against jewry.
I will just express my opinions without compromises towards anyone here because I care for you and I expect the same in return.
I actually think that the post you're refrencing is on-topic. Its about missed opportunities and it brings up an example from the story and then explains itself through that example. Now, if it's good or bad point is up for each person to decied. I think it was servicable.
Nigel has been much better in this thread than in the previous one. And while I haven't check out every post of his in this thread, everything seems adaquate so far.
>>295752
Yeah, I agree you were on-topic.
>I don't see any Naruto/Bleach/whatever references in my previous post
His post uses the phrase "inspired rants" meaning... Well, I'm not completely sure what it means but it doesn't mean that there necessarily has to be any refrences of these things in it.
I don't really mind where your inspiration comes from so long as you make good points or, really on-topic ones.
Even with all my complaints towards you, I still do want everyone here to still be here. I believe you all are geniune souls that I share a lot of intrests with. At the end of the day, we do not have many allies. We should not burn bridges with potential ones over minor diffrences in beliefs when our enemy is what it is. I guess, that only tangentially applies here since, we're talking about books and forum conduct not the fight against jewry.
I will just express my opinions without compromises towards anyone here because I care for you and I expect the same in return.
>>295632
Sorry fren, but I'm gonna have to disagree with you on this one. Not only is the post on topic, but I agree with his post enough to reply. His phrasing could still use work, but that's not an expectation that can be asserted, though in this case suggestions are still perfectly reasonable.
>>295576
I agree with this point about the robot brains and missed opportunities. Thesis statement
With a little bit of effort, this could have been turned into a very deep and dark moral quandary for Little pip and anypony who was along for the ride (was anyone along for the ride? I'm not actually reading the story). One sentence expounding of thesis statement
In the end, it needed not have changed anything about the direction of the storyline; "robot brains go wrrrrr and then splat" is the appropriate outcome in the end, but at least Gaykat could have tugged at heartstrings a little bit.hypothesis and conclusion
Compare it to a series like Bleach or D Gray Man where the soul of the Hollow, or the trapped soul of the Akuma is given consideration. This doesnt prevent Ishida or other Quinceys from destroying Hollow souls in the one, while the other example emphasizes the torment of the trapped soul and the importance of freeing them, even unto death. The memories inspired by the revolver dont even need to be guilty, as LP doesnt have the skill or means to change or fix the robo-brain's situation, but ffs GKat could've paid lip service. Succinct examples that relate to hypothesis, and validate the conclusion
All in all, a huge missed opportunity to develop LP and thiat particular section of the story with depth and emotion that would significantly increase the quality of the instance reiteration of thesis statement and conclusion after the facts
Please pardon the spoilers, this is to help our friend with his phrasing.
>>295576
This is the best example I can give of how to make short, succinct, yet effective references to other media. I dont meander at all, because my purpose is to stick to the facts and info when conveying the idea. I also dont emphasize "I" or "my opinion" because for one that would be redundant; it's all my opinion that I'm positing to be agreed or negated by discussion. Additionally, emphasizing the opinion makes me the subject of discussion versus the idea/info. I am virtually irrelevant to the discussion, whereas the info/idea is paramount to the discussion. This is something I feel you could improve on, and will significantly aid the quality of your writing
Sorry fren, but I'm gonna have to disagree with you on this one. Not only is the post on topic, but I agree with his post enough to reply. His phrasing could still use work, but that's not an expectation that can be asserted, though in this case suggestions are still perfectly reasonable.
>>295576
I agree with this point about the robot brains and missed opportunities. Thesis statement
With a little bit of effort, this could have been turned into a very deep and dark moral quandary for Little pip and anypony who was along for the ride (was anyone along for the ride? I'm not actually reading the story). One sentence expounding of thesis statement
In the end, it needed not have changed anything about the direction of the storyline; "robot brains go wrrrrr and then splat" is the appropriate outcome in the end, but at least Gaykat could have tugged at heartstrings a little bit.hypothesis and conclusion
Compare it to a series like Bleach or D Gray Man where the soul of the Hollow, or the trapped soul of the Akuma is given consideration. This doesnt prevent Ishida or other Quinceys from destroying Hollow souls in the one, while the other example emphasizes the torment of the trapped soul and the importance of freeing them, even unto death. The memories inspired by the revolver dont even need to be guilty, as LP doesnt have the skill or means to change or fix the robo-brain's situation, but ffs GKat could've paid lip service. Succinct examples that relate to hypothesis, and validate the conclusion
All in all, a huge missed opportunity to develop LP and thiat particular section of the story with depth and emotion that would significantly increase the quality of the instance reiteration of thesis statement and conclusion after the facts
Please pardon the spoilers, this is to help our friend with his phrasing.
>>295576
This is the best example I can give of how to make short, succinct, yet effective references to other media. I dont meander at all, because my purpose is to stick to the facts and info when conveying the idea. I also dont emphasize "I" or "my opinion" because for one that would be redundant; it's all my opinion that I'm positing to be agreed or negated by discussion. Additionally, emphasizing the opinion makes me the subject of discussion versus the idea/info. I am virtually irrelevant to the discussion, whereas the info/idea is paramount to the discussion. This is something I feel you could improve on, and will significantly aid the quality of your writing
>>295759
>>295756
Thanks mates!
I dropped bleach about seven-ish episodes in (Fisher King's introduction was the last ep I saw) so I've got no idea if anything I said has anything to do with bleach.
Still I don't think Bleach is likely to have robobrains or pop concert assassinations, it just seemed like a gloomy pretentious Danny Phantom/DBZ knockoff but with goofy swords. Though I hear Ichigo's got a Hitler Swastika on his sword and starts hitting people with a giant swastika named Fullbring?
Anyway I've seen all of Naruto so I can confidently say absolutely nothing in my recent post has anything to do with Naruto.
If Equestria invented RoboBrains to try and give a body to terminally-ill/disabled ponies only to fuck up and put the robot programming in control of the body while the brain is used as a backup processor by the machine, it would be really tragic.
Double-tragic if the robot AI acts like a convincing replica of the terminally-ill/disabled pony while the real brain is trapped and screaming inside the metal body!
And a neat contrast to Fallout-America, which built the Robobrains that way on purpose because they wanted a smart and mentally-flexible killbot still forced to follow orders. America initially used chimp brains in those robots until realizing human brains worked better. Then it took brains from executed criminals, military prisoners, and so on. Obedient brains that are smart but lack personality/individuality were preferred, then they had their memories wiped anyway and tried to brainwash the brains further.
(why select for obedience/lack of personality if you're brainwashing and memory-wiping the brains anyway? how do you have any sort of selection process when your brains only come from executed criminals and military prisoners? goddamn it bethesda stop being so bad at writing lore)
These "RoboBrain" bots never reached full production status because they kept having problems with RoboBrain aggression and violence. (which doesn't fit the lore because Fallout America put ads on TV featuring their power-armoured troops executing kneeling Canadians in Fallout 1. Bloody hell, it's like Matt Ward of Warhammer 40K fame but dumber)
There's no Naruto stuff there. Captain "One post thread-wide by this ID" over there >>295632 can go fuck himself.
As it stands, Littlepip's robobrain encounter is basically:
>"I am Littlepip and I went into a factory and squished some robots and liked it and then I found a sick gun and then I read some computer terminal entry to learn the gun's backstory and then I fucked off out of the factory and moved on".
The only meaningful change this has on the status quo?
Littlepoop gets one new gun, a scoped revolver that could have been found anywhere else.
This scene could have been cut. It probably should have been cut since this story is over 500,000 words long.
If the revolver was put on a corpse Littlepoop found when fleeing "Rad-Gators" or found it while looting the Raider-infested Ponyville Library this entire factory could have been skipped while still keeping its only change to the status quo (+1 gun) intact.
This early on in the story we've got big questions like "Why did the world end?" and "Whose fault was the world's end?" and "why are Raiders like this?" and "Who's in charge of this shitshow?" and "How will the hero fix things?" and "Why did we see a statue of Big Mac?"
So a question like "Where did the guns come from?" is high on the question list but not the highest-ranked question.
a detail like "The apple family ran a gun-making company and Applejack was in charge of it plus a gun-making ministry also she commissioned a big revolver named Little Macintosh in honour of his death and kept it here" seems too inconsequential to the world to have this short story arc and location dedicated to it.
It also seems like too big an answer for it to be revealed so early on. Shouldn't we still wonder where all the guns and grenades came from?
We learn the backstory of this revolver in particular in such an awkward manner, too. Has Littlepip met even a single friendly face at this point if you don't count The Watcher?
Is this really the time to drop those super-special named "Unique Weapons" with their own special effects and short backstories into Littlepip's lap and on the audience when there's so much the author hasn't established yet?
Unique Weapons in Fallout 3 are better than their non-unique non-named counterparts, but that's a stupid videogame effect and it makes no sense to copy that in a book when this ordinary-ass gun is firing the same bullets as all other guns of its caliber.
If Littlepip is supposed to be an underdog, how come she's the only one who gets to find and unlock all these safes, why does she get special super-gear that's nonsensically better than average, and how come she's better-equipped than most of the Raiders/Bandits/Slavers she slaughters effortlessly?
The only way to turn this stupid side-story distraction Filler Moment into a meaningful part of the story (that I can see) is to make it emotionally significant to Littlepip and her development. She goes from "I've literally never seen or operated a gun before" to "Haha squish mmf that sound of crushed robobrain is so satisfying" way too fast, and this could be reworked into a stepping stone on the path from scared stressed terrified pissed-off newbie who needs a hug to snarky seen-it-all pro murderer. Better books make a hero's transformation from bloodshed-fearing rookie to hardened killer/sadistic hardened killer a slow and gradual process for a reason.
>>295756
Thanks mates!
I dropped bleach about seven-ish episodes in (Fisher King's introduction was the last ep I saw) so I've got no idea if anything I said has anything to do with bleach.
Still I don't think Bleach is likely to have robobrains or pop concert assassinations, it just seemed like a gloomy pretentious Danny Phantom/DBZ knockoff but with goofy swords. Though I hear Ichigo's got a Hitler Swastika on his sword and starts hitting people with a giant swastika named Fullbring?
Anyway I've seen all of Naruto so I can confidently say absolutely nothing in my recent post has anything to do with Naruto.
If Equestria invented RoboBrains to try and give a body to terminally-ill/disabled ponies only to fuck up and put the robot programming in control of the body while the brain is used as a backup processor by the machine, it would be really tragic.
Double-tragic if the robot AI acts like a convincing replica of the terminally-ill/disabled pony while the real brain is trapped and screaming inside the metal body!
And a neat contrast to Fallout-America, which built the Robobrains that way on purpose because they wanted a smart and mentally-flexible killbot still forced to follow orders. America initially used chimp brains in those robots until realizing human brains worked better. Then it took brains from executed criminals, military prisoners, and so on. Obedient brains that are smart but lack personality/individuality were preferred, then they had their memories wiped anyway and tried to brainwash the brains further.
(why select for obedience/lack of personality if you're brainwashing and memory-wiping the brains anyway? how do you have any sort of selection process when your brains only come from executed criminals and military prisoners? goddamn it bethesda stop being so bad at writing lore)
These "RoboBrain" bots never reached full production status because they kept having problems with RoboBrain aggression and violence. (which doesn't fit the lore because Fallout America put ads on TV featuring their power-armoured troops executing kneeling Canadians in Fallout 1. Bloody hell, it's like Matt Ward of Warhammer 40K fame but dumber)
There's no Naruto stuff there. Captain "One post thread-wide by this ID" over there >>295632 can go fuck himself.
As it stands, Littlepip's robobrain encounter is basically:
>"I am Littlepip and I went into a factory and squished some robots and liked it and then I found a sick gun and then I read some computer terminal entry to learn the gun's backstory and then I fucked off out of the factory and moved on".
The only meaningful change this has on the status quo?
Littlepoop gets one new gun, a scoped revolver that could have been found anywhere else.
This scene could have been cut. It probably should have been cut since this story is over 500,000 words long.
If the revolver was put on a corpse Littlepoop found when fleeing "Rad-Gators" or found it while looting the Raider-infested Ponyville Library this entire factory could have been skipped while still keeping its only change to the status quo (+1 gun) intact.
This early on in the story we've got big questions like "Why did the world end?" and "Whose fault was the world's end?" and "why are Raiders like this?" and "Who's in charge of this shitshow?" and "How will the hero fix things?" and "Why did we see a statue of Big Mac?"
So a question like "Where did the guns come from?" is high on the question list but not the highest-ranked question.
a detail like "The apple family ran a gun-making company and Applejack was in charge of it plus a gun-making ministry also she commissioned a big revolver named Little Macintosh in honour of his death and kept it here" seems too inconsequential to the world to have this short story arc and location dedicated to it.
It also seems like too big an answer for it to be revealed so early on. Shouldn't we still wonder where all the guns and grenades came from?
We learn the backstory of this revolver in particular in such an awkward manner, too. Has Littlepip met even a single friendly face at this point if you don't count The Watcher?
Is this really the time to drop those super-special named "Unique Weapons" with their own special effects and short backstories into Littlepip's lap and on the audience when there's so much the author hasn't established yet?
Unique Weapons in Fallout 3 are better than their non-unique non-named counterparts, but that's a stupid videogame effect and it makes no sense to copy that in a book when this ordinary-ass gun is firing the same bullets as all other guns of its caliber.
If Littlepip is supposed to be an underdog, how come she's the only one who gets to find and unlock all these safes, why does she get special super-gear that's nonsensically better than average, and how come she's better-equipped than most of the Raiders/Bandits/Slavers she slaughters effortlessly?
The only way to turn this stupid side-story distraction Filler Moment into a meaningful part of the story (that I can see) is to make it emotionally significant to Littlepip and her development. She goes from "I've literally never seen or operated a gun before" to "Haha squish mmf that sound of crushed robobrain is so satisfying" way too fast, and this could be reworked into a stepping stone on the path from scared stressed terrified pissed-off newbie who needs a hug to snarky seen-it-all pro murderer. Better books make a hero's transformation from bloodshed-fearing rookie to hardened killer/sadistic hardened killer a slow and gradual process for a reason.
>>295761
The point of the references were to establish that LP's motivations after exploring the moral implications of murdering otherwise alive robots ponies didnt need to devolve into sadistic hardened killer' territory. It could as easily have resulted in the determination that while technically alive the robots weren't either 'really living' nor 'themselves', by way of the madness. In this sense, LP could be performing something of a service of freeing the robots from an otherwise hellish existence that was the result of best intentions in the interest of survival.
The point of the references were to establish that LP's motivations after exploring the moral implications of murdering otherwise alive robots ponies didnt need to devolve into sadistic hardened killer' territory. It could as easily have resulted in the determination that while technically alive the robots weren't either 'really living' nor 'themselves', by way of the madness. In this sense, LP could be performing something of a service of freeing the robots from an otherwise hellish existence that was the result of best intentions in the interest of survival.
>>295762
That's a good point.
Littlepip started her murderhobo adventure by killing "Raiders", the most cartoonishly evil ponies imaginable. They smear gore and poop over the walls of their own homes and abuse captors for fun, and Littlepip thinks "I am a good guy because I am killing baddies who must die" every ten seconds to help her get through the stress of her first fight.
She can reasonably claim "These baddies must go" even though she wandered onto their turf (well, was brought to it by her captors) and ended up robbing them anyway. Not sure if she can claim self-defense until after they started shooting at her though.
But the robots... That's closer to killing a pony, even though RoboBrains (unless the author does something new with them) are angry guard robots that use the still-alive insane mind-wiped brains of assholes for talking graphics cards. She can't claim "These guys morally needed to go" here because the bots guarding this abandoned factory are still just doing their jobs. She can call taking these things out a necessary mercy kill and claim robbing this ruined factory is necessary because it could contain resources useful to the Wasteland or traders or her Make-Equestria-Great-Again plan, but Littlepip shouldn't show such glee when taking these bots out after learning what they are.
While we're talking about moments Littlepip enjoyed but shouldn't have enjoyed, that "Hahahaha dumb Earth Ponies never think to look up" moment when she was escaping her Stable and telekinetically clubbed them unconscious was cringe too. Leaving the home she grew up in and the society she was raised in, saying goodbye to everypony she ever met or knew of... Even if she hated them all, there should still be at least a little hesitancy or regret or sadness here. She's leaving her bunker and entering a deadly world to bring back a pop star who might not even want to come back with her, and she's fine with living out here in The Hellhole Formerly Known As Equestria with the target she was seeking, the reason she had her reputation and stable life ruined and ripped away from her, the reason she might never get to take a warm shower or sleep in a warm safe Stable bed again.
You'd think there'd be something like that scene from Madagascar when the Lion and Zebra ran to each other while yelling each other's names, only for the Lion to get increasingly pissed as he realizes everything going wrong right now is this Zebra's fault, so the Zebra ends up running away. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQ2DAA-i8l0
A scene like that would be perfect for when Littlepip realizes she came all this way, risked death all these times, and killed all these ponies for the sake of a stupid fucking singer who's singing her heart out willingly to literal goddamn slavers.
That's a good point.
Littlepip started her murderhobo adventure by killing "Raiders", the most cartoonishly evil ponies imaginable. They smear gore and poop over the walls of their own homes and abuse captors for fun, and Littlepip thinks "I am a good guy because I am killing baddies who must die" every ten seconds to help her get through the stress of her first fight.
She can reasonably claim "These baddies must go" even though she wandered onto their turf (well, was brought to it by her captors) and ended up robbing them anyway. Not sure if she can claim self-defense until after they started shooting at her though.
But the robots... That's closer to killing a pony, even though RoboBrains (unless the author does something new with them) are angry guard robots that use the still-alive insane mind-wiped brains of assholes for talking graphics cards. She can't claim "These guys morally needed to go" here because the bots guarding this abandoned factory are still just doing their jobs. She can call taking these things out a necessary mercy kill and claim robbing this ruined factory is necessary because it could contain resources useful to the Wasteland or traders or her Make-Equestria-Great-Again plan, but Littlepip shouldn't show such glee when taking these bots out after learning what they are.
While we're talking about moments Littlepip enjoyed but shouldn't have enjoyed, that "Hahahaha dumb Earth Ponies never think to look up" moment when she was escaping her Stable and telekinetically clubbed them unconscious was cringe too. Leaving the home she grew up in and the society she was raised in, saying goodbye to everypony she ever met or knew of... Even if she hated them all, there should still be at least a little hesitancy or regret or sadness here. She's leaving her bunker and entering a deadly world to bring back a pop star who might not even want to come back with her, and she's fine with living out here in The Hellhole Formerly Known As Equestria with the target she was seeking, the reason she had her reputation and stable life ruined and ripped away from her, the reason she might never get to take a warm shower or sleep in a warm safe Stable bed again.
You'd think there'd be something like that scene from Madagascar when the Lion and Zebra ran to each other while yelling each other's names, only for the Lion to get increasingly pissed as he realizes everything going wrong right now is this Zebra's fault, so the Zebra ends up running away. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQ2DAA-i8l0
A scene like that would be perfect for when Littlepip realizes she came all this way, risked death all these times, and killed all these ponies for the sake of a stupid fucking singer who's singing her heart out willingly to literal goddamn slavers.
>>295770
Come to think of it...
Right after Littlepip escapes from Raider's Ponyville for the first time, "The Watcher" aka the author floats right up to Littlepip and clumsily says "You must go back into that town because you were supposed to kill all the Raiders and get a certain book from the library".
She "has" to have the book so that she can say "Now I have the Wasteland Survival Guide"
and all the people who played Fallout 3 will say "Whaaat? The book was already made? In Fallout 3, the player had to make that with some possibly-ghoul NPC's help! Who made this book?"
and those people will nut uncontrollably when they find out it was ghoul Derpy Hooves.
But that's an out-of-universe reason for her to go back to Poopyville. She has no in-universe reason to go back there besides a robot telling her to and claiming it's got good loot.
And Littlepip just... does what the robot questgiver says.
This really stands out as a stupid videogamey moment because aside from "lmao what else would I do today? at least he told me there's sick lewt in that raider hellhole. I guess I'll trust this weird robot hacker guy and risk my life because he tells me to" she doesn't have any reason to go back into that raider hellhole and has plenty of "I don't want to go into that zone of almost-certain death! I just escaped it, and you're telling me to go back in?! I'd rather go anywhere else even though I have no idea where anything is! Fuck you and fuck your book!" reasons not to.
Is any intel he could give her for completing his quest worth risking her life? Possibly, but Littlepip shouldn't think she's invincible from day one! And if she does, any dark world worth its edge should pin her to a wall and fuck her over for such arrogance! Did he even think to mention the captives in Twilight's Tree Library? Gee, it sure is convenient that despite all the damage done by these Raiders for fun, all of these captives can easily fuck off without needing food from Littlepip. Or needing any help to stand/walk. Fuck, one featherless ghoul Pegasus can even fly!
If Littlepip is a danger-loving thrill-seeking loot-hungry murderhobo who loves winning (and squishing) from day one, why was she loathed back in her Stable for being a small weak wimpy coward who canonically had a nightmare at a slumber party about falling upwards into the endless sky outside her vault, causing her to scream like a little bitch?
How Littlepip thinks and acts outside the Stable doesn't fit the character he spent all this time setting up inside the Stable, meaning all that time spent inside the Stable was pointless too, along with everything established during that point including who Velvet is and LP's "relationship" with her.
First he establishes Littlepip as the type to think "Fuck, I'm boooooreed. Somepony should paint a mural on this boring-ass wall" for 10 hours instead of trying to paint one herself, and then after leaving the Stable he writes her as somepony who goes above and beyond the call of duty whenever there's the promise of loot and EXP even when she has no guarantee that doing things the explosion-loving murderhobo way will result in more EXP/reputation/good impact on the world/Loot gain.
Despite never seeing a gun before and having absolutely no idea what one is (fucking somehow?) she can immediately figure out what it is and how it works and how to threaten somepony with it just by watching it get fired once or twice. Even learns how to reload and knows what reloading is, and gets a chance to use her new knowledge "intimidatingly" almost immediately because Monterry Jack's retarded.
She escaped from Raider Ponyville and went back in for the loot while slaughtering and intimidating all the baddies she could just because a hacker's voice coming from a robot told her to.
She solved a "Go close the door to this monster-filled vault" quest by locking herself in it, stealing everything that isn't nailed down, getting her friend poisoned, saving him and getting the antidote, blowing the place up to kill all the enemies, and escaping!
She single-hoofedly (ok Calamity helped and she found Velvet along the way) slaughtered an entire Slaver settlement on their own turf and LIFTED A FUCKING BOXCAR to squish an Alicorn guard she didn't expect to fight.
She also derailed a train during a fight and there was some other shit and right now her goal is to put her pal's music on the radio or slaughter everypony at Slaver City on the other side of Equestria just because it's there, whichever comes first. Point is, she's so destructive and violent and reckless and overpowered and unnaturally hungry for bloodshed and loot, yet the world and the characters within the world and the author never seem to notice this isn't a scared little pussy newbie struggling to survive. This isn't an underdog. "her limbs get crippled sometimes" but that never fucks her over or significantly impacts her. No matter how often characters jack the world (and the author) off by calling this world the saddest edgiest thing ever, it's a lie full of easily-duped, easily-intimidated, and easily-defeated cardboard cutouts for Littlepip to knock down one by one.
Characters speak as if this world of pure edge is infinitely bleak and utterly unchangeable and truly forsaken and she's a tragic hero on some doomed quest of folly for trying to make this world a better place, but not only can she solve all the problems in the world with a handgun and "sufficient determination"(guess nopony else had enough determination, not Big Mac or Twilight or Fluttershy or anypony else without plot armour!), she will fucking enjoy it whether she and the author realize it or not, no matter what inconsistent scenes of angsting the author sometimes writes.
The tale of a world of failures and monsters getting consumed by a bigger and badder ever-growing monster who seems like a cute little girl at first would be improved if Kkat realized that's what he's writing and started writing it better.
Come to think of it...
Right after Littlepip escapes from Raider's Ponyville for the first time, "The Watcher" aka the author floats right up to Littlepip and clumsily says "You must go back into that town because you were supposed to kill all the Raiders and get a certain book from the library".
She "has" to have the book so that she can say "Now I have the Wasteland Survival Guide"
and all the people who played Fallout 3 will say "Whaaat? The book was already made? In Fallout 3, the player had to make that with some possibly-ghoul NPC's help! Who made this book?"
and those people will nut uncontrollably when they find out it was ghoul Derpy Hooves.
But that's an out-of-universe reason for her to go back to Poopyville. She has no in-universe reason to go back there besides a robot telling her to and claiming it's got good loot.
And Littlepip just... does what the robot questgiver says.
This really stands out as a stupid videogamey moment because aside from "lmao what else would I do today? at least he told me there's sick lewt in that raider hellhole. I guess I'll trust this weird robot hacker guy and risk my life because he tells me to" she doesn't have any reason to go back into that raider hellhole and has plenty of "I don't want to go into that zone of almost-certain death! I just escaped it, and you're telling me to go back in?! I'd rather go anywhere else even though I have no idea where anything is! Fuck you and fuck your book!" reasons not to.
Is any intel he could give her for completing his quest worth risking her life? Possibly, but Littlepip shouldn't think she's invincible from day one! And if she does, any dark world worth its edge should pin her to a wall and fuck her over for such arrogance! Did he even think to mention the captives in Twilight's Tree Library? Gee, it sure is convenient that despite all the damage done by these Raiders for fun, all of these captives can easily fuck off without needing food from Littlepip. Or needing any help to stand/walk. Fuck, one featherless ghoul Pegasus can even fly!
If Littlepip is a danger-loving thrill-seeking loot-hungry murderhobo who loves winning (and squishing) from day one, why was she loathed back in her Stable for being a small weak wimpy coward who canonically had a nightmare at a slumber party about falling upwards into the endless sky outside her vault, causing her to scream like a little bitch?
How Littlepip thinks and acts outside the Stable doesn't fit the character he spent all this time setting up inside the Stable, meaning all that time spent inside the Stable was pointless too, along with everything established during that point including who Velvet is and LP's "relationship" with her.
First he establishes Littlepip as the type to think "Fuck, I'm boooooreed. Somepony should paint a mural on this boring-ass wall" for 10 hours instead of trying to paint one herself, and then after leaving the Stable he writes her as somepony who goes above and beyond the call of duty whenever there's the promise of loot and EXP even when she has no guarantee that doing things the explosion-loving murderhobo way will result in more EXP/reputation/good impact on the world/Loot gain.
Despite never seeing a gun before and having absolutely no idea what one is (fucking somehow?) she can immediately figure out what it is and how it works and how to threaten somepony with it just by watching it get fired once or twice. Even learns how to reload and knows what reloading is, and gets a chance to use her new knowledge "intimidatingly" almost immediately because Monterry Jack's retarded.
She escaped from Raider Ponyville and went back in for the loot while slaughtering and intimidating all the baddies she could just because a hacker's voice coming from a robot told her to.
She solved a "Go close the door to this monster-filled vault" quest by locking herself in it, stealing everything that isn't nailed down, getting her friend poisoned, saving him and getting the antidote, blowing the place up to kill all the enemies, and escaping!
She single-hoofedly (ok Calamity helped and she found Velvet along the way) slaughtered an entire Slaver settlement on their own turf and LIFTED A FUCKING BOXCAR to squish an Alicorn guard she didn't expect to fight.
She also derailed a train during a fight and there was some other shit and right now her goal is to put her pal's music on the radio or slaughter everypony at Slaver City on the other side of Equestria just because it's there, whichever comes first. Point is, she's so destructive and violent and reckless and overpowered and unnaturally hungry for bloodshed and loot, yet the world and the characters within the world and the author never seem to notice this isn't a scared little pussy newbie struggling to survive. This isn't an underdog. "her limbs get crippled sometimes" but that never fucks her over or significantly impacts her. No matter how often characters jack the world (and the author) off by calling this world the saddest edgiest thing ever, it's a lie full of easily-duped, easily-intimidated, and easily-defeated cardboard cutouts for Littlepip to knock down one by one.
Characters speak as if this world of pure edge is infinitely bleak and utterly unchangeable and truly forsaken and she's a tragic hero on some doomed quest of folly for trying to make this world a better place, but not only can she solve all the problems in the world with a handgun and "sufficient determination"(guess nopony else had enough determination, not Big Mac or Twilight or Fluttershy or anypony else without plot armour!), she will fucking enjoy it whether she and the author realize it or not, no matter what inconsistent scenes of angsting the author sometimes writes.
The tale of a world of failures and monsters getting consumed by a bigger and badder ever-growing monster who seems like a cute little girl at first would be improved if Kkat realized that's what he's writing and started writing it better.
>>295762
>>295770
I may be wrong, but going purely by memory I don't recall the robobrains ever coming up again in any meaningful capacity for the rest of FoE. They're essentially a disposable enemy in the same vein as the raiders. This makes sense *if* you assume this conception of Equestria works the same way as Fallout 3 the videogame, where raiders and robobrains are disposable recurring enemies that one can kill without thought or consequence. Considering that this is *supposed* to be the Equestria we know from FiM, just 200-odd years down the line, and that Littlepip isn't *supposed* to be a sociopathic murderhobo who exists to kill and loot, this is simply bad writing.
In Fallout, the robobrains were a highly unethical top-secret military project that used the brains of prisoners to create perfectly obedient (in theory) military cyborgs. This is consistent with Fallout's presentation of America's government as jingoistic and deeply corrupt. Their mere existence in Equestria, wandering around a random factory, ought to raise a dozen red flags about what went on during the war. The existence of combat-capable robots makes sense - if a technologically advanced Equestria went to war it's understandable that they'd use artificial soldiers instead of risking pony lives, but this goes a step further. Why were these things made? Who signed off on their creation? Where (or who) did the brains originally come from? Even if we accept the premise that Equestria had reason to create these things, there's entire potential stories to be told about how and why. But nah. They're just mooks guarding treasure.
>Right after Littlepip escapes from Raider's Ponyville for the first time, "The Watcher" aka the author floats right up to Littlepip and clumsily says "You must go back into that town because you were supposed to kill all the Raiders and get a certain book from the library".
I can kinda accept Watcher as a sort of mysterious mentor figure, given what we learn about them later. Enigmatically guiding people to perform small acts of good like saving Derpy makes sense in their situation, setting aside the question of whether Pip should logically be up to it. The real author avatar in this story is Homage, the DJ and oh jesus christ is it both obvious and insufferable.
>>295770
I may be wrong, but going purely by memory I don't recall the robobrains ever coming up again in any meaningful capacity for the rest of FoE. They're essentially a disposable enemy in the same vein as the raiders. This makes sense *if* you assume this conception of Equestria works the same way as Fallout 3 the videogame, where raiders and robobrains are disposable recurring enemies that one can kill without thought or consequence. Considering that this is *supposed* to be the Equestria we know from FiM, just 200-odd years down the line, and that Littlepip isn't *supposed* to be a sociopathic murderhobo who exists to kill and loot, this is simply bad writing.
In Fallout, the robobrains were a highly unethical top-secret military project that used the brains of prisoners to create perfectly obedient (in theory) military cyborgs. This is consistent with Fallout's presentation of America's government as jingoistic and deeply corrupt. Their mere existence in Equestria, wandering around a random factory, ought to raise a dozen red flags about what went on during the war. The existence of combat-capable robots makes sense - if a technologically advanced Equestria went to war it's understandable that they'd use artificial soldiers instead of risking pony lives, but this goes a step further. Why were these things made? Who signed off on their creation? Where (or who) did the brains originally come from? Even if we accept the premise that Equestria had reason to create these things, there's entire potential stories to be told about how and why. But nah. They're just mooks guarding treasure.
>Right after Littlepip escapes from Raider's Ponyville for the first time, "The Watcher" aka the author floats right up to Littlepip and clumsily says "You must go back into that town because you were supposed to kill all the Raiders and get a certain book from the library".
I can kinda accept Watcher as a sort of mysterious mentor figure, given what we learn about them later. Enigmatically guiding people to perform small acts of good like saving Derpy makes sense in their situation, setting aside the question of whether Pip should logically be up to it. The real author avatar in this story is Homage, the DJ and oh jesus christ is it both obvious and insufferable.
>>295752
>>295761
Okay muttnigger. Good job continuing to gaslight and QQ'ing about your oh-so-nuanced exposition dogshit being called out even though it's the same verbatim trash. Again. Like usual. For the 1,000th+ time. Your retardation is so old the dinosaurs are tired of your whinging and kvetching at this point. Keep on winning all those Social Darwin Awards over there, they still do not make dealing with you worthwhile. Also poor job with that low quality plebbit/jewt00b b8, your "b-b-but it's not me it's all U" meter is still pounding somewhere around the 100 out of 10 mark. Go hang yourself, you worthless inbred mutt.
>>295756
>>295759
Not one bit. Nigel is still poorly disguising [aka: shoehorning] his retarded, old animu rants as "new content" by using a slightly different stench of bullshit to mask his brain damaged 'tism outbursts. Not only that, as a so-called 'writer' he has not changed enough to warrant being treated differently from the crybaby douchebarge he's been, especially for being unable to accept ANY form of critique or criticism without it becoming a !!PeRsOnAl InSuLt!! which makes him a fairly reliable lulzcow.
On the Robobrains, they featured in Fallout 1 & 2 as a specific type of cyborg. Some regions, particularly in The Glow (Fallout 1), Mariposa Military Base (Fallout 2), and the Sierra Army Depot (also Fallout 2) harbored anywhere from 10-80 of them. Only being vulnerable to EMP, the fairly to extremely rare rare coilguns [and their much more rare ammunition], and a few unique weapons which could be nearly impossible to get without knowing how, made them a major threat. Drowning them in bullets, shells, grenades, laser bursts or plasma is an option, although they're generally too durable unless you specifically toss every companion 40+ Stimpaks and give them 40+ pounds of ammunition. The one 'friendly' Robobrain was part of a sidequest in the NCR during Fallout 2, where it was a helpful technician/mechanic for an NPC. Another one, however, was MUCH more prominent (especially if one used the Fallout 2 Restoration Patch). It's name was... of course, Skynet. The PC could transplant any number of brains into it, which would greatly improve skills and combat abilities, also improving the number of action points. However, pissing off the Skynet A.I. before attempting to transplant would cause it to shut down the Sierra Army Depot through the use of extremely lethal biological weapons. From it you learn that a large number of Robobrain cyborgs were willing subjects from a large pool of severely wounded and/or crippled soldiers, although a small 'test' population of lizards, cats, dogs, chimpanzees, pigs, and a few other animal species were also available. In particular there were NO prisoner brains due to "one incident" mildly referred from a holodisk log.
Long version: Robobrains were intended to be used as an extremely cheap, efficient stopgap measure between soldiers without power armor, and those with T-45 power armor. Robobrains were capable of utilizing nearly any weapon, especially the PPK12 Gauss Pistol and the M72 Gauss Rifle, reload most weapons quicker than any human could, have armored storage compartments for ammunition/grenades/etc., and be easily & cheaply repaired using commonly available components from hundreds if not thousands of vehicles and machinery. They would have been vastly superior even if they weren't cybernetically improved like Skynet was... but there was juuuust one huge problem: production for the medigel necessary to transplant a human brain was completely halted, In Fallout: New Vegas we learn why the previous occurred: nearly all medigel was sent to the Big Empty where the Think Tank robobrains used it for a number of dipshit experiments. Thank them for the Cazadores, too. There were hundreds of thousands unfilled throughout now-derelict, lost, abandoned, or merely buried bases, which could have swung the various wars into positive outcomes.
In FoE: Robobrains are simply a "m-muh danjerus enemih!" emote moment that falls flat.
>>295761
Okay muttnigger. Good job continuing to gaslight and QQ'ing about your oh-so-nuanced exposition dogshit being called out even though it's the same verbatim trash. Again. Like usual. For the 1,000th+ time. Your retardation is so old the dinosaurs are tired of your whinging and kvetching at this point. Keep on winning all those Social Darwin Awards over there, they still do not make dealing with you worthwhile. Also poor job with that low quality plebbit/jewt00b b8, your "b-b-but it's not me it's all U" meter is still pounding somewhere around the 100 out of 10 mark. Go hang yourself, you worthless inbred mutt.
>>295756
>>295759
Not one bit. Nigel is still poorly disguising [aka: shoehorning] his retarded, old animu rants as "new content" by using a slightly different stench of bullshit to mask his brain damaged 'tism outbursts. Not only that, as a so-called 'writer' he has not changed enough to warrant being treated differently from the crybaby douchebarge he's been, especially for being unable to accept ANY form of critique or criticism without it becoming a !!PeRsOnAl InSuLt!! which makes him a fairly reliable lulzcow.
On the Robobrains, they featured in Fallout 1 & 2 as a specific type of cyborg. Some regions, particularly in The Glow (Fallout 1), Mariposa Military Base (Fallout 2), and the Sierra Army Depot (also Fallout 2) harbored anywhere from 10-80 of them. Only being vulnerable to EMP, the fairly to extremely rare rare coilguns [and their much more rare ammunition], and a few unique weapons which could be nearly impossible to get without knowing how, made them a major threat. Drowning them in bullets, shells, grenades, laser bursts or plasma is an option, although they're generally too durable unless you specifically toss every companion 40+ Stimpaks and give them 40+ pounds of ammunition. The one 'friendly' Robobrain was part of a sidequest in the NCR during Fallout 2, where it was a helpful technician/mechanic for an NPC. Another one, however, was MUCH more prominent (especially if one used the Fallout 2 Restoration Patch). It's name was... of course, Skynet. The PC could transplant any number of brains into it, which would greatly improve skills and combat abilities, also improving the number of action points. However, pissing off the Skynet A.I. before attempting to transplant would cause it to shut down the Sierra Army Depot through the use of extremely lethal biological weapons. From it you learn that a large number of Robobrain cyborgs were willing subjects from a large pool of severely wounded and/or crippled soldiers, although a small 'test' population of lizards, cats, dogs, chimpanzees, pigs, and a few other animal species were also available. In particular there were NO prisoner brains due to "one incident" mildly referred from a holodisk log.
Long version: Robobrains were intended to be used as an extremely cheap, efficient stopgap measure between soldiers without power armor, and those with T-45 power armor. Robobrains were capable of utilizing nearly any weapon, especially the PPK12 Gauss Pistol and the M72 Gauss Rifle, reload most weapons quicker than any human could, have armored storage compartments for ammunition/grenades/etc., and be easily & cheaply repaired using commonly available components from hundreds if not thousands of vehicles and machinery. They would have been vastly superior even if they weren't cybernetically improved like Skynet was... but there was juuuust one huge problem: production for the medigel necessary to transplant a human brain was completely halted, In Fallout: New Vegas we learn why the previous occurred: nearly all medigel was sent to the Big Empty where the Think Tank robobrains used it for a number of dipshit experiments. Thank them for the Cazadores, too. There were hundreds of thousands unfilled throughout now-derelict, lost, abandoned, or merely buried bases, which could have swung the various wars into positive outcomes.
In FoE: Robobrains are simply a "m-muh danjerus enemih!" emote moment that falls flat.
>>295576
>Personally I really enjoyed the creativity of using an idol concert to draw in assassination targets even though the setup for it was retarded. If this was a movie, this part of the movie would probably look great.
I actually agree with you that this was a good scene. Velvet singing before an assembled crowd of wastelanders, belting out some heart-wrenching old song, until suddenly a shot rings out from the balcony and Deadeyes goes down, is great visually, fits the setting perfectly, and is an all-around great idea for a scene. If it was the honest product of the author's imagination and not something he plagiarized directly from one of the games then he deserves all the more respect for it.
Unfortunately, as you say, it was poorly set up. My guess is he had the scene thought out well in advance, possibly before he even started writing the actual story, and intended for this scene to go in somewhere. His choice of where and how to work it in worked heavily against him, and mostly negated whatever impact it might have had.
The existence of the robo-brains had a much darker implication than the story ever dealt with, which is odd because the author was clearly trying to make it dark. Unfortunately this was a definite missed opportunity, as the purpose of the factory invasion scene seemed to be nothing more than "Littlepoop finds a cool gun."
>Personally I really enjoyed the creativity of using an idol concert to draw in assassination targets even though the setup for it was retarded. If this was a movie, this part of the movie would probably look great.
I actually agree with you that this was a good scene. Velvet singing before an assembled crowd of wastelanders, belting out some heart-wrenching old song, until suddenly a shot rings out from the balcony and Deadeyes goes down, is great visually, fits the setting perfectly, and is an all-around great idea for a scene. If it was the honest product of the author's imagination and not something he plagiarized directly from one of the games then he deserves all the more respect for it.
Unfortunately, as you say, it was poorly set up. My guess is he had the scene thought out well in advance, possibly before he even started writing the actual story, and intended for this scene to go in somewhere. His choice of where and how to work it in worked heavily against him, and mostly negated whatever impact it might have had.
The existence of the robo-brains had a much darker implication than the story ever dealt with, which is odd because the author was clearly trying to make it dark. Unfortunately this was a definite missed opportunity, as the purpose of the factory invasion scene seemed to be nothing more than "Littlepoop finds a cool gun."
>>295821
>On the Robobrains, they featured in Fallout 1 & 2 as a specific type of cyborg. Some regions, particularly in The Glow (Fallout 1), Mariposa Military Base (Fallout 2), and the Sierra Army Depot (also Fallout 2) harbored anywhere from 10-80 of them. Only being vulnerable to EMP, the fairly to extremely rare rare coilguns [and their much more rare ammunition], and a few unique weapons which could be nearly impossible to get without knowing how, made them a major threat.
Contrasted to their appearance in Fallout 3, where they show up anywhere vaguely associated with technology, wield only a weak laser, and can be easily dispatched by small arms fire. Big think.
>In particular there were NO prisoner brains due to "one incident" mildly referred from a holodisk log.
The Fallout wiki references an old interview with Chris Taylor where he supposedly stated that the brains came from prisoners, though granted this is a pretty dubious source. Whether the brains were from willing volunteers or "volunteers" is largely moot, since the process of creating a robobrain involved wiping the original personality and artificially fostering obedience and compliance. If the subject wasn't lobotomized or simply killed in the process, that is. However you slice it, there are massive ethical questions involved in their creation and their sudden, meaningless appearance and disappearance in FoE would be shocking if such a level of hackery weren't already firmly established as the norm.
>On the Robobrains, they featured in Fallout 1 & 2 as a specific type of cyborg. Some regions, particularly in The Glow (Fallout 1), Mariposa Military Base (Fallout 2), and the Sierra Army Depot (also Fallout 2) harbored anywhere from 10-80 of them. Only being vulnerable to EMP, the fairly to extremely rare rare coilguns [and their much more rare ammunition], and a few unique weapons which could be nearly impossible to get without knowing how, made them a major threat.
Contrasted to their appearance in Fallout 3, where they show up anywhere vaguely associated with technology, wield only a weak laser, and can be easily dispatched by small arms fire. Big think.
>In particular there were NO prisoner brains due to "one incident" mildly referred from a holodisk log.
The Fallout wiki references an old interview with Chris Taylor where he supposedly stated that the brains came from prisoners, though granted this is a pretty dubious source. Whether the brains were from willing volunteers or "volunteers" is largely moot, since the process of creating a robobrain involved wiping the original personality and artificially fostering obedience and compliance. If the subject wasn't lobotomized or simply killed in the process, that is. However you slice it, there are massive ethical questions involved in their creation and their sudden, meaningless appearance and disappearance in FoE would be shocking if such a level of hackery weren't already firmly established as the norm.
>>295821
You are a very angry baby. Delusional, too. Ain't no anime repackaged in "killing robobrains should make LP cry".
Still, you actually posted something related to Fallout this time instead of just trying to restart long-dead drama so it seems you're improving. Maybe with your third post, you can leave the whining at home and focus on the thread's topic? Then again I'll ignore your whining from now on anyway because I don't respect you or your opinion of me.
>>295777
That's a good point. Why the fuck are Robobrains in Equestria? What pony would make a killbot with a brainwashed fleshy brain for a CPU instead of something more magical like a lifesized metal or wooden pony puppet possessed by a pony's soul?
While I like the idea of LP having a mysterious mentor figure, Watcher is too powerful. He can control any spritebot and send any message anywhere in the Wasteland to bring help whenever it's needed, but only when the author remembers he exists. He also feels redundant because Littlepip already has Calamity for an experienced friend and mentor figure. He would be teaching her about gun use and wasteland survival if she wasn't already instantly an expert at those. What has Watcher really taught her? I've said he feels like a GMPC before but by that I mean he doesn't feel like a character that truly exists in this world and makes himself a part of it. Instead he feels like a tool of the author who shows up conveniently whenever he is needed and fucks off once he has deus ex machina'd things away. And it makes no sense that he would fuck off whenever his work here is done. Why doesn't he join Team Littlepip? The answer eventually given for this is retarded.
Perhaps it would be better if Watcher started out as a voice in Littlepip's PipBuck who can only tell her things and hack things for her. But only when she wirelessly connects her Pipbuck to those things. Then Watcher sends her on a quest to "Free me" from an abandoned robot factory that turns out to be metaphorical. Watcher is an AI that wanted LP to repair this factory and build a robot body to his exact specifications, because he was the AI of this factory that has been protected from scavengers by out-of-control killbots for 200 years. Now Watcher is just a robotic friend in Team Littlepip. A hacker robot with a laser pistol or some shit that can only be in one place at one time. Not a mysterious omnipresent ghost that can possess any spritebot anywhere to send any message or get help from anyone anywhere. That would give Kkat the opportunity to make Watcher into a character with a personality and motives and a character arc. What does the artificial intelligence who abandoned his lost post and watched Equestria fall have to say about the places he encounters while travelling with LP? Could be interesting. Or Kkat could be a faggot and rip off E123 Omega/HK42 and make the robot call everybody "MEATBAG" every ten seconds.
>>295844
It's weird that even though the author tries way too hard in some places to make things as artificially dark as possible, he misses obvious opportunities to make things dark in a tragic way that fits the "good intentions aren't enough" theme he thinks he's writing. If Robobrains were an attempt to help disabled ponies walk in better bodies that went wrong it would be really sad.
Or it could be an attempted PTSD cure. Let's say prewar ponies tried curing the bad memories of shellshocked soldiers by magically removing them but they fucked up and lobotomized them. So the soul is fine and alive but trapped in a body that can't be moved by the nonfunctioning brain and shoving their souls into puppet bodies while burying the real bodies was the only way to save the souls and keep the ponies "alive". But over time the puppet ponies went crazy because they missed being able to eat food and feel sunlight and sleep and shit and fuck. So they became magically controlled and used as rentable/buyable guards because prewar ponies just didn't have the heart to mercy kill these things since magic couldn't tell them if there was an afterlife or not.
>>295846
That's another problem with Fallout 3's "go anywhere at any level" mindset. For that to function the player needs to be able to beat any enemy he encounters and clear any enemy den he wanders into, even if he is weak and low-level and has terrible weapons/armour. Rewards can't be too big a deal or they make areas designed for gearless newbies even easier, but some rewards are OP anyway because lmao fuck game balance here's a perfect invisibility device and a perk that makes you immune to traps that are too wimpy to really hurt you anyway and a robot friend that gives you free water sometimes and a giant invincible stupid mutant with a goofy name and an infinite ammo laser minigun. It's weird that the author reflects this in his story by making LP more than a match for any enemy she runs into even though LP is supposed to be a weak undergeared newbie at the start. And it's weird that LP seemingly knows she's invincible but only sometimes.
You are a very angry baby. Delusional, too. Ain't no anime repackaged in "killing robobrains should make LP cry".
Still, you actually posted something related to Fallout this time instead of just trying to restart long-dead drama so it seems you're improving. Maybe with your third post, you can leave the whining at home and focus on the thread's topic? Then again I'll ignore your whining from now on anyway because I don't respect you or your opinion of me.
>>295777
That's a good point. Why the fuck are Robobrains in Equestria? What pony would make a killbot with a brainwashed fleshy brain for a CPU instead of something more magical like a lifesized metal or wooden pony puppet possessed by a pony's soul?
While I like the idea of LP having a mysterious mentor figure, Watcher is too powerful. He can control any spritebot and send any message anywhere in the Wasteland to bring help whenever it's needed, but only when the author remembers he exists. He also feels redundant because Littlepip already has Calamity for an experienced friend and mentor figure. He would be teaching her about gun use and wasteland survival if she wasn't already instantly an expert at those. What has Watcher really taught her? I've said he feels like a GMPC before but by that I mean he doesn't feel like a character that truly exists in this world and makes himself a part of it. Instead he feels like a tool of the author who shows up conveniently whenever he is needed and fucks off once he has deus ex machina'd things away. And it makes no sense that he would fuck off whenever his work here is done. Why doesn't he join Team Littlepip? The answer eventually given for this is retarded.
Perhaps it would be better if Watcher started out as a voice in Littlepip's PipBuck who can only tell her things and hack things for her. But only when she wirelessly connects her Pipbuck to those things. Then Watcher sends her on a quest to "Free me" from an abandoned robot factory that turns out to be metaphorical. Watcher is an AI that wanted LP to repair this factory and build a robot body to his exact specifications, because he was the AI of this factory that has been protected from scavengers by out-of-control killbots for 200 years. Now Watcher is just a robotic friend in Team Littlepip. A hacker robot with a laser pistol or some shit that can only be in one place at one time. Not a mysterious omnipresent ghost that can possess any spritebot anywhere to send any message or get help from anyone anywhere. That would give Kkat the opportunity to make Watcher into a character with a personality and motives and a character arc. What does the artificial intelligence who abandoned his lost post and watched Equestria fall have to say about the places he encounters while travelling with LP? Could be interesting. Or Kkat could be a faggot and rip off E123 Omega/HK42 and make the robot call everybody "MEATBAG" every ten seconds.
>>295844
It's weird that even though the author tries way too hard in some places to make things as artificially dark as possible, he misses obvious opportunities to make things dark in a tragic way that fits the "good intentions aren't enough" theme he thinks he's writing. If Robobrains were an attempt to help disabled ponies walk in better bodies that went wrong it would be really sad.
Or it could be an attempted PTSD cure. Let's say prewar ponies tried curing the bad memories of shellshocked soldiers by magically removing them but they fucked up and lobotomized them. So the soul is fine and alive but trapped in a body that can't be moved by the nonfunctioning brain and shoving their souls into puppet bodies while burying the real bodies was the only way to save the souls and keep the ponies "alive". But over time the puppet ponies went crazy because they missed being able to eat food and feel sunlight and sleep and shit and fuck. So they became magically controlled and used as rentable/buyable guards because prewar ponies just didn't have the heart to mercy kill these things since magic couldn't tell them if there was an afterlife or not.
>>295846
That's another problem with Fallout 3's "go anywhere at any level" mindset. For that to function the player needs to be able to beat any enemy he encounters and clear any enemy den he wanders into, even if he is weak and low-level and has terrible weapons/armour. Rewards can't be too big a deal or they make areas designed for gearless newbies even easier, but some rewards are OP anyway because lmao fuck game balance here's a perfect invisibility device and a perk that makes you immune to traps that are too wimpy to really hurt you anyway and a robot friend that gives you free water sometimes and a giant invincible stupid mutant with a goofy name and an infinite ammo laser minigun. It's weird that the author reflects this in his story by making LP more than a match for any enemy she runs into even though LP is supposed to be a weak undergeared newbie at the start. And it's weird that LP seemingly knows she's invincible but only sometimes.
Wait a second, we must be at least 80k words into this story by now. Almost a fifth of the way through these 500k words, and despite how much exposition the author has dumped on us involving backstory and lore and setting wankery, so far the only hint of a plot for the future and the characters we're reading about now is "Littlepip heard there's a slaver town over in that direction so she's going to go fuck it up. Also she might stop at a radio tower to get her friend's songs on the radio and possibly meet the DJ".
Littlepip's goal is to slaughter Evil(tm) NPCs for being there and get Velvet's music on the radio, and Velvet's going along with it plus she might want to be a doctor. Calamity's got no dreams besides keeping these two girls alive. There's something inherently cool about wanting to protect your friends with your life. And he's so simple that the author can't fuck him up like he fucked up the murderhobo and singing doctor. I wish Calamity got cooler moments and I wish the author didn't treat him like an afterthought. When the trio got banned from New Appleoosa, did he say anything about the home he had there?
Anyway, the author's pacing is absurdly slow. All this time spent lingering on this and diary/terminal-entry-reading about this and backstory-expositing about that doesn't help the story because Kkat can't tell what to focus on and explain and elaborate upon from what to gloss over and leave behind in Fallout and skip.
Littlepip's goal is to slaughter Evil(tm) NPCs for being there and get Velvet's music on the radio, and Velvet's going along with it plus she might want to be a doctor. Calamity's got no dreams besides keeping these two girls alive. There's something inherently cool about wanting to protect your friends with your life. And he's so simple that the author can't fuck him up like he fucked up the murderhobo and singing doctor. I wish Calamity got cooler moments and I wish the author didn't treat him like an afterthought. When the trio got banned from New Appleoosa, did he say anything about the home he had there?
Anyway, the author's pacing is absurdly slow. All this time spent lingering on this and diary/terminal-entry-reading about this and backstory-expositing about that doesn't help the story because Kkat can't tell what to focus on and explain and elaborate upon from what to gloss over and leave behind in Fallout and skip.
Trying to be more positive now as part of another new year's resolution.
While reading great real books made by professionals, it dawned on me that the prose is usually really fucking good.
The specifics of the prose depend on the author but it can be be tight, refined, and focused. Nobody's afraid to end a paragraph after less than three words or let some dialogue float on its own without some accompanying text outside the quotation marks. Some authors do it more than others but it's rare for an author to clutter up their story in an attempt to get you to visually understand the movie in their heads.
A good book can be more than "a movie in your head", senses are mentioned besides what the "camera" sees.
There are conversations with brisk and snappy paces. And quick arguments from motivated characters who speak for a reason feel like dances, even sword duels at times. The value of brevity is known, whether the author lets you watch the dueling lines without commentary or postfaces every line with some narration that tells you what the character thinks and how he formulates his response. It's not a competition of kitschy speeches that instantly sway someone just for sounding nice enough.
When characters speak, how long their sentences take to get to the point depends on the character and how complex the point is to explain. Characters really do speak differently from one another, and not just in the sense that some characters speak "normally" in the author's eyes and some say a word over and over like "Darling" and some have funetik aksents and apostrophes where letters should be.
Even if some shit doesn't matter, everything important feels like it does to the plot or characters. Characters go through arcs, characters can be wrong, characters can have their whole world turned upside down. Characters can be broken and brought to their lowest points. Characters can do morally questionable things because the author isn't afraid of some audience member saying "I don't like this character as a person so I loathe this story and author for inventing him/her".
If the prose lingers on one subject for a while, it is because the author or some character has something to say on that subject. So when sentences get long, it stands out among the short sentences.
But while prose can be short, it can be long, flowing, and flowery. Instead of showing off Said-Book thesaurus fuckery like they're trying to impress someone, good authors can precisely use fancy words and clever metaphors/similes to elevate their text in indescribable ways. They can make you feel shit, man.
And instead of hiding vital information from the audience for a big reveal or stupid "once more with clarity" flashback later on, good mystery writers can let you figure shit out along with the characters, or even before the characters have figured out information that confirms your educated guess!
And when authors do enough research to make the facts right, it makes the world feel plausibly realistic and the story feel believable. Even if the "science" is just impossible magic bollocks disguised as science.
I've seen shit authors fuck their prose up, but I'm glad I read the prose of good writers in my lifetime. Even though prose is not one the most important thing out there, it's still a vital part of the book-reading experience.
How great prose can be contrasts with this story, because this story's prose sucks gay asshole. It feels like an un-edited rough draft that has yet to be seen by a single editor, even though Kkat probably had more proof-readers than Nyx's stupid story.
What's the point of a proof-reader if your editor can't tell what to cut from what to elaborate on, or point out when the author's assumption that everyone already knows what he knows renders a story arc borderline incomprehensible until it's over and everything's spelled out after the fact?
When Littlepip talks and thinks, it is with the author's train of thought. She's familiar with shit she shouldn't be whenever the author forgets her backstory and any prior characterization as anything other than a blank-slate murderhobo whose only consistent traits are "Lockpicker", "Moralizes", and "Lesbian". This whole story feels like one big stream of train-of-thought vomit barely reined in by a vague outline of what "sick loot" Littlepip needs to find and where, along with a word doc full of setting backstory the author isn't sure where to put or what to do with. Keeping the chunks of Canon Pony backstory directly (or at least thematically) relevant to what's going on now would improve these exposition dumps about long-dead characters the author killed off and didn't create or get.
Everything's so long and drawn-out when it doesn't need to be, except when it's skipped over even though it shouldn't be. Sometimes LP's looting sessions are needlessly detailed and sometimes they're skipped over, only for something LP picked up "offscreen" (during a skipped scene) to be vitally important later. You can't keep track of LP's loot-katamari so why ever narrate her picking ammo from corpse pockets and swiping shotguns from safes as if the reader could? Littlepip's limbs might break often but that never significantly impacts her and only exists to make her seem tough for "fighting through the pain". Littlepip might struggle to lockpick one particularly dastardly safe but she'll eventually get it open after enough lockpicks, not that the author keeps bobby pins limited so LP must think+weigh possible loot vs the risk of breaking her only bobby pins.
Characters under-explain who they are because they're NPCs who only exist as far as their role in the story allows, except when there's some backstory unrelated to who they are and what they do in the story. You can't work things out with the information you're given to guess shit ahead of time, unless your guess is "The oversized 8-ball Guybrush Threepwood picked up at the Mêlée Island theater will be used later like that dress from chapter 2 was".
While reading great real books made by professionals, it dawned on me that the prose is usually really fucking good.
The specifics of the prose depend on the author but it can be be tight, refined, and focused. Nobody's afraid to end a paragraph after less than three words or let some dialogue float on its own without some accompanying text outside the quotation marks. Some authors do it more than others but it's rare for an author to clutter up their story in an attempt to get you to visually understand the movie in their heads.
A good book can be more than "a movie in your head", senses are mentioned besides what the "camera" sees.
There are conversations with brisk and snappy paces. And quick arguments from motivated characters who speak for a reason feel like dances, even sword duels at times. The value of brevity is known, whether the author lets you watch the dueling lines without commentary or postfaces every line with some narration that tells you what the character thinks and how he formulates his response. It's not a competition of kitschy speeches that instantly sway someone just for sounding nice enough.
When characters speak, how long their sentences take to get to the point depends on the character and how complex the point is to explain. Characters really do speak differently from one another, and not just in the sense that some characters speak "normally" in the author's eyes and some say a word over and over like "Darling" and some have funetik aksents and apostrophes where letters should be.
Even if some shit doesn't matter, everything important feels like it does to the plot or characters. Characters go through arcs, characters can be wrong, characters can have their whole world turned upside down. Characters can be broken and brought to their lowest points. Characters can do morally questionable things because the author isn't afraid of some audience member saying "I don't like this character as a person so I loathe this story and author for inventing him/her".
If the prose lingers on one subject for a while, it is because the author or some character has something to say on that subject. So when sentences get long, it stands out among the short sentences.
But while prose can be short, it can be long, flowing, and flowery. Instead of showing off Said-Book thesaurus fuckery like they're trying to impress someone, good authors can precisely use fancy words and clever metaphors/similes to elevate their text in indescribable ways. They can make you feel shit, man.
And instead of hiding vital information from the audience for a big reveal or stupid "once more with clarity" flashback later on, good mystery writers can let you figure shit out along with the characters, or even before the characters have figured out information that confirms your educated guess!
And when authors do enough research to make the facts right, it makes the world feel plausibly realistic and the story feel believable. Even if the "science" is just impossible magic bollocks disguised as science.
I've seen shit authors fuck their prose up, but I'm glad I read the prose of good writers in my lifetime. Even though prose is not one the most important thing out there, it's still a vital part of the book-reading experience.
How great prose can be contrasts with this story, because this story's prose sucks gay asshole. It feels like an un-edited rough draft that has yet to be seen by a single editor, even though Kkat probably had more proof-readers than Nyx's stupid story.
What's the point of a proof-reader if your editor can't tell what to cut from what to elaborate on, or point out when the author's assumption that everyone already knows what he knows renders a story arc borderline incomprehensible until it's over and everything's spelled out after the fact?
When Littlepip talks and thinks, it is with the author's train of thought. She's familiar with shit she shouldn't be whenever the author forgets her backstory and any prior characterization as anything other than a blank-slate murderhobo whose only consistent traits are "Lockpicker", "Moralizes", and "Lesbian". This whole story feels like one big stream of train-of-thought vomit barely reined in by a vague outline of what "sick loot" Littlepip needs to find and where, along with a word doc full of setting backstory the author isn't sure where to put or what to do with. Keeping the chunks of Canon Pony backstory directly (or at least thematically) relevant to what's going on now would improve these exposition dumps about long-dead characters the author killed off and didn't create or get.
Everything's so long and drawn-out when it doesn't need to be, except when it's skipped over even though it shouldn't be. Sometimes LP's looting sessions are needlessly detailed and sometimes they're skipped over, only for something LP picked up "offscreen" (during a skipped scene) to be vitally important later. You can't keep track of LP's loot-katamari so why ever narrate her picking ammo from corpse pockets and swiping shotguns from safes as if the reader could? Littlepip's limbs might break often but that never significantly impacts her and only exists to make her seem tough for "fighting through the pain". Littlepip might struggle to lockpick one particularly dastardly safe but she'll eventually get it open after enough lockpicks, not that the author keeps bobby pins limited so LP must think+weigh possible loot vs the risk of breaking her only bobby pins.
Characters under-explain who they are because they're NPCs who only exist as far as their role in the story allows, except when there's some backstory unrelated to who they are and what they do in the story. You can't work things out with the information you're given to guess shit ahead of time, unless your guess is "The oversized 8-ball Guybrush Threepwood picked up at the Mêlée Island theater will be used later like that dress from chapter 2 was".
>>295462
Alright, holidays are over, so I suppose it's time to get back to this in earnest.
Littlepoop pulls out some tools and starts working on fixing the recording (which from >>295493 I am now imagining as something akin to a VHS cassette), while Calamity barters with the merchant. I might have found something interesting here:
>I had just started working when Velvet Remedy gave a stomp. “No, no, no.” I looked up, wondering why she objected to my efforts, only to realize she was neighing to Calamity. Lowering her head, she pushed him away from the merchant.
>“What’s got yer tail in a twist?” he huffed.
>“You’re letting him rob you, that’s what,” she retorted. “Here, let a pony who knows a thing or two handle this.”
>I watched my companions, bemused. The merchant pony was staring at them with a slight frown. Velvet Remedy returned, and while Calamity watched from behind, she ignored the pile of goods he was trying to sell the pony, not to mention everything he had been hoping to buy; she fluttered her eyelashes at the merchant, giving him a look that sparked a twitch of jealousy in my breast, and asked, “That dress over there, the one in the spring colors? How much is that?”
This is one of the few times in this story where an ordinary, mundane interaction taking place between characters is written convincingly, and what's even more shocking is that it's not just a dialogue exchange; the author appears to have actually injected some meaningful subtext. Let's take a closer look.
Littlepoop is engaged in repairing the recording she found, that for some bizarre reason was nailed to the door. From the events we've actually witnessed, Littlepoop is clearly a Mary Sue protagonist who can do nearly anything that any situation requires; however, the author has thus far tried to present her as an awkward, unremarkable, untalented pony whose only skills involve fiddling with PipBucks and other small gadgets. Working from this image of her, we can assume a couple of things: first, that she likely takes a great deal of pride in her tinkering, and second, that on some level she probably feels inferior to Calamity, whom she sees as being more experienced and knowledgeable. Please bear in mind that I am currently speaking about how the author intended these characters to be seen; obviously the reality he's presented is quite different
The group is currently engaged in bartering for supplies, and fixing the recording should be a low-priority task; however, Littlepoop whips out her tools and starts working on it while the others are bartering. Subconsciously, she is probably doing this more because she wants to show off in front of Velvet than because she really cares that much about the recording. The text actually tells us that this is her mindset:
>“No, no, no.” I looked up, wondering why she objected to my efforts, only to realize she was neighing to Calamity.
Here, Littlepoop just assumes that everypony, specifically Velvet, is paying attention to what she's doing. She is probably expecting Velvet to say something about it to her; however, she is slightly miffed to discover that Velvet either hasn't noticed or doesn't care.
Here is where it gets interesting. Velvet is not only ignoring Littlepoop, she is ignoring her in order to help Calamity barter for goods. Littlepoop confesses to feeling a "twinge of jealousy" when Velvet starts making googly-eyes at the merchant, but this is only superficial. Nobody actually thinks this merchant is a legitimate contender for Velvet's affections; even Littlepoop can see clearly that she's just using her feminine wiles to get him to come down on his price a little. The jealousy here is not because Velvet is trying to seduce the merchant, it's because Velvet is seducing the merchant in order to help Calamity. Littlepoop is trying to show off for Velvet by repairing the tape in front of her, but Velvet completely ignores her a focuses on Calamity. That she uses her feminine appeal to help him adds a sexual dimension to the exchange and adds to LP's jealousy and frustration.
What's more, the help was unsolicited, and the end it achieves doesn't serve any practical purpose. If we read a few lines beyond the section I highlighted, we see that Velvet doesn't even end up buying any important supplies, she just talks the merchant into selling her a few extra dresses at half price. Once this transaction is complete, she gives Calamity the new dresses as well as the one that LP gave her from Rarity's boutique, and asks him to use the new dresses to patch up the damage that the Rarity gown sustained during the dragon fight.
This is a bit awkward since there's been no indication that Calamity has any talent for sewing dresses (in-world it's unlikely that anypony except a unicorn would be able to sew in the first place), but the significance of the scene is clear enough: Velvet ignored Littlepoop's showboating in order to flirt with Calamity. It's not surprising that she would do this; while LP's views on pony vaginas are a matter of public record, we've had no indication that Velvet has the same appetite. Thus, if Velvet is going to develop feelings for anypony, Calamity would be the most likely target for her affections.
I was beginning to wonder if something of this sort was going to happen eventually. My original guess was going to be that Calamity would develop feelings for LP, which she would naturally rebuff, and this would put strain on their friendship and add an element of discord to the group. However, this Velvet x Calamity angle accomplishes the same purpose, probably even more effectively. Assuming all this was intentional on the author's part and I'm not just reading into things that aren't there, this short interaction, and its hint of a love triangle, is probably one of the best things we've seen in the story so far, and is the first indication that the romantic subplot will be anything more than LP drooling over Velvet's hindquarters.
Alright, holidays are over, so I suppose it's time to get back to this in earnest.
Littlepoop pulls out some tools and starts working on fixing the recording (which from >>295493 I am now imagining as something akin to a VHS cassette), while Calamity barters with the merchant. I might have found something interesting here:
>I had just started working when Velvet Remedy gave a stomp. “No, no, no.” I looked up, wondering why she objected to my efforts, only to realize she was neighing to Calamity. Lowering her head, she pushed him away from the merchant.
>“What’s got yer tail in a twist?” he huffed.
>“You’re letting him rob you, that’s what,” she retorted. “Here, let a pony who knows a thing or two handle this.”
>I watched my companions, bemused. The merchant pony was staring at them with a slight frown. Velvet Remedy returned, and while Calamity watched from behind, she ignored the pile of goods he was trying to sell the pony, not to mention everything he had been hoping to buy; she fluttered her eyelashes at the merchant, giving him a look that sparked a twitch of jealousy in my breast, and asked, “That dress over there, the one in the spring colors? How much is that?”
This is one of the few times in this story where an ordinary, mundane interaction taking place between characters is written convincingly, and what's even more shocking is that it's not just a dialogue exchange; the author appears to have actually injected some meaningful subtext. Let's take a closer look.
Littlepoop is engaged in repairing the recording she found, that for some bizarre reason was nailed to the door. From the events we've actually witnessed, Littlepoop is clearly a Mary Sue protagonist who can do nearly anything that any situation requires; however, the author has thus far tried to present her as an awkward, unremarkable, untalented pony whose only skills involve fiddling with PipBucks and other small gadgets. Working from this image of her, we can assume a couple of things: first, that she likely takes a great deal of pride in her tinkering, and second, that on some level she probably feels inferior to Calamity, whom she sees as being more experienced and knowledgeable. Please bear in mind that I am currently speaking about how the author intended these characters to be seen; obviously the reality he's presented is quite different
The group is currently engaged in bartering for supplies, and fixing the recording should be a low-priority task; however, Littlepoop whips out her tools and starts working on it while the others are bartering. Subconsciously, she is probably doing this more because she wants to show off in front of Velvet than because she really cares that much about the recording. The text actually tells us that this is her mindset:
>“No, no, no.” I looked up, wondering why she objected to my efforts, only to realize she was neighing to Calamity.
Here, Littlepoop just assumes that everypony, specifically Velvet, is paying attention to what she's doing. She is probably expecting Velvet to say something about it to her; however, she is slightly miffed to discover that Velvet either hasn't noticed or doesn't care.
Here is where it gets interesting. Velvet is not only ignoring Littlepoop, she is ignoring her in order to help Calamity barter for goods. Littlepoop confesses to feeling a "twinge of jealousy" when Velvet starts making googly-eyes at the merchant, but this is only superficial. Nobody actually thinks this merchant is a legitimate contender for Velvet's affections; even Littlepoop can see clearly that she's just using her feminine wiles to get him to come down on his price a little. The jealousy here is not because Velvet is trying to seduce the merchant, it's because Velvet is seducing the merchant in order to help Calamity. Littlepoop is trying to show off for Velvet by repairing the tape in front of her, but Velvet completely ignores her a focuses on Calamity. That she uses her feminine appeal to help him adds a sexual dimension to the exchange and adds to LP's jealousy and frustration.
What's more, the help was unsolicited, and the end it achieves doesn't serve any practical purpose. If we read a few lines beyond the section I highlighted, we see that Velvet doesn't even end up buying any important supplies, she just talks the merchant into selling her a few extra dresses at half price. Once this transaction is complete, she gives Calamity the new dresses as well as the one that LP gave her from Rarity's boutique, and asks him to use the new dresses to patch up the damage that the Rarity gown sustained during the dragon fight.
This is a bit awkward since there's been no indication that Calamity has any talent for sewing dresses (in-world it's unlikely that anypony except a unicorn would be able to sew in the first place), but the significance of the scene is clear enough: Velvet ignored Littlepoop's showboating in order to flirt with Calamity. It's not surprising that she would do this; while LP's views on pony vaginas are a matter of public record, we've had no indication that Velvet has the same appetite. Thus, if Velvet is going to develop feelings for anypony, Calamity would be the most likely target for her affections.
I was beginning to wonder if something of this sort was going to happen eventually. My original guess was going to be that Calamity would develop feelings for LP, which she would naturally rebuff, and this would put strain on their friendship and add an element of discord to the group. However, this Velvet x Calamity angle accomplishes the same purpose, probably even more effectively. Assuming all this was intentional on the author's part and I'm not just reading into things that aren't there, this short interaction, and its hint of a love triangle, is probably one of the best things we've seen in the story so far, and is the first indication that the romantic subplot will be anything more than LP drooling over Velvet's hindquarters.
>>296124
>when one of the best things seen in this story so far is a love triangle
TerribleWritingAdviceGuy_happy.jpg
Funny how The Love Triangle is a running gag on the "Terrible Writing Advice" youtube channel, where a guy gives comically bad advice like "Make your characters as simple and uninteresting as possible! Don't make them deep and multi-layered, that'd be hard! Being a good fantasy author is all about colouring inside the lines and doing exactly what thousands of fantasy authors are doing! Shoehorn a love triangle into your story even if it detracts from the story being told!"
But by giving this party a love triangle Kkat ends up livening up this party by giving it some conflict and internal drama. Even though so many people are sick of love triangles, it really is better than nothing.
>when one of the best things seen in this story so far is a love triangle
TerribleWritingAdviceGuy_happy.jpg
Funny how The Love Triangle is a running gag on the "Terrible Writing Advice" youtube channel, where a guy gives comically bad advice like "Make your characters as simple and uninteresting as possible! Don't make them deep and multi-layered, that'd be hard! Being a good fantasy author is all about colouring inside the lines and doing exactly what thousands of fantasy authors are doing! Shoehorn a love triangle into your story even if it detracts from the story being told!"
But by giving this party a love triangle Kkat ends up livening up this party by giving it some conflict and internal drama. Even though so many people are sick of love triangles, it really is better than nothing.
>>296029
Bit of a random tidbit really quick but I think I may have found you in a YouTube comment section. Not sure what Silver looks like besides that meme Glim made but saw a profile with the exact same pony.
>>296124
Bit nice to see some actual natural interactions between the party. When I first read through this part (which granted was years ago) I didn't pick up on this sort of stuff not only in this story but most stories in general.
I like the idea of the love triangle bit and while this is about the last bits of the story I remember ever reading I certianly wouldn't get my hopes up on that element. Talking to fans of the story to ask about reception to it at the time they mostly said how people were going gaga over the lesbian stuff since she types like it and autistic guys like it so it's a garuntied home run.
Bit interesting to see not only how Fallout 3 rubbed off on FoE but how FoE rubbed off on a lot of the fan fics for the fan fic. Seems like everyone tried to replicate it with having a spunky lesbian unicorn who is super powerful and the best and has lots of lesbian sex.
Bit of a random tidbit really quick but I think I may have found you in a YouTube comment section. Not sure what Silver looks like besides that meme Glim made but saw a profile with the exact same pony.
>>296124
Bit nice to see some actual natural interactions between the party. When I first read through this part (which granted was years ago) I didn't pick up on this sort of stuff not only in this story but most stories in general.
I like the idea of the love triangle bit and while this is about the last bits of the story I remember ever reading I certianly wouldn't get my hopes up on that element. Talking to fans of the story to ask about reception to it at the time they mostly said how people were going gaga over the lesbian stuff since she types like it and autistic guys like it so it's a garuntied home run.
Bit interesting to see not only how Fallout 3 rubbed off on FoE but how FoE rubbed off on a lot of the fan fics for the fan fic. Seems like everyone tried to replicate it with having a spunky lesbian unicorn who is super powerful and the best and has lots of lesbian sex.
>>296135
Yeah, that's my pony.
I don't want to spoil how the romance in this story goes but I find it interesting how so many "fanfics of fanfics" try to make themselves similar to the original. Some elaborate on backstory or show the lives of minor characters, but so many more would rather recreate the story "but more". They want to recapture the story's "mass appeal" (by a small mini-fandom's standards) so they make their story similar by default and rarely diverge from that templatee.
If the original tale featured a small lesbian unicorn with a big revolver and sniper rifle, here's a tale about an ordinary-sized bisexual unicorn with a bigger revolver and bigger sniper rifle and even bigger laser cannon, or a tale about a massive lesbian alicorn who keeps saying she "sucks at lockpicking" even though she just telekinetically tears locks open which always works and makes her the world's best lockpicker.
If the original tale featured a teenager who turns into a Lucario with an arbitrary chosen-one superpower tacked on that makes EXP grinding and pokemon attacks irrelevant while giving him infinite health/stamina/magic, fans make their own fics where teenagers turn into Lucarios or other primarily-bipedal Pokemon with similarly-overpowered god-tier superpowers that render actual Pokemon combat utterly irrelevant.
There's a fanfiction concept called "The Stations Of The Canon".
Basically, take any piece of media.
People might expect Naruto from me but I'll pick Harry Potter and The Philosopher's Stone for this.
The sequences of events in Harry Potter 1, where Harry does magic and gets a letter of acceptance to Hogwarts and meets Hagrid and goes to magicland and buys his wand at Olivander's and then buys a robe and then goes to hogwarts, the order in which he meets certain characters, the important plot beats from this story...
They are "The stations of the canon".
So a fanfic that seeks to answer "What if Harry Potter was raised by Tony Stark instead of the Dursleys?" would still show this story's "Harry Stark" doing magic and going to magicland and buying his wand and then his robe and so on and do these scenes in the same order as the original.
This fic's Harry Stark will meet Hermione on the train just like the canon Harry did, even though HS will talk and act differently from canon. Harry Stark will still meet Draco Malfoy when Harry Potter did, though Harry Stark might show off for the audience by calling Malfoy a faggot.
Despite what some say about a butterfly effect's wingbeats causing hurricanes somewhere else, the author is still using the original story as a guide and template when writing this story so it will take a shitload of changes piling up before things diverge from the familiar and comfortable Harry Potter 1 fans really just want to re-experience all over like they're kids again.
It's the same with Pokemon fanfics.
A Pokemon Trainer's goal is to catch and train strong Pokemon then visit the 8 major towns so you can fight their Gym Leaders and get their Gym Badges. After that you head to the Pokemon League, battle the Elite Four and Champion, kick all their asses in pokemon fights, and become the new Sinnoh Champion.
Looking at a map of Sinnoh for example (the red marks are cities/towns, the blue ones are towns or other locations) you might pick any town for your OC to start his journey from, and plan your own unique route around the region.
But in the Pokemon games and anime, assorted roadblocks block your path until you've completed certain objectives or found certain items.
Sometimes there's a small tree or rock blocking your path, and your Pokemon must destroy it using the Cut or Rock Smash move, and you'll need a Hidden Machine to teach that, so you must get that HM somehow. You'll need the HM for Surf to teach your water Pokemon to let you surf across the ocean. You'll need Waterfall's HM to climb waterfalls. Oh and you also need the Gym Badge connected to that HM for it to work for some reason.
Sometimes it's the arbitrary artificial NPC kind of roadblock where some prick blocks the only way out of town and says "Sorry, the bridge up ahead is broken!" until you go complete a story-event cutscene moment ten feet away, then he fucks off after you've done everything you can in the town.
So every adventure through the games is the same when it comes to where you go and what order you do stuff in.
Fanfics don't have to copypaste this limitation, but they do out of laziness.
So many rookie trainers start their journey in Twinleaf Town, get one of three approved Starter Pokemon (or an Eevee) from Professor Oak, and start doing everything exactly as it happened in the anime/videogame.
Because why be a rookie trainer from a big city like Jublife or Hearthome desperately trying to win fights with the shitty pokemon his unhelpful parents got him, when you could instead take the fatherless blank-slate protagonist's route just as literally as you take the turn-based RPG mechanics?
Even Naruto fics do this.
Naruto was born in Leafland, he did an escort mission to protect a bridge-builder from Shark-man and Ice-Notagirl, fought against Sandy Cuntman in the Chunin Exams, then Sasuke defected so he tried and failed to bring Sasuke back, then he fucked off. One timeskip later, he comes back home to Leafland and then Akatsuki shit sort of happens around him while he blathers about friendship. He fails to kick blonde bomberman's ass and his crush crushes Reverse Pinnochio with the help of an old lady who dies for King Sandy of Sandtopia. He fails to save Sasuke, who got snaked by snakeman. Eventually he gets a win against Your Heart Will Go On in the background of a story arc where Shikamaru's the real main character going through real shit. Eventually 5 kagays show up and eventually 3 dudes do everything wrong to start WW4 then assman's moon matrix then flashbacks then fucking moon-people.
AU fics change like 1-2 things tops while keeping everything else the same.
It's like a fucking game of Mad Libs.
Yeah, that's my pony.
I don't want to spoil how the romance in this story goes but I find it interesting how so many "fanfics of fanfics" try to make themselves similar to the original. Some elaborate on backstory or show the lives of minor characters, but so many more would rather recreate the story "but more". They want to recapture the story's "mass appeal" (by a small mini-fandom's standards) so they make their story similar by default and rarely diverge from that templatee.
If the original tale featured a small lesbian unicorn with a big revolver and sniper rifle, here's a tale about an ordinary-sized bisexual unicorn with a bigger revolver and bigger sniper rifle and even bigger laser cannon, or a tale about a massive lesbian alicorn who keeps saying she "sucks at lockpicking" even though she just telekinetically tears locks open which always works and makes her the world's best lockpicker.
If the original tale featured a teenager who turns into a Lucario with an arbitrary chosen-one superpower tacked on that makes EXP grinding and pokemon attacks irrelevant while giving him infinite health/stamina/magic, fans make their own fics where teenagers turn into Lucarios or other primarily-bipedal Pokemon with similarly-overpowered god-tier superpowers that render actual Pokemon combat utterly irrelevant.
There's a fanfiction concept called "The Stations Of The Canon".
Basically, take any piece of media.
People might expect Naruto from me but I'll pick Harry Potter and The Philosopher's Stone for this.
The sequences of events in Harry Potter 1, where Harry does magic and gets a letter of acceptance to Hogwarts and meets Hagrid and goes to magicland and buys his wand at Olivander's and then buys a robe and then goes to hogwarts, the order in which he meets certain characters, the important plot beats from this story...
They are "The stations of the canon".
So a fanfic that seeks to answer "What if Harry Potter was raised by Tony Stark instead of the Dursleys?" would still show this story's "Harry Stark" doing magic and going to magicland and buying his wand and then his robe and so on and do these scenes in the same order as the original.
This fic's Harry Stark will meet Hermione on the train just like the canon Harry did, even though HS will talk and act differently from canon. Harry Stark will still meet Draco Malfoy when Harry Potter did, though Harry Stark might show off for the audience by calling Malfoy a faggot.
Despite what some say about a butterfly effect's wingbeats causing hurricanes somewhere else, the author is still using the original story as a guide and template when writing this story so it will take a shitload of changes piling up before things diverge from the familiar and comfortable Harry Potter 1 fans really just want to re-experience all over like they're kids again.
It's the same with Pokemon fanfics.
A Pokemon Trainer's goal is to catch and train strong Pokemon then visit the 8 major towns so you can fight their Gym Leaders and get their Gym Badges. After that you head to the Pokemon League, battle the Elite Four and Champion, kick all their asses in pokemon fights, and become the new Sinnoh Champion.
Looking at a map of Sinnoh for example (the red marks are cities/towns, the blue ones are towns or other locations) you might pick any town for your OC to start his journey from, and plan your own unique route around the region.
But in the Pokemon games and anime, assorted roadblocks block your path until you've completed certain objectives or found certain items.
Sometimes there's a small tree or rock blocking your path, and your Pokemon must destroy it using the Cut or Rock Smash move, and you'll need a Hidden Machine to teach that, so you must get that HM somehow. You'll need the HM for Surf to teach your water Pokemon to let you surf across the ocean. You'll need Waterfall's HM to climb waterfalls. Oh and you also need the Gym Badge connected to that HM for it to work for some reason.
Sometimes it's the arbitrary artificial NPC kind of roadblock where some prick blocks the only way out of town and says "Sorry, the bridge up ahead is broken!" until you go complete a story-event cutscene moment ten feet away, then he fucks off after you've done everything you can in the town.
So every adventure through the games is the same when it comes to where you go and what order you do stuff in.
Fanfics don't have to copypaste this limitation, but they do out of laziness.
So many rookie trainers start their journey in Twinleaf Town, get one of three approved Starter Pokemon (or an Eevee) from Professor Oak, and start doing everything exactly as it happened in the anime/videogame.
Because why be a rookie trainer from a big city like Jublife or Hearthome desperately trying to win fights with the shitty pokemon his unhelpful parents got him, when you could instead take the fatherless blank-slate protagonist's route just as literally as you take the turn-based RPG mechanics?
Even Naruto fics do this.
Naruto was born in Leafland, he did an escort mission to protect a bridge-builder from Shark-man and Ice-Notagirl, fought against Sandy Cuntman in the Chunin Exams, then Sasuke defected so he tried and failed to bring Sasuke back, then he fucked off. One timeskip later, he comes back home to Leafland and then Akatsuki shit sort of happens around him while he blathers about friendship. He fails to kick blonde bomberman's ass and his crush crushes Reverse Pinnochio with the help of an old lady who dies for King Sandy of Sandtopia. He fails to save Sasuke, who got snaked by snakeman. Eventually he gets a win against Your Heart Will Go On in the background of a story arc where Shikamaru's the real main character going through real shit. Eventually 5 kagays show up and eventually 3 dudes do everything wrong to start WW4 then assman's moon matrix then flashbacks then fucking moon-people.
AU fics change like 1-2 things tops while keeping everything else the same.
It's like a fucking game of Mad Libs.
>>296124
Anyway, as with the skies of the Equestrian Wasteland, this short bit of quality writing is only a thin ray of sunlight, poking momentarily through the clouds. Before it can even be savored and appreciated, it's gone; swallowed up by the grey, endless canopy of mediocrity that is the rest of the story.
>I went back to tinkering with the recording. After the better part of an hour, I was pleased by my progress. I realized the contents of the recording wouldn’t be worth the effort, but by now it had become a challenge. The actual message didn’t really matter.
Littlepoop's brief moment of heartache is quickly forgotten, as she becomes absorbed in the maze of her own autism. What a complete retard.
>Calamity had finished repairing Velvet Remedy’s gorgeous dress. I was impressed.
She is also a cuck, or whatever the lesbian version of a cuck would be.
>Velvet smiled and gave him a small kiss on the cheek (eliciting another flutter of jealousy from me)
It ought to elicit more than that. Despite its undertones, Velvet's flirting with the merchant was superficial enough and could probably be brushed off with a quick "flutter" of jealousy; Calamity, however, is another matter. He has the potential to be a serious contender in a love battle that Littlepoop hasn't even technically staked a claim in yet. If she had half a brain in her head, she would be very worried right now.
>then took the dress and trotted around behind some rubble to put it on. (Which, truth be told, made no sense to me.)
Again, assuming this isn't just more random autism on the author's part, trying the dress on is probably a continuation of Velvet's efforts to attract Calamity's attention. LP is correct that in and of itself, this action does not make sense.
Anyway, instead of focusing on any of this, LP once again turns her attention to the recording, which she has just finished repairing. As you've probably guessed, it contains another randomly-placed chunk of backstory that has nothing to do with anything happening in the present. The references to canon MLP characters are more overt than in previous episodes; both Twilight Sparkle and Trixie are mentioned by name.
The recording is addressed to somepony named Whitelip, and the speaker appears to be Trixie herself. It's actually a little confusing, since the only direct reference to Trixie is in the third person and there are no other clues as to the speaker's identity; however, the actual Trixie has a habit of talking about herself this way, and LP's PipBuck referred to this location as "Trixie's Cottage" earlier, so it's not hard to put two and two together here.
As far as I can tell, the story is that Whitelip is somepony who delivers Trixie's groceries, and judging from the familiarity with which she addresses him, they probably have a personal relationship as well. Trixie is leaving a message to say that she has been summoned to Manehattan by Twilight to work for the Ministry of Magic, and she doesn't know when she'll return; however, Whitelip can just leave her groceries on the porch. There are several fairly obvious logic problems here that we may as well go over.
First, I really don't understand why all communication in this world is handled via these voice recordings. Some of it kind of makes sense; for instance, Diamond Tiara probably would have found it easier to verbally narrate the last few days of her life instead of trying to write it out longhand (assuming she had a convenient method of making a sound recording nearby, of course; this is another detail the story is vague about). However, it mostly seems like a cumbersome way of handling communication, particularly for mundane tasks like what Trixie is doing here. Imagine yourself in her horseshoes for a moment: you've just been summoned out of town, and you need to communicate this simple fact to the guy who delivers your groceries and possibly bangs you. Do you:
A) Write out a quick post-it note and stick it to the door, or
B) Record yourself speaking the message onto a cassette tape, and then nail the tape to the door like a fucking autist?
The nailing of the tape actually brings us to another point. It was nailed well enough to still be attached to the door after 200 years, and furthermore the nailing damaged it to the point that LP had to spend an entire hour repairing it. So what exactly was Trixie thinking here? All she really needed to do was tell a delivery boy she's not home; a simple note would have sufficed. Even if she wanted to make a recording, was there no better way of ensuring he'd find it than by physically nailing it to the door? What is he supposed to do here? Pry it off, take it home, spend an hour fixing it, and then listen to it, only to discover that all it says is "I'm not home, leave the groceries by the door?"
There's also the question of how or why this tape is still tacked to the door after all this time. We can probably assume that the apocalypse must have happened before the grocery delivery came; either that or the delivery boy just dumped her groceries in the trash and didn't bother with the tape. However, there's obviously been activity here between then and now. Even in a vastly depopulated world, a lot can happen in 200 years. This hut has probably had numerous occupants; for that matter, the merchant has probably been operating his store out of it for quite a while. In all this time, nopony, not even the merchant, has ever thought to unpin that stupid tape?
Any potential this story might have is counterweighted by all of the ridiculous crap the author expects us to swallow. As I've been saying over and over, just because you can get away with a particular device in a video game, it doesn't mean that the same device will work in a novel.
>All of that effort, and I’d salvaged an order to the local milk-buck? I’d promised myself I wouldn’t be bothered, but I kinda was.
I'm honestly not sure who is the biggest autist here: LP, Trixie, or kkat.
Anyway, as with the skies of the Equestrian Wasteland, this short bit of quality writing is only a thin ray of sunlight, poking momentarily through the clouds. Before it can even be savored and appreciated, it's gone; swallowed up by the grey, endless canopy of mediocrity that is the rest of the story.
>I went back to tinkering with the recording. After the better part of an hour, I was pleased by my progress. I realized the contents of the recording wouldn’t be worth the effort, but by now it had become a challenge. The actual message didn’t really matter.
Littlepoop's brief moment of heartache is quickly forgotten, as she becomes absorbed in the maze of her own autism. What a complete retard.
>Calamity had finished repairing Velvet Remedy’s gorgeous dress. I was impressed.
She is also a cuck, or whatever the lesbian version of a cuck would be.
>Velvet smiled and gave him a small kiss on the cheek (eliciting another flutter of jealousy from me)
It ought to elicit more than that. Despite its undertones, Velvet's flirting with the merchant was superficial enough and could probably be brushed off with a quick "flutter" of jealousy; Calamity, however, is another matter. He has the potential to be a serious contender in a love battle that Littlepoop hasn't even technically staked a claim in yet. If she had half a brain in her head, she would be very worried right now.
>then took the dress and trotted around behind some rubble to put it on. (Which, truth be told, made no sense to me.)
Again, assuming this isn't just more random autism on the author's part, trying the dress on is probably a continuation of Velvet's efforts to attract Calamity's attention. LP is correct that in and of itself, this action does not make sense.
Anyway, instead of focusing on any of this, LP once again turns her attention to the recording, which she has just finished repairing. As you've probably guessed, it contains another randomly-placed chunk of backstory that has nothing to do with anything happening in the present. The references to canon MLP characters are more overt than in previous episodes; both Twilight Sparkle and Trixie are mentioned by name.
The recording is addressed to somepony named Whitelip, and the speaker appears to be Trixie herself. It's actually a little confusing, since the only direct reference to Trixie is in the third person and there are no other clues as to the speaker's identity; however, the actual Trixie has a habit of talking about herself this way, and LP's PipBuck referred to this location as "Trixie's Cottage" earlier, so it's not hard to put two and two together here.
As far as I can tell, the story is that Whitelip is somepony who delivers Trixie's groceries, and judging from the familiarity with which she addresses him, they probably have a personal relationship as well. Trixie is leaving a message to say that she has been summoned to Manehattan by Twilight to work for the Ministry of Magic, and she doesn't know when she'll return; however, Whitelip can just leave her groceries on the porch. There are several fairly obvious logic problems here that we may as well go over.
First, I really don't understand why all communication in this world is handled via these voice recordings. Some of it kind of makes sense; for instance, Diamond Tiara probably would have found it easier to verbally narrate the last few days of her life instead of trying to write it out longhand (assuming she had a convenient method of making a sound recording nearby, of course; this is another detail the story is vague about). However, it mostly seems like a cumbersome way of handling communication, particularly for mundane tasks like what Trixie is doing here. Imagine yourself in her horseshoes for a moment: you've just been summoned out of town, and you need to communicate this simple fact to the guy who delivers your groceries and possibly bangs you. Do you:
A) Write out a quick post-it note and stick it to the door, or
B) Record yourself speaking the message onto a cassette tape, and then nail the tape to the door like a fucking autist?
The nailing of the tape actually brings us to another point. It was nailed well enough to still be attached to the door after 200 years, and furthermore the nailing damaged it to the point that LP had to spend an entire hour repairing it. So what exactly was Trixie thinking here? All she really needed to do was tell a delivery boy she's not home; a simple note would have sufficed. Even if she wanted to make a recording, was there no better way of ensuring he'd find it than by physically nailing it to the door? What is he supposed to do here? Pry it off, take it home, spend an hour fixing it, and then listen to it, only to discover that all it says is "I'm not home, leave the groceries by the door?"
There's also the question of how or why this tape is still tacked to the door after all this time. We can probably assume that the apocalypse must have happened before the grocery delivery came; either that or the delivery boy just dumped her groceries in the trash and didn't bother with the tape. However, there's obviously been activity here between then and now. Even in a vastly depopulated world, a lot can happen in 200 years. This hut has probably had numerous occupants; for that matter, the merchant has probably been operating his store out of it for quite a while. In all this time, nopony, not even the merchant, has ever thought to unpin that stupid tape?
Any potential this story might have is counterweighted by all of the ridiculous crap the author expects us to swallow. As I've been saying over and over, just because you can get away with a particular device in a video game, it doesn't mean that the same device will work in a novel.
>All of that effort, and I’d salvaged an order to the local milk-buck? I’d promised myself I wouldn’t be bothered, but I kinda was.
I'm honestly not sure who is the biggest autist here: LP, Trixie, or kkat.
>>296137
Seriously, you'd fucking think that in an alternate timeline where Naruto was born with some kind of super-amazing power from day one, his life would have gone very differently and baddies would have planned things differently.
You'd think he'd be sent on different missions even if it does mean he doesn't get to meet Zabuza/Haku and cry over their bodies like he did in the original show. Snakeman went after Sasuke back then specifically because Snakeman wanted Sasuke's special eyes and at the time Sasuke seemed more special than Naruto. Why wouldn't The Akatsuki make their move earlier than they did in canon given their goal requires capturing and soul-draining Naruto and his living-pokeball pals?
The Ninja World's fucked because of 5 different masterminds trying to out-scheme each other at the same time, no matter how many lives their schemes cost (RIP snakefag 2 and wannabe-geass) and if anyone would do shit differently and react to the different circumstances, it's them. It's absurd that aside from Naruto becoming a buff chad with a harem and Haku lucking out and surviving his canon death, barely anything gets to change the "glorious" canon unless it gets in the way of giving Naruto more power and importance and girlfriends.
But the worst offender has to be Code Geass.
This is a series about a level twenty turbo-autist and the clusterfucks that happen when he and other turbo-autists play speed-chess with human lives and giant mechs and supernatural powers. The only times he ever lost at anything was when something unpredictable happened and there was nothing smart he could do in time. And he canonically hates people who "Play chess by the numbers", doing wacky suboptimal shit during chess games just to make people adapt. Fucker makes his King chesspiece walk ahead of his other piece just to expose it, even though it's an illegal move, just to flex.
So if he was sent back to episode one for a "Re-do" of his life with all his memories intact, he would make MANY changes to his life.
He wouldn't waste this opportunity to fix everything or die trying. Or fuck everything up harder trying. He'd throw things off the rails just to prove to himself he can win when he doesn't know what happens next.
But every goddamn fic like this is just a retelling of the show except every 5 lines the main character tells himself "This is the part where ___ happened so I need to ____ just like I did last time" right up until the moment the author decides to finally start making changes, whenever that is, if that moment ever comes.
There is never any excuse given for this kind of slavish devotion to canon like "Death said I can only change one moment in my life and I'm saving that for the Euphinigger Moment" or "I'm a doomed old-man time-traveller trying to subtly help my past self win my own life without alerting The Bureau Of Hostile Canon-Obsessed Time-Travelling Faggots In Black by making massive changes".
>>296138
Kkat could have made this "Tape pinned to the wall" moment less retarded by making Trixie's tape say "I left this tape on my doormat for you, so if you're listening to this and you're not Whitelip, put it down and fuck off. Whitelip... leave the groceries here. Also I'm breaking up with you, by the way, and I'm already halfway to Canterlot by now. Sorry but I'm just too important to be your housewife, also fuck you, you're too much of a boring doormat for me"
So Whitelip finds this tape on her doorstep, listens to it, drops the groceries, and then comes back with a hammer and nails so he can angrily nail this tape to her doorframe before stamping his way back home and crying into his pillow as his mommy tries to soothe his broken heart and his dad calls him a faggot and tells him to move on.
It becomes an emotional moment of "Fuck you" aimed at Trixie.
It's still retarded but a little less retarded, as the tape was never meant to be repaired. It was meant to stay on her door and look really dramatic. A sign that he accepted her rejection letter, and now hates her forever. He might move on some day and consider this a cringe moment in retrospect but the tape can't reveal that.
Being able to find a 200-year-old tape nobody's touched in over 200 years just as easily as you'll find unused ammo nobody manufactures any more and dead bodies with unpicked pockets nobody even bothered to move and mint-condition guns in gun safes nobody else knows how to pick is a fallout game thing, but Kkat should have updated this to fit a literary world of cause-and-effect better.
Writing as if Littlepip's the only pony in the world who knows how to loot doesn't make the world feel "Desolate and isolated", it makes the writer seem retarded. Stops the author from writing an interesting morally-grey conflict scene where LP and some rival scavenger want to scavenge the same territory, too.
Seriously, you'd fucking think that in an alternate timeline where Naruto was born with some kind of super-amazing power from day one, his life would have gone very differently and baddies would have planned things differently.
You'd think he'd be sent on different missions even if it does mean he doesn't get to meet Zabuza/Haku and cry over their bodies like he did in the original show. Snakeman went after Sasuke back then specifically because Snakeman wanted Sasuke's special eyes and at the time Sasuke seemed more special than Naruto. Why wouldn't The Akatsuki make their move earlier than they did in canon given their goal requires capturing and soul-draining Naruto and his living-pokeball pals?
The Ninja World's fucked because of 5 different masterminds trying to out-scheme each other at the same time, no matter how many lives their schemes cost (RIP snakefag 2 and wannabe-geass) and if anyone would do shit differently and react to the different circumstances, it's them. It's absurd that aside from Naruto becoming a buff chad with a harem and Haku lucking out and surviving his canon death, barely anything gets to change the "glorious" canon unless it gets in the way of giving Naruto more power and importance and girlfriends.
But the worst offender has to be Code Geass.
This is a series about a level twenty turbo-autist and the clusterfucks that happen when he and other turbo-autists play speed-chess with human lives and giant mechs and supernatural powers. The only times he ever lost at anything was when something unpredictable happened and there was nothing smart he could do in time. And he canonically hates people who "Play chess by the numbers", doing wacky suboptimal shit during chess games just to make people adapt. Fucker makes his King chesspiece walk ahead of his other piece just to expose it, even though it's an illegal move, just to flex.
So if he was sent back to episode one for a "Re-do" of his life with all his memories intact, he would make MANY changes to his life.
He wouldn't waste this opportunity to fix everything or die trying. Or fuck everything up harder trying. He'd throw things off the rails just to prove to himself he can win when he doesn't know what happens next.
But every goddamn fic like this is just a retelling of the show except every 5 lines the main character tells himself "This is the part where ___ happened so I need to ____ just like I did last time" right up until the moment the author decides to finally start making changes, whenever that is, if that moment ever comes.
There is never any excuse given for this kind of slavish devotion to canon like "Death said I can only change one moment in my life and I'm saving that for the Euphinigger Moment" or "I'm a doomed old-man time-traveller trying to subtly help my past self win my own life without alerting The Bureau Of Hostile Canon-Obsessed Time-Travelling Faggots In Black by making massive changes".
>>296138
Kkat could have made this "Tape pinned to the wall" moment less retarded by making Trixie's tape say "I left this tape on my doormat for you, so if you're listening to this and you're not Whitelip, put it down and fuck off. Whitelip... leave the groceries here. Also I'm breaking up with you, by the way, and I'm already halfway to Canterlot by now. Sorry but I'm just too important to be your housewife, also fuck you, you're too much of a boring doormat for me"
So Whitelip finds this tape on her doorstep, listens to it, drops the groceries, and then comes back with a hammer and nails so he can angrily nail this tape to her doorframe before stamping his way back home and crying into his pillow as his mommy tries to soothe his broken heart and his dad calls him a faggot and tells him to move on.
It becomes an emotional moment of "Fuck you" aimed at Trixie.
It's still retarded but a little less retarded, as the tape was never meant to be repaired. It was meant to stay on her door and look really dramatic. A sign that he accepted her rejection letter, and now hates her forever. He might move on some day and consider this a cringe moment in retrospect but the tape can't reveal that.
Being able to find a 200-year-old tape nobody's touched in over 200 years just as easily as you'll find unused ammo nobody manufactures any more and dead bodies with unpicked pockets nobody even bothered to move and mint-condition guns in gun safes nobody else knows how to pick is a fallout game thing, but Kkat should have updated this to fit a literary world of cause-and-effect better.
Writing as if Littlepip's the only pony in the world who knows how to loot doesn't make the world feel "Desolate and isolated", it makes the writer seem retarded. Stops the author from writing an interesting morally-grey conflict scene where LP and some rival scavenger want to scavenge the same territory, too.
>>296138
Anyway, after LP finishes with the tape, Velvet reemerges wearing the gown from Rarity's. She resumes haggling with the merchant, this time attempting to sell off the goods that Calamity was trying to sell earlier. She talks him into buying the magic lance, and some other shit as well. Both LP and Calamity are visibly impressed by her ability to fleece this poor, retarded middle-of-fucking-nowhere shop owner. The scene ends with a page break.
>The body of the radroach crunched grossly under my hoof. I quickly scraped the radroach gunk from my hoof using a collapsed road sign. We’d slept at Trixie’s Cottage the night before, and had made good time over the course of the morning.
As with the "radgators" we met earlier, which the author also didn't bother to explain, I am assuming that a "radroach" is just a more "rad" version of an ordinary roach. See pic related for visual.
>We were taking it slow; such a large area meant that there were still a dusting of scavenge-worthy items to be found, even outside of locked safes and trunks.
I've completely forgotten what they are even supposed to be doing right now; they're either going to Fillydelphia to beat up slavers because reasons, or to the DJ tower to get Velvet's music played on the radio, also because reasons. Either way, their task can't be that urgent if they're willing to take the time to explore every single house they come across, just so they can pilfer more random junk for their collection.
>Velvet Remedy squealed happily as she opened up an old refrigerator and found several bottles of still-pure water inside. Our canteens were almost empty, and the few working faucets I had found made my PipBuck clickity-click at the radiation levels in the water. Her find was a blessing straight from Luna.
I know that radiation is some kind of a factor here (albeit a vague one as the author has not even made the slightest attempt to explain it yet), so potable water may be hard to find. Still, I find it a little hard to believe that conditions are actually this harsh. Uncontaminated water sources would have to be common enough that life on the planet could still be supported; it's virtually impossible to imagine a large population sustaining itself for 200 years just on whatever bottled water the previous civilization left lying around. It's even harder to imagine that in such conditions, an entire refrigerator full of the stuff would have been left unattended for this long. If there are literally no uncontaminated water sources, then bottled water would be the most precious commodity on the planet, and its value would exponentially increase as the supply inevitably diminished due to consumption. Forget about gems and bottle caps; bottles of water would be the most valuable thing in Equestria.
Part of the problem, again, is that k "don't stare too long into my gaping taint wound or you'll go mad" kat has obviously created a fairly complex world here, but there are any number of essential details about it that he either hasn't thought through or hasn't bothered to explain. It's well past time that he at least supplied us with some cursory explanations about radiation and magic and how badly fucked Equestria actually is as a result of whatever the fuck happened exactly. Other than some vague references to "the war," we don't even have the slightest idea what happened, and without knowing the capabilities of weapons like "balefire bombs" or "megaspells" that the text also makes vague references to, it's impossible to ascertain their effect on natural resources.
How does water work around here? Is the groundwater contaminated everywhere, or is that limited to urban areas that suffered direct attacks? Can wells be dug anywhere? What about rivers and lakes? Has magical-radiation-whatever made those sources unusable, or has that problem run its course by now? Can they drink rainwater? Even if it's not directly explained, the author needs to have shit like this thought out, and it needs to be implemented in the text consistently enough that we don't wonder about it.
I'd also like to restate my complaint from earlier, that this whole vision of the apocalypse is the kind of scenario that only a modern mind could produce. In the immediate aftermath of an apocalypse event, presumably most would survive by scavenging and would live in repurposed old houses and RVs and what have you, but this would pretty much have to be a temporary situation. Sooner or later, people ponies, whatever would have to come to grips with the fact that the old civilization was gone and it wouldn't be coming back. For someone who has lived their entire life in a world of grocery stores and running water and for the record I include myself in this group, it would be immensely difficult to adjust to life without all of that. However, eventually people would have no choice but to adapt. Water sources would have to be found, food would have to be grown, new houses would have to be built, new weapons would have to be made. In the absence of civilization, the world would simply revert to a pre-civilizational state; those who can adapt would do so, and those who can't would die out. Eventually, civilization would return. The idea that 200 years after the fact, people ponies, whatever would still be fighting over old cans of creamed corn, because nobody remembers how to grow corn, is either extremely implausible or extremely depressing. Anyway.
>There was no shelter to speak of, and red spots were always crawling across my E.F.S. compass. Mostly radroaches or the occasional giant mutant hedgehogs.
I'd think "giant mutant hedgehogs" would deserve more than just a casual mention.
>The magical radiation that had soaked into the water had twisted a multitude of wasteland’s animal inhabitants into grotesque and often monstrous versions of their original species. Most creatures had not survived the transformations.
This at least kind of explains things.
Anyway, after LP finishes with the tape, Velvet reemerges wearing the gown from Rarity's. She resumes haggling with the merchant, this time attempting to sell off the goods that Calamity was trying to sell earlier. She talks him into buying the magic lance, and some other shit as well. Both LP and Calamity are visibly impressed by her ability to fleece this poor, retarded middle-of-fucking-nowhere shop owner. The scene ends with a page break.
>The body of the radroach crunched grossly under my hoof. I quickly scraped the radroach gunk from my hoof using a collapsed road sign. We’d slept at Trixie’s Cottage the night before, and had made good time over the course of the morning.
As with the "radgators" we met earlier, which the author also didn't bother to explain, I am assuming that a "radroach" is just a more "rad" version of an ordinary roach. See pic related for visual.
>We were taking it slow; such a large area meant that there were still a dusting of scavenge-worthy items to be found, even outside of locked safes and trunks.
I've completely forgotten what they are even supposed to be doing right now; they're either going to Fillydelphia to beat up slavers because reasons, or to the DJ tower to get Velvet's music played on the radio, also because reasons. Either way, their task can't be that urgent if they're willing to take the time to explore every single house they come across, just so they can pilfer more random junk for their collection.
>Velvet Remedy squealed happily as she opened up an old refrigerator and found several bottles of still-pure water inside. Our canteens were almost empty, and the few working faucets I had found made my PipBuck clickity-click at the radiation levels in the water. Her find was a blessing straight from Luna.
I know that radiation is some kind of a factor here (albeit a vague one as the author has not even made the slightest attempt to explain it yet), so potable water may be hard to find. Still, I find it a little hard to believe that conditions are actually this harsh. Uncontaminated water sources would have to be common enough that life on the planet could still be supported; it's virtually impossible to imagine a large population sustaining itself for 200 years just on whatever bottled water the previous civilization left lying around. It's even harder to imagine that in such conditions, an entire refrigerator full of the stuff would have been left unattended for this long. If there are literally no uncontaminated water sources, then bottled water would be the most precious commodity on the planet, and its value would exponentially increase as the supply inevitably diminished due to consumption. Forget about gems and bottle caps; bottles of water would be the most valuable thing in Equestria.
Part of the problem, again, is that k "don't stare too long into my gaping taint wound or you'll go mad" kat has obviously created a fairly complex world here, but there are any number of essential details about it that he either hasn't thought through or hasn't bothered to explain. It's well past time that he at least supplied us with some cursory explanations about radiation and magic and how badly fucked Equestria actually is as a result of whatever the fuck happened exactly. Other than some vague references to "the war," we don't even have the slightest idea what happened, and without knowing the capabilities of weapons like "balefire bombs" or "megaspells" that the text also makes vague references to, it's impossible to ascertain their effect on natural resources.
How does water work around here? Is the groundwater contaminated everywhere, or is that limited to urban areas that suffered direct attacks? Can wells be dug anywhere? What about rivers and lakes? Has magical-radiation-whatever made those sources unusable, or has that problem run its course by now? Can they drink rainwater? Even if it's not directly explained, the author needs to have shit like this thought out, and it needs to be implemented in the text consistently enough that we don't wonder about it.
I'd also like to restate my complaint from earlier, that this whole vision of the apocalypse is the kind of scenario that only a modern mind could produce. In the immediate aftermath of an apocalypse event, presumably most would survive by scavenging and would live in repurposed old houses and RVs and what have you, but this would pretty much have to be a temporary situation. Sooner or later, people ponies, whatever would have to come to grips with the fact that the old civilization was gone and it wouldn't be coming back. For someone who has lived their entire life in a world of grocery stores and running water and for the record I include myself in this group, it would be immensely difficult to adjust to life without all of that. However, eventually people would have no choice but to adapt. Water sources would have to be found, food would have to be grown, new houses would have to be built, new weapons would have to be made. In the absence of civilization, the world would simply revert to a pre-civilizational state; those who can adapt would do so, and those who can't would die out. Eventually, civilization would return. The idea that 200 years after the fact, people ponies, whatever would still be fighting over old cans of creamed corn, because nobody remembers how to grow corn, is either extremely implausible or extremely depressing. Anyway.
>There was no shelter to speak of, and red spots were always crawling across my E.F.S. compass. Mostly radroaches or the occasional giant mutant hedgehogs.
I'd think "giant mutant hedgehogs" would deserve more than just a casual mention.
>The magical radiation that had soaked into the water had twisted a multitude of wasteland’s animal inhabitants into grotesque and often monstrous versions of their original species. Most creatures had not survived the transformations.
This at least kind of explains things.
>>296137
>>296147
>The Stations Of The Canon
>Harry potter
>Pokemon
>Naruto
>Code Geass
Why use more than one example when the concept was explained in the Harry Potter paragraph and why is there so much unecessary text in this?
Literally, Pokemon paragraph but short:
"In Pokemon, the games, you have a map over the region the game plays out on. It looks like you can take many different paths to complete yor goals but, it's actually quite linear since only some many paths are open for you to explore. The others are not avialable until you have complete the tasks you have to preform in that paths that are.
For some reason, fanfiction writers that use this concept copy this, video game restrction and paste it into their story."
>The naruto example
>Gives synopsis for naruto and then says
>AU fics change like 1-2 things tops while keeping everything else the same.
You could have just wrote, "it's naruto with two plot relevant events changed tops.
"Since the story is about evil masterminds trying to outscheme each other, any changes to the circumstances would make them deploy new strategies."
>Code Geass
"The Mc of Code geass is a egomanic and an intellectual so he wouldn't go through the same motions if he had his whole story in his head from the start."
Your point is valid but I just don't like that this ramble of off-topic stuff. Like, seriously why are you including so much of this?
Another thing is that I don't really understand. Like, while your point is true, all I gleam from that is that there is a bunch of bad writers in fanfiction. Who really cares if some fanfiction writers are mediocre? Its all free and you don't have to read it. The people who write it are probably new to writing as well. I guess, the only ones who suffers from this are people such as myself, who tries to find the good fanfiction writers and have to scroll through a bunch of trash. Because, there are writers on fanfiction.net, for example, that really should be professional writers instead.
I suppoe this relates to this fic in some manner (I'm not sure if you specified how this point related to this fic, but whatever.) Is the point that Kkat does this as well to some degree?
.
>>296147
>The Stations Of The Canon
>Harry potter
>Pokemon
>Naruto
>Code Geass
Why use more than one example when the concept was explained in the Harry Potter paragraph and why is there so much unecessary text in this?
Literally, Pokemon paragraph but short:
"In Pokemon, the games, you have a map over the region the game plays out on. It looks like you can take many different paths to complete yor goals but, it's actually quite linear since only some many paths are open for you to explore. The others are not avialable until you have complete the tasks you have to preform in that paths that are.
For some reason, fanfiction writers that use this concept copy this, video game restrction and paste it into their story."
>The naruto example
>Gives synopsis for naruto and then says
>AU fics change like 1-2 things tops while keeping everything else the same.
You could have just wrote, "it's naruto with two plot relevant events changed tops.
"Since the story is about evil masterminds trying to outscheme each other, any changes to the circumstances would make them deploy new strategies."
>Code Geass
"The Mc of Code geass is a egomanic and an intellectual so he wouldn't go through the same motions if he had his whole story in his head from the start."
Your point is valid but I just don't like that this ramble of off-topic stuff. Like, seriously why are you including so much of this?
Another thing is that I don't really understand. Like, while your point is true, all I gleam from that is that there is a bunch of bad writers in fanfiction. Who really cares if some fanfiction writers are mediocre? Its all free and you don't have to read it. The people who write it are probably new to writing as well. I guess, the only ones who suffers from this are people such as myself, who tries to find the good fanfiction writers and have to scroll through a bunch of trash. Because, there are writers on fanfiction.net, for example, that really should be professional writers instead.
I suppoe this relates to this fic in some manner (I'm not sure if you specified how this point related to this fic, but whatever.) Is the point that Kkat does this as well to some degree?
.
>>296159
I guess, it's fine. I guess, that happens when you try to explain yourself, just try to be more concise or something in the future.
I guess, it's fine. I guess, that happens when you try to explain yourself, just try to be more concise or something in the future.
>>296156
Yep, it's time for another round of "let's thoughtlessly lift things from Fallout 3".
>As with the "radgators" we met earlier, which the author also didn't bother to explain, I am assuming that a "radroach" is just a more "rad" version of an ordinary roach. See pic related for visual.
Kek. Fallout and FoE subscribe to the good old Godzilla logic of 'radiation makes things bigger'. Rad-[animal]s show up throughout the games, and are essentially scaled up, typically hostile versions of local wildlife. Radroaches are cockroaches the size of dogs. Radscorpions are scorpions as big as a human, and so on.
>Uncontaminated water sources would have to be common enough that life on the planet could still be supported; it's virtually impossible to imagine a large population sustaining itself for 200 years just on whatever bottled water the previous civilization left lying around. It's even harder to imagine that in such conditions, an entire refrigerator full of the stuff would have been left unattended for this long. If there are literally no uncontaminated water sources, then bottled water would be the most precious commodity on the planet, and its value would exponentially increase as the supply inevitably diminished due to consumption. Forget about gems and bottle caps; bottles of water would be the most valuable thing in Equestria.
This is both a massive plot point later AND plot hole throughout, and something Kkat really should have paid much more attention to. In the early Fallout games, the question of resource scarcity is addressed. In Fallout 1, securing a new water source is the primary goal of the game. The water trade guarantees the setting's bottlecap currency. Both Fallout 1 and 2 featured new settlements, farms and so forth being set up in the wake of the apocalypse at various scales and tech levels. It's not until Fallout 3 and Bethesda came along that the people of the wasteland became a bunch of squatters living in rusty sheet metal sheds and living off 200-year old junk food they happened to find in a nearby fridge. FoE subscribes to the latter logic, which is bizarre as Kkat has clearly played the earlier games and bases large parts of FoE's later arcs on them.
For reasons that will be pointed out later, Equestria logically shouldn't be able to support life at all.
Yep, it's time for another round of "let's thoughtlessly lift things from Fallout 3".
>As with the "radgators" we met earlier, which the author also didn't bother to explain, I am assuming that a "radroach" is just a more "rad" version of an ordinary roach. See pic related for visual.
Kek. Fallout and FoE subscribe to the good old Godzilla logic of 'radiation makes things bigger'. Rad-[animal]s show up throughout the games, and are essentially scaled up, typically hostile versions of local wildlife. Radroaches are cockroaches the size of dogs. Radscorpions are scorpions as big as a human, and so on.
>Uncontaminated water sources would have to be common enough that life on the planet could still be supported; it's virtually impossible to imagine a large population sustaining itself for 200 years just on whatever bottled water the previous civilization left lying around. It's even harder to imagine that in such conditions, an entire refrigerator full of the stuff would have been left unattended for this long. If there are literally no uncontaminated water sources, then bottled water would be the most precious commodity on the planet, and its value would exponentially increase as the supply inevitably diminished due to consumption. Forget about gems and bottle caps; bottles of water would be the most valuable thing in Equestria.
This is both a massive plot point later AND plot hole throughout, and something Kkat really should have paid much more attention to. In the early Fallout games, the question of resource scarcity is addressed. In Fallout 1, securing a new water source is the primary goal of the game. The water trade guarantees the setting's bottlecap currency. Both Fallout 1 and 2 featured new settlements, farms and so forth being set up in the wake of the apocalypse at various scales and tech levels. It's not until Fallout 3 and Bethesda came along that the people of the wasteland became a bunch of squatters living in rusty sheet metal sheds and living off 200-year old junk food they happened to find in a nearby fridge. FoE subscribes to the latter logic, which is bizarre as Kkat has clearly played the earlier games and bases large parts of FoE's later arcs on them.
For reasons that will be pointed out later, Equestria logically shouldn't be able to support life at all.
>>296160
Sorry about that.
To put it more concisely and relate it to this fic, "The stations of the canon" is when despite any changes certain events still happen, perhaps even in the order they happened in canon, typically because fanfics use their inspiration as a guide and template.
Some cry "stations of the canon!" whenever stuff happens in a fanfic that happened in the original story but it's only really SOTC when it defies reason.
Any new OC Hogwarts student is going to visit Diagon Alley and buy a wand and robe and other necessary shit unless there's a good excuse not to. But if that OC goes through an adventure unreasonably similar to the canon HP plot even though changes the author made to the characters and backstory and setting should radically transform the plot but doesn't it's SOTC.
In this fic, even though the hero is a unicorn and everything is supposedly in Equestria, the hero is still from a fairly ordinary Control Vault (vault without a gimmick or social experiment) even tthough the Vault is called a Stable. The hero still can't return home even though it makes little sense this time since LP's goal was to retrieve Velvet and the Overmare is just mad that LP left without consent. The hero still leaves the vault in search of a doctor. People might be ponies but they still live in Fallout 3 style homes like rusty sheet metal shacks and repurposed train cars. A Vault/Stable the hero runs into still has a mandom gimmick unrelated to how it ended in mutant monster disaster even though Fallout's vaults were mainly Enclave experiments and Equestria's vaults were actually supposed to save ponies. The hero still fights psychically linked Super Mutants and will eventually fight the overmind controlling them even though they're alicorns now. The hero is still eventually going to The Pitt in Pittsburg Philadelphia to defeat an evil slaver in charge of slavers even though Ashur has been renamed Red Eye and Philadelphia has been renamed Fillydelphia. The Talons still exist even though they've been turned into goodish guys. There's still a 3Dog on the radio commenting on the hero's actions and playing music even though the DJ is named DJ Pon3 in this fic. Stuff in Fallout 1 2 and 3 is still going to show up here on a world entirely alien from Fallout America even though it makes no sense.
Even though the existence of magic and giant dragons and Elements Of Harmony plus the lack of american guns and robots and nuclear ICBMs should make a post-apocalyptic Equestria entirely different from the Fallout post-apocalypse, everything necessary for a Fallout product to "Look Fallouty" still happens to be invented by long-dead ponies before this tale began.
Sorry about that.
To put it more concisely and relate it to this fic, "The stations of the canon" is when despite any changes certain events still happen, perhaps even in the order they happened in canon, typically because fanfics use their inspiration as a guide and template.
Some cry "stations of the canon!" whenever stuff happens in a fanfic that happened in the original story but it's only really SOTC when it defies reason.
Any new OC Hogwarts student is going to visit Diagon Alley and buy a wand and robe and other necessary shit unless there's a good excuse not to. But if that OC goes through an adventure unreasonably similar to the canon HP plot even though changes the author made to the characters and backstory and setting should radically transform the plot but doesn't it's SOTC.
In this fic, even though the hero is a unicorn and everything is supposedly in Equestria, the hero is still from a fairly ordinary Control Vault (vault without a gimmick or social experiment) even tthough the Vault is called a Stable. The hero still can't return home even though it makes little sense this time since LP's goal was to retrieve Velvet and the Overmare is just mad that LP left without consent. The hero still leaves the vault in search of a doctor. People might be ponies but they still live in Fallout 3 style homes like rusty sheet metal shacks and repurposed train cars. A Vault/Stable the hero runs into still has a mandom gimmick unrelated to how it ended in mutant monster disaster even though Fallout's vaults were mainly Enclave experiments and Equestria's vaults were actually supposed to save ponies. The hero still fights psychically linked Super Mutants and will eventually fight the overmind controlling them even though they're alicorns now. The hero is still eventually going to The Pitt in Pittsburg Philadelphia to defeat an evil slaver in charge of slavers even though Ashur has been renamed Red Eye and Philadelphia has been renamed Fillydelphia. The Talons still exist even though they've been turned into goodish guys. There's still a 3Dog on the radio commenting on the hero's actions and playing music even though the DJ is named DJ Pon3 in this fic. Stuff in Fallout 1 2 and 3 is still going to show up here on a world entirely alien from Fallout America even though it makes no sense.
Even though the existence of magic and giant dragons and Elements Of Harmony plus the lack of american guns and robots and nuclear ICBMs should make a post-apocalyptic Equestria entirely different from the Fallout post-apocalypse, everything necessary for a Fallout product to "Look Fallouty" still happens to be invented by long-dead ponies before this tale began.
>>296156
>But at least it wasn’t raiders or slavers. It was a relief to not be battling other ponies.
I know that I, for one, would definitely rather fight a giant radioactive hedgehog than an ordinary human with the same capabilities and physical makeup as me.
>Velvet Remedy was beginning to develop skill with her needler pistol; her moral reservations about killing clearly did not apply to ravenous and hostile beasts.
And this is the girl who is supposed to idolize Fluttershy to the point of obsession?
Anyway, they're wandering around the decaying remains of a Manehattan suburb, aimlessly looting crap out of buildings and fending off gigantic hedgehogs. Just another humdrum day for Littlepoop and Co. After a long day of cracking safes and stuffing random junk into their saddlebags, they decide it's time to bed down for the night. In the midst of this gigantic, ruined and largely empty city that is probably chock full of semi-habitable buildings, Calamity manages to find them the perfect shelter: a rusted out passenger car filled with the charred skeletons of ponies who were caught in an explosion of balefire or whatever the hell.
>I stared at the wagon full of pony skeletons and found myself wondering who they had been. What had their lives been like? Had they been happy? I wondered if the wagon had been heading into Manehattan. Were these ponies all heading into work. Were some of them friends, chatting about the shopping they would do?
>I squelched those thoughts under a strong hoof. The apocalypse was already a daily assault of horror and sadness without making it worse by actually thinking about it. Doing that could only drive a pony to suicide or madness.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdhveixpV24
>Looking away, I felt a tiny ember of joy as I spotted the flickering light of a Sparkle~Cola machine tucked into a nook just around the corner from the wagon-stop. “I’ll be right back,” I announced, leaving Calamity and Velvet to clean out the passenger wagon. Or argue about it. Whichever.
"I wandered through the crumbling ruins of this once-great Metropolis, gazing upon the charred remains of thousands of ponies; just ordinary ponies, cut down in the prime of their lives by the horrors of war. Oh, the ponemanity! I thought to myself. The sheer horror of it all! The purposeless, wanton destruction and carnage! When would the killing end? Would we ever be free of the terrors of this neverending--OOOH! Is that a 200 year old vending machine over there? I'm kind of thirsty!"
Anyway, after droning on about the horrors of war for a few paragraphs, Littlepoop goes to get a soda out of the vending machine, and runs into a manticore which she has to fight. However, she doesn't have any of her thousands of weapons handy for some reason or another, so she tries to melee fight it, which doesn't work out so well. She runs away, and then Calamity jumps in and shoots it with his battle saddle. This gives LP enough time to whip out Lil' Macintosh, and...long story short, they kill the thing.
I think I remember manticores being in MLP somewhere, and I know they're also a creature from mythology whose mythology exactly I can't remember, but I've forgotten what they are exactly. I think it was a lion with the head of a scorpion, or a chicken that with the body of a snake, or some wacky shit like that. Are manticores the things that can turn you to stone by looking at you? Or was that something else? Either way, even though "manticore" is a somewhat commonly-known creature, it would still help to provide a brief description of its appearance. Even if you're referencing a common mythological creature like a dragon that nearly anyone could be expected to know, it's still a good idea to at least paint a quick picture of it so the reader has something specific to visualize, and so that the occasional odd reader who for whatever reason doesn't know what a dragon is won't be left in the lurch. How big is it, what color are its scales, how long are its claws, does it have wings, etc etc. A short sentence or two giving a super-brief physical description is all that is needed here.
After they kill the manticore, there is a page break and we rejoin them a few hours later after they've settled into their camp. LP is roasting manticore flesh over an open fire, and Velvet Remedy is scarfing down their last can of creamed corn. An idyllic scene if ever there was one.
Calamity apparently ate a bunch of beans and then crawled under the passenger wagon for some undisclosed reason, probably either because he's afraid of a charred skeleton uprising, or more likely because he didn't want to fart in front of Velvet. Littlepoop, always the cockeyed optimist, remarks that even though she took a few knocks fighting the manticore, she managed to get some usable supplies out of it:
>the venom sacks from the manticore’s stinging tail were the last thing I needed to build a poisoned dart gun from the schematics I’d found in the old Appleloosa armory.
She hasn't built that thing yet? She found the plans like 5 chapters ago, and I'm pretty sure I remember something about her finding the parts she needed to build it a chapter or two later. Either make the gun or don't.
Eventually, Velvet pokes her head under the wagon and demands that Calamity come out from under there so she can attend to whatever wounds he still has.
>“And this time, I want you to strip completely out of that saddle and let me give you a full examination.”
Wakka chicka wokka chicka.
Anyway, it turns out that the reason Calamity was down there is he wanted to inspect the workings of the passenger wagon. Turns out I got it slightly wrong: it's not a train car, it's one of those flying skywagon things that exploded earlier. He apparently thinks he can get this one working again without it exploding. It apparently needs a new "flux regulator," though, and as LP points out, that's apparently not something you just find lying around.
>But at least it wasn’t raiders or slavers. It was a relief to not be battling other ponies.
I know that I, for one, would definitely rather fight a giant radioactive hedgehog than an ordinary human with the same capabilities and physical makeup as me.
>Velvet Remedy was beginning to develop skill with her needler pistol; her moral reservations about killing clearly did not apply to ravenous and hostile beasts.
And this is the girl who is supposed to idolize Fluttershy to the point of obsession?
Anyway, they're wandering around the decaying remains of a Manehattan suburb, aimlessly looting crap out of buildings and fending off gigantic hedgehogs. Just another humdrum day for Littlepoop and Co. After a long day of cracking safes and stuffing random junk into their saddlebags, they decide it's time to bed down for the night. In the midst of this gigantic, ruined and largely empty city that is probably chock full of semi-habitable buildings, Calamity manages to find them the perfect shelter: a rusted out passenger car filled with the charred skeletons of ponies who were caught in an explosion of balefire or whatever the hell.
>I stared at the wagon full of pony skeletons and found myself wondering who they had been. What had their lives been like? Had they been happy? I wondered if the wagon had been heading into Manehattan. Were these ponies all heading into work. Were some of them friends, chatting about the shopping they would do?
>I squelched those thoughts under a strong hoof. The apocalypse was already a daily assault of horror and sadness without making it worse by actually thinking about it. Doing that could only drive a pony to suicide or madness.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdhveixpV24
>Looking away, I felt a tiny ember of joy as I spotted the flickering light of a Sparkle~Cola machine tucked into a nook just around the corner from the wagon-stop. “I’ll be right back,” I announced, leaving Calamity and Velvet to clean out the passenger wagon. Or argue about it. Whichever.
"I wandered through the crumbling ruins of this once-great Metropolis, gazing upon the charred remains of thousands of ponies; just ordinary ponies, cut down in the prime of their lives by the horrors of war. Oh, the ponemanity! I thought to myself. The sheer horror of it all! The purposeless, wanton destruction and carnage! When would the killing end? Would we ever be free of the terrors of this neverending--OOOH! Is that a 200 year old vending machine over there? I'm kind of thirsty!"
Anyway, after droning on about the horrors of war for a few paragraphs, Littlepoop goes to get a soda out of the vending machine, and runs into a manticore which she has to fight. However, she doesn't have any of her thousands of weapons handy for some reason or another, so she tries to melee fight it, which doesn't work out so well. She runs away, and then Calamity jumps in and shoots it with his battle saddle. This gives LP enough time to whip out Lil' Macintosh, and...long story short, they kill the thing.
I think I remember manticores being in MLP somewhere, and I know they're also a creature from mythology whose mythology exactly I can't remember, but I've forgotten what they are exactly. I think it was a lion with the head of a scorpion, or a chicken that with the body of a snake, or some wacky shit like that. Are manticores the things that can turn you to stone by looking at you? Or was that something else? Either way, even though "manticore" is a somewhat commonly-known creature, it would still help to provide a brief description of its appearance. Even if you're referencing a common mythological creature like a dragon that nearly anyone could be expected to know, it's still a good idea to at least paint a quick picture of it so the reader has something specific to visualize, and so that the occasional odd reader who for whatever reason doesn't know what a dragon is won't be left in the lurch. How big is it, what color are its scales, how long are its claws, does it have wings, etc etc. A short sentence or two giving a super-brief physical description is all that is needed here.
After they kill the manticore, there is a page break and we rejoin them a few hours later after they've settled into their camp. LP is roasting manticore flesh over an open fire, and Velvet Remedy is scarfing down their last can of creamed corn. An idyllic scene if ever there was one.
Calamity apparently ate a bunch of beans and then crawled under the passenger wagon for some undisclosed reason, probably either because he's afraid of a charred skeleton uprising, or more likely because he didn't want to fart in front of Velvet. Littlepoop, always the cockeyed optimist, remarks that even though she took a few knocks fighting the manticore, she managed to get some usable supplies out of it:
>the venom sacks from the manticore’s stinging tail were the last thing I needed to build a poisoned dart gun from the schematics I’d found in the old Appleloosa armory.
She hasn't built that thing yet? She found the plans like 5 chapters ago, and I'm pretty sure I remember something about her finding the parts she needed to build it a chapter or two later. Either make the gun or don't.
Eventually, Velvet pokes her head under the wagon and demands that Calamity come out from under there so she can attend to whatever wounds he still has.
>“And this time, I want you to strip completely out of that saddle and let me give you a full examination.”
Wakka chicka wokka chicka.
Anyway, it turns out that the reason Calamity was down there is he wanted to inspect the workings of the passenger wagon. Turns out I got it slightly wrong: it's not a train car, it's one of those flying skywagon things that exploded earlier. He apparently thinks he can get this one working again without it exploding. It apparently needs a new "flux regulator," though, and as LP points out, that's apparently not something you just find lying around.
1609868830.jpg (151.6 KB, 920x563, 112-et-in-arcadia-ego-the-arcadian-shepherds-n-poussin.jpg)
>>296460
Anyway, there is some more overt flirting between Velvet and Calamity, in which Velvet tries to prod him into taking off his saddle so she can see his cutie mark. This appears to sail right over Littlepoop's head; she realizes that she doesn't know what Calamity's cutie mark is either, and her autism compels her to see it.
>He was always wearing at least his barding and saddle bags, except when he bathed. And I’d always given him privacy for that, albeit mostly out of disinterest in watching a stallion clean himself.
Littlepoop is a lesbian, in case you've forgotten.
Anyway, quelle surprise, it turns out that Calamity is a blank flank. A full grown stallion who never got his cutie mark? Sacrebleu! Is Calamity Equestria's version of a wizard? Well, as it turns out, not quite. It seems he used to have a cutie mark, but he lost it. Or, more technically, it was "branded off" by his pegasus brothers for some strange reason, which he appears to be about to explain to us.
>How could a grown buck not have his yet.
Btw, this is a question and it should end with a question mark.
>“They say that Rainbow Dash saw what the other pegasus ponies were doing, and turned away from them just as they turned away from all the ponies below…”
>“Who?” Velvet Remedy interrupted as politely as she could.
Returning to one of my more frequently voiced complaints, the author really does a piss-poor job of laying out exactly how much of this world's history is meant to be common knowledge, and how much of it Littlepoop and the others are supposed to be aware of. By now, it's pretty clear that in the pre-apocalypse days each of the Mane 6 was the head of some kind of government Ministry. Littlepoop for the most part seems to know almost nothing of the outside world and its history, yet some of this stuff, particularly the stuff about the Ministries and the large-scale history of the war, is also presented as if it ought to be mostly common knowledge. As I've said before, these characters tend to mostly fluctuate between being weirdly knowledgeable and weirdly ignorant about various aspects of the world they live in.
Case in point: nobody here except Calamity seems to be familiar with Rainbow Dash. Both Velvet Remedy and Littlepoop seem to have already known who Fluttershy was from their days in the Stable, and yet Littlepoop has only learned who Pinkie Pie was from seeing her on billboards and such. The status of the other ponies and their ministries is unclear.
Anyway, Calamity goes on to offer something like an explanation. Apparently, Dash was appointed head something called the Ministry of Awesome I'm not making this up, which apparently didn't do much of anything. She was also an ace fighter pilot and she militarized the pegasi and so forth and so on. Seems like she ought to be as famous as any of the others, right? Well, that appears to be complicated.
At some point, the pegasi decided that they didn't want to be involved in the war anymore, so they cut themselves off from the rest of Equestria and basically declared themselves neutral to the whole thing. It's unclear where they went exactly; from what I can tell they retreated to some kind of sky fortress, and covered the entire sky in some kind of mass cloud cover which...maybe protects their fortress somehow? I'm not quite sure how it works. Either that or the "sky closing" was just meant to be a final "fuck you" to the rest of Equestria. But, in any event, the pegasi are the reason the sky is permanently overcast, and they have all agreed upon some kind of mass code of neutrality. Any pegasus that doesn't agree to be neutral, and who gets involved in whatever the fuck is going on with the ground ponies' world, apparently loses their status as a pegasus and gets branded a traitor. This process involves physically removing so to speak the pony's cutie mark, and replacing it with a crude copy of Rainbow Dash's, because I guess Rainbow Dash was the first pegasus to refuse to become neutral with them. Or something.
Seems to me that a better way for pegasi to brand one of their own as a traitor would be to chop the offender's wings off, since that's literally the physical attribute that makes them a pegasus. It would also be perfectly in line with all of the other edgelord crap this story is so fond of. My guess is that this idea either didn't occur to the author, or else it occurred to him but then he rejected it, because it would effectively mean that Calamity could not really be a pegasus, and he would thus no longer be able to do any of his cool flying tricks. There would be ways around this handicap of course; for instance, giving him robotic wings or something wouldn't be any stupider than battle saddles or mouth-mounted pistols or any of the rest of the ridiculous technology that's in here. However, for whatever reason, the author did not wish to go this route.
But whatever; the point of all this is: Rainbow Dash didn't want to join the other pegasi in being neutral, so she was cast out and lost her status as a hero to them. They took her "employee of the month" picture off the wall, revoked her parking pass, and gave away her reserved seat at the bar. Now, whenever any other pegasus wants to leave the glorious Hall of Neutrality and go down to the ground so they can run around the Wasteland shooting at stuff, they are branded a Dashite and lose their cutie mark. Calamity, for reasons we have yet to learn, is just such a pegasus. And that's the story of why Calamity doesn't have a cutie mark.
There is a page break, and the next scene opens at some indeterminate point in the future. They have moved on from the area they were in, which was called Fetlock, and are now at a place called SteelHooves Shack. Whether or not Calamity ever found his flux-whatever to fix the flying-train-car-jiggy is left unresolved for now.
Anyway, there is some more overt flirting between Velvet and Calamity, in which Velvet tries to prod him into taking off his saddle so she can see his cutie mark. This appears to sail right over Littlepoop's head; she realizes that she doesn't know what Calamity's cutie mark is either, and her autism compels her to see it.
>He was always wearing at least his barding and saddle bags, except when he bathed. And I’d always given him privacy for that, albeit mostly out of disinterest in watching a stallion clean himself.
Littlepoop is a lesbian, in case you've forgotten.
Anyway, quelle surprise, it turns out that Calamity is a blank flank. A full grown stallion who never got his cutie mark? Sacrebleu! Is Calamity Equestria's version of a wizard? Well, as it turns out, not quite. It seems he used to have a cutie mark, but he lost it. Or, more technically, it was "branded off" by his pegasus brothers for some strange reason, which he appears to be about to explain to us.
>How could a grown buck not have his yet.
Btw, this is a question and it should end with a question mark.
>“They say that Rainbow Dash saw what the other pegasus ponies were doing, and turned away from them just as they turned away from all the ponies below…”
>“Who?” Velvet Remedy interrupted as politely as she could.
Returning to one of my more frequently voiced complaints, the author really does a piss-poor job of laying out exactly how much of this world's history is meant to be common knowledge, and how much of it Littlepoop and the others are supposed to be aware of. By now, it's pretty clear that in the pre-apocalypse days each of the Mane 6 was the head of some kind of government Ministry. Littlepoop for the most part seems to know almost nothing of the outside world and its history, yet some of this stuff, particularly the stuff about the Ministries and the large-scale history of the war, is also presented as if it ought to be mostly common knowledge. As I've said before, these characters tend to mostly fluctuate between being weirdly knowledgeable and weirdly ignorant about various aspects of the world they live in.
Case in point: nobody here except Calamity seems to be familiar with Rainbow Dash. Both Velvet Remedy and Littlepoop seem to have already known who Fluttershy was from their days in the Stable, and yet Littlepoop has only learned who Pinkie Pie was from seeing her on billboards and such. The status of the other ponies and their ministries is unclear.
Anyway, Calamity goes on to offer something like an explanation. Apparently, Dash was appointed head something called the Ministry of Awesome I'm not making this up, which apparently didn't do much of anything. She was also an ace fighter pilot and she militarized the pegasi and so forth and so on. Seems like she ought to be as famous as any of the others, right? Well, that appears to be complicated.
At some point, the pegasi decided that they didn't want to be involved in the war anymore, so they cut themselves off from the rest of Equestria and basically declared themselves neutral to the whole thing. It's unclear where they went exactly; from what I can tell they retreated to some kind of sky fortress, and covered the entire sky in some kind of mass cloud cover which...maybe protects their fortress somehow? I'm not quite sure how it works. Either that or the "sky closing" was just meant to be a final "fuck you" to the rest of Equestria. But, in any event, the pegasi are the reason the sky is permanently overcast, and they have all agreed upon some kind of mass code of neutrality. Any pegasus that doesn't agree to be neutral, and who gets involved in whatever the fuck is going on with the ground ponies' world, apparently loses their status as a pegasus and gets branded a traitor. This process involves physically removing so to speak the pony's cutie mark, and replacing it with a crude copy of Rainbow Dash's, because I guess Rainbow Dash was the first pegasus to refuse to become neutral with them. Or something.
Seems to me that a better way for pegasi to brand one of their own as a traitor would be to chop the offender's wings off, since that's literally the physical attribute that makes them a pegasus. It would also be perfectly in line with all of the other edgelord crap this story is so fond of. My guess is that this idea either didn't occur to the author, or else it occurred to him but then he rejected it, because it would effectively mean that Calamity could not really be a pegasus, and he would thus no longer be able to do any of his cool flying tricks. There would be ways around this handicap of course; for instance, giving him robotic wings or something wouldn't be any stupider than battle saddles or mouth-mounted pistols or any of the rest of the ridiculous technology that's in here. However, for whatever reason, the author did not wish to go this route.
But whatever; the point of all this is: Rainbow Dash didn't want to join the other pegasi in being neutral, so she was cast out and lost her status as a hero to them. They took her "employee of the month" picture off the wall, revoked her parking pass, and gave away her reserved seat at the bar. Now, whenever any other pegasus wants to leave the glorious Hall of Neutrality and go down to the ground so they can run around the Wasteland shooting at stuff, they are branded a Dashite and lose their cutie mark. Calamity, for reasons we have yet to learn, is just such a pegasus. And that's the story of why Calamity doesn't have a cutie mark.
There is a page break, and the next scene opens at some indeterminate point in the future. They have moved on from the area they were in, which was called Fetlock, and are now at a place called SteelHooves Shack. Whether or not Calamity ever found his flux-whatever to fix the flying-train-car-jiggy is left unresolved for now.
>>296462
Anyway, the trio arrives at this place called SteelHooves Shack, and they're about to go down there for some reason, when Littlepoop notices that there's landmines outside or something and she tells them to hold up. Then, suddenly, a wild alicorn appears.
The alicorn tells them that she "remembers them from Appleoosa," but Littlepoop observes that it's not the same one she dropped a train car on. Then, out of nowhere, two more alicorns appear. Littlepoop laments that there are no boxcars nearby that she can drop on them, and then the chapter ends on a cliffhanger.
Chapter Fourteen: SteelHooves
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>The Stables were never meant to save anypony.
Something something out of context unattributed epitaphs are stupid.
In a refreshing twist, the opening chapter actually gives us the payoff for the cliffhanger of the previous chapter. The way cliffhangers usually seem to work in this story is: Littlepoop encounters some kind of horrible enemy, the chapter ends, and then in the next scene we learn that LP defeated it somehow, usually accompanied by a half-assed recap of whatever preposterous thing she did. It seems that this time around, we get to actually witness that preposterous thing.
However, it's a little difficult to figure out what exactly is going on here. There's clearly a battle going on, but the chapter seems to have begun in the midst of some kind of giant explosion, and it's not obvious what the source is:
>Time slowed to a crawl, as if sensory overload was causing my own brain to lag. Fire and shrapnel tore at me, sparks of pain igniting all over my body. The roar that filled the world died with a high-pitched whine as I lost my hearing. I was rooted in place, unable to make my body move. Blood splattered across my face as the pseudo-goddess standing in front of me tore apart, the parts of her body savagely flung in every direction.
This author can occasionally pull some decent descriptive passages out of his ass, and I notice that it mostly happens either when he's talking about characters being violently dismembered, or when he's describing some terrible, desolate scene like an old ruin or a bus full of skeletons. It takes a lot of effort to write polished prose, and the natural tendency of just about any writer is to use the best prose in their arsenal mainly when writing about the subjects that interest them, and wallpapering over the rest. So, it speaks volumes that k "I do to my characters what that third rate surgeon in Guatemala did to my penis" kat is usually at his best when he's talking about something excessively depressing or violent. Between his obsession with death and gore and his gender confusion, a psych profile on this guy might be turn out to be a more entertaining read than anything he's actually written.
Anyway, it looks like I may have jumped the gun on giving him credit for properly resolving the cliffhanger, because it appears that we are again skipping the battle and jumping right to whatever silly deus ex machina event is going to save Littlepoop's bacon this time around. As we can see from the above passage, at least one of the alicorns appears to have mysteriously exploded, thus bypassing the need for the party to actually fight it, and I have little hope that the other two will not encounter a similar fate.
>The second pseudo-goddess was turning, wide-eyed as she brought up her own magical shield. But it was too late for her; the rapid-fire explosions that were killing Velvet Remedy and me just by proximity were ripping directly into the creature. The pseudo-goddess’s shield rippled, fluctuated and died before it could fully manifest. Then she too was consumed in a mutilating blaze.
That's two down.
Anyway, before vaporizing the third alicorn, the author is kind enough to give us a glimpse of the thing causing the explosions:
>A pony completely concealed in steel-grey armor, even its tail. It was a mighty relic from the war, a “Steel Ranger”. A bright lamp on its forehead spotlighted its target, and the huge gun on the right side of its monstrous battle saddle began to fire again.
So there are cyborg ponies now. Sure, why not? At this point most of this story's entertainment value comes from its sheer absurdity, so we might as well see how far the author is able to push it.
The third alicorn has time to raise its shield, and the robo-pony's exploding apples yes, this autism is actually in the text bounce harmlessly off of it, despite having completely obliterated the magic shield put up by alicorn #2 literal seconds ago. Realizing that its grenades are doing no damage, Roboponer tries using its rocket launcher. It's not very effective. The alicorn uses some kind of alicorn voodoo magic to reverse the rockets, and Roboponer seems to be KO'd. The alicorn cackles triumphantly, then Calamity flies in and shoots some regular-ass bullets at her, which unsurprisingly accomplishes nothing.
Alright, I've decided to give kkat partial credit here. Anyone who was expecting an actual fight scene as payoff for the previous chapter's cliffhanger basically got one. However, if anyone was assuming that just because the chapter ended with three alicorns threatening Littlepoop's party, it meant that the next scene was going to be a fight between Littlepoop's party and three alicorns, well, that person would be getting something of a mixed bag: while it looks as if LP & Co. are going to have to do a little bit of heavy lifting now that Roboponer is down, it doesn't alter the fact that two out of three preposterously overpowered enemies were conveniently taken down by a preposterously overpowered mysterious ally, who showed up out of literally nowhere at the most convenient possible moment.
Lastly, anyone expecting LP to win the fight in a non-ridiculous way would be completely let down. However, I am out of space, so you will all have to wait until the next post to find out just how ridiculous a solution LP comes up with.
Anyway, the trio arrives at this place called SteelHooves Shack, and they're about to go down there for some reason, when Littlepoop notices that there's landmines outside or something and she tells them to hold up. Then, suddenly, a wild alicorn appears.
The alicorn tells them that she "remembers them from Appleoosa," but Littlepoop observes that it's not the same one she dropped a train car on. Then, out of nowhere, two more alicorns appear. Littlepoop laments that there are no boxcars nearby that she can drop on them, and then the chapter ends on a cliffhanger.
Chapter Fourteen: SteelHooves
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>The Stables were never meant to save anypony.
Something something out of context unattributed epitaphs are stupid.
In a refreshing twist, the opening chapter actually gives us the payoff for the cliffhanger of the previous chapter. The way cliffhangers usually seem to work in this story is: Littlepoop encounters some kind of horrible enemy, the chapter ends, and then in the next scene we learn that LP defeated it somehow, usually accompanied by a half-assed recap of whatever preposterous thing she did. It seems that this time around, we get to actually witness that preposterous thing.
However, it's a little difficult to figure out what exactly is going on here. There's clearly a battle going on, but the chapter seems to have begun in the midst of some kind of giant explosion, and it's not obvious what the source is:
>Time slowed to a crawl, as if sensory overload was causing my own brain to lag. Fire and shrapnel tore at me, sparks of pain igniting all over my body. The roar that filled the world died with a high-pitched whine as I lost my hearing. I was rooted in place, unable to make my body move. Blood splattered across my face as the pseudo-goddess standing in front of me tore apart, the parts of her body savagely flung in every direction.
This author can occasionally pull some decent descriptive passages out of his ass, and I notice that it mostly happens either when he's talking about characters being violently dismembered, or when he's describing some terrible, desolate scene like an old ruin or a bus full of skeletons. It takes a lot of effort to write polished prose, and the natural tendency of just about any writer is to use the best prose in their arsenal mainly when writing about the subjects that interest them, and wallpapering over the rest. So, it speaks volumes that k "I do to my characters what that third rate surgeon in Guatemala did to my penis" kat is usually at his best when he's talking about something excessively depressing or violent. Between his obsession with death and gore and his gender confusion, a psych profile on this guy might be turn out to be a more entertaining read than anything he's actually written.
Anyway, it looks like I may have jumped the gun on giving him credit for properly resolving the cliffhanger, because it appears that we are again skipping the battle and jumping right to whatever silly deus ex machina event is going to save Littlepoop's bacon this time around. As we can see from the above passage, at least one of the alicorns appears to have mysteriously exploded, thus bypassing the need for the party to actually fight it, and I have little hope that the other two will not encounter a similar fate.
>The second pseudo-goddess was turning, wide-eyed as she brought up her own magical shield. But it was too late for her; the rapid-fire explosions that were killing Velvet Remedy and me just by proximity were ripping directly into the creature. The pseudo-goddess’s shield rippled, fluctuated and died before it could fully manifest. Then she too was consumed in a mutilating blaze.
That's two down.
Anyway, before vaporizing the third alicorn, the author is kind enough to give us a glimpse of the thing causing the explosions:
>A pony completely concealed in steel-grey armor, even its tail. It was a mighty relic from the war, a “Steel Ranger”. A bright lamp on its forehead spotlighted its target, and the huge gun on the right side of its monstrous battle saddle began to fire again.
So there are cyborg ponies now. Sure, why not? At this point most of this story's entertainment value comes from its sheer absurdity, so we might as well see how far the author is able to push it.
The third alicorn has time to raise its shield, and the robo-pony's exploding apples yes, this autism is actually in the text bounce harmlessly off of it, despite having completely obliterated the magic shield put up by alicorn #2 literal seconds ago. Realizing that its grenades are doing no damage, Roboponer tries using its rocket launcher. It's not very effective. The alicorn uses some kind of alicorn voodoo magic to reverse the rockets, and Roboponer seems to be KO'd. The alicorn cackles triumphantly, then Calamity flies in and shoots some regular-ass bullets at her, which unsurprisingly accomplishes nothing.
Alright, I've decided to give kkat partial credit here. Anyone who was expecting an actual fight scene as payoff for the previous chapter's cliffhanger basically got one. However, if anyone was assuming that just because the chapter ended with three alicorns threatening Littlepoop's party, it meant that the next scene was going to be a fight between Littlepoop's party and three alicorns, well, that person would be getting something of a mixed bag: while it looks as if LP & Co. are going to have to do a little bit of heavy lifting now that Roboponer is down, it doesn't alter the fact that two out of three preposterously overpowered enemies were conveniently taken down by a preposterously overpowered mysterious ally, who showed up out of literally nowhere at the most convenient possible moment.
Lastly, anyone expecting LP to win the fight in a non-ridiculous way would be completely let down. However, I am out of space, so you will all have to wait until the next post to find out just how ridiculous a solution LP comes up with.
>>296463
LP's relief here is a symptom of author badness
Monsters are easier to deal with than gun-using enemies in Fallout 3, since it's easy to shoot them before they melee you but humanoid foes might use good guns on you.
But LP shouldn't know the author forgot to make monsters intimidating threats deadlier than than Mad Max cosplayers with shitty 200 year old rifles and shotguns.
In a world where all monsters are paper tigers, and all ponies are selfish dumbfucks, why would monsters survive ponies eating them? who'd raid a deadly settlement for tins of corn when a live herd of wimpy Deathclaws can give you more meat for less effort and danger?
Where's the scene where LP accepts a "go kill some raiders" quest expecting the raiders to be threatening the town, only to have her expectations subverted when she's told "actually those raiders are threatening the local wildlife by eating too much of it. You know, the 10 foot tall glowing giant animal wildlife. These giant monsters survive in the grassless and mostly-empty wastelands with devastated ecosystem and no prey creatures by feeding on magic radiation. And they're delicious. And ours."
It would be fun and explain how giant predators can exist without sufficient numbers of suitably giant prey. "What do they eat?" isn't just a meme. Starving wanderers should want to know this, in case the answer is "somewhere out there is a thriving grass-filled oasis".
>Velvet's needler
Call me a faggot but I still find it hard to tell when the author means "Tranq dart gun" or "SMG that fires long sharp thin needles".
And does it really make sense that Velvet would object to using a revolver but jump at the chance to use a crueller gun that spits long, thin, horrifyingly visible spikes that make precise puncture wounds perfect for making targets bleed out and fucking their limbs up? Come to think of it, do real needle guns make needles neatly sink into meat with superhuman accuracy that could disable specific pressure points and make needle-tossing ninjas jealous, or do needle guns just shred the shit out of meat and armour and everything else? The author should specify that here because it's important to Velvet's pseudo-pacifism and characterization. A weapon the geneva convention would want banned just wouldn't suit a doctor who wants to "do no harm" to living ponies.
>tfw a vending machine that logiclally should have been emptied 198 years ago distracts you from your internal monologue as you take shelter in a shithole full of skeletons someone probably should have cleaned out by now
Ever get the feeling this fic would be better if it was an intentional parody of the idea of shoving something like Fallout into FIM?
>manticores
Always thought they were Greek but turns out they're Persian. Anyway FIM had a manticore in S1E2, Fluttershy pulled a thorn out of its paw. Cockatrices turn you to stone, Fluttershy out-stared one in some other ep.
>eating canned food when there's a perfectly good meat source right there that will spoil eventually so you might as well eat it now
Is Velvet a veganfag or just really bad at sorting perishables from nonperishables?
>poison dart gun
I thought she already made it. I must be going blind. I thought this faggy pacifist was using a tranquilizer dart gun or was going to get one, but if you're going to use poison to make your dart gun lethal anyway why bother with the poison when lead stuck inside the body's technically poisonous? Manticore poison's probably a painful way to go. And if it's lethal enough to be painless, is it quicker than a bullet? Kkat should explain this shit by making Velvet and LP argue over the morality of using this weapons, giving him a chance to explain its capabilities!
>The Great Pegasus Betrayal That Lasted 200+ Years
For a long time I've been holding back a rant on how much I hate this plot point. But now that I'm here I can't think of a way to put it into words. Where do I start with this? I'll need to take a break and gather my thoughts before ranting about this later.
>The Stables were never meant to save anypony.
KKAT IS A TRIPLE FAGGOT AND HERE'S WHY.
The Vaults of Fallout were never meant to save anyBODY. They were secretly Enclave experiments to test social experiments and sci-fi shit like mind-control techniques. A baddie explains this to you in Fallout 2 and uses this quote. At least I think that's where the line comes from.
But the STABLES in EQUESTRIA were supposed to save ponies.
They are different settings and different characters existed in them and the author should try harder to remember that while writing! Trying to make one happen in the other doesn't work if your justification for it falls flat on its face!
The Cutie Mark Crusaders were in charge of making and designing the Stables (I am not kidding) and they wanted to save ponies. The Stables were meant to save ponies! Yes, some Stables had stupid gimmicky social experiments going on for no reason like "You will have men in charge instead of women and coat walls in propaganda as if this state of society requires propaganda to uphold" and "This Stable will be filled with Earth Ponies only because I say so and research cybernetic cyborgery" but Scootaloo's goal was to try and create a society in at least one of these Stables more resistant to Zigger corruption and maginuclear failure than the one that "died" when the nukes fell.
He is literally just copypasting shit from Fallout right now and changing Vault to Stable and changing body to pony and pretending he's ponifying it even though it would never fit canon Equestria or his bastardized mockery of it!
LP's relief here is a symptom of author badness
Monsters are easier to deal with than gun-using enemies in Fallout 3, since it's easy to shoot them before they melee you but humanoid foes might use good guns on you.
But LP shouldn't know the author forgot to make monsters intimidating threats deadlier than than Mad Max cosplayers with shitty 200 year old rifles and shotguns.
In a world where all monsters are paper tigers, and all ponies are selfish dumbfucks, why would monsters survive ponies eating them? who'd raid a deadly settlement for tins of corn when a live herd of wimpy Deathclaws can give you more meat for less effort and danger?
Where's the scene where LP accepts a "go kill some raiders" quest expecting the raiders to be threatening the town, only to have her expectations subverted when she's told "actually those raiders are threatening the local wildlife by eating too much of it. You know, the 10 foot tall glowing giant animal wildlife. These giant monsters survive in the grassless and mostly-empty wastelands with devastated ecosystem and no prey creatures by feeding on magic radiation. And they're delicious. And ours."
It would be fun and explain how giant predators can exist without sufficient numbers of suitably giant prey. "What do they eat?" isn't just a meme. Starving wanderers should want to know this, in case the answer is "somewhere out there is a thriving grass-filled oasis".
>Velvet's needler
Call me a faggot but I still find it hard to tell when the author means "Tranq dart gun" or "SMG that fires long sharp thin needles".
And does it really make sense that Velvet would object to using a revolver but jump at the chance to use a crueller gun that spits long, thin, horrifyingly visible spikes that make precise puncture wounds perfect for making targets bleed out and fucking their limbs up? Come to think of it, do real needle guns make needles neatly sink into meat with superhuman accuracy that could disable specific pressure points and make needle-tossing ninjas jealous, or do needle guns just shred the shit out of meat and armour and everything else? The author should specify that here because it's important to Velvet's pseudo-pacifism and characterization. A weapon the geneva convention would want banned just wouldn't suit a doctor who wants to "do no harm" to living ponies.
>tfw a vending machine that logiclally should have been emptied 198 years ago distracts you from your internal monologue as you take shelter in a shithole full of skeletons someone probably should have cleaned out by now
Ever get the feeling this fic would be better if it was an intentional parody of the idea of shoving something like Fallout into FIM?
>manticores
Always thought they were Greek but turns out they're Persian. Anyway FIM had a manticore in S1E2, Fluttershy pulled a thorn out of its paw. Cockatrices turn you to stone, Fluttershy out-stared one in some other ep.
>eating canned food when there's a perfectly good meat source right there that will spoil eventually so you might as well eat it now
Is Velvet a veganfag or just really bad at sorting perishables from nonperishables?
>poison dart gun
I thought she already made it. I must be going blind. I thought this faggy pacifist was using a tranquilizer dart gun or was going to get one, but if you're going to use poison to make your dart gun lethal anyway why bother with the poison when lead stuck inside the body's technically poisonous? Manticore poison's probably a painful way to go. And if it's lethal enough to be painless, is it quicker than a bullet? Kkat should explain this shit by making Velvet and LP argue over the morality of using this weapons, giving him a chance to explain its capabilities!
>The Great Pegasus Betrayal That Lasted 200+ Years
For a long time I've been holding back a rant on how much I hate this plot point. But now that I'm here I can't think of a way to put it into words. Where do I start with this? I'll need to take a break and gather my thoughts before ranting about this later.
>The Stables were never meant to save anypony.
KKAT IS A TRIPLE FAGGOT AND HERE'S WHY.
The Vaults of Fallout were never meant to save anyBODY. They were secretly Enclave experiments to test social experiments and sci-fi shit like mind-control techniques. A baddie explains this to you in Fallout 2 and uses this quote. At least I think that's where the line comes from.
But the STABLES in EQUESTRIA were supposed to save ponies.
They are different settings and different characters existed in them and the author should try harder to remember that while writing! Trying to make one happen in the other doesn't work if your justification for it falls flat on its face!
The Cutie Mark Crusaders were in charge of making and designing the Stables (I am not kidding) and they wanted to save ponies. The Stables were meant to save ponies! Yes, some Stables had stupid gimmicky social experiments going on for no reason like "You will have men in charge instead of women and coat walls in propaganda as if this state of society requires propaganda to uphold" and "This Stable will be filled with Earth Ponies only because I say so and research cybernetic cyborgery" but Scootaloo's goal was to try and create a society in at least one of these Stables more resistant to Zigger corruption and maginuclear failure than the one that "died" when the nukes fell.
He is literally just copypasting shit from Fallout right now and changing Vault to Stable and changing body to pony and pretending he's ponifying it even though it would never fit canon Equestria or his bastardized mockery of it!
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>The Great Pegasus Betrayal That Started Before Equestria Fell And Lasted At Least 201+ Years
First of all, the skies.
The cloud covering keeps grass from growing on land, creating a "permanent nuclear winter" effect. It's here to try and justify how non-nuclear warheads gave Equestria a nuclear winter that lasted 200 years, because I guess Kkat saw some GameFAQs user point out that after 200 years Washington DC really shouldn't be a desert and should be overwhelmed with greenery.
The lack of sunlight should obliterate the ecosystem and eliminate most life on earth and force everything to evolve in a magical "eats emotions or radiation" kind of way but doesn't because potatoes. How do the Skylanders feed themselves? Lmao I dunno. With the sky blocked it should be colder but if this Wasteland was cold, you could melt snow into water and purify it plus it would make the Wasteland "Frostpunk", meaning it wouldn't look like the classic 1985 film Mad Max starring Will Ferrel any more.
The Pegasi (The entire Pegasi race aside from a hooffull who stayed on the ground!) betrayed Equestria and all their friends and non-pegasi family members BEFORE the bombs dropped, fucking off into the cloud and creating a cloud covering Pegasi at the time thought might shield them from megaspell nukes. No idea if it worked or not since Kkat never tells us if any Megaspell(TM) ICBMs hit the place or not.
Derpy Hooves doesn't have a Dashite mark, but that's never explained. It's not like The Neutral Skyfags were fans of one newsletter who came from all over Equestria and converged into a single point to make their own ethnostate hoping it would protect them from bad decisions made by the Mane Six.
It's unrealistic for a culture to stay stagnant and devoted to absolute neutrality for 200+ years before abruptly shifting into what it becomes later in this story: The Enclave from Fallout 3. No justification for this cultural shift is given. It's stated that Rainbow Dash "Militarized the Pegasi" but what the fuck does that mean? She gave them the Power Armour and Enclave Lasers
Like you said, branding a Pegasus won't stop that Pegasus from flying. It won't stop them from seeking revenge on the Neutral Skyfags in any way, including sabotage or violence or sniping.
Fallout's got cybernetic implants that boost your videogame stats and a Cyborg perk with robot parts in its picture, so Fallout fans certainly wouldn't complain if Twilight invented robo-wings in her quest to make Alicornification available to the masses, or if one Stable had "People here fuck robots and fucking want robot limbs and think ascending into robot bodies is the one true path to salvation" as its gimmick to justify why cyber-parts exist now.
Hell, THIS STORY includes cyber-parts because it makes Red Eye a Cyborg and makes "we are earth ponies only for no reason and we invented cybernetics" his stable's gimmick!
Later on we'll meet a throwaway character who's a bodyguard for a baddie. The baddie's named after one of the most interesting characters in Fallout 1. And this bodyguard grew up in Red-Eye's stable! Despite all the intel this character could have, despite how much she could humanize Red-Eye, she is simply killed when Littlepip jams a pencil in her giant cartoon-horse eye and that's that.
Fallout Equestria: Project Horizons, a fanfic longer than the real FE and twice as edgy, gave its bisexual LITERALLY BLACK AND RED EDGY unicorn protag some knife-feathered steel mecha-wings and glowing red eyes and cyber-legs to look edgier and justify letting the unicorn fly.
Why do the overclocked and broken cloud factories that created and maintained the cloud covering still work after 200 years?
What would a lack of sunlight do to the world and ocean and what disasters would that cause? Lmao kkat doesn't know.
How good's the oxygen on a world without any plant life or sunlight? Lmao kkat doesn't know!
Whether you call yourself neutral or not, impairing someone's basic survival on this planetary scale is an aggressive act. The Skyfags of Neutral Pegasonia are choking the life out of the planet and stopping plants from growing with their cloud covering. Fresh fruit can only be grown in greenhouses with artificial sun lamps. Everyone on the ground and on every continent and even the ocean should want the skies clear and every Pegasi (even those not born into Skyfaggot Enclave Society) should want those skies cleared for moral "I want to be a hero" reasons or pragmatic "I want grass" survival reasons.
Not to mention...
First of all, the skies.
The cloud covering keeps grass from growing on land, creating a "permanent nuclear winter" effect. It's here to try and justify how non-nuclear warheads gave Equestria a nuclear winter that lasted 200 years, because I guess Kkat saw some GameFAQs user point out that after 200 years Washington DC really shouldn't be a desert and should be overwhelmed with greenery.
The lack of sunlight should obliterate the ecosystem and eliminate most life on earth and force everything to evolve in a magical "eats emotions or radiation" kind of way but doesn't because potatoes. How do the Skylanders feed themselves? Lmao I dunno. With the sky blocked it should be colder but if this Wasteland was cold, you could melt snow into water and purify it plus it would make the Wasteland "Frostpunk", meaning it wouldn't look like the classic 1985 film Mad Max starring Will Ferrel any more.
The Pegasi (The entire Pegasi race aside from a hooffull who stayed on the ground!) betrayed Equestria and all their friends and non-pegasi family members BEFORE the bombs dropped, fucking off into the cloud and creating a cloud covering Pegasi at the time thought might shield them from megaspell nukes. No idea if it worked or not since Kkat never tells us if any Megaspell(TM) ICBMs hit the place or not.
Derpy Hooves doesn't have a Dashite mark, but that's never explained. It's not like The Neutral Skyfags were fans of one newsletter who came from all over Equestria and converged into a single point to make their own ethnostate hoping it would protect them from bad decisions made by the Mane Six.
It's unrealistic for a culture to stay stagnant and devoted to absolute neutrality for 200+ years before abruptly shifting into what it becomes later in this story: The Enclave from Fallout 3. No justification for this cultural shift is given. It's stated that Rainbow Dash "Militarized the Pegasi" but what the fuck does that mean? She gave them the Power Armour and Enclave Lasers
Like you said, branding a Pegasus won't stop that Pegasus from flying. It won't stop them from seeking revenge on the Neutral Skyfags in any way, including sabotage or violence or sniping.
Fallout's got cybernetic implants that boost your videogame stats and a Cyborg perk with robot parts in its picture, so Fallout fans certainly wouldn't complain if Twilight invented robo-wings in her quest to make Alicornification available to the masses, or if one Stable had "People here fuck robots and fucking want robot limbs and think ascending into robot bodies is the one true path to salvation" as its gimmick to justify why cyber-parts exist now.
Hell, THIS STORY includes cyber-parts because it makes Red Eye a Cyborg and makes "we are earth ponies only for no reason and we invented cybernetics" his stable's gimmick!
Later on we'll meet a throwaway character who's a bodyguard for a baddie. The baddie's named after one of the most interesting characters in Fallout 1. And this bodyguard grew up in Red-Eye's stable! Despite all the intel this character could have, despite how much she could humanize Red-Eye, she is simply killed when Littlepip jams a pencil in her giant cartoon-horse eye and that's that.
Fallout Equestria: Project Horizons, a fanfic longer than the real FE and twice as edgy, gave its bisexual LITERALLY BLACK AND RED EDGY unicorn protag some knife-feathered steel mecha-wings and glowing red eyes and cyber-legs to look edgier and justify letting the unicorn fly.
Why do the overclocked and broken cloud factories that created and maintained the cloud covering still work after 200 years?
What would a lack of sunlight do to the world and ocean and what disasters would that cause? Lmao kkat doesn't know.
How good's the oxygen on a world without any plant life or sunlight? Lmao kkat doesn't know!
Whether you call yourself neutral or not, impairing someone's basic survival on this planetary scale is an aggressive act. The Skyfags of Neutral Pegasonia are choking the life out of the planet and stopping plants from growing with their cloud covering. Fresh fruit can only be grown in greenhouses with artificial sun lamps. Everyone on the ground and on every continent and even the ocean should want the skies clear and every Pegasi (even those not born into Skyfaggot Enclave Society) should want those skies cleared for moral "I want to be a hero" reasons or pragmatic "I want grass" survival reasons.
Not to mention...
>>296476
Pegasi are fucking fast. Rainbow Dash has been seen with mach cones so she's at least able to break the sound barrier, and Hurricane Fluttershy showed most Pegasi can pull decently high speeds. If some Pegasus in Evil Pegasusland decided to fly away from home one night after realizing they're the baddies, expert fliers might be able to catch him but only if they can detect him before he got too far away. And if a Power Armoured Operative for the Skyfags decided to quit during a mission, how could they track him down and brand him without taking heavy losses for trying to fuck with someone in power armour? How the hell are the Skyfags catching and branding absolutely every single fucker who quits their retarded egotistical cult of pseudo-neutrality?
Why are Pegasi so rare in the Wasteland? Surely, ponies on the ground can still pop out Pegasi children. Pegasi can cover a shitload of ground, and easily take the higher ground by flying behind a building or mountain and then flying to its top. Brands aren't inherited unless the Skyfag Society's dedicated enough to keep tabs on every Dashite and brand every kid they have on the day they get their Cutie Marks.
Why is the source of the cloud covering a secret known only to the enclave, when they brand everyone who leaves them and let them live? Everypony should know whose fault the cloud covering is and want the skyfags destroyed! Don't "Individual friendless branded Pegasi probably wouldn't want to give ground-bound creatures a reason to be racist towards pegasi" me, the first Pegasus to fly up and blow up a cloud factory or bring a society together with talk of a mutual enemy or help ground ponies rebel against the enclave in some meaningful way would be hailed as a hero!
These Skyfaggot Cloudniggers don't even make for a good metaphor for anything! They aren't dumb Boomers with their head in the clouds, keeping the world beneath them out of sight and mind while narcissistically enjoying luxuries created by their branded and enslaved children as their hedonism and wannabe-green environment-destroying retardity chokes the life out of the world. And unlike Fallout's enclave they aren't a remnant of the evil American politicians and evil American military brutes that arguably contributed to the world's downfall. They're most of a third of the Equine species that one day just decided that because they can fuck off into the clouds, they should, even if it starts killing the planet everypony left behind lives on.
Why the obsession with sticking a branding iron shaped like RD's cutie mark into pony asses? It's not like this actually disables whatever magical benefit you gain from having a Cutie Mark, even though that could be an interesting way to remove the "Weather Control or Sewing or something else that's good for a peaceful life in an agrarian-ish culture" Cutie Marks any Pegasi might be able to bring with them down to the surface, forcing them to live by the gun whether for good or evil. That's some motherfucking wannabe-Evenicle shit right there.
RAINBOW DASH HERSELF WAS BRANDED BY THESE FAGGOTS. You'd think she or some other Mane Six member or Princess Luna or Princess Celestia would obliterate these retards but nope, the Neutral Skyfag Society outlasts all of them and continues branding Pegasi for over 200 years.
And then, there's The Only Sin. I don't know if people are calling this common writing mistake a trope yet but that's my suggestion for its name.
It's incredibly limiting to your potential options as a writer to say "Only". But rookie authors are practically addicted to saying shit like "This is the only Superalien left in the universe" and "This legendary magic sword only chooses the worthiest person alive and only exists for one day every ten thousand years" and "This is the legendary special thing that you must consider extra-special because I artificially limited how many of them there are out here. And the absolute best thing because I'm officially saying there is nothing out there better than this, until next week when I introduce something even better. Whoops, I'm being unusually honest about how artificial this is!"
Except later these writers realize their mistake and retcon this. Sometimes with sequels that ignore X's rareness and sometimes with prequels set before the moment X became rare.
"Oh, Superman wasn't the last Kryptonian alive, just one of twenty three still alive somewhere out there!"
"Only four Jedi are left alive in the galaxy? In the prequels there are hundreds, maybe even thousands!"
"Remember when I said Freeza was the absolute strongest being in the universe? That was before Cell and the Androids were created, and before the author thought of Majin Buu or the Shadow Dragons or Whis and Goku Nigger and Beerus or other universes or Zamasu or Goatfag or King Fagchild or King Fagchild 2 or Broly or Broly or Bio-Broly or or those dancing faggots from GT."
"Did I say there is only one Keyblade Wielder? Well there are actually 15 now and there used to be millions!"
Why arbitrarily limit something if you're not sure you can write within those limits? Why say absolutely every Pegasi is either a Dashite, or Enclave, or somepony with a good excuse not to be on the Enclave's radar?
And finally, there's the irony here.
The Dashites are forced, against their will, to wear a Brand.
It's Rainbow Dash's Cutie Mark, a copyrighted Hasbro symbol.
It's forced onto ponies by a large and immoral conglomerate of short-sighted faggots whose foolishness has been directly killing the pony world for far too long.
And this is Rainbow Dash's only appearance in the story. Her name and Cutie Mark is the closest she gets to an appearance. We don't even find out how she died. This is her contribution to the world: To be betrayed by the entire Pegasus race she "militarized" in a way that inspires their habit of branding non-evil Pegasi like cattle, and then mysteriously disappear.
aaand done.
I deleted parts that looked off-topic, how did I do?
Pegasi are fucking fast. Rainbow Dash has been seen with mach cones so she's at least able to break the sound barrier, and Hurricane Fluttershy showed most Pegasi can pull decently high speeds. If some Pegasus in Evil Pegasusland decided to fly away from home one night after realizing they're the baddies, expert fliers might be able to catch him but only if they can detect him before he got too far away. And if a Power Armoured Operative for the Skyfags decided to quit during a mission, how could they track him down and brand him without taking heavy losses for trying to fuck with someone in power armour? How the hell are the Skyfags catching and branding absolutely every single fucker who quits their retarded egotistical cult of pseudo-neutrality?
Why are Pegasi so rare in the Wasteland? Surely, ponies on the ground can still pop out Pegasi children. Pegasi can cover a shitload of ground, and easily take the higher ground by flying behind a building or mountain and then flying to its top. Brands aren't inherited unless the Skyfag Society's dedicated enough to keep tabs on every Dashite and brand every kid they have on the day they get their Cutie Marks.
Why is the source of the cloud covering a secret known only to the enclave, when they brand everyone who leaves them and let them live? Everypony should know whose fault the cloud covering is and want the skyfags destroyed! Don't "Individual friendless branded Pegasi probably wouldn't want to give ground-bound creatures a reason to be racist towards pegasi" me, the first Pegasus to fly up and blow up a cloud factory or bring a society together with talk of a mutual enemy or help ground ponies rebel against the enclave in some meaningful way would be hailed as a hero!
These Skyfaggot Cloudniggers don't even make for a good metaphor for anything! They aren't dumb Boomers with their head in the clouds, keeping the world beneath them out of sight and mind while narcissistically enjoying luxuries created by their branded and enslaved children as their hedonism and wannabe-green environment-destroying retardity chokes the life out of the world. And unlike Fallout's enclave they aren't a remnant of the evil American politicians and evil American military brutes that arguably contributed to the world's downfall. They're most of a third of the Equine species that one day just decided that because they can fuck off into the clouds, they should, even if it starts killing the planet everypony left behind lives on.
Why the obsession with sticking a branding iron shaped like RD's cutie mark into pony asses? It's not like this actually disables whatever magical benefit you gain from having a Cutie Mark, even though that could be an interesting way to remove the "Weather Control or Sewing or something else that's good for a peaceful life in an agrarian-ish culture" Cutie Marks any Pegasi might be able to bring with them down to the surface, forcing them to live by the gun whether for good or evil. That's some motherfucking wannabe-Evenicle shit right there.
RAINBOW DASH HERSELF WAS BRANDED BY THESE FAGGOTS. You'd think she or some other Mane Six member or Princess Luna or Princess Celestia would obliterate these retards but nope, the Neutral Skyfag Society outlasts all of them and continues branding Pegasi for over 200 years.
And then, there's The Only Sin. I don't know if people are calling this common writing mistake a trope yet but that's my suggestion for its name.
It's incredibly limiting to your potential options as a writer to say "Only". But rookie authors are practically addicted to saying shit like "This is the only Superalien left in the universe" and "This legendary magic sword only chooses the worthiest person alive and only exists for one day every ten thousand years" and "This is the legendary special thing that you must consider extra-special because I artificially limited how many of them there are out here. And the absolute best thing because I'm officially saying there is nothing out there better than this, until next week when I introduce something even better. Whoops, I'm being unusually honest about how artificial this is!"
Except later these writers realize their mistake and retcon this. Sometimes with sequels that ignore X's rareness and sometimes with prequels set before the moment X became rare.
"Oh, Superman wasn't the last Kryptonian alive, just one of twenty three still alive somewhere out there!"
"Only four Jedi are left alive in the galaxy? In the prequels there are hundreds, maybe even thousands!"
"Remember when I said Freeza was the absolute strongest being in the universe? That was before Cell and the Androids were created, and before the author thought of Majin Buu or the Shadow Dragons or Whis and Goku Nigger and Beerus or other universes or Zamasu or Goatfag or King Fagchild or King Fagchild 2 or Broly or Broly or Bio-Broly or or those dancing faggots from GT."
"Did I say there is only one Keyblade Wielder? Well there are actually 15 now and there used to be millions!"
Why arbitrarily limit something if you're not sure you can write within those limits? Why say absolutely every Pegasi is either a Dashite, or Enclave, or somepony with a good excuse not to be on the Enclave's radar?
And finally, there's the irony here.
The Dashites are forced, against their will, to wear a Brand.
It's Rainbow Dash's Cutie Mark, a copyrighted Hasbro symbol.
It's forced onto ponies by a large and immoral conglomerate of short-sighted faggots whose foolishness has been directly killing the pony world for far too long.
And this is Rainbow Dash's only appearance in the story. Her name and Cutie Mark is the closest she gets to an appearance. We don't even find out how she died. This is her contribution to the world: To be betrayed by the entire Pegasus race she "militarized" in a way that inspires their habit of branding non-evil Pegasi like cattle, and then mysteriously disappear.
aaand done.
I deleted parts that looked off-topic, how did I do?
>>296476
>The cloud covering keeps grass from growing on land, creating a "permanent nuclear winter" effect. It's here to try and justify how non-nuclear warheads gave Equestria a nuclear winter that lasted 200 years, because I guess Kkat saw some GameFAQs user point out that after 200 years Washington DC really shouldn't be a desert and should be overwhelmed with greenery.
Just gonna hop in here and correct this, but it's clarified later in FoE that the clouds aren't the reason the surface is so shitty - the pegasi use them to conceal their nation and grow crops on them (however that is supposed to work). The earth and water are literally too contaminated for anything that's not massively mutated to grow in them, which is why Pip and friends need the anti-radiation macguffin even after the sky is cleared. In Kkat's eyes, the great sin of the pegasi is trying to maintain their isolationism and refusing to share their limited resources of food and technology with the poor, unfortunate surface ponies. You know, the ones who decorate their homes with gore and kill/rape one another for fun.
Also, shame on you for bringing up Project Horizons. That story has far bigger problems than its overuse of edgy cybernetics, like its rapid downward spiral into anime nonsense, fixation with rape and recurring pedobait.
>The cloud covering keeps grass from growing on land, creating a "permanent nuclear winter" effect. It's here to try and justify how non-nuclear warheads gave Equestria a nuclear winter that lasted 200 years, because I guess Kkat saw some GameFAQs user point out that after 200 years Washington DC really shouldn't be a desert and should be overwhelmed with greenery.
Just gonna hop in here and correct this, but it's clarified later in FoE that the clouds aren't the reason the surface is so shitty - the pegasi use them to conceal their nation and grow crops on them (however that is supposed to work). The earth and water are literally too contaminated for anything that's not massively mutated to grow in them, which is why Pip and friends need the anti-radiation macguffin even after the sky is cleared. In Kkat's eyes, the great sin of the pegasi is trying to maintain their isolationism and refusing to share their limited resources of food and technology with the poor, unfortunate surface ponies. You know, the ones who decorate their homes with gore and kill/rape one another for fun.
Also, shame on you for bringing up Project Horizons. That story has far bigger problems than its overuse of edgy cybernetics, like its rapid downward spiral into anime nonsense, fixation with rape and recurring pedobait.
>>296487
Thank you, you're right.
I never finished PH but I heard it ends in a literal multi-phase videogame boss battle where Blackjack the canonical child rapist fights a big evil blob monster that's responsible for everything that ever went wrong. It's a pure DPS Rush and she fires many rockets at ir. Is that true?
Thank you, you're right.
I never finished PH but I heard it ends in a literal multi-phase videogame boss battle where Blackjack the canonical child rapist fights a big evil blob monster that's responsible for everything that ever went wrong. It's a pure DPS Rush and she fires many rockets at ir. Is that true?
>>296515
It is, I had a friend who read it all tell me about it. I am still baffled how FoE and PH has such a rabid and dedicated fan base that claim it to be the peak of any pony or Fallout media ever. I want to imagine it's shit posting but some are super rabid about it. Sure I got fanfics and fan music I really like but I won't say it beats Blood Meridian or John Prine by orders of magnitude.
Also decided to sub to your YouTube channel if you don't mind!
It is, I had a friend who read it all tell me about it. I am still baffled how FoE and PH has such a rabid and dedicated fan base that claim it to be the peak of any pony or Fallout media ever. I want to imagine it's shit posting but some are super rabid about it. Sure I got fanfics and fan music I really like but I won't say it beats Blood Meridian or John Prine by orders of magnitude.
Also decided to sub to your YouTube channel if you don't mind!
>>296481
I still find it funny how one of the most vital pieces of Equestria and the Mane Six and FIM as a whole, Rainbow Dash, somepony who gained her mark when she metaphorically saved the lives of her friends and saved the world numerous times with the help of those friends and would eventually go on to literally save Rarity's life with another Rainboom...
Her role in this story begins and ends at being blamed for some random Fallout-knockoff bollocks including how some baddies she supposedly created started using a symbol of her aerial superiority and a reminder of one of her life's greatest moments in the edgiest branding-fetish manner the author could think of. In a story that normally revels in making canon ponies get eaten alive or slit their wrists on glass to bleed to death so they can avoid being raped by approaching Raiders, the author forgot to give Rainbow Dash an ending because this is where her role in the story begins and ends: To contribute a symbol that's taken out of context and used in a way utterly contrary to its real meaning and what its meaning should be to Pegasi.
What Pegasus out there who heard tales of Rainbow Dash's heroics wouldn't want her symbol on his body? There are absolute faggots out there who get tattoos of Pokeballs and MLP Cutie Marks and Rick Sanchez's face and the Reddit mascot, so you'd fucking think that in a world where magic exists and technology depends on the episode, somewhere out there you'd be able to find a tattoo parlour with a magical tattoo gun full of magic ink that gives you convincing knockoffs of real Cutie Marks.
Why is Calamity ashamed to have Rainbow Fucking Dash's mark on his asscheeks? Sure, it's a brand put there without his consent, but having that brand means the Enclave wanted to lump you in the same category as Rainbow Dash, Hero Of Equestria And Second-Best Pony.
>>296545
Thanks! Please don't talk about that channel here, that's bad for OpSec.
The pony fandom has a lot of people in it who aren't here because they like FIM, they're here because they want to BE SEEN liking FIM. They want to look like "The biggest brony", because they think this will get them the respect of other bronies. So they'll scream their devotion to FIM from the rooftops and tell everyone they're a brony and whine about "being persecuted" when normies say publicly admitting to liking a little girl's show is weird. They'll go on these absurd neo-religious rants where they swear the brony fandom is the nicest greatest world-changing community that ever existed. They'll talk as if a cartoon can create world peace by making everyone like it. Sure, the USSR persecuted those who listened to rock music because shared identity and real unity disrupts the divisive hate-driven identity politics commies specialize in, but while media can help bring people who like it together it won't single-handedly get the whole world singing Cum By Ya.
Some made a career out of digging absurdly deep into FIM episodes to try and find something that sounds mature, like a random math equation on a chalkboard or the position of some stars or a sex joke hidden in plain sight, and making analysis videos where they rant about the deep hidden super-smart symbolism within FIM "which is actually really the super-de-duper smartest show ever you guys". This stuff helps the fake brony feel like he's intellectually and morally superior for liking this cartoon.
I can respect healthy appreciations for good media and FIM is good. But these people unhealthily obsess over this show to the point where they give themselves shitty bootleg tulpas forced to imitate ponies they like and disallowed from developing their own consciousnesses and designing their own bodies, or start hypnotizing themselves to be more like the pony they want to fuck the most, even if that's a fandom creation with no canon basis.
There are little girls out there who will say "Justin Bieber saved my life" because his music was the first good thing they ever experienced and up until they heard his music for the first time they lived in a dull mindless trance where they didn't care about or love anything or feel any reason to live. They'll ravenously defend Bieber because he was their first crush and in another timeline where their parents did their jobs right, those girls would be this dedicated to Jesus and making God happy instead. These days it's Kpop bitches who do and say that "Jungkook and Udon Dango saved my life!" shit, but "FIM saved the lives" of these faggots by being a good source of comfort and fun, and by giving them the first community they've ever felt like a part of.
But the FIM fandom is big.
It's harder to rise to the top of a big fandom full of people saying what you're saying and doing what you're already doing.
So they niche themselves. Some try to be the biggest and most important and powerful-feeling brony on a gimmicky forum exclusively for waifu discussion and pony roleplay with only 30 active members tops. Some try to pretend some crappy fanfic they started reading was actually the greatest and best piece of literature in the world, because they want to say shit that will please its incestuous mini-fandom hoping to be beloved by it. And in a fandom that loves fanfiction spinoffs of this fanfic, but rejects anything too divergent from this fanfic, it's easy to yell "This is the best fic ever!" and write 10k-150k words of a shitty bootleg-of-a-bootleg story you'll stop writing once you realize the incestuous mini-fandom will never make you famous or pay you to publish this like they adore and pay and simp for Kkat.
Project Horizons became the most popular fanfic of Fallout Equestria by basically being Fallout Equestria except everything a shallow explosion-loving cuck who loves seeing his favourite bitch get fucked would call "Great" about FE is turned up to 11. More sex, rape, explosions, edge, and trashy hamfisted exposition.
Puppysmiles's story became a close second because it's nothing but kitsh shlock.
I still find it funny how one of the most vital pieces of Equestria and the Mane Six and FIM as a whole, Rainbow Dash, somepony who gained her mark when she metaphorically saved the lives of her friends and saved the world numerous times with the help of those friends and would eventually go on to literally save Rarity's life with another Rainboom...
Her role in this story begins and ends at being blamed for some random Fallout-knockoff bollocks including how some baddies she supposedly created started using a symbol of her aerial superiority and a reminder of one of her life's greatest moments in the edgiest branding-fetish manner the author could think of. In a story that normally revels in making canon ponies get eaten alive or slit their wrists on glass to bleed to death so they can avoid being raped by approaching Raiders, the author forgot to give Rainbow Dash an ending because this is where her role in the story begins and ends: To contribute a symbol that's taken out of context and used in a way utterly contrary to its real meaning and what its meaning should be to Pegasi.
What Pegasus out there who heard tales of Rainbow Dash's heroics wouldn't want her symbol on his body? There are absolute faggots out there who get tattoos of Pokeballs and MLP Cutie Marks and Rick Sanchez's face and the Reddit mascot, so you'd fucking think that in a world where magic exists and technology depends on the episode, somewhere out there you'd be able to find a tattoo parlour with a magical tattoo gun full of magic ink that gives you convincing knockoffs of real Cutie Marks.
Why is Calamity ashamed to have Rainbow Fucking Dash's mark on his asscheeks? Sure, it's a brand put there without his consent, but having that brand means the Enclave wanted to lump you in the same category as Rainbow Dash, Hero Of Equestria And Second-Best Pony.
>>296545
Thanks! Please don't talk about that channel here, that's bad for OpSec.
The pony fandom has a lot of people in it who aren't here because they like FIM, they're here because they want to BE SEEN liking FIM. They want to look like "The biggest brony", because they think this will get them the respect of other bronies. So they'll scream their devotion to FIM from the rooftops and tell everyone they're a brony and whine about "being persecuted" when normies say publicly admitting to liking a little girl's show is weird. They'll go on these absurd neo-religious rants where they swear the brony fandom is the nicest greatest world-changing community that ever existed. They'll talk as if a cartoon can create world peace by making everyone like it. Sure, the USSR persecuted those who listened to rock music because shared identity and real unity disrupts the divisive hate-driven identity politics commies specialize in, but while media can help bring people who like it together it won't single-handedly get the whole world singing Cum By Ya.
Some made a career out of digging absurdly deep into FIM episodes to try and find something that sounds mature, like a random math equation on a chalkboard or the position of some stars or a sex joke hidden in plain sight, and making analysis videos where they rant about the deep hidden super-smart symbolism within FIM "which is actually really the super-de-duper smartest show ever you guys". This stuff helps the fake brony feel like he's intellectually and morally superior for liking this cartoon.
I can respect healthy appreciations for good media and FIM is good. But these people unhealthily obsess over this show to the point where they give themselves shitty bootleg tulpas forced to imitate ponies they like and disallowed from developing their own consciousnesses and designing their own bodies, or start hypnotizing themselves to be more like the pony they want to fuck the most, even if that's a fandom creation with no canon basis.
There are little girls out there who will say "Justin Bieber saved my life" because his music was the first good thing they ever experienced and up until they heard his music for the first time they lived in a dull mindless trance where they didn't care about or love anything or feel any reason to live. They'll ravenously defend Bieber because he was their first crush and in another timeline where their parents did their jobs right, those girls would be this dedicated to Jesus and making God happy instead. These days it's Kpop bitches who do and say that "Jungkook and Udon Dango saved my life!" shit, but "FIM saved the lives" of these faggots by being a good source of comfort and fun, and by giving them the first community they've ever felt like a part of.
But the FIM fandom is big.
It's harder to rise to the top of a big fandom full of people saying what you're saying and doing what you're already doing.
So they niche themselves. Some try to be the biggest and most important and powerful-feeling brony on a gimmicky forum exclusively for waifu discussion and pony roleplay with only 30 active members tops. Some try to pretend some crappy fanfic they started reading was actually the greatest and best piece of literature in the world, because they want to say shit that will please its incestuous mini-fandom hoping to be beloved by it. And in a fandom that loves fanfiction spinoffs of this fanfic, but rejects anything too divergent from this fanfic, it's easy to yell "This is the best fic ever!" and write 10k-150k words of a shitty bootleg-of-a-bootleg story you'll stop writing once you realize the incestuous mini-fandom will never make you famous or pay you to publish this like they adore and pay and simp for Kkat.
Project Horizons became the most popular fanfic of Fallout Equestria by basically being Fallout Equestria except everything a shallow explosion-loving cuck who loves seeing his favourite bitch get fucked would call "Great" about FE is turned up to 11. More sex, rape, explosions, edge, and trashy hamfisted exposition.
Puppysmiles's story became a close second because it's nothing but kitsh shlock.
>>296578
I don't remember if we've talked about Puppysmiles and her story Fallout Equestria: Pink Eyes yet, but it sucks ass. I'll review it and spoil everything about it now so if you plan on reading all 134K words of it don't read this.
On the final day before the apocalypse one excessively "Cute" little filly was given a life support suit by her mom, then the nukes fell and rubble buried the filly.
Supposedly these suits were designed to help filles get to Stables that hadn't closed yet but what Fallout Vault by another name would open its massive door shortly after the apocalypse to let in one more filly? And others in these suits are never met. The Trauma Harnesses from FNV Dead Money were protective suits that walk the wounded back to base or return with skeletons but this up-to-11 Tauma Harness really should have changed the world but doesn't. Still, one of these abnormally effective super-suits has to exist for the story to happen and for the heroine to get her gimmick.
Pink Cloud, a hazardous material from Kkat's Fallout Equestria that artificially binds things together to create abominations 99% of the time and 1% of the time just superglues plot-armour protagonists to useful gear they'd normally never take off anyway (OH GOD HELP ME THE IRONY IS TOO MUCH AND KKAT MISSED ABSOLUTELY ALL OF IT) merged this filly with her life support suit and helps keep her alive.
200 years later this undead filly wakes up and goes around saying "Hi, I'm Puppysmiles. Have you seen my Mom?" as the author tries to make her seem adorable.
She's invincible and her soul's stuck in the suit.
She finds "Sentenza", which is a renamed Euclid's C-Finder gun from Fallout NV that summons down laser satellite blasts just like in Fallout NV. It eventually runs out of ammo (lolwut) so she trades the useless thing for a brushable Lyra plushie doll.
She also carries a EMP tank shell and a small rock named "The Rock Of Destiny", which is just a small rock. She uses it to kill enemies that normally take much more to kill. Har har har do you get the reference to FIM when Rarity found her rock of destiny? There is also a shard of Nightmare Moon inside Puppysmiles for no reason and she named it Creepy Voice.
After a lot of utterly meaningless filler where Puppysmiles meets renamed Fallout characters and does copypasted Fallout quests, Puppysmiles finds her mom's grave and is very sad. A friend Puppysmiles made said "You don't need to keep looking for your mom because you made a positive impact on the lives of so many living ponies". Creepy Voice (Nightmare Moon) takes over Puppysmiles but to stop Nightmare Moon, a friend Puppysmiles made shows PS her own mother's grave and a bunch of assorted mementos gained from a nearby safe and then that friend says "You need to move on". So Puppysmiles dies instantly and Nightmare Moon's evil plan to sort-of exist again is foiled.
Story's over, that was it.
A gimmicky filly exists, shows her gimmick off, helps some side characters, and after being sucked off by a side character for doing so many nice things in filler scenes she dies eventually in front of her mother's tombstone in the most tragic scene the author could imagine.
Was it really necessary to have NIGHTMARE FUCKING MOON invade this final moment out of nowhere despite this character's complete lack of any connection to darkness and Luna's jealousy of Celestia's bigger ass and greater popularity? Did this old relic of FIM really need to invade a long-dead filly's final moments alive? Sure it makes things seem more "Tense and dangerous" but is that tone right for a moment like this? What the fuck could a tiny magicless shard of Nightmare Moon even do in Puppysmiles's tiny filly body?
I rate this story a 3/5!
Just kidding it's a 2/10 just like Project Horizons. The original Fallout Equestria gets a 1/10 from me for having less originality than those two fanfics of fanfics and taking more "inspiration" from games than them.
Hey, Glim?
Now that Calamity has revealed himself to be a Dashite, what do you think of him personally and as a character?
Does this revelation that he has a mark, followed by an explanation of what the mark means and what backstory lore it's connected to and how he used to be Enclave until he wasn't any more, change things significantly about him and what he means to the story?
I think this would be a better reveal if we knew more about the Enclave, the Dashites, the betrayal of the Pegasi, and the branding before we learned he was mixed up in all of this once.
Arcade Ganon from FNV seemed like a snarky but nice Followers Of The Apocalypse doctor at first, until you learned of his connection to the Enclave. That fundamentally changed his character and role in the world. And all of those moments where he said "Seeing all these energy weapons makes me nostalgic" or revealed he knew too much about Vertibirds turned out to be clever foreshadowing.
A surprising number of Fallout fans shifted into NPC mode upon learning this and gunned him down while screeching "REEEE NAZIS!!! I don't care if he did nothing wrong, he's white and blonde and related to THEM!!!".
But he humanizes the Enclave, along with the rest of his Enclave Remnants. Sure, there were bad eggs who loved the bad stuff the Enclave was doing. There were good eggs who hated the bad things the Enclave was doing and wanted to bring America back better than ever before. There were neutral eggs who didn't give a shit about anything except flying.
He's just some guy trying to do the right thing, even though he doesn't get a happy ending. Closest he can get is one where he, as a doctor, constantly has shit to do.
He's like Veronica, when it comes to the tragedy of his character. The world's changing and old groups like the BOS and Enclave don't have much of a role to play in it any more. Best thing he can do is turn the Remnants into something good. Best Veronica can do is try to change the BOS, fail, and become a lonely wanderer.
Kkat can't rip this off right.
I don't remember if we've talked about Puppysmiles and her story Fallout Equestria: Pink Eyes yet, but it sucks ass. I'll review it and spoil everything about it now so if you plan on reading all 134K words of it don't read this.
On the final day before the apocalypse one excessively "Cute" little filly was given a life support suit by her mom, then the nukes fell and rubble buried the filly.
Supposedly these suits were designed to help filles get to Stables that hadn't closed yet but what Fallout Vault by another name would open its massive door shortly after the apocalypse to let in one more filly? And others in these suits are never met. The Trauma Harnesses from FNV Dead Money were protective suits that walk the wounded back to base or return with skeletons but this up-to-11 Tauma Harness really should have changed the world but doesn't. Still, one of these abnormally effective super-suits has to exist for the story to happen and for the heroine to get her gimmick.
Pink Cloud, a hazardous material from Kkat's Fallout Equestria that artificially binds things together to create abominations 99% of the time and 1% of the time just superglues plot-armour protagonists to useful gear they'd normally never take off anyway (OH GOD HELP ME THE IRONY IS TOO MUCH AND KKAT MISSED ABSOLUTELY ALL OF IT) merged this filly with her life support suit and helps keep her alive.
200 years later this undead filly wakes up and goes around saying "Hi, I'm Puppysmiles. Have you seen my Mom?" as the author tries to make her seem adorable.
She's invincible and her soul's stuck in the suit.
She finds "Sentenza", which is a renamed Euclid's C-Finder gun from Fallout NV that summons down laser satellite blasts just like in Fallout NV. It eventually runs out of ammo (lolwut) so she trades the useless thing for a brushable Lyra plushie doll.
She also carries a EMP tank shell and a small rock named "The Rock Of Destiny", which is just a small rock. She uses it to kill enemies that normally take much more to kill. Har har har do you get the reference to FIM when Rarity found her rock of destiny? There is also a shard of Nightmare Moon inside Puppysmiles for no reason and she named it Creepy Voice.
After a lot of utterly meaningless filler where Puppysmiles meets renamed Fallout characters and does copypasted Fallout quests, Puppysmiles finds her mom's grave and is very sad. A friend Puppysmiles made said "You don't need to keep looking for your mom because you made a positive impact on the lives of so many living ponies". Creepy Voice (Nightmare Moon) takes over Puppysmiles but to stop Nightmare Moon, a friend Puppysmiles made shows PS her own mother's grave and a bunch of assorted mementos gained from a nearby safe and then that friend says "You need to move on". So Puppysmiles dies instantly and Nightmare Moon's evil plan to sort-of exist again is foiled.
Story's over, that was it.
A gimmicky filly exists, shows her gimmick off, helps some side characters, and after being sucked off by a side character for doing so many nice things in filler scenes she dies eventually in front of her mother's tombstone in the most tragic scene the author could imagine.
Was it really necessary to have NIGHTMARE FUCKING MOON invade this final moment out of nowhere despite this character's complete lack of any connection to darkness and Luna's jealousy of Celestia's bigger ass and greater popularity? Did this old relic of FIM really need to invade a long-dead filly's final moments alive? Sure it makes things seem more "Tense and dangerous" but is that tone right for a moment like this? What the fuck could a tiny magicless shard of Nightmare Moon even do in Puppysmiles's tiny filly body?
I rate this story a 3/5!
Just kidding it's a 2/10 just like Project Horizons. The original Fallout Equestria gets a 1/10 from me for having less originality than those two fanfics of fanfics and taking more "inspiration" from games than them.
Hey, Glim?
Now that Calamity has revealed himself to be a Dashite, what do you think of him personally and as a character?
Does this revelation that he has a mark, followed by an explanation of what the mark means and what backstory lore it's connected to and how he used to be Enclave until he wasn't any more, change things significantly about him and what he means to the story?
I think this would be a better reveal if we knew more about the Enclave, the Dashites, the betrayal of the Pegasi, and the branding before we learned he was mixed up in all of this once.
Arcade Ganon from FNV seemed like a snarky but nice Followers Of The Apocalypse doctor at first, until you learned of his connection to the Enclave. That fundamentally changed his character and role in the world. And all of those moments where he said "Seeing all these energy weapons makes me nostalgic" or revealed he knew too much about Vertibirds turned out to be clever foreshadowing.
A surprising number of Fallout fans shifted into NPC mode upon learning this and gunned him down while screeching "REEEE NAZIS!!! I don't care if he did nothing wrong, he's white and blonde and related to THEM!!!".
But he humanizes the Enclave, along with the rest of his Enclave Remnants. Sure, there were bad eggs who loved the bad stuff the Enclave was doing. There were good eggs who hated the bad things the Enclave was doing and wanted to bring America back better than ever before. There were neutral eggs who didn't give a shit about anything except flying.
He's just some guy trying to do the right thing, even though he doesn't get a happy ending. Closest he can get is one where he, as a doctor, constantly has shit to do.
He's like Veronica, when it comes to the tragedy of his character. The world's changing and old groups like the BOS and Enclave don't have much of a role to play in it any more. Best thing he can do is turn the Remnants into something good. Best Veronica can do is try to change the BOS, fail, and become a lonely wanderer.
Kkat can't rip this off right.
>>296463
Both Littlepoop and Velvet caught some shrapnel or something when Roboponer was blasting the two alicorns. In all honesty, both of them should be dead by now, but kkat has them simply wounded. Velvet has completely lost consciousness but is still alive, and LP, of course, is basically fine except for some "serious" injuries that will most probably not hamper her in any significant way. His justification seems to be that since Roboponer was concentrating his fire on the alicorns, they received the brunt of the attack and LP and Velvet were partially spared because they were only standing nearby. However, you'll also recall that Roboponer was rapid-firing grenades in a stream, so we are probably talking about literally hundreds of grenades exploding in a small area at roughly the same time. Ignoring things like magic shields and whatnot, realistically the alicorns and anything standing anywhere near them should have been blown to smithereens, and in the unlikely event that any of them survived, they would be completely deaf, and possibly have retina damage from all of those flashes going off at once. However, I've long since accepted that kkat's understanding of real-world physics is derived entirely from video game physics, so I have little choice but to ignore this problem.
Anyway, LP finds that Velvet is lying unconscious and bleeding on top of her isn't that just like a woman?. She opens her saddlebags to try and rummage around for those magical healing bandages that make literally every injury better, but she apparently can't find enough of them. Then, she notices that they apparently still have a bunch of those crack mints from before.
The scene that follows is basically like something out of an old Popeye cartoon, where he's getting his shit kicked in by Bluto until he finds a can of spinach and it magically transforms his muscles into Panzer tanks. LP downs the mints, and instantly gains coke-fueled superpowers that allow her to figure out probably the most hare-brained scheme she's cooked up to date. She takes Velvet's memory orb, the one with Fluttershy giving a speech, and floats it towards the alicorn. The alicorn apparently thinks it's a grenade or something, so she uses her magic to bat it back towards LP. However, as soon as the magic touches it, it activates the orb, which pulls the alicorn into whatever sort of trance state occurs when one of these orbs is being viewed. This causes the alicorn to drop her defenses, allowing LP to use her sniper rifle to finish her off.
I'm actually willing to give k "take enough party mints and you won't even be able to tell the difference between my Mega Bloks and her Legos" kat some points for creativity here; this is at the very least a more clever and imaginative way of defeating an alicorn than simply summoning Goku-strength out of nowhere and levitating a boxcar on top of her. The biggest problem here is that he never really clarified how the memory orbs work in the first place, so it's hard to tell if this is plausible or not. Unicorn magic is itself rather poorly explained in the MLP universe, but I get the impression that the aura a horn generates will assume different capabilities based on the intent of the user. For instance, if a unicorn is trying to pick something up, then horn magic becomes something like a physical force field around an object, that the user can then move around. Alternatively, we've seen instances where a unicorn will fire something like a laser blast out of its horn, in which case it becomes a destructive projectile. Since there don't seem to be different types of horn auras, we can assume that the horn produces some kind of all-purpose magic field, which then assumes different attributes based on whatever the unicorn summoning it is mentally commanding it to do, and presumably more complex tasks require higher mastery of magic.
What this scene implies is that the memory orbs will simply activate whenever any sort of magic touches them. This seems like a pretty serious design flaw, since unicorns will generally use levitation as their primary means of handling objects. If any sort of magic will activate the orb, this means that it would be impossible to even pick one up without getting sucked into whatever memory scene it contains. Since LP uses her magic to levitate the orb towards the alicorn, logically she should get sucked into the memory herself when she does this, so this whole trick shouldn't work.
However, since we've already seen multiple instances of both LP and Velvet handling this thing without setting it off, then it can't work this way without creating a continuity problem. The most logical way for the orbs to work would be to have them activate by intent, which means the unicorn needs to be physically touching the orb with its magic while explicitly intending to activate it. If this is the case, then what LP does here shouldn't work; the alicorn batting the orb away shouldn't activate it any more than LP's picking it up and levitating it would.
These two explanations are literally the only way I can think of for any of this to work, and either way it creates a problem. If the orb activates with intent, LP's trick here shouldn't work. If it activates at any touch of magic, LP shouldn't even be able to handle it in the first place. If the author has an explanation for all of this I'd be willing to listen; however, based on what he's given us, I have no choice but to declare shenanigans here.
Anyway, this where the scene ends.
Both Littlepoop and Velvet caught some shrapnel or something when Roboponer was blasting the two alicorns. In all honesty, both of them should be dead by now, but kkat has them simply wounded. Velvet has completely lost consciousness but is still alive, and LP, of course, is basically fine except for some "serious" injuries that will most probably not hamper her in any significant way. His justification seems to be that since Roboponer was concentrating his fire on the alicorns, they received the brunt of the attack and LP and Velvet were partially spared because they were only standing nearby. However, you'll also recall that Roboponer was rapid-firing grenades in a stream, so we are probably talking about literally hundreds of grenades exploding in a small area at roughly the same time. Ignoring things like magic shields and whatnot, realistically the alicorns and anything standing anywhere near them should have been blown to smithereens, and in the unlikely event that any of them survived, they would be completely deaf, and possibly have retina damage from all of those flashes going off at once. However, I've long since accepted that kkat's understanding of real-world physics is derived entirely from video game physics, so I have little choice but to ignore this problem.
Anyway, LP finds that Velvet is lying unconscious and bleeding on top of her isn't that just like a woman?. She opens her saddlebags to try and rummage around for those magical healing bandages that make literally every injury better, but she apparently can't find enough of them. Then, she notices that they apparently still have a bunch of those crack mints from before.
The scene that follows is basically like something out of an old Popeye cartoon, where he's getting his shit kicked in by Bluto until he finds a can of spinach and it magically transforms his muscles into Panzer tanks. LP downs the mints, and instantly gains coke-fueled superpowers that allow her to figure out probably the most hare-brained scheme she's cooked up to date. She takes Velvet's memory orb, the one with Fluttershy giving a speech, and floats it towards the alicorn. The alicorn apparently thinks it's a grenade or something, so she uses her magic to bat it back towards LP. However, as soon as the magic touches it, it activates the orb, which pulls the alicorn into whatever sort of trance state occurs when one of these orbs is being viewed. This causes the alicorn to drop her defenses, allowing LP to use her sniper rifle to finish her off.
I'm actually willing to give k "take enough party mints and you won't even be able to tell the difference between my Mega Bloks and her Legos" kat some points for creativity here; this is at the very least a more clever and imaginative way of defeating an alicorn than simply summoning Goku-strength out of nowhere and levitating a boxcar on top of her. The biggest problem here is that he never really clarified how the memory orbs work in the first place, so it's hard to tell if this is plausible or not. Unicorn magic is itself rather poorly explained in the MLP universe, but I get the impression that the aura a horn generates will assume different capabilities based on the intent of the user. For instance, if a unicorn is trying to pick something up, then horn magic becomes something like a physical force field around an object, that the user can then move around. Alternatively, we've seen instances where a unicorn will fire something like a laser blast out of its horn, in which case it becomes a destructive projectile. Since there don't seem to be different types of horn auras, we can assume that the horn produces some kind of all-purpose magic field, which then assumes different attributes based on whatever the unicorn summoning it is mentally commanding it to do, and presumably more complex tasks require higher mastery of magic.
What this scene implies is that the memory orbs will simply activate whenever any sort of magic touches them. This seems like a pretty serious design flaw, since unicorns will generally use levitation as their primary means of handling objects. If any sort of magic will activate the orb, this means that it would be impossible to even pick one up without getting sucked into whatever memory scene it contains. Since LP uses her magic to levitate the orb towards the alicorn, logically she should get sucked into the memory herself when she does this, so this whole trick shouldn't work.
However, since we've already seen multiple instances of both LP and Velvet handling this thing without setting it off, then it can't work this way without creating a continuity problem. The most logical way for the orbs to work would be to have them activate by intent, which means the unicorn needs to be physically touching the orb with its magic while explicitly intending to activate it. If this is the case, then what LP does here shouldn't work; the alicorn batting the orb away shouldn't activate it any more than LP's picking it up and levitating it would.
These two explanations are literally the only way I can think of for any of this to work, and either way it creates a problem. If the orb activates with intent, LP's trick here shouldn't work. If it activates at any touch of magic, LP shouldn't even be able to handle it in the first place. If the author has an explanation for all of this I'd be willing to listen; however, based on what he's given us, I have no choice but to declare shenanigans here.
Anyway, this where the scene ends.
>>296621
After a page break, LP is apparently still trying to down crack mints despite the alicorn already being defeated, because she doesn't want to deal with the comedown afterward. This is actually pretty accurate addict behavior; based on his writing and his hobbies I'm assuming that kkat took Ritalin as a child, so maybe he has some personal experience to draw from here.
>“But…!” I tried to come up with something that Velvet Remedy would buy. I was amazing now; I could talk anyone into anything. “At least let me hold onto them. I might need them.” And yet somehow, I couldn’t convince the most beautiful mare in the wasteland to let me keep a tin full of medicine.
Speaking of things that haven't been particularly well explained, what exactly these mints even do has not been made tremendously clear either. The mints, again, seem to basically be a powerful stimulant along the lines of cocaine or amphetamine, which stimulates brain activity but won't improve a person's intelligence or vocabulary. However, the author has made multiple references to this drug making it possible to "talk anyone into anything," which seems to imply that it somehow makes a person more perceptive, imaginative, or persuasive.
Considering this is a world based on an RPG game, where things like Perception, Imagination, and Persuasion are all skills or attributes or whatever that can be modified by ticking the integer value up or down, and considering that these "party-time mint-als" are probably yet another element ripped off directly from one of the Fallout games, my guess is that this is exactly what the author has in mind for them. This is actually completely legal; it's his world, and if he wants to invent a magical drug that does something like this he can. All he needs to do is to firmly establish that this is the actual effect the drug produces; unfortunately, though, he hasn't done this. He has only vaguely implied what this drug does, and seems to be relying on the reader's being familiar with whatever thing from Fallout he's ripping off in order to explain the rest. A person on coke might think they have become more persuasive and charming, when in reality they are just babbling like a retard. We don't know if LP's claims of being able to talk anyone into anything should be taken literally or not.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASk_ndnBD0Y
>I’d administered the last of the medical potions to Velvet Remedy. The magical liquid seemed to work achingly slowly at closing her wounds. Now she was left with just the healing bandages to aid Calamity and myself. We didn’t have anywhere near enough. She was still very weak from the loss of blood, and was having trouble standing. Calamity needed a medical brace to fix his leg; Velvet Remedy didn’t want to risk a mending spell until it was properly set. More, he needed serious bed rest to recover from the lightning strike.
And, as long as we're still on the subject of things that are very poorly explained, the way medicine works in this universe is VERY poorly explained. As far as I can tell, no injury in this world is actually fatal; these general-purpose "healing potions" that exist are basically bottles of some kind of grand panacea that will cure literally anything. In addition to this, bandages apparently have some kind of healing property as well, in addition to performing their ordinary purpose of binding wounds and blocking infections. In addition to this, some unicorns are apparently also capable of knitting bones together, healing flesh wounds, and probably healing just about anything else.
Taking all of this together, it's a wonder that anyone in this story has died at all, or that death is even something to be concerned about. If you can have half of your skin flayed off by shrapnel, lose most of your blood, and then cure yourself with band-aids and a potion, you are for all practical purposes immortal. Do the raiders and slavers and all the various enemies in this world not have the same level of access to this stuff that LP and her friends do? LP's group doesn't seem to have any kind of special hook-up; they just find it lying around. Are they just the only group of ponies in this entire world who ever had the bright idea of looking inside of all the old cabinets and safes that are lying around? Or are their enemies just too busy torturing children and decorating their bedrooms with intestines to bother looking around for potions?
All of this is illogical on the same level as the water problem I brought up earlier. There are basically two possible scenarios here: either all of this stuff was made before the war, and there is a limited amount of it in the world, or else these supplies are something commonplace that are either currently made, or are abundant enough that there is little chance of their ever running out. In the first case, this stuff should be much more valuable than it is, to the point where the entire world economy should revolve around it. Why would ponies be worrying about working for bottle caps or digging gems out of the ground? The real path to economic domination would be gathering up and hoarding all the world's panacea potions and magic bandages. Unicorns like Velvet, who have healing abilities, would also be highly sought after; this means that the slavers would have likely imprisoned her as a high-value piece of merchandise instead of simply letting her live and work among them.
In the second case, this stuff would be common enough that literally no one in this world should fear death. If you can just walk around the Wasteland opening random closets and picking up magical cure-all potions, suddenly the thought of having a limb blown off by a raider with a grenade launcher isn't quite as terrifying.
The author tries to make it sound like this stuff is scarce so the party has to scavenge for it, but at the same time there seems to be little competition for it. This makes no sense.
After a page break, LP is apparently still trying to down crack mints despite the alicorn already being defeated, because she doesn't want to deal with the comedown afterward. This is actually pretty accurate addict behavior; based on his writing and his hobbies I'm assuming that kkat took Ritalin as a child, so maybe he has some personal experience to draw from here.
>“But…!” I tried to come up with something that Velvet Remedy would buy. I was amazing now; I could talk anyone into anything. “At least let me hold onto them. I might need them.” And yet somehow, I couldn’t convince the most beautiful mare in the wasteland to let me keep a tin full of medicine.
Speaking of things that haven't been particularly well explained, what exactly these mints even do has not been made tremendously clear either. The mints, again, seem to basically be a powerful stimulant along the lines of cocaine or amphetamine, which stimulates brain activity but won't improve a person's intelligence or vocabulary. However, the author has made multiple references to this drug making it possible to "talk anyone into anything," which seems to imply that it somehow makes a person more perceptive, imaginative, or persuasive.
Considering this is a world based on an RPG game, where things like Perception, Imagination, and Persuasion are all skills or attributes or whatever that can be modified by ticking the integer value up or down, and considering that these "party-time mint-als" are probably yet another element ripped off directly from one of the Fallout games, my guess is that this is exactly what the author has in mind for them. This is actually completely legal; it's his world, and if he wants to invent a magical drug that does something like this he can. All he needs to do is to firmly establish that this is the actual effect the drug produces; unfortunately, though, he hasn't done this. He has only vaguely implied what this drug does, and seems to be relying on the reader's being familiar with whatever thing from Fallout he's ripping off in order to explain the rest. A person on coke might think they have become more persuasive and charming, when in reality they are just babbling like a retard. We don't know if LP's claims of being able to talk anyone into anything should be taken literally or not.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASk_ndnBD0Y
>I’d administered the last of the medical potions to Velvet Remedy. The magical liquid seemed to work achingly slowly at closing her wounds. Now she was left with just the healing bandages to aid Calamity and myself. We didn’t have anywhere near enough. She was still very weak from the loss of blood, and was having trouble standing. Calamity needed a medical brace to fix his leg; Velvet Remedy didn’t want to risk a mending spell until it was properly set. More, he needed serious bed rest to recover from the lightning strike.
And, as long as we're still on the subject of things that are very poorly explained, the way medicine works in this universe is VERY poorly explained. As far as I can tell, no injury in this world is actually fatal; these general-purpose "healing potions" that exist are basically bottles of some kind of grand panacea that will cure literally anything. In addition to this, bandages apparently have some kind of healing property as well, in addition to performing their ordinary purpose of binding wounds and blocking infections. In addition to this, some unicorns are apparently also capable of knitting bones together, healing flesh wounds, and probably healing just about anything else.
Taking all of this together, it's a wonder that anyone in this story has died at all, or that death is even something to be concerned about. If you can have half of your skin flayed off by shrapnel, lose most of your blood, and then cure yourself with band-aids and a potion, you are for all practical purposes immortal. Do the raiders and slavers and all the various enemies in this world not have the same level of access to this stuff that LP and her friends do? LP's group doesn't seem to have any kind of special hook-up; they just find it lying around. Are they just the only group of ponies in this entire world who ever had the bright idea of looking inside of all the old cabinets and safes that are lying around? Or are their enemies just too busy torturing children and decorating their bedrooms with intestines to bother looking around for potions?
All of this is illogical on the same level as the water problem I brought up earlier. There are basically two possible scenarios here: either all of this stuff was made before the war, and there is a limited amount of it in the world, or else these supplies are something commonplace that are either currently made, or are abundant enough that there is little chance of their ever running out. In the first case, this stuff should be much more valuable than it is, to the point where the entire world economy should revolve around it. Why would ponies be worrying about working for bottle caps or digging gems out of the ground? The real path to economic domination would be gathering up and hoarding all the world's panacea potions and magic bandages. Unicorns like Velvet, who have healing abilities, would also be highly sought after; this means that the slavers would have likely imprisoned her as a high-value piece of merchandise instead of simply letting her live and work among them.
In the second case, this stuff would be common enough that literally no one in this world should fear death. If you can just walk around the Wasteland opening random closets and picking up magical cure-all potions, suddenly the thought of having a limb blown off by a raider with a grenade launcher isn't quite as terrifying.
The author tries to make it sound like this stuff is scarce so the party has to scavenge for it, but at the same time there seems to be little competition for it. This makes no sense.
>>296623
Anyway, the author has placed them in what he seems to think is a dire situation: pretty much everypony in their party was technically mortally wounded, but even though they have a cure for that now, there's only so much magic elixir and special all-purpose-boo-boo-healer bandages to go around. So, they are probably going to have to take it easy for the next few days. But will the Wasteland allow them to? Let's find out.
In the meantime, LP decides to go down to the sugar shack or whatever it's called and see if Roboponer is okay.
>I had to wave Velvet Remedy back before I approached the unmoving armored figure crumpled against the shack below. Harnessing my levitation, I could pass over the minefield safely. Velvet Remedy could not.
"No, Velvet, I know you want to come with me, but you must rest yourself! Only I can magically lift myself up by my own asshole and float myself to safety over nearly any obstacle. Only I can harness the refreshing power of crack cocaine and think up preposterous ways to kill an enemy, that logically shouldn't work but do for some reason. It's a heavy, heavy burden being the strongest and best at everything but also being tiny and weak somehow because the author says so. So rest yourself, my little lesbo crush, while I levitate myself over this field of landmines so I can rub grand panacea ointment all over the mortal bum wounds of this all-powerful killbot." Have I mentioned recently that I hate this character?
>Between the alicorn’s thought-words and the label my PipBuck had spontaneously given the shack, it didn’t take Party-Time Mint-al-enhanced smarts to realize that this had probably been SteelHooves.
So...she's saying that SteelHooves is Roboponer's name? I don't really see how that's a given. "SteelHooves Shack" is the name that the PipBuck gave this location, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's a shack belonging to someone named SteelHooves. If that were the case, the PipBuck would have called it "SteelHooves' Shack", with a trailing apostrophe denoting ownership, and I know that a consummate professional like kkat wouldn't make such an obvious grammatical error. So, logic would dictate that SteelHooves would be the name of the shack itself, not the name of the Roboponer it contains. I mean, if you were exploring the ruins of post apocalyptic Orlando and found a place your PipBuck told you is called Disney World, would you automatically assume that the eight foot tall robotic Mickey Mouse guarding the place was named Disney? I wouldn't.
Here's why this matters. Earlier, when we first encountered Roboponer, here is how it was described:
>It was a mighty relic from the war, a “Steel Ranger”. A bright lamp on its forehead spotlighted its target, and the huge gun on the right side of its monstrous battle saddle began to fire again.
The quotation marks and the capital letters suggest that the proper term for this kind of thing is Steel Ranger. At the time I actually remember this line striking me as odd; this seems like another one of those weird instances where LP knows some random historical fact that it doesn't seem like she ought to know.
Anyway, next we have this:
>The great alicorn hunter… meaning there were more of these. Possibly a lot more. The thought was frightening.
This indicates that this robot is a type of thing, not a unique individual thing. Thus, its name would refer to its type and not itself; if the unit itself has a proper name we don't know it yet. So, is thing called a Steel Ranger or a SteelHooves? "Steel Ranger" is a term that Littlepoop seems to just know for some reason, and SteelHooves is something that her PipBuck gave her, which she simply assumed was the name of this type of thing even though she already gave us a name for it. Hence my confusion.
Is it possible that SteelHooves is the name of this particular Steel Ranger, and Littlepoop knows this because the PipBuck told her that this is his shack? Who knows; I'm probably spending far more time on this puzzle than it really deserves.
>The metal stallion (or, at least, I was assuming stallion based on the form of the armor) had not moved since the battle. I crouched down next to the fallen Ranger (several of my bandages shifting and coming undone as I did so, my wounds oozing blood).
Now she's back to calling it a Ranger.
Anyway, we get a closer look at the SteelHooves and/or Steel Ranger:
>Up close, the armor was even more impressive. It had its own air filtration system, complete life support, even mechanized drug injection. The damage from the rockets was far less than it had any right to be. Still, the armor had cave in at the point of impact, gruesomely crushing the pony inside.
So apparently it's not a robot or a cyborg, it's just an extremely sophisticated suit of armor. Good to know.
>I tried to find a way to remove the helmet. If there was one, it was well concealed. But I found a jackpoint that would allow my PipBuck to interface with the helmet’s own arcane technology matrix.
"I have never seen this particular piece of 200 year old technology before, but I automatically know two different names for it, and also this thing I wear on my wrist can just connect to it automatically and communicate with it because reasons." Have I mentioned recently that I hate this character?
>I pulled out a tool from my utility barding, already suspecting that the helmet included its own E.F.S. and S.A.T.S. equivalents, if not more.
Of course it does, and of course you would suspect that. If anything, you're being too modest here; you don't just suspect, you know. You are Mary Sue, the author's Chosen One, destined to know all and see all, and have all the answers and all the powers. There is nary a problem in this world you could possibly encounter whose solution isn't buried somewhere in the vast pocket dimension contained within your asshole, just waiting for you to reach in and pull it out.
Anyway, the author has placed them in what he seems to think is a dire situation: pretty much everypony in their party was technically mortally wounded, but even though they have a cure for that now, there's only so much magic elixir and special all-purpose-boo-boo-healer bandages to go around. So, they are probably going to have to take it easy for the next few days. But will the Wasteland allow them to? Let's find out.
In the meantime, LP decides to go down to the sugar shack or whatever it's called and see if Roboponer is okay.
>I had to wave Velvet Remedy back before I approached the unmoving armored figure crumpled against the shack below. Harnessing my levitation, I could pass over the minefield safely. Velvet Remedy could not.
"No, Velvet, I know you want to come with me, but you must rest yourself! Only I can magically lift myself up by my own asshole and float myself to safety over nearly any obstacle. Only I can harness the refreshing power of crack cocaine and think up preposterous ways to kill an enemy, that logically shouldn't work but do for some reason. It's a heavy, heavy burden being the strongest and best at everything but also being tiny and weak somehow because the author says so. So rest yourself, my little lesbo crush, while I levitate myself over this field of landmines so I can rub grand panacea ointment all over the mortal bum wounds of this all-powerful killbot." Have I mentioned recently that I hate this character?
>Between the alicorn’s thought-words and the label my PipBuck had spontaneously given the shack, it didn’t take Party-Time Mint-al-enhanced smarts to realize that this had probably been SteelHooves.
So...she's saying that SteelHooves is Roboponer's name? I don't really see how that's a given. "SteelHooves Shack" is the name that the PipBuck gave this location, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's a shack belonging to someone named SteelHooves. If that were the case, the PipBuck would have called it "SteelHooves' Shack", with a trailing apostrophe denoting ownership, and I know that a consummate professional like kkat wouldn't make such an obvious grammatical error. So, logic would dictate that SteelHooves would be the name of the shack itself, not the name of the Roboponer it contains. I mean, if you were exploring the ruins of post apocalyptic Orlando and found a place your PipBuck told you is called Disney World, would you automatically assume that the eight foot tall robotic Mickey Mouse guarding the place was named Disney? I wouldn't.
Here's why this matters. Earlier, when we first encountered Roboponer, here is how it was described:
>It was a mighty relic from the war, a “Steel Ranger”. A bright lamp on its forehead spotlighted its target, and the huge gun on the right side of its monstrous battle saddle began to fire again.
The quotation marks and the capital letters suggest that the proper term for this kind of thing is Steel Ranger. At the time I actually remember this line striking me as odd; this seems like another one of those weird instances where LP knows some random historical fact that it doesn't seem like she ought to know.
Anyway, next we have this:
>The great alicorn hunter… meaning there were more of these. Possibly a lot more. The thought was frightening.
This indicates that this robot is a type of thing, not a unique individual thing. Thus, its name would refer to its type and not itself; if the unit itself has a proper name we don't know it yet. So, is thing called a Steel Ranger or a SteelHooves? "Steel Ranger" is a term that Littlepoop seems to just know for some reason, and SteelHooves is something that her PipBuck gave her, which she simply assumed was the name of this type of thing even though she already gave us a name for it. Hence my confusion.
Is it possible that SteelHooves is the name of this particular Steel Ranger, and Littlepoop knows this because the PipBuck told her that this is his shack? Who knows; I'm probably spending far more time on this puzzle than it really deserves.
>The metal stallion (or, at least, I was assuming stallion based on the form of the armor) had not moved since the battle. I crouched down next to the fallen Ranger (several of my bandages shifting and coming undone as I did so, my wounds oozing blood).
Now she's back to calling it a Ranger.
Anyway, we get a closer look at the SteelHooves and/or Steel Ranger:
>Up close, the armor was even more impressive. It had its own air filtration system, complete life support, even mechanized drug injection. The damage from the rockets was far less than it had any right to be. Still, the armor had cave in at the point of impact, gruesomely crushing the pony inside.
So apparently it's not a robot or a cyborg, it's just an extremely sophisticated suit of armor. Good to know.
>I tried to find a way to remove the helmet. If there was one, it was well concealed. But I found a jackpoint that would allow my PipBuck to interface with the helmet’s own arcane technology matrix.
"I have never seen this particular piece of 200 year old technology before, but I automatically know two different names for it, and also this thing I wear on my wrist can just connect to it automatically and communicate with it because reasons." Have I mentioned recently that I hate this character?
>I pulled out a tool from my utility barding, already suspecting that the helmet included its own E.F.S. and S.A.T.S. equivalents, if not more.
Of course it does, and of course you would suspect that. If anything, you're being too modest here; you don't just suspect, you know. You are Mary Sue, the author's Chosen One, destined to know all and see all, and have all the answers and all the powers. There is nary a problem in this world you could possibly encounter whose solution isn't buried somewhere in the vast pocket dimension contained within your asshole, just waiting for you to reach in and pull it out.
>>296605
Actually got a physical copy of Pink Eyes. Bought it for shits and giggles at a convention after losing an auction for another fanfic book. Got about halfway through it but my interest slowly waned due to it following the filly main character and no much happening. Fallout Equestria and PH have the benefit of having a sociopathic horn dog so could be baffled at all the crazy stuff they do so can get some entertainment from it like this review we are all enjoying (except maybe Glim Glam for having to read it but he's a trooper).
Feel like the pegasus stuff should have been established earlier. Even just hints about the clouds or mysterious pegasus ponies attacking places with a lightning strike (not actual lightning but hey considering the fact they can control weather could maybe do that to) decimating certain communities with survivors terrified of them.
Figured what was said earlier to where it'd make more sense to cut their wings off so they can't fly but you'd think they wouldn't want Dashites to share their secrets or use their training to help surface ponies so would probably be keeping tabs on the surface and send kill squads to hunt down Dashites that are trying to play the upstart hero.
Would give Calamity a reason why he was loitering at Appleossa and wasn't trying to interfere with the salve trade. Could be opposed to it and respect Rainbow Dash's element of loyalty but too scared to help and have the Enclave come and kill him. Could give him some extra depth having the training and the drive to be a hero but too scared of reprisal to actually act on it and sees LP as his chance to atone for being passive for so long and want to make a difference.
LittlePip learning about all that could have made her initial shock at the open sky be a constant anxiety. While the Stable ceiling was a bland canvas it was a shelter at the least but now she is in this vast open expanse with no cover or protection knowing that there are enemies who could be watching them and listening to DJ Pon-3 and have her and Calamity worried that Enclave soldiers may be listening in.
Velvet even could have a good reaction to it thinking that being outside means she is free but now realized the irony that even outside she is still in a cage created and watched by ponies who are closer to birds and have the ability to fly freely. Would give her a new motivation to free the ponies on the surface from this ever present cage of the clouds.
Also as an earth pony fan glad to see they are shafted even further and relegated to useless idiot melee meat shield while unicorns are super wizards and pegasus ponies can grow sky crops while earth ponies have no distinguishing traits in this universe and one of their main gimmicks which is to help nurture animals and plants is not present. Swear most the community just sees them as pack mules.
Actually got a physical copy of Pink Eyes. Bought it for shits and giggles at a convention after losing an auction for another fanfic book. Got about halfway through it but my interest slowly waned due to it following the filly main character and no much happening. Fallout Equestria and PH have the benefit of having a sociopathic horn dog so could be baffled at all the crazy stuff they do so can get some entertainment from it like this review we are all enjoying (except maybe Glim Glam for having to read it but he's a trooper).
Feel like the pegasus stuff should have been established earlier. Even just hints about the clouds or mysterious pegasus ponies attacking places with a lightning strike (not actual lightning but hey considering the fact they can control weather could maybe do that to) decimating certain communities with survivors terrified of them.
Figured what was said earlier to where it'd make more sense to cut their wings off so they can't fly but you'd think they wouldn't want Dashites to share their secrets or use their training to help surface ponies so would probably be keeping tabs on the surface and send kill squads to hunt down Dashites that are trying to play the upstart hero.
Would give Calamity a reason why he was loitering at Appleossa and wasn't trying to interfere with the salve trade. Could be opposed to it and respect Rainbow Dash's element of loyalty but too scared to help and have the Enclave come and kill him. Could give him some extra depth having the training and the drive to be a hero but too scared of reprisal to actually act on it and sees LP as his chance to atone for being passive for so long and want to make a difference.
LittlePip learning about all that could have made her initial shock at the open sky be a constant anxiety. While the Stable ceiling was a bland canvas it was a shelter at the least but now she is in this vast open expanse with no cover or protection knowing that there are enemies who could be watching them and listening to DJ Pon-3 and have her and Calamity worried that Enclave soldiers may be listening in.
Velvet even could have a good reaction to it thinking that being outside means she is free but now realized the irony that even outside she is still in a cage created and watched by ponies who are closer to birds and have the ability to fly freely. Would give her a new motivation to free the ponies on the surface from this ever present cage of the clouds.
Also as an earth pony fan glad to see they are shafted even further and relegated to useless idiot melee meat shield while unicorns are super wizards and pegasus ponies can grow sky crops while earth ponies have no distinguishing traits in this universe and one of their main gimmicks which is to help nurture animals and plants is not present. Swear most the community just sees them as pack mules.
>>296471
>Come to think of it, do real needle guns make needles neatly sink into meat with superhuman accuracy that could disable specific pressure points and make needle-tossing ninjas jealous, or do needle guns just shred the shit out of meat and armour and everything else?
I will preface this by saying that I am not an expert in weapons nor was I ever a particularly bright physics student, so if anyone who knows more about these subjects wants to correct me here feel free, but based on my limited knowledge here is my view.
An ordinary modern firearm round contains a small amount of compressed gas and a charge. When you pull the trigger, a hammer strikes and ignites the charge, which causes the gas to explode. This creates a force inside the barrel, and since the barrel is strong enough to contain the force of the explosion, the projectile in the barrel has nowhere to go but forward. Obviously, a needle is just a needle; you can't really rig it with its own gas canister and an explosive charge, so you'd have to create some kind of force inside the barrel itself that would move the needle forward. If you were going to do this with an explosion, you'd have to put the explosive charge inside the barrel and then manually ignite it somehow, so you'd end up with something like a musket, where you'd have to put a fresh powder charge into the barrel every time you fire it. This would kind of defeat the point of a needle gun, which as I understand it is supposed to shoot multiple needles fairly rapidly.
The best way to manage this then would be to use compressed air like a BB gun. You would probably have a canister of compressed air that would go into the handle or something, and then every time the trigger is pulled it releases a burst of air that fires a needle. A BB gun is obviously not as deadly as a real gun, and my assumption is that this is because the release of air that launches the BB is nowhere near as powerful a force as the compressed gas explosion that launches a bullet. Presumably a needle gun would be similar, so the weapon's effect would come from the sharpness of the needle rather than blunt force. The effectiveness of a needle gun would probably vary based on how much pressure is in the air cartridge (or whatever it has), and the density of whatever you're firing at. If it hit you in the eyeball for example your eye would be pretty much fucked. Anything soft and spongy like flesh or fatty tissue it would probably drill through. Muscle and bone would probably stop a needle; except for a few vulnerable spots, it's unlikely a needler would be able to hit your body with enough force to hit anything vital on the inside. Most armor would probably deflect it (not chain mail obviously).
It seems like the kind of weapon that could be extremely nasty to get shot with, and would be more than enough to make someone think twice about attacking you, but unless you dip the needles in poison or can somehow produce a yuge amount of force to launch the needle, it's unlikely to be deadly.
>Ever get the feeling this fic would be better if it was an intentional parody of the idea of shoving something like Fallout into FIM?
This has been my view for some time now.
>>296605
>Now that Calamity has revealed himself to be a Dashite, what do you think of him personally and as a character?
I can't really say what I think of Calamity being a Dashite because the word "Dashite" doesn't really mean anything yet. We have no idea why the pegasi decided to break off from Equestria during the war, or why being separate from it is still important to them 200 years after the fact. We also don't know anything about why Calamity decided to leave them, or if it was even his decision to do so. For all we know they kicked him out for diddling colts or something. This information won't mean anything until we know more about what actually happened.
>I think this would be a better reveal if we knew more about the Enclave, the Dashites, the betrayal of the Pegasi, and the branding before we learned he was mixed up in all of this once.
Knowing this would make it a more significant reveal, but that doesn't mean the author is necessarily wrong to do it this way. We know something about Calamity that we didn't know before, it just doesn't mean anything yet. This shows us that there is more to his character than we've thus far seen, but we still don't know the details, which makes him mysterious and therefore interesting.
You could potentially develop a character like this rather artfully by giving the reader a blunt fact about him up front, and then filling in the details behind it as you go. For instance, if you started out a story by introducing a soldier who had sold out his platoon to the enemy, you could potentially make it interesting by giving the reader nothing except this information up front, and then gradually introducing bits and pieces of his past that explain why he did it. Why did the soldier defect? Was he a coward? Was it greed? Did he have some crisis of conscience over what his side was doing? If you tell the reader that your character did something controversial without explaining the controversy, it provokes curiosity and keeps the reader interested, whereas if you just told them up front that the soldier changed sides because he thought the enemy had cuter uniforms, the reader would just be like "oh," and then wonder why the fuck they should even bother reading all the rest of the words you wrote.
Absalom Absalom by William Faulkner is a good example of this kind of thing. The first chapter basically gives you the entire plot of the book, but it only covers the actual events, and they are colored by a particular character's opinions. As the story unfolds, you learn more about the characters involved and their actual desires and motivations. I'm certainly not saying that kkat is doing anything along the same lines as Faulkner, just that this is an acceptable way to build backstory.
>Come to think of it, do real needle guns make needles neatly sink into meat with superhuman accuracy that could disable specific pressure points and make needle-tossing ninjas jealous, or do needle guns just shred the shit out of meat and armour and everything else?
I will preface this by saying that I am not an expert in weapons nor was I ever a particularly bright physics student, so if anyone who knows more about these subjects wants to correct me here feel free, but based on my limited knowledge here is my view.
An ordinary modern firearm round contains a small amount of compressed gas and a charge. When you pull the trigger, a hammer strikes and ignites the charge, which causes the gas to explode. This creates a force inside the barrel, and since the barrel is strong enough to contain the force of the explosion, the projectile in the barrel has nowhere to go but forward. Obviously, a needle is just a needle; you can't really rig it with its own gas canister and an explosive charge, so you'd have to create some kind of force inside the barrel itself that would move the needle forward. If you were going to do this with an explosion, you'd have to put the explosive charge inside the barrel and then manually ignite it somehow, so you'd end up with something like a musket, where you'd have to put a fresh powder charge into the barrel every time you fire it. This would kind of defeat the point of a needle gun, which as I understand it is supposed to shoot multiple needles fairly rapidly.
The best way to manage this then would be to use compressed air like a BB gun. You would probably have a canister of compressed air that would go into the handle or something, and then every time the trigger is pulled it releases a burst of air that fires a needle. A BB gun is obviously not as deadly as a real gun, and my assumption is that this is because the release of air that launches the BB is nowhere near as powerful a force as the compressed gas explosion that launches a bullet. Presumably a needle gun would be similar, so the weapon's effect would come from the sharpness of the needle rather than blunt force. The effectiveness of a needle gun would probably vary based on how much pressure is in the air cartridge (or whatever it has), and the density of whatever you're firing at. If it hit you in the eyeball for example your eye would be pretty much fucked. Anything soft and spongy like flesh or fatty tissue it would probably drill through. Muscle and bone would probably stop a needle; except for a few vulnerable spots, it's unlikely a needler would be able to hit your body with enough force to hit anything vital on the inside. Most armor would probably deflect it (not chain mail obviously).
It seems like the kind of weapon that could be extremely nasty to get shot with, and would be more than enough to make someone think twice about attacking you, but unless you dip the needles in poison or can somehow produce a yuge amount of force to launch the needle, it's unlikely to be deadly.
>Ever get the feeling this fic would be better if it was an intentional parody of the idea of shoving something like Fallout into FIM?
This has been my view for some time now.
>>296605
>Now that Calamity has revealed himself to be a Dashite, what do you think of him personally and as a character?
I can't really say what I think of Calamity being a Dashite because the word "Dashite" doesn't really mean anything yet. We have no idea why the pegasi decided to break off from Equestria during the war, or why being separate from it is still important to them 200 years after the fact. We also don't know anything about why Calamity decided to leave them, or if it was even his decision to do so. For all we know they kicked him out for diddling colts or something. This information won't mean anything until we know more about what actually happened.
>I think this would be a better reveal if we knew more about the Enclave, the Dashites, the betrayal of the Pegasi, and the branding before we learned he was mixed up in all of this once.
Knowing this would make it a more significant reveal, but that doesn't mean the author is necessarily wrong to do it this way. We know something about Calamity that we didn't know before, it just doesn't mean anything yet. This shows us that there is more to his character than we've thus far seen, but we still don't know the details, which makes him mysterious and therefore interesting.
You could potentially develop a character like this rather artfully by giving the reader a blunt fact about him up front, and then filling in the details behind it as you go. For instance, if you started out a story by introducing a soldier who had sold out his platoon to the enemy, you could potentially make it interesting by giving the reader nothing except this information up front, and then gradually introducing bits and pieces of his past that explain why he did it. Why did the soldier defect? Was he a coward? Was it greed? Did he have some crisis of conscience over what his side was doing? If you tell the reader that your character did something controversial without explaining the controversy, it provokes curiosity and keeps the reader interested, whereas if you just told them up front that the soldier changed sides because he thought the enemy had cuter uniforms, the reader would just be like "oh," and then wonder why the fuck they should even bother reading all the rest of the words you wrote.
Absalom Absalom by William Faulkner is a good example of this kind of thing. The first chapter basically gives you the entire plot of the book, but it only covers the actual events, and they are colored by a particular character's opinions. As the story unfolds, you learn more about the characters involved and their actual desires and motivations. I'm certainly not saying that kkat is doing anything along the same lines as Faulkner, just that this is an acceptable way to build backstory.
>>296621
>The memory orb trick
I guess you could fudge it and say "The memory orb only works if your magic squeezes down on the ball hard enough or pushes into the ball" but in that case it sure is convenient the Alicorn held the memory orb wrong while assuming it was a grenade and got cutscene triggered by it. You know, instead of trying to bounce the "grenade" back by smacking it with a magically conjured shield wall that could also bounce away the grenade blast if it detonated early.
Come to think of it, how do Earth Ponies and Pegasi and Donkeys/Zebras/Dragons/other S1 creatures use these things?
Anyway this moment gets dumber in retrospect. If you're cool with me spoiling something the author already blatantly spoiled ahead of time because he forgot it was a twist in fallout 1, a hive mind unifies all Alicorns. What one sees, the hive mind learns from. It's how they recognized Littlepip on sight even though the Alicorn she dropped a boxcar on died. All Alicorns are cunts and their minds are linked to the gigacunt in charge.
For this Memory Orb "That strange spherical ball's probably a grenade so I had better toss it back- OH FUCK NOW I'M IN A FLASHBACK" trick to work, not a single one of any of the many Wasteland-wandering completely-fertile-yet-daughter-creating-only 200+ year old Alicorns can have ever encountered a Memory Orb, ever. They can't've even seen one. Or heard any sort of rumors or myths about these things.
Hell, the hive mind's ruled by Trixie, who is a pony who existed during the same pre-war times as Fluttershy and the rest.
While Fluttershy and some other Mane Six members were filling a shitload of memory orbs with random scenes from their lives, and Trixie was working with Twilight on a secret project, Trixie supposedly never heard of or encountered or played with a Memory Orb even once?! This is like if some voice actress from the modern day survived 200 years yet couldn't tell her hive mind's future-people about old phones 200 years later because she had somehow never heard of or seen or tried using a Smart Phone and absolutely none of her hive-mind-buddies or their girl-only families or captured males killed by snu-snu ever ran into any Smart Phones or anyone who knew about them either.
>The healing problem
Yep. The only Health Point you have that matters is your last one.
Once you have a lot of healing items in Fallout 3/NV you can map them to a button and run around spamming that button to keep your health full no matter what dangers you run into.
Beartraps and landmines and other traps and enemy attacks can be ignored by those with enough healing items. And those games are so generous with their healing item supply, mods to make them rarer were swiftly coded.
NV's Hardcore Mode (in addition to new Food/Water/Sleep requirements) fixed a little of this by making Stimpaks heal over time instead of healing instantly. Also forces you to use the rarer-than-stimpaks Doctor's Bag items or the addictive drug Hydra to fix limb damage, so crippled legs can slow you down in fights and broken arms can reduce your gun accuracy.
Now dangerous situations can kill you faster than stimpaks can heal you, even if you've got 500+ stimpaks pocketed!
I still use a mod so Stimpaks dehydrate you and make you tired and hungrier. It makes sense, since fully healing from 5 bulletholes in 6 seconds should take a lot out of you. Also gives you a reason to carry more food/water, meaning less of your limited carry weight's spent on guns and bullets and empty space for any loot you find.
Would it be correct to say authors should do something similar to reduce the "game-breaking" (story-breaking) power and convenience of Stimpaks/Healing Potions/other analogue for the Floor Chicken that instantly restores your health points?
This is unusual for me but real book comparison time.
in Shadow Of The Conqueror by Shad M. Brooks, there are special magic people who can heal themselves and some special people who can heal others using magic.
Medical technology's shit as a result in this semi-medieval world because everyone relies on Healers for their healing, so you can survive near-death experiences with a healer nearby but without one, even simple wounds can fuck you up from injury/infection.
In a world where a third of the pony population are Unicorns who CAN learn healing spells, but any type of pony can be destined to get a healing Cutie Mark to represent how they should be doctors/magical healers/something specific, would it really make sense for them to be medical experts who know about things like bones and how they might wrong?
Would a society used to solving its problems with magic and friendship think it's worth trying to understand the body, or think it's worth performing autopsies on dead ponies?
Why would a society able to make Healing Potions not make Energy/Magic-Restoring Potions for the horned healers?
If cartoon ponies understood how germs worked, would ponies put antibacterial gel in First Aid Kits or shrinking potions so ponies can shrink themselves down to physically beat germs up like in every "shrink and go inside someone's body" stock episode ever?
Zebras invented potions and can make healing potions, so why do ponies at war with Zebrica (and Zebras in general, not that they realize this until it's too late) have so many healing potions? If ponies can make potions too, why does Kkat never do anything with that idea? Where's the racist pony potioneer who says "We make potions better than you stripey idiots! You're stripey like my mom's underwear, you zigger faggots!"?
It's supposed to be a part of this story that War-Era Equestria was full of retards who didn't know how to treat PTSD and had no idea what it was. So why would they have our modern understanding of bones/medicine/healing without magic AND magical insta-heal cheat spells AND so many different kinds of magical mass-produced insta-heal cheat items that they're still somewhat plentiful after the war?
>The memory orb trick
I guess you could fudge it and say "The memory orb only works if your magic squeezes down on the ball hard enough or pushes into the ball" but in that case it sure is convenient the Alicorn held the memory orb wrong while assuming it was a grenade and got cutscene triggered by it. You know, instead of trying to bounce the "grenade" back by smacking it with a magically conjured shield wall that could also bounce away the grenade blast if it detonated early.
Come to think of it, how do Earth Ponies and Pegasi and Donkeys/Zebras/Dragons/other S1 creatures use these things?
Anyway this moment gets dumber in retrospect. If you're cool with me spoiling something the author already blatantly spoiled ahead of time because he forgot it was a twist in fallout 1, a hive mind unifies all Alicorns. What one sees, the hive mind learns from. It's how they recognized Littlepip on sight even though the Alicorn she dropped a boxcar on died. All Alicorns are cunts and their minds are linked to the gigacunt in charge.
For this Memory Orb "That strange spherical ball's probably a grenade so I had better toss it back- OH FUCK NOW I'M IN A FLASHBACK" trick to work, not a single one of any of the many Wasteland-wandering completely-fertile-yet-daughter-creating-only 200+ year old Alicorns can have ever encountered a Memory Orb, ever. They can't've even seen one. Or heard any sort of rumors or myths about these things.
Hell, the hive mind's ruled by Trixie, who is a pony who existed during the same pre-war times as Fluttershy and the rest.
While Fluttershy and some other Mane Six members were filling a shitload of memory orbs with random scenes from their lives, and Trixie was working with Twilight on a secret project, Trixie supposedly never heard of or encountered or played with a Memory Orb even once?! This is like if some voice actress from the modern day survived 200 years yet couldn't tell her hive mind's future-people about old phones 200 years later because she had somehow never heard of or seen or tried using a Smart Phone and absolutely none of her hive-mind-buddies or their girl-only families or captured males killed by snu-snu ever ran into any Smart Phones or anyone who knew about them either.
>The healing problem
Yep. The only Health Point you have that matters is your last one.
Once you have a lot of healing items in Fallout 3/NV you can map them to a button and run around spamming that button to keep your health full no matter what dangers you run into.
Beartraps and landmines and other traps and enemy attacks can be ignored by those with enough healing items. And those games are so generous with their healing item supply, mods to make them rarer were swiftly coded.
NV's Hardcore Mode (in addition to new Food/Water/Sleep requirements) fixed a little of this by making Stimpaks heal over time instead of healing instantly. Also forces you to use the rarer-than-stimpaks Doctor's Bag items or the addictive drug Hydra to fix limb damage, so crippled legs can slow you down in fights and broken arms can reduce your gun accuracy.
Now dangerous situations can kill you faster than stimpaks can heal you, even if you've got 500+ stimpaks pocketed!
I still use a mod so Stimpaks dehydrate you and make you tired and hungrier. It makes sense, since fully healing from 5 bulletholes in 6 seconds should take a lot out of you. Also gives you a reason to carry more food/water, meaning less of your limited carry weight's spent on guns and bullets and empty space for any loot you find.
Would it be correct to say authors should do something similar to reduce the "game-breaking" (story-breaking) power and convenience of Stimpaks/Healing Potions/other analogue for the Floor Chicken that instantly restores your health points?
This is unusual for me but real book comparison time.
in Shadow Of The Conqueror by Shad M. Brooks, there are special magic people who can heal themselves and some special people who can heal others using magic.
Medical technology's shit as a result in this semi-medieval world because everyone relies on Healers for their healing, so you can survive near-death experiences with a healer nearby but without one, even simple wounds can fuck you up from injury/infection.
In a world where a third of the pony population are Unicorns who CAN learn healing spells, but any type of pony can be destined to get a healing Cutie Mark to represent how they should be doctors/magical healers/something specific, would it really make sense for them to be medical experts who know about things like bones and how they might wrong?
Would a society used to solving its problems with magic and friendship think it's worth trying to understand the body, or think it's worth performing autopsies on dead ponies?
Why would a society able to make Healing Potions not make Energy/Magic-Restoring Potions for the horned healers?
If cartoon ponies understood how germs worked, would ponies put antibacterial gel in First Aid Kits or shrinking potions so ponies can shrink themselves down to physically beat germs up like in every "shrink and go inside someone's body" stock episode ever?
Zebras invented potions and can make healing potions, so why do ponies at war with Zebrica (and Zebras in general, not that they realize this until it's too late) have so many healing potions? If ponies can make potions too, why does Kkat never do anything with that idea? Where's the racist pony potioneer who says "We make potions better than you stripey idiots! You're stripey like my mom's underwear, you zigger faggots!"?
It's supposed to be a part of this story that War-Era Equestria was full of retards who didn't know how to treat PTSD and had no idea what it was. So why would they have our modern understanding of bones/medicine/healing without magic AND magical insta-heal cheat spells AND so many different kinds of magical mass-produced insta-heal cheat items that they're still somewhat plentiful after the war?
>>296626
LP's Pipbuck gave her the name of SteelHooves on sight and his home's name, and she recognized him as "a Steel Ranger" which is also dumb.
These moments of "Littlepip sometimes knows her own kind's history and sometimes she doesn't but we have to discover it alongside her even if she already knows something and reminds herself what she already knows for our benefit sometimes" are stupid. How does she know what a Steel Ranger is, when up until this point we have no idea what one is?
If they're a pre-war thing every Stable Pony knows of, it should be foreshadowed sooner.
Perhaps during chapter 1 while Littlepip stares at a wall while on the clock at her pipbuck repair place and thinks "Needs a mural", two faggy co-workers of hers could argue with each other over whether Applejack's Steel Rangers or Rainbow Dash's Shadowbolts were cooler.
Could foreshadow or comically exaggerate the capabilities of the Steel Ranger we're encountering now, and the capabilities of the Pegasus Enclave baddies we'll eventually meet, by saying shit like... uh...
>"The Steel Ranger's armour is two feet thick and weighs 300 pounds, and they can lift 700 pounds! They carry miniguns with armour-piercing 50cal bullets on their right side, a 150mm tank gun on their back, and on their left they've got a rapid-fire auto-targeting grenade launcher on their back that can spit out six 40mm grenades a second and takes 120-round grenade drums! And that's on top of anything their mouths carry into battle, like the Heavy Flamer or Super-Heavy Flamer! Their suits literally heal them faster than a standard flamethrower can hurt them! Their suits are enchanted to absorb fire and burn it as fuel! For their journeys, no challenge is too great! They also have huge magic hardlight Tower Shields that can block enemy bullets but not their own and retractable massive 40 pound chainsaw swords connected to their asses by a retractable steel cable and commanded by their SATS attack system! Plus with their piston-enhanced kicks that can shatter concrete, a Steel Ranger could beat the shit out of any Shadowbolt!"
>"Maybe if they can catch them, which they can't. Brute strength doesn't matter when you can fly faster than a fighter jet! If a Shadowbolt gets into melee range, his vibroblade deathsteel wingblades will slice a Steel Ranger's head clean off! Or he can manipulate the wind itself with his Ceremonial Wind Saber to whip up a tornado or slice your head off from up to 1000 meters away! All they need is a clean line of sight and a second to swing that sword hard enough, and you're fucking dead, kiddo. Or their Tractor Beam can magically lift anything up to 1200 pounds! Or they can fly way higher than any unarmoured pony could ever dream of, flying so high you can't see them and everypony else's Power Armour would ice up and everypony without Power Armour would be completely unable to breathe, since a proper Shadowbolt suit stores enough oxygen for 30 minutes of sustained almost-orbital flight! And he carries enough long-range miniguns and lock-on missiles to destroy a whole army of enemy aircraft, and he has enough easily-dropped bombs to flatten a small town! First they drop a bunch of small grenade-sized bombs from bomber-doors on a secret compartment in their stomach, then the shrinking spell on that compartment wears off and the grenade-sized bombs grow to the size of houses! He can carry all sorts of supplies and extra ammo in that special shrinking compartment. He even carry megaspells and fire them at will, goddamn it! Can your stupid fucking Steel Ranger faggots survive explosion spells big enough to take out whole cities?"
"Yes! Yes, they can! Remember how the Ziggers dropped a Hellfire nuke on Fillydelphia and it killed or mutated everypony EXCEPT the Steel Rangers dancing in a military parade with their armour on? Tanks melted, skyscrapers crumbled, and the Steel Rangers still fucking stood. Fire and thunder! Blood and brotherhood! The Steel Rangers are the greatest heroes in the ENTIRE MULTI GALAXY-UNIVERSE TIMES A BILLION!"
"Ok, so Steel Rangers can survive explosive Megaspells. They can't just shrug off other magical effects put into Megaspells, like mind-control ones that make you kill your friends or shrinking ones that make you tiny or transformation ones that turn you into cows forever! Remember when we dropped the Cow Bomb on the Zigger capital, whatever the fuck its stupid muh-bongo-donger name was, for suicide-bombing our schools? The Shadowbolts could turn your Steel Rangers into fucking cows, retard! Blood and brotherhood? More like milk and chewing cud!"
"Fuck you, asshole! Even if a Steel Ranger was turned into a cow, he'd still be cooler than a Shadowbolt! Steel Rangers are honourable Earth Ponies who will proudly face a thousand enemies alone to give their unarmoured friends the time to retreat! Shadowbolts are pussy faggots who only care about themselves and betrayed Equestria as soon as Rainbow Dash pussied out of life!"
"You fucking take that back, you fucking bitch! Rainbow Dash is still alive out there somewhere, and she'll save us all some day!"
"Yeah, like the rest of her friends were supposed to? It's been 200 years since Equestria got bombed. Twilight and her friends failed Equestria, and it's their fault the world died!"
Then those two guys fistfight over this but the story mostly ignores them like they're background noise.
Meanwhile Littlepip is thinking to herself "This wall definitely needs a mural. Also these losers need girlfriends. I want a girlfriend too".
I might have gone overboard with the weaponry there, but making their in-story appearances far weaker than they are in legend could always be blamed on propaganda and the Steel Rangers/Shadowbolts (Who will become the Enclave for no reason) having already used up their best gear during the war, leaving them with the same third-rate mass-produced military gear that would eventually become the standard 200-year-old shit used by Wastelanders today.
LP's Pipbuck gave her the name of SteelHooves on sight and his home's name, and she recognized him as "a Steel Ranger" which is also dumb.
These moments of "Littlepip sometimes knows her own kind's history and sometimes she doesn't but we have to discover it alongside her even if she already knows something and reminds herself what she already knows for our benefit sometimes" are stupid. How does she know what a Steel Ranger is, when up until this point we have no idea what one is?
If they're a pre-war thing every Stable Pony knows of, it should be foreshadowed sooner.
Perhaps during chapter 1 while Littlepip stares at a wall while on the clock at her pipbuck repair place and thinks "Needs a mural", two faggy co-workers of hers could argue with each other over whether Applejack's Steel Rangers or Rainbow Dash's Shadowbolts were cooler.
Could foreshadow or comically exaggerate the capabilities of the Steel Ranger we're encountering now, and the capabilities of the Pegasus Enclave baddies we'll eventually meet, by saying shit like... uh...
>"The Steel Ranger's armour is two feet thick and weighs 300 pounds, and they can lift 700 pounds! They carry miniguns with armour-piercing 50cal bullets on their right side, a 150mm tank gun on their back, and on their left they've got a rapid-fire auto-targeting grenade launcher on their back that can spit out six 40mm grenades a second and takes 120-round grenade drums! And that's on top of anything their mouths carry into battle, like the Heavy Flamer or Super-Heavy Flamer! Their suits literally heal them faster than a standard flamethrower can hurt them! Their suits are enchanted to absorb fire and burn it as fuel! For their journeys, no challenge is too great! They also have huge magic hardlight Tower Shields that can block enemy bullets but not their own and retractable massive 40 pound chainsaw swords connected to their asses by a retractable steel cable and commanded by their SATS attack system! Plus with their piston-enhanced kicks that can shatter concrete, a Steel Ranger could beat the shit out of any Shadowbolt!"
>"Maybe if they can catch them, which they can't. Brute strength doesn't matter when you can fly faster than a fighter jet! If a Shadowbolt gets into melee range, his vibroblade deathsteel wingblades will slice a Steel Ranger's head clean off! Or he can manipulate the wind itself with his Ceremonial Wind Saber to whip up a tornado or slice your head off from up to 1000 meters away! All they need is a clean line of sight and a second to swing that sword hard enough, and you're fucking dead, kiddo. Or their Tractor Beam can magically lift anything up to 1200 pounds! Or they can fly way higher than any unarmoured pony could ever dream of, flying so high you can't see them and everypony else's Power Armour would ice up and everypony without Power Armour would be completely unable to breathe, since a proper Shadowbolt suit stores enough oxygen for 30 minutes of sustained almost-orbital flight! And he carries enough long-range miniguns and lock-on missiles to destroy a whole army of enemy aircraft, and he has enough easily-dropped bombs to flatten a small town! First they drop a bunch of small grenade-sized bombs from bomber-doors on a secret compartment in their stomach, then the shrinking spell on that compartment wears off and the grenade-sized bombs grow to the size of houses! He can carry all sorts of supplies and extra ammo in that special shrinking compartment. He even carry megaspells and fire them at will, goddamn it! Can your stupid fucking Steel Ranger faggots survive explosion spells big enough to take out whole cities?"
"Yes! Yes, they can! Remember how the Ziggers dropped a Hellfire nuke on Fillydelphia and it killed or mutated everypony EXCEPT the Steel Rangers dancing in a military parade with their armour on? Tanks melted, skyscrapers crumbled, and the Steel Rangers still fucking stood. Fire and thunder! Blood and brotherhood! The Steel Rangers are the greatest heroes in the ENTIRE MULTI GALAXY-UNIVERSE TIMES A BILLION!"
"Ok, so Steel Rangers can survive explosive Megaspells. They can't just shrug off other magical effects put into Megaspells, like mind-control ones that make you kill your friends or shrinking ones that make you tiny or transformation ones that turn you into cows forever! Remember when we dropped the Cow Bomb on the Zigger capital, whatever the fuck its stupid muh-bongo-donger name was, for suicide-bombing our schools? The Shadowbolts could turn your Steel Rangers into fucking cows, retard! Blood and brotherhood? More like milk and chewing cud!"
"Fuck you, asshole! Even if a Steel Ranger was turned into a cow, he'd still be cooler than a Shadowbolt! Steel Rangers are honourable Earth Ponies who will proudly face a thousand enemies alone to give their unarmoured friends the time to retreat! Shadowbolts are pussy faggots who only care about themselves and betrayed Equestria as soon as Rainbow Dash pussied out of life!"
"You fucking take that back, you fucking bitch! Rainbow Dash is still alive out there somewhere, and she'll save us all some day!"
"Yeah, like the rest of her friends were supposed to? It's been 200 years since Equestria got bombed. Twilight and her friends failed Equestria, and it's their fault the world died!"
Then those two guys fistfight over this but the story mostly ignores them like they're background noise.
Meanwhile Littlepip is thinking to herself "This wall definitely needs a mural. Also these losers need girlfriends. I want a girlfriend too".
I might have gone overboard with the weaponry there, but making their in-story appearances far weaker than they are in legend could always be blamed on propaganda and the Steel Rangers/Shadowbolts (Who will become the Enclave for no reason) having already used up their best gear during the war, leaving them with the same third-rate mass-produced military gear that would eventually become the standard 200-year-old shit used by Wastelanders today.
>>296626
>The great alicorn hunter… meaning there were more of these.
LP shouldn't know these guys hunt Alicorns.
Even if they did run around doing shit for Equestria and getting famous before the nukes fell, there were only two Alicorns: Celestia and Luna, who were both on Equestria's side even though they sucked.
The "Artificial Alicorns" running around 200 years later aka now were first seen by Wastelanders ten years before Littlepip left her Vault.
Yes, it's retarded that they spent 190 years doing nothing besides sitting around practicing their evil laughs and edgy fashion sense.
But unless someone told Littlepip about the alicorn-hunting Steel Rangers offscreen, she shouldn't know these guys like hunting Alicorns.
I forget, was Big Mac a Steel Ranger? If not, have the Steel Rangers had any foreshadowing at this point in the story at all? It feels like the Steel Rangers and everything about them came out of nowhere just so she could be saved by the timely arrival of someone besides Watcher.
>>296627
Bro, you're a fucking genius.
At any moment, any Pegasus including an Enclave Pegasus could pop their upper bodies down out of the clouds like a Whack-A-Mole character and snipe down at targets marked by their Pip-Bucks. That should be horrifying to these ponies. The clouded sky becomes an ever-present hazard and constant reason to seek roofed shelters... Genius!
As for Earth Ponies I've seen authors who like them emphasize their super-strength/super-toughness and try to spin Cutie Marks so while Unicorns and Pegasi typically get something specific, Earth Ponies usually get vague ones with many meanings. RD's good with the weather (her speed comes from training) and Fluttershy's good with animals. Applejack the farmer's great at all parts of running a farm, Pinkie Pie can do all sorts of cartoon-physics party tricks and Sherlock-Scan people to know what parties they like, Nurse Redheart's godlike at everything remotely medical in nature, and so on. Plus the average Unicorn's only magically strong and the average Pegasus is only fast after a lifetime of study/athleticism but Earth Ponies are always in peak physical condition, to the point where getting fat for bulking purposes takes significant effort and cartoonish mountains of food.
>>296649
That makes sense, thanks for the needle gun info. The weapon sounds like something impractical as a main battle rifle. Probably best used for precisely-aimed stealth kills but only if they're quieter than guns. If they run on compressed air, how common are compressed air tanks and perfectly-crafted needles in the apocalypse?
>Dashite means nothing for now
Oh yeah, good point. Come to think of it I've seen other pieces of media build backstory this way before. There was a lengthy Naruto example here (first we learn Kakashi's dad once abandoned a mission and was considered a pussy and killed himself, making Kakashi anal about rule-following, then we learn he abandoned his mission to protect his comrades so Kakashi becomes nicer) but I shortened it.
>The great alicorn hunter… meaning there were more of these.
LP shouldn't know these guys hunt Alicorns.
Even if they did run around doing shit for Equestria and getting famous before the nukes fell, there were only two Alicorns: Celestia and Luna, who were both on Equestria's side even though they sucked.
The "Artificial Alicorns" running around 200 years later aka now were first seen by Wastelanders ten years before Littlepip left her Vault.
Yes, it's retarded that they spent 190 years doing nothing besides sitting around practicing their evil laughs and edgy fashion sense.
But unless someone told Littlepip about the alicorn-hunting Steel Rangers offscreen, she shouldn't know these guys like hunting Alicorns.
I forget, was Big Mac a Steel Ranger? If not, have the Steel Rangers had any foreshadowing at this point in the story at all? It feels like the Steel Rangers and everything about them came out of nowhere just so she could be saved by the timely arrival of someone besides Watcher.
>>296627
Bro, you're a fucking genius.
At any moment, any Pegasus including an Enclave Pegasus could pop their upper bodies down out of the clouds like a Whack-A-Mole character and snipe down at targets marked by their Pip-Bucks. That should be horrifying to these ponies. The clouded sky becomes an ever-present hazard and constant reason to seek roofed shelters... Genius!
As for Earth Ponies I've seen authors who like them emphasize their super-strength/super-toughness and try to spin Cutie Marks so while Unicorns and Pegasi typically get something specific, Earth Ponies usually get vague ones with many meanings. RD's good with the weather (her speed comes from training) and Fluttershy's good with animals. Applejack the farmer's great at all parts of running a farm, Pinkie Pie can do all sorts of cartoon-physics party tricks and Sherlock-Scan people to know what parties they like, Nurse Redheart's godlike at everything remotely medical in nature, and so on. Plus the average Unicorn's only magically strong and the average Pegasus is only fast after a lifetime of study/athleticism but Earth Ponies are always in peak physical condition, to the point where getting fat for bulking purposes takes significant effort and cartoonish mountains of food.
>>296649
That makes sense, thanks for the needle gun info. The weapon sounds like something impractical as a main battle rifle. Probably best used for precisely-aimed stealth kills but only if they're quieter than guns. If they run on compressed air, how common are compressed air tanks and perfectly-crafted needles in the apocalypse?
>Dashite means nothing for now
Oh yeah, good point. Come to think of it I've seen other pieces of media build backstory this way before. There was a lengthy Naruto example here (first we learn Kakashi's dad once abandoned a mission and was considered a pussy and killed himself, making Kakashi anal about rule-following, then we learn he abandoned his mission to protect his comrades so Kakashi becomes nicer) but I shortened it.
>>296460
A lot of the confusion regarding the dart gun Pip's been trying to build for the past 4 chapters is due to yet another Fallout 3 reference Kkat expects you to intuitvely know about. Fo3 has a handful of weapons only available through crafting, one of which is a dart gun. It's a gas-operated miniature crossbow that shoots paralyzing poison-tipped darts. Not weapons-grade darts - pic related darts. In the game these darts greatly reduce their targets' movement speed, but do minimal damage. FoE's version put their targets to sleep instead. This makes some sense as a weapon for Velvet to use considering her alleged pacifism, or at least as a means to end fights with something other than a gorefest, but absolutely NONE OF THIS IS IN THE STORY until it becomes immediately relevant.
It's also distinct from the needler weapon, which isn't a thing in Fallout and, as I recall, vanishes into the ether at some point around here and is never mentioned again. Maybe Kkat was playing Halo for a change when he wrote that thing in.
>>296462
>Seems to me that a better way for pegasi to brand one of their own as a traitor would be to chop the offender's wings off, since that's literally the physical attribute that makes them a pegasus. It would also be perfectly in line with all of the other edgelord crap this story is so fond of.
The bizarre thing about dashites is that as the story goes on, Kkat can't seem to decide if they're a society of principled pegasus revolutionaries or just exiles with a silly name. Also, we later learn that the pegasi have a vested interest in staying hidden from the surface world and have absolutely no reservations about brutally killing one another at the slightest suggestion of insubordination. The only reason dashites exist in the first place is so that they can tell Pip that the hidden pegasus nation exists in the first place.
Later, we'll see that the other pegasi were kind enough to let Calamity leave with his own suit of power armor and cutting edge custom guns.
>>296463
>As we can see from the above passage, at least one of the alicorns appears to have mysteriously exploded, thus bypassing the need for the party to actually fight it, and I have little hope that the other two will not encounter a similar fate.
Once again, alicorns appear and are played up as a terrifying threat, only to accomplish nothing and be jobbed immediately. We're not even to the actual main plot yet and Pip's merry band is already killing wizard supersoldiers three at a time.
>>296623
>Considering this is a world based on an RPG game, where things like Perception, Imagination, and Persuasion are all skills or attributes or whatever that can be modified by ticking the integer value up or down, and considering that these "party-time mint-als" are probably yet another element ripped off directly from one of the Fallout games, my guess is that this is exactly what the author has in mind for them.
Correct. In Fallout New Vegas, Party Time Mentats increase a character's intelligence, perception and charisma stats by a hefty amount for a short time. Because your chaarcter's skills are directly influenced by their stats, this translates to a significant boost to the related skills including hacking, lockpicking, shooting and persuasion. This comes at the cost of withdrawal reducing your intelligence and perception if you get addicted.
In other words, Littlepip is powergaming. She's using a consumable to boost her stats/skills a little higher to pass the threshold of stat/skill checks she'd otherwise fail. Kkat probably imagines that this is a meaningful way of having his character surmount difficult problems.
>>296626
>The quotation marks and the capital letters suggest that the proper term for this kind of thing is Steel Ranger. At the time I actually remember this line striking me as odd; this seems like another one of those weird instances where LP knows some random historical fact that it doesn't seem like she ought to know.
Yet another Fallout series reference. The powered armor used by the games' Brotherhood of Steel is iconic to the series - it shows up on the cover of most of the games. If the Steel Rangers were founded during the war it makes sense that Pip and the others would have heard of them, though in the games they're a faction that formed from remnants of the US army *after* the war and therefore have a lot of high end military tech. If that were the case here Pip would recognise the armor but not the affiliation with the Rangers. There is absolutely no reason that Pip should know Steelhooves hunts alicorns.
A lot of the confusion regarding the dart gun Pip's been trying to build for the past 4 chapters is due to yet another Fallout 3 reference Kkat expects you to intuitvely know about. Fo3 has a handful of weapons only available through crafting, one of which is a dart gun. It's a gas-operated miniature crossbow that shoots paralyzing poison-tipped darts. Not weapons-grade darts - pic related darts. In the game these darts greatly reduce their targets' movement speed, but do minimal damage. FoE's version put their targets to sleep instead. This makes some sense as a weapon for Velvet to use considering her alleged pacifism, or at least as a means to end fights with something other than a gorefest, but absolutely NONE OF THIS IS IN THE STORY until it becomes immediately relevant.
It's also distinct from the needler weapon, which isn't a thing in Fallout and, as I recall, vanishes into the ether at some point around here and is never mentioned again. Maybe Kkat was playing Halo for a change when he wrote that thing in.
>>296462
>Seems to me that a better way for pegasi to brand one of their own as a traitor would be to chop the offender's wings off, since that's literally the physical attribute that makes them a pegasus. It would also be perfectly in line with all of the other edgelord crap this story is so fond of.
The bizarre thing about dashites is that as the story goes on, Kkat can't seem to decide if they're a society of principled pegasus revolutionaries or just exiles with a silly name. Also, we later learn that the pegasi have a vested interest in staying hidden from the surface world and have absolutely no reservations about brutally killing one another at the slightest suggestion of insubordination. The only reason dashites exist in the first place is so that they can tell Pip that the hidden pegasus nation exists in the first place.
Later, we'll see that the other pegasi were kind enough to let Calamity leave with his own suit of power armor and cutting edge custom guns.
>>296463
>As we can see from the above passage, at least one of the alicorns appears to have mysteriously exploded, thus bypassing the need for the party to actually fight it, and I have little hope that the other two will not encounter a similar fate.
Once again, alicorns appear and are played up as a terrifying threat, only to accomplish nothing and be jobbed immediately. We're not even to the actual main plot yet and Pip's merry band is already killing wizard supersoldiers three at a time.
>>296623
>Considering this is a world based on an RPG game, where things like Perception, Imagination, and Persuasion are all skills or attributes or whatever that can be modified by ticking the integer value up or down, and considering that these "party-time mint-als" are probably yet another element ripped off directly from one of the Fallout games, my guess is that this is exactly what the author has in mind for them.
Correct. In Fallout New Vegas, Party Time Mentats increase a character's intelligence, perception and charisma stats by a hefty amount for a short time. Because your chaarcter's skills are directly influenced by their stats, this translates to a significant boost to the related skills including hacking, lockpicking, shooting and persuasion. This comes at the cost of withdrawal reducing your intelligence and perception if you get addicted.
In other words, Littlepip is powergaming. She's using a consumable to boost her stats/skills a little higher to pass the threshold of stat/skill checks she'd otherwise fail. Kkat probably imagines that this is a meaningful way of having his character surmount difficult problems.
>>296626
>The quotation marks and the capital letters suggest that the proper term for this kind of thing is Steel Ranger. At the time I actually remember this line striking me as odd; this seems like another one of those weird instances where LP knows some random historical fact that it doesn't seem like she ought to know.
Yet another Fallout series reference. The powered armor used by the games' Brotherhood of Steel is iconic to the series - it shows up on the cover of most of the games. If the Steel Rangers were founded during the war it makes sense that Pip and the others would have heard of them, though in the games they're a faction that formed from remnants of the US army *after* the war and therefore have a lot of high end military tech. If that were the case here Pip would recognise the armor but not the affiliation with the Rangers. There is absolutely no reason that Pip should know Steelhooves hunts alicorns.
Glim, a while back it dawned on me that Littlepip's party can't meaningfully fight against anything responsible for Equestria's downfall, whether it's an abstract idea like "greed" or "short-sightedness" or "fear of giving up the moral high ground to protect what you love" or a physical threat like an enemy nation or an evil army or a giant enemy crab. She might be able to shoot at some baddies that set up shop within the 200 years after the megaspells fell but she can't meaningfully fight the flaws that let Equestria die or get revenge on the ones who killed it.
But is what Project Horizons did to address that - making a big physical threat in the form of a giant multi phase videogame final boss for its protag to shoot and saying it represents the abstract idea of evil that caused everything bad that ever happened to happen - a smart way to solve that problem?
But is what Project Horizons did to address that - making a big physical threat in the form of a giant multi phase videogame final boss for its protag to shoot and saying it represents the abstract idea of evil that caused everything bad that ever happened to happen - a smart way to solve that problem?
>>296827
>Once again, alicorns appear and are played up as a terrifying threat, only to accomplish nothing and be jobbed immediately.
One of the things that annoys me about this is that even lacking any kind of depth or substance, this idea could still be an entertaining hack and slash adventure, but the author can't even manage to do that right. He sets up encounters to look like they are going to be major fights, but then either skips the action entirely or else solves it by having LP pull some asinine solution out of her ass. It's like he deliberately sets his characters against enemies they shouldn't logically be able to beat because he wants to make them look bad ass, then realizes they can't actually win, and then finds a way to end the fight before it can get started so his characters don't lose face. Doing this kind of thing once is bad enough, but doing it over and over again like this is just infuriating, particularly in the absence of any other redeeming qualities in the book.
>In Fallout New Vegas, Party Time Mentats increase a character's intelligence, perception and charisma stats by a hefty amount for a short time.
I had assumed the "party time" part of "Party Time Mint-als" was something the author had thought up, but if that's what they are actually called in Fallout I almost want to forgive him for including them. If you're transposing another universe's elements into Equestria and something in that universe is called "Party Time ____", I'm pretty sure you're legally obligated to include them and associate them with Pinkie Pie somehow.
>In other words, Littlepip is powergaming. She's using a consumable to boost her stats/skills a little higher to pass the threshold of stat/skill checks she'd otherwise fail. Kkat probably imagines that this is a meaningful way of having his character surmount difficult problems.
This is where I object to how the author handles this. It's another example of his clumsily transposing video game elements into literature. In a game everything is controlled by numbers because there's no other way to do it, and giving the player little boosts and whatnot that screw with the numbers can make gameplay more entertaining. In a book though it makes little sense to approach it this way. Giving Littlepoop a drug addiction isn't a bad addition to the story, but a story isn't a game; a story tries to paint a picture that is at least somewhat akin to reality, and in reality your ability to smooth-talk someone isn't determined by an arbitrary number that can be modified. What's doubly irritating here is that the author is clearly using some kind of game mechanic here, which is unrealistic to begin with, and to make matters worse he doesn't bother explaining any of his mechanics to the reader, so we're left guessing at whatever was in his head. You basically have to be as much of a video game autist as the author is to make any sort of sense out of how anything works in this story.
>There is absolutely no reason that Pip should know Steelhooves hunts alicorns.
In the author's defense, I believe she learns this by overhearing something one of the alicorns murmurs to itself.
>Once again, alicorns appear and are played up as a terrifying threat, only to accomplish nothing and be jobbed immediately.
One of the things that annoys me about this is that even lacking any kind of depth or substance, this idea could still be an entertaining hack and slash adventure, but the author can't even manage to do that right. He sets up encounters to look like they are going to be major fights, but then either skips the action entirely or else solves it by having LP pull some asinine solution out of her ass. It's like he deliberately sets his characters against enemies they shouldn't logically be able to beat because he wants to make them look bad ass, then realizes they can't actually win, and then finds a way to end the fight before it can get started so his characters don't lose face. Doing this kind of thing once is bad enough, but doing it over and over again like this is just infuriating, particularly in the absence of any other redeeming qualities in the book.
>In Fallout New Vegas, Party Time Mentats increase a character's intelligence, perception and charisma stats by a hefty amount for a short time.
I had assumed the "party time" part of "Party Time Mint-als" was something the author had thought up, but if that's what they are actually called in Fallout I almost want to forgive him for including them. If you're transposing another universe's elements into Equestria and something in that universe is called "Party Time ____", I'm pretty sure you're legally obligated to include them and associate them with Pinkie Pie somehow.
>In other words, Littlepip is powergaming. She's using a consumable to boost her stats/skills a little higher to pass the threshold of stat/skill checks she'd otherwise fail. Kkat probably imagines that this is a meaningful way of having his character surmount difficult problems.
This is where I object to how the author handles this. It's another example of his clumsily transposing video game elements into literature. In a game everything is controlled by numbers because there's no other way to do it, and giving the player little boosts and whatnot that screw with the numbers can make gameplay more entertaining. In a book though it makes little sense to approach it this way. Giving Littlepoop a drug addiction isn't a bad addition to the story, but a story isn't a game; a story tries to paint a picture that is at least somewhat akin to reality, and in reality your ability to smooth-talk someone isn't determined by an arbitrary number that can be modified. What's doubly irritating here is that the author is clearly using some kind of game mechanic here, which is unrealistic to begin with, and to make matters worse he doesn't bother explaining any of his mechanics to the reader, so we're left guessing at whatever was in his head. You basically have to be as much of a video game autist as the author is to make any sort of sense out of how anything works in this story.
>There is absolutely no reason that Pip should know Steelhooves hunts alicorns.
In the author's defense, I believe she learns this by overhearing something one of the alicorns murmurs to itself.
>>296834
>But is what Project Horizons did to address that - making a big physical threat in the form of a giant multi phase videogame final boss for its protag to shoot and saying it represents the abstract idea of evil that caused everything bad that ever happened to happen - a smart way to solve that problem?
I haven't read Project Horizons and don't really know anything about it, so I can't really comment on that. Overall, though, one of this author's problems I think is that his idea here was just too big. He obviously has a very complex world that he's thought out, or at least tried to think out, and he tries to cram so much of it into one book that he ends up with a haphazard mishmash of all sorts of ideas that have nothing to do with each other.
For all its complexity, the backstory of this world has almost nothing to do with anything going on in the main story, such as it is. In between her adventures, Littlepoop wanders around picking up fragments of the past and getting little bits and pieces of information from the pre-war or wartime era, and this is how the author handles backstory revelation. However, there's no clear reason why she does this or why she is interested; she has no connection to any of these characters or events, and other than being a nosy klepto there's no reason for her to care about finding journal fragments and terminal entries from hundreds of years ago. The reader may be interested, but that's not enough; these events from the past need to be connected to LP's own motivations and storyline in order for her investigations into them to make sense. Thus, in an effort to answer your question, I would say that trying to have her avenge the death of old Equestria, or fight whatever evil supposedly caused the apocalypse, is the wrong direction to go no matter how the author tries to approach it.
The author's problem is that he's basically trying to tell a story about the war that destroyed Equestria, but he's telling it 200 years after the fact and attempting to use events in the present as a framing device. His other problem is that he does it badly. His heroine has no apparent connection to any of these events, however, so trying to unravel them and/or avenge them don't make any sense for her as a motivation. Again, the problem is just the size of the idea.
Imagine if JRR Tolkien took all of the lore about Middle Earth contained in The Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion and tried to cram all of it into the text of The Hobbit. It would just be a complete mess. Bilbo Baggins has no reason to give a shit about what the Valar were doing thousands of years before he was born, even if that information is a crucial part of the world he lives in. Thus, even though they're important, those events don't factor into his story and thus didn't end up in his book. The Hobbit works because it's a simple adventure story about a quest to find some gold. It takes place within a very large, rich, and detailed setting, but the actual events of the story don't even scrape the surface of this lore. The reason Tolkien was able to make his world feel so real is that he didn't try to tell you everything about it all at once, he just gave you a quick glimpse of it with a simple story, and then filled in more details later on as he began to weave larger and more complex stories in that world that dealt with more significant events.
Kkat would have been much better served by writing multiple short works set in his FoE world than by trying to write one massive epic that contained everything up to and including the kitchen sink. If he wanted to write this story about his Littlepoop character, he should have focused it primarily on her. Who is Littlepoop? What are her goals? What is she trying to achieve in life? So far, he hasn't been able to answer any of that, because he seems more focused on trying to explain all of this complex shit from 200 years ago. If he wanted to do all of that, he should have just written a war epic set during the period of the actual war, but that idea would likely be dismissed outright because he wants to mimic a Fallout game, which is set in the post-apocalyptic period.
Ideally, what we should have here is a story about Littlepoop and her life and goals. The story started out promisingly enough, with the storyline about her leaving the Stable to chase her crush across the Wasteland, and if he'd pursued that he could have spun it into an interesting, self-contained story. As the story progressed, we would have seen this ruined version of Equestria that is obviously quite different from the version we're familiar with, and we would have been curious as to how it wound up this way. He could slip in hints or references to past events where relevant, but there's no reason the entire history of the war should be contained in this story about Littlepoop. If he successfully told this story, his reader base would likely be curious enough about past events that it would have justified writing other stories, probably prequels set during the war itself, which would have been much more suitable vessels for all of this backstory. Ironically, many of the journal fragments LP picks up have hinted at stories far more interesting than the one we are reading. For instance, Diamond Tiara's last days in the Shattered Hoof facility could have been its own self-contained work, or a small event in a larger work dealing with that period, instead of just a bunch of sound files that some dull-as-ditchwater protagonist found while randomly looting a dungeon.
>But is what Project Horizons did to address that - making a big physical threat in the form of a giant multi phase videogame final boss for its protag to shoot and saying it represents the abstract idea of evil that caused everything bad that ever happened to happen - a smart way to solve that problem?
I haven't read Project Horizons and don't really know anything about it, so I can't really comment on that. Overall, though, one of this author's problems I think is that his idea here was just too big. He obviously has a very complex world that he's thought out, or at least tried to think out, and he tries to cram so much of it into one book that he ends up with a haphazard mishmash of all sorts of ideas that have nothing to do with each other.
For all its complexity, the backstory of this world has almost nothing to do with anything going on in the main story, such as it is. In between her adventures, Littlepoop wanders around picking up fragments of the past and getting little bits and pieces of information from the pre-war or wartime era, and this is how the author handles backstory revelation. However, there's no clear reason why she does this or why she is interested; she has no connection to any of these characters or events, and other than being a nosy klepto there's no reason for her to care about finding journal fragments and terminal entries from hundreds of years ago. The reader may be interested, but that's not enough; these events from the past need to be connected to LP's own motivations and storyline in order for her investigations into them to make sense. Thus, in an effort to answer your question, I would say that trying to have her avenge the death of old Equestria, or fight whatever evil supposedly caused the apocalypse, is the wrong direction to go no matter how the author tries to approach it.
The author's problem is that he's basically trying to tell a story about the war that destroyed Equestria, but he's telling it 200 years after the fact and attempting to use events in the present as a framing device. His other problem is that he does it badly. His heroine has no apparent connection to any of these events, however, so trying to unravel them and/or avenge them don't make any sense for her as a motivation. Again, the problem is just the size of the idea.
Imagine if JRR Tolkien took all of the lore about Middle Earth contained in The Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion and tried to cram all of it into the text of The Hobbit. It would just be a complete mess. Bilbo Baggins has no reason to give a shit about what the Valar were doing thousands of years before he was born, even if that information is a crucial part of the world he lives in. Thus, even though they're important, those events don't factor into his story and thus didn't end up in his book. The Hobbit works because it's a simple adventure story about a quest to find some gold. It takes place within a very large, rich, and detailed setting, but the actual events of the story don't even scrape the surface of this lore. The reason Tolkien was able to make his world feel so real is that he didn't try to tell you everything about it all at once, he just gave you a quick glimpse of it with a simple story, and then filled in more details later on as he began to weave larger and more complex stories in that world that dealt with more significant events.
Kkat would have been much better served by writing multiple short works set in his FoE world than by trying to write one massive epic that contained everything up to and including the kitchen sink. If he wanted to write this story about his Littlepoop character, he should have focused it primarily on her. Who is Littlepoop? What are her goals? What is she trying to achieve in life? So far, he hasn't been able to answer any of that, because he seems more focused on trying to explain all of this complex shit from 200 years ago. If he wanted to do all of that, he should have just written a war epic set during the period of the actual war, but that idea would likely be dismissed outright because he wants to mimic a Fallout game, which is set in the post-apocalyptic period.
Ideally, what we should have here is a story about Littlepoop and her life and goals. The story started out promisingly enough, with the storyline about her leaving the Stable to chase her crush across the Wasteland, and if he'd pursued that he could have spun it into an interesting, self-contained story. As the story progressed, we would have seen this ruined version of Equestria that is obviously quite different from the version we're familiar with, and we would have been curious as to how it wound up this way. He could slip in hints or references to past events where relevant, but there's no reason the entire history of the war should be contained in this story about Littlepoop. If he successfully told this story, his reader base would likely be curious enough about past events that it would have justified writing other stories, probably prequels set during the war itself, which would have been much more suitable vessels for all of this backstory. Ironically, many of the journal fragments LP picks up have hinted at stories far more interesting than the one we are reading. For instance, Diamond Tiara's last days in the Shattered Hoof facility could have been its own self-contained work, or a small event in a larger work dealing with that period, instead of just a bunch of sound files that some dull-as-ditchwater protagonist found while randomly looting a dungeon.
>>296652
>For this Memory Orb "That strange spherical ball's probably a grenade so I had better toss it back- OH FUCK NOW I'M IN A FLASHBACK" trick to work, not a single one of any of the many Wasteland-wandering completely-fertile-yet-daughter-creating-only 200+ year old Alicorns can have ever encountered a Memory Orb, ever. They can't've even seen one. Or heard any sort of rumors or myths about these things.
This is actually a good point. If anything, the alicorn should know more about the memory orbs than LP does, especially since the one she chucks at her is actually the first one she ever saw.
>I still use a mod so Stimpaks dehydrate you and make you tired and hungrier. It makes sense, since fully healing from 5 bulletholes in 6 seconds should take a lot out of you. Also gives you a reason to carry more food/water, meaning less of your limited carry weight's spent on guns and bullets and empty space for any loot you find.
>Would it be correct to say authors should do something similar to reduce the "game-breaking" (story-breaking) power and convenience of Stimpaks/Healing Potions/other analogue for the Floor Chicken that instantly restores your health points?
What I think authors should do is to completely forget about stimpacks and healing potions and shit like that, because they are items that only make sense in video games. Instead, they should treat character injuries as real injuries with real consequences. If Littlepoop gets her leg blown off, then she shouldn't have a leg for the rest of the story. If losing a leg is a major part of her character arc, then this would become a significant event that affects the entire outcome of the story. If that's not what the author wants, and he needs her to have a leg for most of the story in order for it to work, then it shouldn't get blown off in the first place. Having a character suffer some life-altering injury and then heal it through some entirely bullshit means is just a waste of words; a life-altering injury should either be life-altering, or else the author should just have the character suffer light wounds that she could heal from normally.
In Johnny Tremain, when the titular character dumps molten silver on his hand, it fucks up his hand and he can't be a silversmith anymore. It's a major turning point in the story, and that's why it's in there. If kkat had been writing it, Johnny would just chug a healing potion, fix his hand, go back to making the most awesome silver goblet ever, and then graft a laser cannon onto his dick so he could defeat the entire British army by himself.
>For this Memory Orb "That strange spherical ball's probably a grenade so I had better toss it back- OH FUCK NOW I'M IN A FLASHBACK" trick to work, not a single one of any of the many Wasteland-wandering completely-fertile-yet-daughter-creating-only 200+ year old Alicorns can have ever encountered a Memory Orb, ever. They can't've even seen one. Or heard any sort of rumors or myths about these things.
This is actually a good point. If anything, the alicorn should know more about the memory orbs than LP does, especially since the one she chucks at her is actually the first one she ever saw.
>I still use a mod so Stimpaks dehydrate you and make you tired and hungrier. It makes sense, since fully healing from 5 bulletholes in 6 seconds should take a lot out of you. Also gives you a reason to carry more food/water, meaning less of your limited carry weight's spent on guns and bullets and empty space for any loot you find.
>Would it be correct to say authors should do something similar to reduce the "game-breaking" (story-breaking) power and convenience of Stimpaks/Healing Potions/other analogue for the Floor Chicken that instantly restores your health points?
What I think authors should do is to completely forget about stimpacks and healing potions and shit like that, because they are items that only make sense in video games. Instead, they should treat character injuries as real injuries with real consequences. If Littlepoop gets her leg blown off, then she shouldn't have a leg for the rest of the story. If losing a leg is a major part of her character arc, then this would become a significant event that affects the entire outcome of the story. If that's not what the author wants, and he needs her to have a leg for most of the story in order for it to work, then it shouldn't get blown off in the first place. Having a character suffer some life-altering injury and then heal it through some entirely bullshit means is just a waste of words; a life-altering injury should either be life-altering, or else the author should just have the character suffer light wounds that she could heal from normally.
In Johnny Tremain, when the titular character dumps molten silver on his hand, it fucks up his hand and he can't be a silversmith anymore. It's a major turning point in the story, and that's why it's in there. If kkat had been writing it, Johnny would just chug a healing potion, fix his hand, go back to making the most awesome silver goblet ever, and then graft a laser cannon onto his dick so he could defeat the entire British army by himself.
>>297322
I thought I already said Party Time Mentats are from FNV and went on an overly long autistic rant about how the ingame recipe [A tin of mentats, a whiskey bottle, a honey mesquite pod crafted at a Campfire in the dusty wasteland air or on a Hot Plate somewhere] would probably make something really unappetizing if taken literally. I take too long to get to the point and it pisses me off.
Anyway boiling a tin of 200 year old intelligence enhancing addictive crack mints in whiskey and honey over a campfire... why would that magically make the resulting honey and booze boiled intelligence-boosting crack mints also increase your Charisma stat? Booze doesn't make you charming, it just makes you think you're charming. Where does the honey mesquite pod factor in? For flavour? Junkies snort and inject some wild shit in wild places but this is ridiculous. And magic is never confirmed to be how these are made. You can say blending some greenish plant and water gets you a red health potion if "because magic" excuse but this is just silly.
and LP's first ever PTMentat/Mint-al was because Calamity told her it was a hangover cure even though it wore off practically instantly.
I asked about the "blame everything on an evil god for the hero to shoot" thing because it was an immensely unsatisfying copout when Persona 5 ended that way. After all that talk about reforming society and challenging authority and rebellion it turns out everything bad only happened because an evil God made it happen, the same evil god that gave the heroes superpowers for no reason besides "so the plot can happen".
However (this is why I brought it up) would such a magical bullshit final boss dark-god enemy be more suited to a magical world of ponies where a god of chaos can invite you to tea? Yalbadabbadoo was jarring in the supposedly realistic but cartoonishly simplistic Persona 5 setting but if Discord had an evil edgy dad named Oblivion who wanted to destroy everything and taught Discord how to be an asshole it would probably fit the setting. It probably could be done.
One of the most popular pony fics is about ponies and evil gods and "Dark World" counterpart BS but I forgot its name.
But would it make for an entertaining and emotional and satisfying end to the story for Littlepip to get a custom super strong Power Armour suit made by all her friends (especially ones inspired by her heroism or saved by her good deeds) chipping in and working together, and then we watch as Littlepip battles Oblivion The AlicorNequus while dodging his Mega Darkness Destruction Balls Of Darkness And Destruction and shooting Oblivion with different guns she found during her journey and finishing the baddie off with Twilight Sparkle's revolver?
Thank you for mentioning how often the author cheats to make Littlepip and pals look like they're able to beat enemies they could never logically defeat. FE fanboys love talking about her like she's the ultimate badass because these scenes completely fooled them. Reading through her Respect Thread might give you Turbo AIDS.
A "Respect Thread" is when a fan gathers evidence of a character's best feats of durability/strength/intelligence/stealth and the feats of important gear or transformations or teammates and other relevant fight info. This is to make arguing over who would win in a fight between two fictional character easier. So LP's Respect Thread constantly sucks LP's dick.
Sometimes for a joke our out of rage fans make "Disrespect threads" chronicling all the times a character sucked and failed and met their limits while failing to surpass them. For example listing all the times Superman lost fistfights to weaklings and failed to be faster than a speeding bullet even though he travelled halfway across the universe in a second in last week's issue. But that's irrelevant.
You've expertly analyzed the problem with the divide between pre war and post war Equestria in this story. Fallout focused on the "present day" and the backstory added context to what the player encounters.
Do you think this problem could have been fixed by making Littlepip a Dashite who gets cast down from Skyfag society for caring too much about the world below and being a history obsessed faggot who eventually realizes the propaganda version of history she was taught in Skyfag School was absolute bullshit, giving her a reason to wander around at random learning the backstory of different locations while doing sidequests for fun and slaughtering baddies and making friends? If she started out befriending Monterry Jack and forming a "innocent girl and experienced guy" couple only for the Raiders or some Slavers to kill him right in front of her, it would give her a reason to viscerally hate all Raiders and/or slavers besides their foul smell and bad taste and offscreen crimes. It would also give Calamity a reason to stick around with her besides "i like her and want her medic friend and feel guilty about shooting her for wearing raider spikes once". A scene where Velvet gets butthurt at LP for being former enclave could be neat too. And it would explain where her random pro commando fucking gun skills came from.
Your "split the story up" idea is fucking genius. That would.massively improve ALL stories that could be told in this setting! When hearing Diamond Tiara's Final Words Holotape 1 of 4 right after seeing her corpse everyone knows she's dead so there isn't much tension in the story of how she died. It's a mystery but the end result is already solved. But a story set from her perspective could expertly get us feeling what she feels and hoping she makes it even though she doesn't.
I thought I already said Party Time Mentats are from FNV and went on an overly long autistic rant about how the ingame recipe [A tin of mentats, a whiskey bottle, a honey mesquite pod crafted at a Campfire in the dusty wasteland air or on a Hot Plate somewhere] would probably make something really unappetizing if taken literally. I take too long to get to the point and it pisses me off.
Anyway boiling a tin of 200 year old intelligence enhancing addictive crack mints in whiskey and honey over a campfire... why would that magically make the resulting honey and booze boiled intelligence-boosting crack mints also increase your Charisma stat? Booze doesn't make you charming, it just makes you think you're charming. Where does the honey mesquite pod factor in? For flavour? Junkies snort and inject some wild shit in wild places but this is ridiculous. And magic is never confirmed to be how these are made. You can say blending some greenish plant and water gets you a red health potion if "because magic" excuse but this is just silly.
and LP's first ever PTMentat/Mint-al was because Calamity told her it was a hangover cure even though it wore off practically instantly.
I asked about the "blame everything on an evil god for the hero to shoot" thing because it was an immensely unsatisfying copout when Persona 5 ended that way. After all that talk about reforming society and challenging authority and rebellion it turns out everything bad only happened because an evil God made it happen, the same evil god that gave the heroes superpowers for no reason besides "so the plot can happen".
However (this is why I brought it up) would such a magical bullshit final boss dark-god enemy be more suited to a magical world of ponies where a god of chaos can invite you to tea? Yalbadabbadoo was jarring in the supposedly realistic but cartoonishly simplistic Persona 5 setting but if Discord had an evil edgy dad named Oblivion who wanted to destroy everything and taught Discord how to be an asshole it would probably fit the setting. It probably could be done.
One of the most popular pony fics is about ponies and evil gods and "Dark World" counterpart BS but I forgot its name.
But would it make for an entertaining and emotional and satisfying end to the story for Littlepip to get a custom super strong Power Armour suit made by all her friends (especially ones inspired by her heroism or saved by her good deeds) chipping in and working together, and then we watch as Littlepip battles Oblivion The AlicorNequus while dodging his Mega Darkness Destruction Balls Of Darkness And Destruction and shooting Oblivion with different guns she found during her journey and finishing the baddie off with Twilight Sparkle's revolver?
Thank you for mentioning how often the author cheats to make Littlepip and pals look like they're able to beat enemies they could never logically defeat. FE fanboys love talking about her like she's the ultimate badass because these scenes completely fooled them. Reading through her Respect Thread might give you Turbo AIDS.
A "Respect Thread" is when a fan gathers evidence of a character's best feats of durability/strength/intelligence/stealth and the feats of important gear or transformations or teammates and other relevant fight info. This is to make arguing over who would win in a fight between two fictional character easier. So LP's Respect Thread constantly sucks LP's dick.
Sometimes for a joke our out of rage fans make "Disrespect threads" chronicling all the times a character sucked and failed and met their limits while failing to surpass them. For example listing all the times Superman lost fistfights to weaklings and failed to be faster than a speeding bullet even though he travelled halfway across the universe in a second in last week's issue. But that's irrelevant.
You've expertly analyzed the problem with the divide between pre war and post war Equestria in this story. Fallout focused on the "present day" and the backstory added context to what the player encounters.
Do you think this problem could have been fixed by making Littlepip a Dashite who gets cast down from Skyfag society for caring too much about the world below and being a history obsessed faggot who eventually realizes the propaganda version of history she was taught in Skyfag School was absolute bullshit, giving her a reason to wander around at random learning the backstory of different locations while doing sidequests for fun and slaughtering baddies and making friends? If she started out befriending Monterry Jack and forming a "innocent girl and experienced guy" couple only for the Raiders or some Slavers to kill him right in front of her, it would give her a reason to viscerally hate all Raiders and/or slavers besides their foul smell and bad taste and offscreen crimes. It would also give Calamity a reason to stick around with her besides "i like her and want her medic friend and feel guilty about shooting her for wearing raider spikes once". A scene where Velvet gets butthurt at LP for being former enclave could be neat too. And it would explain where her random pro commando fucking gun skills came from.
Your "split the story up" idea is fucking genius. That would.massively improve ALL stories that could be told in this setting! When hearing Diamond Tiara's Final Words Holotape 1 of 4 right after seeing her corpse everyone knows she's dead so there isn't much tension in the story of how she died. It's a mystery but the end result is already solved. But a story set from her perspective could expertly get us feeling what she feels and hoping she makes it even though she doesn't.
>>297362
>I thought I already said Party Time Mentats are from FNV and went on an overly long autistic rant about how the ingame recipe [A tin of mentats, a whiskey bottle, a honey mesquite pod crafted at a Campfire in the dusty wasteland air or on a Hot Plate somewhere] would probably make something really unappetizing if taken literally
I think you did, actually. This story discussion is already well into its second thread and we're barely a quarter of the way through the text, so it's hard to keep track of everything we've talked about.
>Do you think this problem could have been fixed by making Littlepip a Dashite who gets cast down from Skyfag society for caring too much about the world below and being a history obsessed faggot who eventually realizes the propaganda version of history she was taught in Skyfag School was absolute bullshit, giving her a reason to wander around at random learning the backstory of different locations while doing sidequests for fun and slaughtering baddies and making friends?
Again, it's a bit difficult to say because I haven't read far enough to know about the Dashites and what they did or why they did it. However, if it was firmly established that she had some familiarity with history and had a reason to be interested in the world below, it probably would give her more of a motivation to delve into what really happened during the war. Having her friend killed early by raiders would make a good motivation for her to want to kill raiders, so you're definitely thinking along the right lines.
>I thought I already said Party Time Mentats are from FNV and went on an overly long autistic rant about how the ingame recipe [A tin of mentats, a whiskey bottle, a honey mesquite pod crafted at a Campfire in the dusty wasteland air or on a Hot Plate somewhere] would probably make something really unappetizing if taken literally
I think you did, actually. This story discussion is already well into its second thread and we're barely a quarter of the way through the text, so it's hard to keep track of everything we've talked about.
>Do you think this problem could have been fixed by making Littlepip a Dashite who gets cast down from Skyfag society for caring too much about the world below and being a history obsessed faggot who eventually realizes the propaganda version of history she was taught in Skyfag School was absolute bullshit, giving her a reason to wander around at random learning the backstory of different locations while doing sidequests for fun and slaughtering baddies and making friends?
Again, it's a bit difficult to say because I haven't read far enough to know about the Dashites and what they did or why they did it. However, if it was firmly established that she had some familiarity with history and had a reason to be interested in the world below, it probably would give her more of a motivation to delve into what really happened during the war. Having her friend killed early by raiders would make a good motivation for her to want to kill raiders, so you're definitely thinking along the right lines.
>>297376
I added the number of words in all chapters up to chapter 14 and got 104631 words.
Once chapter 14 is finished, we will have read 104k out of the 620k words in the story. We're making really good time!
At first the online calculator I used gave me 342k and it seemed weird for a story's halfway marker to be chapter 14 out of 45 plus two afterwords but it turned out the commas in the numbers fucked the calculations up. Removing the commas gave me 104,631.
Anyway, if this fic was put onto Wikipedia's list of longest stories ever it would rank below the estimated 645,000 of Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand but above the estimated 610,000 of Jean-Cristophe by Romain Roland, and above the 600,000 reached by both Alan Moore's Jerusalem and "...And ladies of the club" by Helen Hoovy Santmyer
Those stories probably set up a protagonist who makes sense (and whose backstory and pre-adventure life is worth mentioning in the story because it influences who the protagonist is and how he/she thinks) along with stakes and a proper story structure before getting a hundred thousand words into the story, right? I don't know because I've never read them. But they surely set up their goals and setting and stakes before this point.
Does this story have stakes? Saw a writing advice vid today on the importance of stakes.
Littlepip just sort of exists in this apocalypse-themed playground and her plot armour protects her from all the world's worst fates. So her goal is to wander in the direction of the only two places she has been told about (Another Slaver town and a Radio Tower) while fighting baddies and possibly sidequesting along the way.
If Littlepip and her friends die on this quest, what happens to the world? It just sort of goes on being as sucky as it was for the last 199 years. And if the hero succeeds, random NPCs in cages get saved probably but what kind of life can they live in this hellhole? There should probably be a "Important Person" the hero wants to save from the Slavers/Raiders to justify her obsession with those baddies and provide a clear end point for the story. The Punisher's neverending murderous rampage through countless no-name thugs means a new set of no-name thugs need to be established at the next story's start, because like most comic book characters his stories are designed to go on forever and any satisfying finales are flushed down the toilet so the status quo that drives weekly sales can reign supreme. He lost everything, driving him over the edge and motivating his crusade against crime in general, not just the baddies who pissed him off.
But a story with an ending like Taken starring Liam Neeson, Liam's not just going after kidnappers for fun or because they killed his dog. He's trying to save his daughter and her friend, there's a time limit of 96 hours after which they'll be lost forever, and the film ends when he saves them. Sequels could be made with new baddies but Liam's character's goal is simple and concise.
Littlepip's goal? To "Make Equestria great again".
And the only solution the author can think of is for Littlepip to kill ponies in her own pony country she deems "evil" according to her 200 year old morality until the author decides it's time to wrap things up.
So far the thought of creating the foundations for a self-sufficient town/city that could protect her home and stuff, andd grow into a stable civilization able to create useful resources/weapons for her and get gold medals for all the post-apocalypse's unique challenges, and grow over time until it brings civilization back to the Wastes hasn't even crossed Littlepoop's mind. She's just a murderhobo here to kill baddies, and I suspect if any new civilization does get made it will be primarily constructed by side characters and NPCs even though she or a friend will be put in charge of it. I don't think "If the hero dies everything's fucked and the main baddies win forever and their evil Bond Villain plan destroys all hope for a better future" consequences get established until the final arc.
Littlepip's current plan (Go towards locations I've been told about and possibly do stuff along the way) seems like a videogame thing, too.
In Ratchet And Clank you go to different "Planets" (levels) after being rewarded with their "Co-ordinates" typically in the form of an ad. But they make sense for your journey.
Ratchet doesn't take a detour from his "Stop Drek from destroying the galaxy" quest to race hoverboards or fight in arena battles for fun, he does so because the winner of the race/tournament gets a Gadget he needs to progress further into the adventure. He needs the Refractor to solve laser puzzles or the Trespasser to hack doors or the Swingshot to get over bottomless pits.
LP taking detours for looty-shooty "fun" has no similar excuse.
And in Fallout 1, you leave your Vault at the game's start. You have 150 days to find a Water Chip to fix your Vault's water purifier, before everyone dies. You're told "Go east to this vault, they might have one" but it's destroyed and chipless. Also you run into the town Shady Sands along the way. You need rope from this town to enter and search that vault.
Returning empty-handed to Shady Sands, the recruitable companion Ian tells you about Junktown and The Hub, your next places to search. The Hub's Water Merchants point you to Necropolis where you learn of the Super Mutants. Eventually you can steal a Water Chip from Necropolis and then you must stop the Super Mutants at Mariposa, your time limit becomes "Time until the Super Mutants kill everyone". Once you defeat the Super Mutants and their leader the game ends, you win.
Sure in a videogame or when pressed for time and desperate for leads "Let's wander in that direction and slaughter 999 enemies and complete a death-course no matter how dangerous" makes sense. But it still seems inelegant. Have any of LP's murderhobo adventures connected to each other significantly? How can they when she has no "Main Quest" for them to tie into?
I added the number of words in all chapters up to chapter 14 and got 104631 words.
Once chapter 14 is finished, we will have read 104k out of the 620k words in the story. We're making really good time!
At first the online calculator I used gave me 342k and it seemed weird for a story's halfway marker to be chapter 14 out of 45 plus two afterwords but it turned out the commas in the numbers fucked the calculations up. Removing the commas gave me 104,631.
Anyway, if this fic was put onto Wikipedia's list of longest stories ever it would rank below the estimated 645,000 of Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand but above the estimated 610,000 of Jean-Cristophe by Romain Roland, and above the 600,000 reached by both Alan Moore's Jerusalem and "...And ladies of the club" by Helen Hoovy Santmyer
Those stories probably set up a protagonist who makes sense (and whose backstory and pre-adventure life is worth mentioning in the story because it influences who the protagonist is and how he/she thinks) along with stakes and a proper story structure before getting a hundred thousand words into the story, right? I don't know because I've never read them. But they surely set up their goals and setting and stakes before this point.
Does this story have stakes? Saw a writing advice vid today on the importance of stakes.
Littlepip just sort of exists in this apocalypse-themed playground and her plot armour protects her from all the world's worst fates. So her goal is to wander in the direction of the only two places she has been told about (Another Slaver town and a Radio Tower) while fighting baddies and possibly sidequesting along the way.
If Littlepip and her friends die on this quest, what happens to the world? It just sort of goes on being as sucky as it was for the last 199 years. And if the hero succeeds, random NPCs in cages get saved probably but what kind of life can they live in this hellhole? There should probably be a "Important Person" the hero wants to save from the Slavers/Raiders to justify her obsession with those baddies and provide a clear end point for the story. The Punisher's neverending murderous rampage through countless no-name thugs means a new set of no-name thugs need to be established at the next story's start, because like most comic book characters his stories are designed to go on forever and any satisfying finales are flushed down the toilet so the status quo that drives weekly sales can reign supreme. He lost everything, driving him over the edge and motivating his crusade against crime in general, not just the baddies who pissed him off.
But a story with an ending like Taken starring Liam Neeson, Liam's not just going after kidnappers for fun or because they killed his dog. He's trying to save his daughter and her friend, there's a time limit of 96 hours after which they'll be lost forever, and the film ends when he saves them. Sequels could be made with new baddies but Liam's character's goal is simple and concise.
Littlepip's goal? To "Make Equestria great again".
And the only solution the author can think of is for Littlepip to kill ponies in her own pony country she deems "evil" according to her 200 year old morality until the author decides it's time to wrap things up.
So far the thought of creating the foundations for a self-sufficient town/city that could protect her home and stuff, andd grow into a stable civilization able to create useful resources/weapons for her and get gold medals for all the post-apocalypse's unique challenges, and grow over time until it brings civilization back to the Wastes hasn't even crossed Littlepoop's mind. She's just a murderhobo here to kill baddies, and I suspect if any new civilization does get made it will be primarily constructed by side characters and NPCs even though she or a friend will be put in charge of it. I don't think "If the hero dies everything's fucked and the main baddies win forever and their evil Bond Villain plan destroys all hope for a better future" consequences get established until the final arc.
Littlepip's current plan (Go towards locations I've been told about and possibly do stuff along the way) seems like a videogame thing, too.
In Ratchet And Clank you go to different "Planets" (levels) after being rewarded with their "Co-ordinates" typically in the form of an ad. But they make sense for your journey.
Ratchet doesn't take a detour from his "Stop Drek from destroying the galaxy" quest to race hoverboards or fight in arena battles for fun, he does so because the winner of the race/tournament gets a Gadget he needs to progress further into the adventure. He needs the Refractor to solve laser puzzles or the Trespasser to hack doors or the Swingshot to get over bottomless pits.
LP taking detours for looty-shooty "fun" has no similar excuse.
And in Fallout 1, you leave your Vault at the game's start. You have 150 days to find a Water Chip to fix your Vault's water purifier, before everyone dies. You're told "Go east to this vault, they might have one" but it's destroyed and chipless. Also you run into the town Shady Sands along the way. You need rope from this town to enter and search that vault.
Returning empty-handed to Shady Sands, the recruitable companion Ian tells you about Junktown and The Hub, your next places to search. The Hub's Water Merchants point you to Necropolis where you learn of the Super Mutants. Eventually you can steal a Water Chip from Necropolis and then you must stop the Super Mutants at Mariposa, your time limit becomes "Time until the Super Mutants kill everyone". Once you defeat the Super Mutants and their leader the game ends, you win.
Sure in a videogame or when pressed for time and desperate for leads "Let's wander in that direction and slaughter 999 enemies and complete a death-course no matter how dangerous" makes sense. But it still seems inelegant. Have any of LP's murderhobo adventures connected to each other significantly? How can they when she has no "Main Quest" for them to tie into?
1610208576.jpg (51.0 KB, 615x354, tumblr_633f586574e53a645b5f564adca307e6_998dc709_640.jpg)
>>297534
What if Velvet Remedy was captured by Slavers almost immediately after leaving the Vault/Stable, so once Littlepip realizes this her "Hunt down all Slavers" bonus-objective becomes her main quest?
It would give her a reason to take on Old Appleoosa with nothing but her guns and Calamity.
And after saving the slaves and not finding Velvet, she could check that computer terminal in town and get a load of useless (to her. to us, it's backstory) info before finally finding slave-selling records and learning Velvet was bought by a thug working for Deadeyes and taken to the Gem Prison to sing for the gem-mining slaves or something.
The "Velvet Remedy" in Littlepip's team, her role could be filled by a doctor mare forced against her will to cure slaves AND slavers, even though she's a moralfag who'd rather just heal slaves. Or she'd rather sell her medical skills to the highest bidder and slavers only pay you in food and protection. Her character arc becomes "being more moral over time" in that case. Either way Littlepip could still stare at her ass and try to impress her and get jealous whenever Calamity flirts with her.
After this, when Littlepip goes to the Gem Prison and defeats the unexpected dragon and helps the Griffon take over everything, the Griffon says "Velvet was sent to the main Slaver HQ at Fillydelphia because Red-Eye wants her to sing for a pro-slavery radio station of evil he wants to make, so go there. It's near Tenpony Tower, the only radio tower out here that still works. You can't miss it. Also Red-Eye wants to conquer this radio tower and get it playing his propaganda and his music, the same shit played by his Spritebots."
And so Littlepip does.
And instead of obnoxiously flirting with Velvet, she can think "I'm coming for you, Velvet! I'm going to save you!" every night.
Perhaps even fantasize about the day she saves Velvet and how grateful and kind and adoring she thinks Velvet will act, to make it hit harder if LP saves Velvet who turns out to be a spoilt ungrateful wimpy pathetic wishy-washy faggot who loves trying to sound and act morally superior to others but frequently fails to back it up with good deeds.
Anyway all LP has of Velvet is a signed nude autograph she bought at a concert and some old Velvet Remedy MP3s on her Pipbuck INCLUDING a half-finished song Velvet gave to Littlepip (And only Littlepip) as a reward for taking her Pip-Buck off(even though her office was closed at the time, which got her in more trouble. she was the only one in the office at the time after closing hours because she painted a mural on its wall without her boss's consent and had to wash it off), and LP thinks "I should send a message to Velvet and the world, to subtly tell her I'm coming to save her!"
so she decides to make a short detour at Tenpony Tower and get Velvet's old songs on the radio, so if Velvet hears them she can think "Wait, only Littlepip had that song... How'd she get it on the radio station Red-Eye was going to take over, only for his invasion of the radio tower to fail when a bunch of heavily armed ponies slaughtered all of Red-Eye's troops? This must mean Littlepip's coming to save me!"
That way Velvet becomes "The McGuffin" that drives the plot and motivates Littlepip. Combine that with "LP befriended Jack and Raiders killed him" to give her a reason to take detours and slaughter Raider camps, and that could fix the story's big "Littlepip murderhobos aimlessly" issue and give her a reason to think "I must stop these baddies in particular" for all of the story. Or most of it, before the final villains are introduced and become the main threat.
What do you think, Glim?
What if Velvet Remedy was captured by Slavers almost immediately after leaving the Vault/Stable, so once Littlepip realizes this her "Hunt down all Slavers" bonus-objective becomes her main quest?
It would give her a reason to take on Old Appleoosa with nothing but her guns and Calamity.
And after saving the slaves and not finding Velvet, she could check that computer terminal in town and get a load of useless (to her. to us, it's backstory) info before finally finding slave-selling records and learning Velvet was bought by a thug working for Deadeyes and taken to the Gem Prison to sing for the gem-mining slaves or something.
The "Velvet Remedy" in Littlepip's team, her role could be filled by a doctor mare forced against her will to cure slaves AND slavers, even though she's a moralfag who'd rather just heal slaves. Or she'd rather sell her medical skills to the highest bidder and slavers only pay you in food and protection. Her character arc becomes "being more moral over time" in that case. Either way Littlepip could still stare at her ass and try to impress her and get jealous whenever Calamity flirts with her.
After this, when Littlepip goes to the Gem Prison and defeats the unexpected dragon and helps the Griffon take over everything, the Griffon says "Velvet was sent to the main Slaver HQ at Fillydelphia because Red-Eye wants her to sing for a pro-slavery radio station of evil he wants to make, so go there. It's near Tenpony Tower, the only radio tower out here that still works. You can't miss it. Also Red-Eye wants to conquer this radio tower and get it playing his propaganda and his music, the same shit played by his Spritebots."
And so Littlepip does.
And instead of obnoxiously flirting with Velvet, she can think "I'm coming for you, Velvet! I'm going to save you!" every night.
Perhaps even fantasize about the day she saves Velvet and how grateful and kind and adoring she thinks Velvet will act, to make it hit harder if LP saves Velvet who turns out to be a spoilt ungrateful wimpy pathetic wishy-washy faggot who loves trying to sound and act morally superior to others but frequently fails to back it up with good deeds.
Anyway all LP has of Velvet is a signed nude autograph she bought at a concert and some old Velvet Remedy MP3s on her Pipbuck INCLUDING a half-finished song Velvet gave to Littlepip (And only Littlepip) as a reward for taking her Pip-Buck off(even though her office was closed at the time, which got her in more trouble. she was the only one in the office at the time after closing hours because she painted a mural on its wall without her boss's consent and had to wash it off), and LP thinks "I should send a message to Velvet and the world, to subtly tell her I'm coming to save her!"
so she decides to make a short detour at Tenpony Tower and get Velvet's old songs on the radio, so if Velvet hears them she can think "Wait, only Littlepip had that song... How'd she get it on the radio station Red-Eye was going to take over, only for his invasion of the radio tower to fail when a bunch of heavily armed ponies slaughtered all of Red-Eye's troops? This must mean Littlepip's coming to save me!"
That way Velvet becomes "The McGuffin" that drives the plot and motivates Littlepip. Combine that with "LP befriended Jack and Raiders killed him" to give her a reason to take detours and slaughter Raider camps, and that could fix the story's big "Littlepip murderhobos aimlessly" issue and give her a reason to think "I must stop these baddies in particular" for all of the story. Or most of it, before the final villains are introduced and become the main threat.
What do you think, Glim?
>>297535
Oh also it would be necessary to establish the Raiders as a significant threat. I forgot about them at first since the story treats them the way Pokemon treats its Rattatas and Pidgeys.
It's not enough to just give them messy houses full of corpses and pissed-on beds and expect readers to "fill in the blanks". Showing just how evil the Raiders are, making them kill beloved characters the audience cares about, introducing a town for the sole purpose of showing it feeding the Raiders out of cowardice even though feeding Raiders is an evil act since it sustains them and lets them raid more locations, so Littlepip can fight some of these raiders and lose only to inspire the cowardly town to rise up and save her...
Perhaps Littlepip could join a party of adventurers near the start to give the impression that everything is going to be fine. Monterry Jack, some others, an old veteran badass with a sharp mind and scarred 47 yr old body, a hotheaded idiot, an edgy loner stealthfag who can't do teamwork, and at least one cute chick who gets raped right in front of Littlepip by the Raiders. The party represents standard fantasy cliches and typical videogamey ways of adventuring. But they lack plot armour and make frequent mistakes so they are slaughtered horribly right in front of Littlepip. Her memories of their mistakes teach her what to avoid when adventuring with her own party.
Sword Art Online did an arc where Kirito made some friends and they died. But that just made him sad for a while. Didn't contribute much to the story or his character. Didn't teach him anything or make him inherit anyone's hopes and dreams.
Goblin Slayer's opener was a goddamn masterpiece. First we see the generic safe "standard fantasy setting", a power fantasy we've come to expect. An oblivious angry idiot hero and his harem. Then they all die horribly to weak-ass goblins for fucking up so much. Then Goblin Slayer comes in to say if you want to win against Goblins, this is how hardcore you need to be. If Littlepip learned from a character like Goblin Slayer and then watched Raiders kill him, it would be emotional. It would say "not even badasses like this have plot armour". It would say "LP needs to surpass this if she wants to avenge him". It would tell the shonenfags in the audience "LP will eventually grow beyond this Power Ceiling". And it will tell those in the audience here for an emotional rollercoaster "This won't be easy".
Of course for that to work the whole story would need another draft. LP should be creative with her crafting and improvisation to win fights when outgunned and outmatched instead of relying on deus ex machinas and getting saved by strangers and Spontaneous Enemy Retardity Syndrome.
Speaking of retarded the thought of ponies acting like Fallout 1 Raiders is already pushing. They were just bandits that dressed like Mad Max baddies but taking things further brings to mind edgy Sonic The Hedgehog art that tries to look badass and fails. Giving Tails a glock and scar and leather jacket won't change the fact that he's a cute and fluffy 3 foot cartoon fox in Mickey Mouse gloves and no pants. But Fallout 3's Meme Raiders? Cutesy cartoon ponies can't act like this and expect to be taken seriously, they're trying too hard to look tough and scary. That could be turned into a joke and all Raiders could actually turn out to be scared desperate starving softies trying to intimidate poners into giving them free lunches because they suck at fighting. But that wouldn't make them a big threat to the world. If Raiders must act evil even when it harms their own survival chances, then blame it on a virus. Toxoplasma Gondii, the weird shit that makes worms crawl to high places and swell up to resemble caterpillars so birds will eat them and spread the virus, makes mice into fearless cat-biters with a fetish for cat piss, turns men into gay "bugchasers", and makes birds aggressive. Ponyland's magic Toxoplasma Gondii turns ponies into edgy assholes and transforms their Cutie Mark into a big red edgy bloodstain. Ponies invented it and then decided it was too cruel to use on Zebras but when the nukes fell it was released into the world though only Raiders caught it. Because... uh... it's a magic virus that attacks the soul so those with a pure soul can't be corrupted by this. This basically makes Raiders into Zombies and makes killing them an objectively good deed that fights the disease's spread.
Oh also it would be necessary to establish the Raiders as a significant threat. I forgot about them at first since the story treats them the way Pokemon treats its Rattatas and Pidgeys.
It's not enough to just give them messy houses full of corpses and pissed-on beds and expect readers to "fill in the blanks". Showing just how evil the Raiders are, making them kill beloved characters the audience cares about, introducing a town for the sole purpose of showing it feeding the Raiders out of cowardice even though feeding Raiders is an evil act since it sustains them and lets them raid more locations, so Littlepip can fight some of these raiders and lose only to inspire the cowardly town to rise up and save her...
Perhaps Littlepip could join a party of adventurers near the start to give the impression that everything is going to be fine. Monterry Jack, some others, an old veteran badass with a sharp mind and scarred 47 yr old body, a hotheaded idiot, an edgy loner stealthfag who can't do teamwork, and at least one cute chick who gets raped right in front of Littlepip by the Raiders. The party represents standard fantasy cliches and typical videogamey ways of adventuring. But they lack plot armour and make frequent mistakes so they are slaughtered horribly right in front of Littlepip. Her memories of their mistakes teach her what to avoid when adventuring with her own party.
Sword Art Online did an arc where Kirito made some friends and they died. But that just made him sad for a while. Didn't contribute much to the story or his character. Didn't teach him anything or make him inherit anyone's hopes and dreams.
Goblin Slayer's opener was a goddamn masterpiece. First we see the generic safe "standard fantasy setting", a power fantasy we've come to expect. An oblivious angry idiot hero and his harem. Then they all die horribly to weak-ass goblins for fucking up so much. Then Goblin Slayer comes in to say if you want to win against Goblins, this is how hardcore you need to be. If Littlepip learned from a character like Goblin Slayer and then watched Raiders kill him, it would be emotional. It would say "not even badasses like this have plot armour". It would say "LP needs to surpass this if she wants to avenge him". It would tell the shonenfags in the audience "LP will eventually grow beyond this Power Ceiling". And it will tell those in the audience here for an emotional rollercoaster "This won't be easy".
Of course for that to work the whole story would need another draft. LP should be creative with her crafting and improvisation to win fights when outgunned and outmatched instead of relying on deus ex machinas and getting saved by strangers and Spontaneous Enemy Retardity Syndrome.
Speaking of retarded the thought of ponies acting like Fallout 1 Raiders is already pushing. They were just bandits that dressed like Mad Max baddies but taking things further brings to mind edgy Sonic The Hedgehog art that tries to look badass and fails. Giving Tails a glock and scar and leather jacket won't change the fact that he's a cute and fluffy 3 foot cartoon fox in Mickey Mouse gloves and no pants. But Fallout 3's Meme Raiders? Cutesy cartoon ponies can't act like this and expect to be taken seriously, they're trying too hard to look tough and scary. That could be turned into a joke and all Raiders could actually turn out to be scared desperate starving softies trying to intimidate poners into giving them free lunches because they suck at fighting. But that wouldn't make them a big threat to the world. If Raiders must act evil even when it harms their own survival chances, then blame it on a virus. Toxoplasma Gondii, the weird shit that makes worms crawl to high places and swell up to resemble caterpillars so birds will eat them and spread the virus, makes mice into fearless cat-biters with a fetish for cat piss, turns men into gay "bugchasers", and makes birds aggressive. Ponyland's magic Toxoplasma Gondii turns ponies into edgy assholes and transforms their Cutie Mark into a big red edgy bloodstain. Ponies invented it and then decided it was too cruel to use on Zebras but when the nukes fell it was released into the world though only Raiders caught it. Because... uh... it's a magic virus that attacks the soul so those with a pure soul can't be corrupted by this. This basically makes Raiders into Zombies and makes killing them an objectively good deed that fights the disease's spread.
>>297565
>If Raiders must act evil even when it harms their own survival chances, then blame it on a virus. Toxoplasma Gondii, the weird shit that makes worms crawl to high places and swell up to resemble caterpillars so birds will eat them and spread the virus, makes mice into fearless cat-biters with a fetish for cat piss, turns men into gay "bugchasers", and makes birds aggressive. Ponyland's magic Toxoplasma Gondii turns ponies into edgy assholes and transforms their Cutie Mark into a big red edgy bloodstain. Ponies invented it and then decided it was too cruel to use on Zebras but when the nukes fell it was released into the world though only Raiders caught it. Because... uh... it's a magic virus that attacks the soul so those with a pure soul can't be corrupted by this. This basically makes Raiders into Zombies and makes killing them an objectively good deed that fights the disease's spread.
Not to stray too far off topic, but this is pretty much exactly what Project Horizons did - the raiders in that story result from a virus that behaves essentially like pony rabies. It's a passable justification for raiders to behave like disposable videogame enemies with no regard for their own survival if they MUST act that way, I suppose. Still, giving them actual motives beyond random acts of violence, even if they're just "get food", would be preferable if they're supposed to carry any kind of moral weight.
As I recall, FoE does eventually give a vague hand-wavey explanation for the raiders, but it essentially boils down to some nonsense about 'lacking virtue'. Because dedicating their lives to the teachings of Socrates is the only thing stopping tiny horses from killing each other and smearing what's left on the walls, apparently?
>If Raiders must act evil even when it harms their own survival chances, then blame it on a virus. Toxoplasma Gondii, the weird shit that makes worms crawl to high places and swell up to resemble caterpillars so birds will eat them and spread the virus, makes mice into fearless cat-biters with a fetish for cat piss, turns men into gay "bugchasers", and makes birds aggressive. Ponyland's magic Toxoplasma Gondii turns ponies into edgy assholes and transforms their Cutie Mark into a big red edgy bloodstain. Ponies invented it and then decided it was too cruel to use on Zebras but when the nukes fell it was released into the world though only Raiders caught it. Because... uh... it's a magic virus that attacks the soul so those with a pure soul can't be corrupted by this. This basically makes Raiders into Zombies and makes killing them an objectively good deed that fights the disease's spread.
Not to stray too far off topic, but this is pretty much exactly what Project Horizons did - the raiders in that story result from a virus that behaves essentially like pony rabies. It's a passable justification for raiders to behave like disposable videogame enemies with no regard for their own survival if they MUST act that way, I suppose. Still, giving them actual motives beyond random acts of violence, even if they're just "get food", would be preferable if they're supposed to carry any kind of moral weight.
As I recall, FoE does eventually give a vague hand-wavey explanation for the raiders, but it essentially boils down to some nonsense about 'lacking virtue'. Because dedicating their lives to the teachings of Socrates is the only thing stopping tiny horses from killing each other and smearing what's left on the walls, apparently?
>>297578
Individual bandits can have tragic reasons for robbing people, making killing them ethically questionable. Like a stallion who says "I need to rob people for medical supplies because my child is dying".
Or a scavenger who insists showing up to a battleground after you almost completed it and scored the final blow gives him an equal share of the loot because he's out of food and might die soon.
Perhaps a community that used to be self sufficient but had a bad harvest and has to turn to raiding or die out can have "and then the heroes taught them how to farm properly" as a happy ending instead of "then they fought and the heroes won".
But a society dedicated to destroying and stealing while doing nothing for their long-term survival and growth is evil by definition no matter what their interior decorator's tastes are. Multiple raiders might have tragic reasons for becoming raiders but they're united in their evil. Even if they were just born into a Raider society and stealing is all they learned grosing up, at best they can be an enslaved penal labour force until they're ready to stop being niggers and start helping the good guys rebuild society so nobody will be born into a hopeless situation where your choices are kill and steal or die again.
FoE's comments on virtue annoy me. Especially the "figure out what your good virtue is" shit. What a deterministic mindset born out of thinking AJ was destined to be more honest than RD and Flutters was destined to be kinder than Pinkie. Kkat might have "learned about" the world through videogames but his incomplete understanding of FIM taught him all he knows about morality and wisdom. Good people don't figure out what one virtue out of six they were born with. Good people strive to be good people even when it comes at an acceptable personal cost.
Individual bandits can have tragic reasons for robbing people, making killing them ethically questionable. Like a stallion who says "I need to rob people for medical supplies because my child is dying".
Or a scavenger who insists showing up to a battleground after you almost completed it and scored the final blow gives him an equal share of the loot because he's out of food and might die soon.
Perhaps a community that used to be self sufficient but had a bad harvest and has to turn to raiding or die out can have "and then the heroes taught them how to farm properly" as a happy ending instead of "then they fought and the heroes won".
But a society dedicated to destroying and stealing while doing nothing for their long-term survival and growth is evil by definition no matter what their interior decorator's tastes are. Multiple raiders might have tragic reasons for becoming raiders but they're united in their evil. Even if they were just born into a Raider society and stealing is all they learned grosing up, at best they can be an enslaved penal labour force until they're ready to stop being niggers and start helping the good guys rebuild society so nobody will be born into a hopeless situation where your choices are kill and steal or die again.
FoE's comments on virtue annoy me. Especially the "figure out what your good virtue is" shit. What a deterministic mindset born out of thinking AJ was destined to be more honest than RD and Flutters was destined to be kinder than Pinkie. Kkat might have "learned about" the world through videogames but his incomplete understanding of FIM taught him all he knows about morality and wisdom. Good people don't figure out what one virtue out of six they were born with. Good people strive to be good people even when it comes at an acceptable personal cost.
>>296626
>Whoever had designed the armor must have worked tail-twined-with-tail alongside Stable-Tec.
At the very least this provides an explanation for why LP's wristmo-jackameter is able to communicate with SteelNigger's robohelmet. It's still a little too convenient imo, but the author may actually be going somewhere with the connection so I'll let it slide.
Anyway, just as Littlepoop is about to take the guy's helmet off, he tells her to please not do that. She assures him that she is a certified Stable-Tec PipBuck technician not making this up, and that he can therefore place absolute faith in her ability to fuck around with his life support system. Unsurprisingly, this does little to sway him. He assures her that his armor is beyond fucked, and not even the most certified technician in the world could save him now.
>Fueled by Party-Time confidence, approached, trying to reassure him.
This is not a sentence, btw.
>“Without magical power, I cannot even move. I will die here. I am, truly, already dead.” The low voice in the armor sounded resigned to the idea, and at peace with it. “But I took them with me. And, if I am not mistaken, I saved the Stable Dweller. As a final act, it was a good one.”
C:\dialogue\speeches-generic\heroic_death.wav
>I was taken aback. My overblown reputation. A deep discomfort stirred inside me. It wasn’t right for other ponies to risk their lives for me, thinking of me as something special.
Jesus H. Christ, ego much? However, she's not exaggerating; if you look at SteelDong's death speech, you'll see that he explicitly mentions "saving the Stable Dweller" as his motivation here. So yes, you read that correctly; in addition to and/or as a result of having her exploits chronicled on the radio for some reason, LP now has her own personal cult of worshippers in super-powered robo-armor who are willing to sacrifice themselves kamikaze style to protect her, because something something you are the last hope of this dying universe, O Stable Dweller. This character has reached levels of Mary Sue-ness that shouldn't even be possible.
>I looked back towards Velvet Remedy, wishing I had actually taken some time to learn more about medicine from her rather than just relying on her skills.
Yeah, really. No, I mean that unironically; look at this pony's established list of skills and how she obtained them. She learned lockpicking from a magazine she found, hacking she just knows for some reason, levitation is just something she's obscenely good at for some reason, she is able to build and repair weapons for some reason despite having no experience with them until a couple of weeks ago... Really, it's not that implausible that should could have learned everything there is to know about the healing arts just from hanging out with Velvet for an afternoon. After all, she's Littlepoop, Maryest of Sues, Mother of Dragons, defender of the known universe; why should there be a thing she isn't able to do?
>Turning back to the fallen armored pony, “Okay… SteelHooves, right?”
I still am wondering how she knows this name. And, as it turns out, so is SteelHooves:
>“How did you… oh. Of course.”
Oh, wait. It seems he already knows. He's not going to tell us how he knows just yet, but at this point we can hazard a guess. It's probably safe to assume that Littlepoop is the fulfillment of some kind of ancient prophecy, which foretold that an annoying rug-muncher with all the powers would one day vanquish all Baddies and save the world, and as the Chosen One she can be presumed to already know everything important.
>Without another word, I turned and focused my magic on Velvet Remedy. She floated into the air with a shocked eep. She started to float through the air towards us.
First of all, I fucking hate this protagonist. I hate her with a fiery passion that burns with the heat of a thousand suns. If someone doesn't rape and murder her by the end of this story, I may just have to write a Nigel-esque 35,000 word opus in which some retarded OC I make rapes and murders her while lecturing her about all the reasons she sucks, just so I can obtain closure. Second, it's redundant to tell us twice that Velvet floated through the air. Third, "eep" should be in quotation marks, since it's a noise she makes that is not technically a word on its own.
Anyway, she floats Velvet Remedy across the fucking minefield with her fucking infallible levitation powers god I hate this fucking character and sets her down so she can examine SteelFaggot's mighty robotic hypnodong.
>As I informed her of what he had told me, my mind flashed to the poster I had seen on the wall of Candi’s clinic: “You don’t have to be a Steel Ranger to be a Hero. Join the Ministry of Peace today.” I looked at Velvet Remedy, knowing she must be familiar with the same poster from somewhere, and wondered if she was remembering it as well.
Yes, because that's what's important right now. This is what we were all thinking about. Some poster you saw on the wall way the hell back in chapter 4 or some shit. Great job.
There is a page break, even though the next scene begins at pretty much the exact point where the previous one ended. Velvet examines SteelCock and begins trying to figure out how to get him out of his armor so she cansuck his robodick treat his wounds. SteelNuts, however, tells her that if she does this he will die. Since this effectively means he will likely die no matter what she does, this seems like a moot point, but whatever; let's see where it goes.
The long and short of it seems to be that the suit is somehow what is keeping him alive at the moment. It comes equipped with some kind of healing mechanism that automatically administers any kind of medical treatment he might need, but since the suit is offline it's not working. My, what a puzzle.
pic is completely unrelated, but is something I wish I'd found back when we were reviewing a story that had an actual Irish pony character
>Whoever had designed the armor must have worked tail-twined-with-tail alongside Stable-Tec.
At the very least this provides an explanation for why LP's wristmo-jackameter is able to communicate with SteelNigger's robohelmet. It's still a little too convenient imo, but the author may actually be going somewhere with the connection so I'll let it slide.
Anyway, just as Littlepoop is about to take the guy's helmet off, he tells her to please not do that. She assures him that she is a certified Stable-Tec PipBuck technician not making this up, and that he can therefore place absolute faith in her ability to fuck around with his life support system. Unsurprisingly, this does little to sway him. He assures her that his armor is beyond fucked, and not even the most certified technician in the world could save him now.
>Fueled by Party-Time confidence, approached, trying to reassure him.
This is not a sentence, btw.
>“Without magical power, I cannot even move. I will die here. I am, truly, already dead.” The low voice in the armor sounded resigned to the idea, and at peace with it. “But I took them with me. And, if I am not mistaken, I saved the Stable Dweller. As a final act, it was a good one.”
C:\dialogue\speeches-generic\heroic_death.wav
>I was taken aback. My overblown reputation. A deep discomfort stirred inside me. It wasn’t right for other ponies to risk their lives for me, thinking of me as something special.
Jesus H. Christ, ego much? However, she's not exaggerating; if you look at SteelDong's death speech, you'll see that he explicitly mentions "saving the Stable Dweller" as his motivation here. So yes, you read that correctly; in addition to and/or as a result of having her exploits chronicled on the radio for some reason, LP now has her own personal cult of worshippers in super-powered robo-armor who are willing to sacrifice themselves kamikaze style to protect her, because something something you are the last hope of this dying universe, O Stable Dweller. This character has reached levels of Mary Sue-ness that shouldn't even be possible.
>I looked back towards Velvet Remedy, wishing I had actually taken some time to learn more about medicine from her rather than just relying on her skills.
Yeah, really. No, I mean that unironically; look at this pony's established list of skills and how she obtained them. She learned lockpicking from a magazine she found, hacking she just knows for some reason, levitation is just something she's obscenely good at for some reason, she is able to build and repair weapons for some reason despite having no experience with them until a couple of weeks ago... Really, it's not that implausible that should could have learned everything there is to know about the healing arts just from hanging out with Velvet for an afternoon. After all, she's Littlepoop, Maryest of Sues, Mother of Dragons, defender of the known universe; why should there be a thing she isn't able to do?
>Turning back to the fallen armored pony, “Okay… SteelHooves, right?”
I still am wondering how she knows this name. And, as it turns out, so is SteelHooves:
>“How did you… oh. Of course.”
Oh, wait. It seems he already knows. He's not going to tell us how he knows just yet, but at this point we can hazard a guess. It's probably safe to assume that Littlepoop is the fulfillment of some kind of ancient prophecy, which foretold that an annoying rug-muncher with all the powers would one day vanquish all Baddies and save the world, and as the Chosen One she can be presumed to already know everything important.
>Without another word, I turned and focused my magic on Velvet Remedy. She floated into the air with a shocked eep. She started to float through the air towards us.
First of all, I fucking hate this protagonist. I hate her with a fiery passion that burns with the heat of a thousand suns. If someone doesn't rape and murder her by the end of this story, I may just have to write a Nigel-esque 35,000 word opus in which some retarded OC I make rapes and murders her while lecturing her about all the reasons she sucks, just so I can obtain closure. Second, it's redundant to tell us twice that Velvet floated through the air. Third, "eep" should be in quotation marks, since it's a noise she makes that is not technically a word on its own.
Anyway, she floats Velvet Remedy across the fucking minefield with her fucking infallible levitation powers god I hate this fucking character and sets her down so she can examine SteelFaggot's mighty robotic hypnodong.
>As I informed her of what he had told me, my mind flashed to the poster I had seen on the wall of Candi’s clinic: “You don’t have to be a Steel Ranger to be a Hero. Join the Ministry of Peace today.” I looked at Velvet Remedy, knowing she must be familiar with the same poster from somewhere, and wondered if she was remembering it as well.
Yes, because that's what's important right now. This is what we were all thinking about. Some poster you saw on the wall way the hell back in chapter 4 or some shit. Great job.
There is a page break, even though the next scene begins at pretty much the exact point where the previous one ended. Velvet examines SteelCock and begins trying to figure out how to get him out of his armor so she can
The long and short of it seems to be that the suit is somehow what is keeping him alive at the moment. It comes equipped with some kind of healing mechanism that automatically administers any kind of medical treatment he might need, but since the suit is offline it's not working. My, what a puzzle.
pic is completely unrelated, but is something I wish I'd found back when we were reviewing a story that had an actual Irish pony character
>>297836
>“No, I know how to fix him! I can restore power to the armor and reboot the spell matrix.” I beamed. “The suit designer obviously incorporated Stable-Tec arcane technology. It’s really not that different from fixing a PipBuck.”
I may not have mentioned it, but I really, really hate this protagonist.
So anyway, as it turns out, she really didn't have to levitate Velvet across the minefield at all; her A1 PipBuck certification apparently covers repairing ancient technology from the past incorporating complex life-support mechanisms she's never seen or worked with before. Velvet stands back, ready to start applauding her as soon as the job is done, but then this happens:
>I trotted forward, and came crashing back to reality. Recognition of my mistake mixed with the crushing depression that flooded me in the wake of Party-Time Mint-als wearing off. In a moment, I was stupid, ignorant and dumb.
Yes, because this is how drugs work. A drug wears off suddenly in the space of a single second, and when this happens, you not only lose any abilities you've gained from it, but can no longer do things you were apparently supposed to be able to do already without them. Looks like we can add pharmacology to the long list of subjects kkat seems to only understand through their representation in video games.
>“I don’t have the tools.” I felt like crying. The Steel Ranger was going to die, imprisoned in his armor, because I wasn’t a certified Stable-Tec PipBuck Technician. My utility barding didn’t include a spell matrix master key. Reluctantly, I admitted as much.
Wait, what? Of all the autism in this text, this is by far the autismiest ]this is an actual word I swear. Apparently, it turns out that Littlepoop is not actually a certified PipBuck technician after all. Even though her background is in PipBuck repair, and even though the text has not said anything about certifications that I can remember, at least, so it would be fully logical for the reader to just take LP at her word when she claims to be a certified technician, the truth is that even though she is a technician who repairs PipBucks, she never technically obtained her certification, which apparently means she does not have some tool she needs to repair this piece of arcane 200 year old technology. Wew lad. Just...fucking wew.
>“A spell matrix master key?” The voice of SteelHooves sounded hopeful rather than resigned. “You might be able to find one in Stable Twenty-Nine.”
What? Who? What the fuck is going on in this story? Where is Stable Twenty-Nine? Why does this guy know where it is? Why this Stable specifically? Are they going there now? Is that what's happening? They are now off to some Stable located God-knows-where to hunt around randomly for some key that may or may not even be in there, to help this cyborg pony who is probably minutes away from death? Is that actually what's going on right now?
Well, after a page break, it turns out that yes, that is exactly what's going on right now.
>“I’ve changed my mind,” the Steel Ranger protested. “I cannot allow you to go into a Stable for me.”
Wait a minute, never mind.
>His sense of hope had swiftly been squelched by a stubborn nobility that I both understood and rejected. I wasn’t the only one.
What? This sentence is complete gibberish. Do you even read this crap before you publish it?
>Calamity whinnied. “Ponyhole cover marked Stable Twenty-Nine? Near the Fetlock passenger wagon stop?”
Oh, wait a minute again. Turns out that Calamity conveniently found the entrance to this specific stable while he was rooting around under the fucking wagon last night, so it doesn't matter if SteelWang tells them where the entrance is or not; they can go there anyway. Sounds like another pointless treasure hunt that knowing this author will probably suck up an entire chapter at a minimum.
>It took us much longer to reach it than I remembered. We were moving gingerly, avoiding marks of red on my E.F.S. compass. Right now, I felt a few radroaches could finish us off.
I feel like I'm almost insulting the intelligence of everyone reading this by pointing it out, but this whole errand is completely illogical. First of all, SteelWank is in a near-death condition as far as I can tell, and will probably die in a very short time if he doesn't receive medical attention. I doubt the party can hike back to this stable, do a complete dungeon crawl, retrieve the whatever-thingy that Littlepoop needs to work her magic on the suit, and return before he expires. Second, from what I gather all three of them are in rather bad shape as well. Are they even in any condition for a dungeon crawl right now? Can they even handle a walk to the stable and back, let alone dealing with whatever is down there? Is it worth it to spend realistically two or three hours in an abandoned Stable, just to hunt around for this whatever-key-thingy that might not even be in there, only to come back and find that the soldier bled out five minutes after they left? Does any part of this idea make any sense at all?
It's actually a little hard to tell exactly what's going on with the Steel Ranger; it hasn't been made 100% clear how dire his condition is or why exactly he can't take his suit of armor off. As far as I can tell there are two possibilities:
A) the pony is a cyborg who is physically fused with the suit, a la Darth Vader, and he literally can't be separated from it without dying, or
B) he is injured so badly that the suit's life support system is the only reason he's still alive.
My guess is A, because as I understand it the suit is completely powered down, so the life support wouldn't be working anyway. However, the author hasn't clarified this particularly well. Because of what >>296827 wrote, I'm assuming this is yet another case of the author referencing something well-known from Fallout, and just assuming whoever is reading will be already familiar with what he's referencing.
>“No, I know how to fix him! I can restore power to the armor and reboot the spell matrix.” I beamed. “The suit designer obviously incorporated Stable-Tec arcane technology. It’s really not that different from fixing a PipBuck.”
I may not have mentioned it, but I really, really hate this protagonist.
So anyway, as it turns out, she really didn't have to levitate Velvet across the minefield at all; her A1 PipBuck certification apparently covers repairing ancient technology from the past incorporating complex life-support mechanisms she's never seen or worked with before. Velvet stands back, ready to start applauding her as soon as the job is done, but then this happens:
>I trotted forward, and came crashing back to reality. Recognition of my mistake mixed with the crushing depression that flooded me in the wake of Party-Time Mint-als wearing off. In a moment, I was stupid, ignorant and dumb.
Yes, because this is how drugs work. A drug wears off suddenly in the space of a single second, and when this happens, you not only lose any abilities you've gained from it, but can no longer do things you were apparently supposed to be able to do already without them. Looks like we can add pharmacology to the long list of subjects kkat seems to only understand through their representation in video games.
>“I don’t have the tools.” I felt like crying. The Steel Ranger was going to die, imprisoned in his armor, because I wasn’t a certified Stable-Tec PipBuck Technician. My utility barding didn’t include a spell matrix master key. Reluctantly, I admitted as much.
Wait, what? Of all the autism in this text, this is by far the autismiest ]this is an actual word I swear. Apparently, it turns out that Littlepoop is not actually a certified PipBuck technician after all. Even though her background is in PipBuck repair, and even though the text has not said anything about certifications that I can remember, at least, so it would be fully logical for the reader to just take LP at her word when she claims to be a certified technician, the truth is that even though she is a technician who repairs PipBucks, she never technically obtained her certification, which apparently means she does not have some tool she needs to repair this piece of arcane 200 year old technology. Wew lad. Just...fucking wew.
>“A spell matrix master key?” The voice of SteelHooves sounded hopeful rather than resigned. “You might be able to find one in Stable Twenty-Nine.”
What? Who? What the fuck is going on in this story? Where is Stable Twenty-Nine? Why does this guy know where it is? Why this Stable specifically? Are they going there now? Is that what's happening? They are now off to some Stable located God-knows-where to hunt around randomly for some key that may or may not even be in there, to help this cyborg pony who is probably minutes away from death? Is that actually what's going on right now?
Well, after a page break, it turns out that yes, that is exactly what's going on right now.
>“I’ve changed my mind,” the Steel Ranger protested. “I cannot allow you to go into a Stable for me.”
Wait a minute, never mind.
>His sense of hope had swiftly been squelched by a stubborn nobility that I both understood and rejected. I wasn’t the only one.
What? This sentence is complete gibberish. Do you even read this crap before you publish it?
>Calamity whinnied. “Ponyhole cover marked Stable Twenty-Nine? Near the Fetlock passenger wagon stop?”
Oh, wait a minute again. Turns out that Calamity conveniently found the entrance to this specific stable while he was rooting around under the fucking wagon last night, so it doesn't matter if SteelWang tells them where the entrance is or not; they can go there anyway. Sounds like another pointless treasure hunt that knowing this author will probably suck up an entire chapter at a minimum.
>It took us much longer to reach it than I remembered. We were moving gingerly, avoiding marks of red on my E.F.S. compass. Right now, I felt a few radroaches could finish us off.
I feel like I'm almost insulting the intelligence of everyone reading this by pointing it out, but this whole errand is completely illogical. First of all, SteelWank is in a near-death condition as far as I can tell, and will probably die in a very short time if he doesn't receive medical attention. I doubt the party can hike back to this stable, do a complete dungeon crawl, retrieve the whatever-thingy that Littlepoop needs to work her magic on the suit, and return before he expires. Second, from what I gather all three of them are in rather bad shape as well. Are they even in any condition for a dungeon crawl right now? Can they even handle a walk to the stable and back, let alone dealing with whatever is down there? Is it worth it to spend realistically two or three hours in an abandoned Stable, just to hunt around for this whatever-key-thingy that might not even be in there, only to come back and find that the soldier bled out five minutes after they left? Does any part of this idea make any sense at all?
It's actually a little hard to tell exactly what's going on with the Steel Ranger; it hasn't been made 100% clear how dire his condition is or why exactly he can't take his suit of armor off. As far as I can tell there are two possibilities:
A) the pony is a cyborg who is physically fused with the suit, a la Darth Vader, and he literally can't be separated from it without dying, or
B) he is injured so badly that the suit's life support system is the only reason he's still alive.
My guess is A, because as I understand it the suit is completely powered down, so the life support wouldn't be working anyway. However, the author hasn't clarified this particularly well. Because of what >>296827 wrote, I'm assuming this is yet another case of the author referencing something well-known from Fallout, and just assuming whoever is reading will be already familiar with what he's referencing.
>>297837
The other issue here concerns the party's health. Even with whatever bullshit panacea-potions they took, the text clearly stated that they didn't have enough supplies to heal themselves adequately. Can they even move right now, let alone go on a treasure hunt? The problem, again, is that the author is trapped in a video game mentality. He's basically thinking about this as if the party is down to their last few HP, and their primary concern is simply avoiding fights so a random encounter with a "radroach" or something doesn't kill them before they can find more potions. In a game, if you're "injured" to the point that the screen is flashing red every few seconds, this is basically all you have to worry about. A low-level enemy might be able to kill you with a single hit, but you can still run and jump and climb and do whatever else you need to do to get around.
In reality, there is a lot more to it than this. Velvet for instance lost quite a bit of blood; usually that means doing a lot of physically strenuous activity is a bad idea. She could probably pass out just from walking around too much. I think someone injured their leg, though I don't remember who. How badly beat up are these ponies? Again, I feel like I'm almost insulting people's intelligence by pointing this out, but in real life (or whatever this story is supposed to be exactly), your health isn't determined by a number. This group suffered some pretty serious injuries and, even though it's not clear how well the all-purpose bandages and healing potions were able to magically cure them, I don't get the impression they are in any shape to be traipsing through an abandoned Stable just to hunt for some tiny key that, again, might not even exist, in order to rescue someone who realistically has maybe an hour left to live.
In fact, this doesn't even make sense in video-game logic. Any half-wit noob could tell you that you don't enter an unexplored dungeon without resting or healing first.
>Calamity was flying, keeping all weight off his leg. He looked at the passenger wagon and announced too-cheerfully, “Well, I hope your levitation is back to its full impressiveness, Littlepip. Unless we’ve found a flux regulator and nopony’s told me, moving that thing will be up to you.”
God fucking damn it. If Littlepoop doesn't get gruesomely dissected with a blowtorch by the end of this story, I'm going to write my own Silver "I was dissected with a blowtorch once, except it wasn't so much a blowtorch as it was a giant cock, and it wasn't so much dissection as it was rape, and it wasn't so much rape as it was me pretending it was rape so the guy wouldn't stop" Star story where she does.
>I laid down.
I lay down.
>I needed to focus fully on the passenger wagon (Sky Bandit Stages, I noted pointlessly), and that meant not diverting my energies to remaining upright. My horn lit up as I concentrated on the huge wagon. Magical power enveloped it. I pushed, converging all my will onto moving the vehicle. My horn flared. A layer of overglow burst around it. The wagon began to rock, groaning. Sweat broke across my forehead. I began to have trouble breathing. Somewhere distant, Velvet Remedy was being concerned, but I blocked it out. A second layer of overglow erupted around my horn, and the whole wagon lifted several feet into the air and was shoved back onto the sidewalk.
>I let it down gently, then collapsed, exhausted. I could see the ponyhole cover. Yay. Sleep now.
If I even have to explain what's wrong with all of this then there is literally no hope left for humanity.
Anyway, page break. On top of the time it took them to backtrack to this location (since the author has been completely vague about time and distance we can't possibly know how long this was, but I'm assuming a walk of around 30 minutes to an hour, probably longer since they're injured and need to move slowly), as well as however long it will take them to poke around in the Stable, as well as the amount of time it will take them to get back, the dying roboponer is going to also need to wait for Littlepoop to take a fucking nap. Hope he's got Tetris or something in his magical helmet; he's going to be sitting there awhile. Oh yeah, I also hope that none of the giant radioactive hedgehogs or roaches or any of the other ridiculous things that are crawling around everywhere bother to attack his completely immobile and defenseless form during this period of several hours.
>“Well, this was a bust,” he proclaimed. It looked like Stable Twenty-Nine had never opened. And without an override password, it was unlikely that we would be getting in.
Bummer. Time to turn around and march back I guess. If SteelButthole hasn't had his head chewed off by giant radioactive cockroaches yet, I'm sure he'll thank them for at least giving it the ol' college try.
Anyway, in a surprise twist that should surprise no one, the broken control panel or whatever the fuck is stopping them I'm not even bothering to pay attention to details like this anymore isn't actually a problem, because Littlepoop is able to hack into it or something, and she finds out that the door is voice-activated. It requires three distinct voice imprints.
>I thought a moment, and cursed how slow my brain was. “I… um…” Then I remembered Stable Two’s override code. CMC3BFF. “I think I know.”
This is beyond dumb. I think all three of the CMC have been mentioned by name at this point, but AB and Scoot were only mentioned briefly in passing (AB was mentioned in some terminal entry almost at the beginning I think, and Scoot had a single audio recording that LP listened to in New Appleoosa, and neither she nor her message were ever brought up again), and LP has no way of knowing that the three of them were friends, let alone what the name of their club was when they were children together. The meaning of the password would be obvious enough to an MLP fan, but to Littlepoop it should just be unintelligible nonsense.
The other issue here concerns the party's health. Even with whatever bullshit panacea-potions they took, the text clearly stated that they didn't have enough supplies to heal themselves adequately. Can they even move right now, let alone go on a treasure hunt? The problem, again, is that the author is trapped in a video game mentality. He's basically thinking about this as if the party is down to their last few HP, and their primary concern is simply avoiding fights so a random encounter with a "radroach" or something doesn't kill them before they can find more potions. In a game, if you're "injured" to the point that the screen is flashing red every few seconds, this is basically all you have to worry about. A low-level enemy might be able to kill you with a single hit, but you can still run and jump and climb and do whatever else you need to do to get around.
In reality, there is a lot more to it than this. Velvet for instance lost quite a bit of blood; usually that means doing a lot of physically strenuous activity is a bad idea. She could probably pass out just from walking around too much. I think someone injured their leg, though I don't remember who. How badly beat up are these ponies? Again, I feel like I'm almost insulting people's intelligence by pointing this out, but in real life (or whatever this story is supposed to be exactly), your health isn't determined by a number. This group suffered some pretty serious injuries and, even though it's not clear how well the all-purpose bandages and healing potions were able to magically cure them, I don't get the impression they are in any shape to be traipsing through an abandoned Stable just to hunt for some tiny key that, again, might not even exist, in order to rescue someone who realistically has maybe an hour left to live.
In fact, this doesn't even make sense in video-game logic. Any half-wit noob could tell you that you don't enter an unexplored dungeon without resting or healing first.
>Calamity was flying, keeping all weight off his leg. He looked at the passenger wagon and announced too-cheerfully, “Well, I hope your levitation is back to its full impressiveness, Littlepip. Unless we’ve found a flux regulator and nopony’s told me, moving that thing will be up to you.”
God fucking damn it. If Littlepoop doesn't get gruesomely dissected with a blowtorch by the end of this story, I'm going to write my own Silver "I was dissected with a blowtorch once, except it wasn't so much a blowtorch as it was a giant cock, and it wasn't so much dissection as it was rape, and it wasn't so much rape as it was me pretending it was rape so the guy wouldn't stop" Star story where she does.
>I laid down.
I lay down.
>I needed to focus fully on the passenger wagon (Sky Bandit Stages, I noted pointlessly), and that meant not diverting my energies to remaining upright. My horn lit up as I concentrated on the huge wagon. Magical power enveloped it. I pushed, converging all my will onto moving the vehicle. My horn flared. A layer of overglow burst around it. The wagon began to rock, groaning. Sweat broke across my forehead. I began to have trouble breathing. Somewhere distant, Velvet Remedy was being concerned, but I blocked it out. A second layer of overglow erupted around my horn, and the whole wagon lifted several feet into the air and was shoved back onto the sidewalk.
>I let it down gently, then collapsed, exhausted. I could see the ponyhole cover. Yay. Sleep now.
If I even have to explain what's wrong with all of this then there is literally no hope left for humanity.
Anyway, page break. On top of the time it took them to backtrack to this location (since the author has been completely vague about time and distance we can't possibly know how long this was, but I'm assuming a walk of around 30 minutes to an hour, probably longer since they're injured and need to move slowly), as well as however long it will take them to poke around in the Stable, as well as the amount of time it will take them to get back, the dying roboponer is going to also need to wait for Littlepoop to take a fucking nap. Hope he's got Tetris or something in his magical helmet; he's going to be sitting there awhile. Oh yeah, I also hope that none of the giant radioactive hedgehogs or roaches or any of the other ridiculous things that are crawling around everywhere bother to attack his completely immobile and defenseless form during this period of several hours.
>“Well, this was a bust,” he proclaimed. It looked like Stable Twenty-Nine had never opened. And without an override password, it was unlikely that we would be getting in.
Bummer. Time to turn around and march back I guess. If SteelButthole hasn't had his head chewed off by giant radioactive cockroaches yet, I'm sure he'll thank them for at least giving it the ol' college try.
Anyway, in a surprise twist that should surprise no one, the broken control panel or whatever the fuck is stopping them I'm not even bothering to pay attention to details like this anymore isn't actually a problem, because Littlepoop is able to hack into it or something, and she finds out that the door is voice-activated. It requires three distinct voice imprints.
>I thought a moment, and cursed how slow my brain was. “I… um…” Then I remembered Stable Two’s override code. CMC3BFF. “I think I know.”
This is beyond dumb. I think all three of the CMC have been mentioned by name at this point, but AB and Scoot were only mentioned briefly in passing (AB was mentioned in some terminal entry almost at the beginning I think, and Scoot had a single audio recording that LP listened to in New Appleoosa, and neither she nor her message were ever brought up again), and LP has no way of knowing that the three of them were friends, let alone what the name of their club was when they were children together. The meaning of the password would be obvious enough to an MLP fan, but to Littlepoop it should just be unintelligible nonsense.
>>297842
>The first voice was the one that took the longest, simply because I didn’t have a recording of it. Instead, we sat there listening to DJ Pon3 on the radio, waiting for his selection of songs to cycle through. For the first and only time, I was actually grateful that his radio broadcast had such a limited selection of music.
Literally what the fuck? For the sake of my own sanity I'm going to just forget about how LP just magically knew that these three random ponies from 200 years ago would be the three voice imprints this door would want. I'm also not going to worry about whether or not she actually has recordings of SB and Scoot. Scoot I know for a fact she does; SB I don't remember though. However, these autismo bits about sound recordings and journal entries and stupid, tiny, irrelevant details from ages ago that suddenly become important at random times are about the only thing in this story the author actually bothers to keep meticulous track of, so I'm actually willing to take his word that Littlepoop has SB's voice somewhere on that stupid wristy-thingy of hers.
However, what I can't forgive is this bit about the fucking radio. Literally what the goddamn fuck? First of all, they are on a time limit here. LP might have completely forgotten about it while she was napping for God only knows how long, but the whole reason they are doing this is because they are trying to get medicine for a pony whose internal organs have been crushed, and is probably bleeding to death inside his armor as we speak. Call it a hunch, but I would think time would be a factor here. Even assuming they had no trouble with the doors and there are no monsters inside the stable, simply going in to get the stupid key and rushing out would probably take more time than they have. Now, on top of that, they are taking additional time for sleep, as well as sitting around listening to the goddamn radio for God only knows how long just on the off-chance that they might play an old Applebloom song? For that matter, was Applebloom even a singer?
Actually, is it even Applebloom whose voice they need? Did I get that wrong? The author doesn't even bother to clarify which one they need; he just assumes the reader is as autistic as he is and has been keeping scrupulous inventory of every single ridiculous thing this wacky dyke has picked up during the 96,630 words of this garbage we've read so far, and would therefore know exactly which voices she does and does not have recordings of. All he says here is "the first voice," without any previous listing of the three voices in any specific order. I just automatically assumed voice #1 would be Applebloom, because I'm thinking about it in chronological order according to when the three of them were first mentioned in the text, and as far as I can remember it went AB (mentioned when LP first left her stable), Scoot (first mentioned in a recording LP found in the abandoned stable) and SB (actually I don't remember when she was first mentioned, but she wasn't significant until recently).
In fact, now that I look at it, he never even says which three characters the voices belong to. Once again, he just assumes that the reader knows what he's referencing and that it doesn't require any explanation. If a reader had never seen MLP before, they would have no fucking idea what "CMC3BFF" would mean, any more than Littlepoop or any of them logically should at this point. Jesus fucking H. Christ; between the massive length, and the preposterous amount of stupid details, and the haphazard autistic way the story is being told, just trying to keep track of what the hell is going on in this massive autistic clusterfuck is trying enough, let alone giving it a thorough analysis. This author may actually be the death of me. This thread is going to turn out like the end of Amadeus, if instead of commissioning him to write a funeral dirge he could rip off, Salieri had just given Mozart this 500,000 word pile of shit to read, assuming that the sheer autism of it would literally kill him.
Anyway, rant over. Let's continue.
>“Good evening, everypony! This is your humble host, DJ Pon3, master of the airwaves. And it’s just about time for me to turn in. But first, the news! Looks like our wasteland crusader from Stable Two is an equal-opportunity savior. From the reports I’m getting, she and her companions helped out a bunch of raiders up at Shattered Hoof from being enslaved and decimated by an attacking slaver army. And then, because you can’t have a cupcake without icing, she killed a dragon!”
As if the situation weren't implausible enough to begin with, we once again have this random DJ off in the middle of God knows where reporting on the specifics of events that LP was at the center of. This battle at Shattered Hoof would be a large enough event to make the news I suppose, but would LP's role really be common knowledge? Seems like all that would be known from an outsider point of view is that Deadeyes was killed in a skirmish between rival slaver and/or raider groups, and that Gawd is now in charge of the fortress. LP's name might come up if the dragon incident was widely known, but that's about it.
>Luna dammit, why wasn’t it ever “Calamity and his companions?” Or Velvet Remedy and her entourage?
Luna dammit, why is any of this even on the radio? How does this guy even know this stuff? Instead of this stupid false modesty, LP ought to at least show some curiosity as to how this weirdo knows so much about her, or why he's even interested. Since the author clearly intends for her to seek the DJ out at some point, it would give her a natural motive to look for him, instead of just "let's get Velvet's music played on the radio because reasons."
>“Don’t know if I agree with you on this one, kid. Saving raiders? Some monsters deserve to be enslaved.”
Saving who? At this point I don't even remember who or what the Shattered Hoof guys were supposed to be.
>The first voice was the one that took the longest, simply because I didn’t have a recording of it. Instead, we sat there listening to DJ Pon3 on the radio, waiting for his selection of songs to cycle through. For the first and only time, I was actually grateful that his radio broadcast had such a limited selection of music.
Literally what the fuck? For the sake of my own sanity I'm going to just forget about how LP just magically knew that these three random ponies from 200 years ago would be the three voice imprints this door would want. I'm also not going to worry about whether or not she actually has recordings of SB and Scoot. Scoot I know for a fact she does; SB I don't remember though. However, these autismo bits about sound recordings and journal entries and stupid, tiny, irrelevant details from ages ago that suddenly become important at random times are about the only thing in this story the author actually bothers to keep meticulous track of, so I'm actually willing to take his word that Littlepoop has SB's voice somewhere on that stupid wristy-thingy of hers.
However, what I can't forgive is this bit about the fucking radio. Literally what the goddamn fuck? First of all, they are on a time limit here. LP might have completely forgotten about it while she was napping for God only knows how long, but the whole reason they are doing this is because they are trying to get medicine for a pony whose internal organs have been crushed, and is probably bleeding to death inside his armor as we speak. Call it a hunch, but I would think time would be a factor here. Even assuming they had no trouble with the doors and there are no monsters inside the stable, simply going in to get the stupid key and rushing out would probably take more time than they have. Now, on top of that, they are taking additional time for sleep, as well as sitting around listening to the goddamn radio for God only knows how long just on the off-chance that they might play an old Applebloom song? For that matter, was Applebloom even a singer?
Actually, is it even Applebloom whose voice they need? Did I get that wrong? The author doesn't even bother to clarify which one they need; he just assumes the reader is as autistic as he is and has been keeping scrupulous inventory of every single ridiculous thing this wacky dyke has picked up during the 96,630 words of this garbage we've read so far, and would therefore know exactly which voices she does and does not have recordings of. All he says here is "the first voice," without any previous listing of the three voices in any specific order. I just automatically assumed voice #1 would be Applebloom, because I'm thinking about it in chronological order according to when the three of them were first mentioned in the text, and as far as I can remember it went AB (mentioned when LP first left her stable), Scoot (first mentioned in a recording LP found in the abandoned stable) and SB (actually I don't remember when she was first mentioned, but she wasn't significant until recently).
In fact, now that I look at it, he never even says which three characters the voices belong to. Once again, he just assumes that the reader knows what he's referencing and that it doesn't require any explanation. If a reader had never seen MLP before, they would have no fucking idea what "CMC3BFF" would mean, any more than Littlepoop or any of them logically should at this point. Jesus fucking H. Christ; between the massive length, and the preposterous amount of stupid details, and the haphazard autistic way the story is being told, just trying to keep track of what the hell is going on in this massive autistic clusterfuck is trying enough, let alone giving it a thorough analysis. This author may actually be the death of me. This thread is going to turn out like the end of Amadeus, if instead of commissioning him to write a funeral dirge he could rip off, Salieri had just given Mozart this 500,000 word pile of shit to read, assuming that the sheer autism of it would literally kill him.
Anyway, rant over. Let's continue.
>“Good evening, everypony! This is your humble host, DJ Pon3, master of the airwaves. And it’s just about time for me to turn in. But first, the news! Looks like our wasteland crusader from Stable Two is an equal-opportunity savior. From the reports I’m getting, she and her companions helped out a bunch of raiders up at Shattered Hoof from being enslaved and decimated by an attacking slaver army. And then, because you can’t have a cupcake without icing, she killed a dragon!”
As if the situation weren't implausible enough to begin with, we once again have this random DJ off in the middle of God knows where reporting on the specifics of events that LP was at the center of. This battle at Shattered Hoof would be a large enough event to make the news I suppose, but would LP's role really be common knowledge? Seems like all that would be known from an outsider point of view is that Deadeyes was killed in a skirmish between rival slaver and/or raider groups, and that Gawd is now in charge of the fortress. LP's name might come up if the dragon incident was widely known, but that's about it.
>Luna dammit, why wasn’t it ever “Calamity and his companions?” Or Velvet Remedy and her entourage?
Luna dammit, why is any of this even on the radio? How does this guy even know this stuff? Instead of this stupid false modesty, LP ought to at least show some curiosity as to how this weirdo knows so much about her, or why he's even interested. Since the author clearly intends for her to seek the DJ out at some point, it would give her a natural motive to look for him, instead of just "let's get Velvet's music played on the radio because reasons."
>“Don’t know if I agree with you on this one, kid. Saving raiders? Some monsters deserve to be enslaved.”
Saving who? At this point I don't even remember who or what the Shattered Hoof guys were supposed to be.
>>297837
This is dumb. LP has more Mentats. I mean Mintals. I mean Mint-Als because Kkat didn't think his target audience could understand the mint pun without a hyphen. Just take more drugs you fucking lesbian degenerate. ...lol what an odd sentence.
anyway even if his life support system is fucked Velvet can still cast Heal on him or feed him a health potion.
Hell I'm surprised LP doesn't just repair his power armour by consuming a set of heavy Raider armour which is something you can do in the games. It's how she has repaired guns and armour up until now.
>clearly marked manhole cover
The stables were supposed to be hidden. That's why some were in sewers and some were in mountains.
Also in Fallout 1 and 2 Power Armour suits were pneumatically assisted plate armour with no healing. F3 nerfed them to be shittier than a leather jacket and weak enough to be killed by cheap chinese assault rifle bullets. Fnv upgraded their defense stats but The Big MT's Stealth Suit was superior for making you invisible and auto injecting painkillers and health potions. F4 wasn't out yet when this was written. Fuck this cunting power armour niggerstorm of bullshit. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FVzc20Bm8Xo This healing spell matrix autism comes straight from Kkat and he can't be arsed to explain how it works or why they don't just ram a Stimpak into his taint. Or why they don't wait around for Velvet to recover her stamina and then cast Heal a few times. I forget if she knows healing magic or if she's just the only one allowed to apply magic bandages and inject stimpaks/feed you healing potions.
Oh yeah... remember how Steelcunt fired rockets/grenade showers at the Alicorns while they were a few feet from LP and friends? If Steelcunt was motivated by a desire to save Littlepip, it's a good thing she just barely had enough healing supplies to rapidly heal from most of the damage he did to her during his overly destructive attack or else he would have killed her along with the Alicorns. If he hadn't wounded Team LP they could have used their healing items on him.
Fuck, Steelcunt could have killed LP while trying to use psychically grabbable projectiles like missiles and grenades against alicorn foes he knows will have telekinesis and shields. He should have brought Laser guns if he wanted to kill alicorns. As Silver The Hedgehog once famously said, telekinesis can't grab lasers. Plus ain't nothing stopping him from saying "the resonance frequency scrambler I put on my laser rifle lets its shots pierce through magic shields easily. They were expensive as hell before the war but these days you'll find them on the corpses of most solo doomsday preppers who died of old age underground years ago".
The Vaults and Stables were designed so SHITLOADS of people could live underground. In the games there are 20 people and about 3 floors on average per vault for the same reason a farm only has two cows and a town only has 7 people: videogames like compressing space and scale to make exploring huge places faster for the player and easier on the hardware. But a story has no space limitations. The average Science Fiction author can't count or understand scale. Fallout Game Vaults might be the size of Skyrim Dungeons but realistically they should be fucking massive and the story should reflect that instead of letting Littlepoop and pals clear these dungeons in a few hours at most each time. LP knows she can explore this ATTEMPTED UNDERGROUND CIVILIZATION CONTINUATION that may have BULLSHIT GIMMICKS AND WACKY MONSTERS and worst of all A SHITLOAD OF COMPUTER TERMINALS AND DIARIES AND AUDIO LOGS TO READ before Steelcunt dies.
>radroach
A Radroach is a dog sized irRADiated ROACH from fallout. Ponyland has a magical corruptive energy called Balefire or Taint or something like that. Kkat copypasted Radroaches and forgot to change their names to Taintroach or Baleroach or Magiroach or Hellroach or something like that.
LP's mine shit would be less annoying if she psychically picked up and disabled mines slowly instead of rapidly and effortlessly flying over them. Would make trading safety for time a question she has to think about before floating stuff. Then again she knows she can trot over landmines wothout detonating them and must float her friends over which is retarded. Why take the Light Step perk that makes you magically undetectable by landmines so fucking literally?
Why does the author have a boner for LP lifting heavy shit she could just push? And why was this wagon harder to push than the fucking boxcar she dropped on an Alicorn? Again, the average boxcar weighs more than a WW2 nazi tank.
>leaving Steelcunt behind
there are so many jokes that could be made here if this was a comedy. Plenty of shows have made jokes at the expense of characters who can't move or get left behind or both so he should have plenty of material to rip off.
Remember that time Bender was just a head and a dog pissed on him? Comedy gold.
*squidward laugh*
gold. Comedy gold. Gold piss. Heh, I'm funny.
>God
No, he shows up later.
>hurr hurr radio broadcast only has 4 songs on shuffle
this is a videogame limitation except not really. BugthEAsderp was just real lazy when ripping off Saints Row/GTA's ingame radio. Makes no sense that a 200 year old prewar bunker and radio tower would have less than 10 songs. Either they were all built to last or they all degraded into worthlessness.
Also you're right fuck this scene. Waiting for a CMC member, presumably Sweetie Belle since the fic called her a singer once even though she also runs the vaults and died in the vault Velvet and LP are from, is fucking retarded when on a time limit. Didn't the first chapter's pipbuck monologue say the Pipbuck can record radio broadcasts? lol kkat forgot. She should have a Sweetie Belle song prepared just in case.
>radio says Littlepip saved raiders
this should raise some fucking questions
LP thought Gawd was a mercenary.
LP should ask herself "oh fuck were they slavers/raiders too?"
This is dumb. LP has more Mentats. I mean Mintals. I mean Mint-Als because Kkat didn't think his target audience could understand the mint pun without a hyphen. Just take more drugs you fucking lesbian degenerate. ...lol what an odd sentence.
anyway even if his life support system is fucked Velvet can still cast Heal on him or feed him a health potion.
Hell I'm surprised LP doesn't just repair his power armour by consuming a set of heavy Raider armour which is something you can do in the games. It's how she has repaired guns and armour up until now.
>clearly marked manhole cover
The stables were supposed to be hidden. That's why some were in sewers and some were in mountains.
Also in Fallout 1 and 2 Power Armour suits were pneumatically assisted plate armour with no healing. F3 nerfed them to be shittier than a leather jacket and weak enough to be killed by cheap chinese assault rifle bullets. Fnv upgraded their defense stats but The Big MT's Stealth Suit was superior for making you invisible and auto injecting painkillers and health potions. F4 wasn't out yet when this was written. Fuck this cunting power armour niggerstorm of bullshit. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FVzc20Bm8Xo This healing spell matrix autism comes straight from Kkat and he can't be arsed to explain how it works or why they don't just ram a Stimpak into his taint. Or why they don't wait around for Velvet to recover her stamina and then cast Heal a few times. I forget if she knows healing magic or if she's just the only one allowed to apply magic bandages and inject stimpaks/feed you healing potions.
Oh yeah... remember how Steelcunt fired rockets/grenade showers at the Alicorns while they were a few feet from LP and friends? If Steelcunt was motivated by a desire to save Littlepip, it's a good thing she just barely had enough healing supplies to rapidly heal from most of the damage he did to her during his overly destructive attack or else he would have killed her along with the Alicorns. If he hadn't wounded Team LP they could have used their healing items on him.
Fuck, Steelcunt could have killed LP while trying to use psychically grabbable projectiles like missiles and grenades against alicorn foes he knows will have telekinesis and shields. He should have brought Laser guns if he wanted to kill alicorns. As Silver The Hedgehog once famously said, telekinesis can't grab lasers. Plus ain't nothing stopping him from saying "the resonance frequency scrambler I put on my laser rifle lets its shots pierce through magic shields easily. They were expensive as hell before the war but these days you'll find them on the corpses of most solo doomsday preppers who died of old age underground years ago".
The Vaults and Stables were designed so SHITLOADS of people could live underground. In the games there are 20 people and about 3 floors on average per vault for the same reason a farm only has two cows and a town only has 7 people: videogames like compressing space and scale to make exploring huge places faster for the player and easier on the hardware. But a story has no space limitations. The average Science Fiction author can't count or understand scale. Fallout Game Vaults might be the size of Skyrim Dungeons but realistically they should be fucking massive and the story should reflect that instead of letting Littlepoop and pals clear these dungeons in a few hours at most each time. LP knows she can explore this ATTEMPTED UNDERGROUND CIVILIZATION CONTINUATION that may have BULLSHIT GIMMICKS AND WACKY MONSTERS and worst of all A SHITLOAD OF COMPUTER TERMINALS AND DIARIES AND AUDIO LOGS TO READ before Steelcunt dies.
>radroach
A Radroach is a dog sized irRADiated ROACH from fallout. Ponyland has a magical corruptive energy called Balefire or Taint or something like that. Kkat copypasted Radroaches and forgot to change their names to Taintroach or Baleroach or Magiroach or Hellroach or something like that.
LP's mine shit would be less annoying if she psychically picked up and disabled mines slowly instead of rapidly and effortlessly flying over them. Would make trading safety for time a question she has to think about before floating stuff. Then again she knows she can trot over landmines wothout detonating them and must float her friends over which is retarded. Why take the Light Step perk that makes you magically undetectable by landmines so fucking literally?
Why does the author have a boner for LP lifting heavy shit she could just push? And why was this wagon harder to push than the fucking boxcar she dropped on an Alicorn? Again, the average boxcar weighs more than a WW2 nazi tank.
>leaving Steelcunt behind
there are so many jokes that could be made here if this was a comedy. Plenty of shows have made jokes at the expense of characters who can't move or get left behind or both so he should have plenty of material to rip off.
Remember that time Bender was just a head and a dog pissed on him? Comedy gold.
*squidward laugh*
gold. Comedy gold. Gold piss. Heh, I'm funny.
>God
No, he shows up later.
>hurr hurr radio broadcast only has 4 songs on shuffle
this is a videogame limitation except not really. BugthEAsderp was just real lazy when ripping off Saints Row/GTA's ingame radio. Makes no sense that a 200 year old prewar bunker and radio tower would have less than 10 songs. Either they were all built to last or they all degraded into worthlessness.
Also you're right fuck this scene. Waiting for a CMC member, presumably Sweetie Belle since the fic called her a singer once even though she also runs the vaults and died in the vault Velvet and LP are from, is fucking retarded when on a time limit. Didn't the first chapter's pipbuck monologue say the Pipbuck can record radio broadcasts? lol kkat forgot. She should have a Sweetie Belle song prepared just in case.
>radio says Littlepip saved raiders
this should raise some fucking questions
LP thought Gawd was a mercenary.
LP should ask herself "oh fuck were they slavers/raiders too?"
It just dawned on me how artificial this whole setup is.
Out of nowhere Littlepip gets attacked by not one, not two, but three alicorns. And then a super mecha badass in a fighting robot power armour Iron Man suit pops up out of nowhere and helps kill them. Except he's a faggot with terrible aim and preparation skills who's so "eager" to kill alicorns and save Muh Stable Dweller he forgot to make sure he doesn't hurt the Stable Dweller or her friends or himself.
He's kind of a total fucking retard. And it's not intentional. This isn't a character trait the author knows about. This robofag won't grow over time and learn the value of restraint and abandon some made-up "hurr durr crusade heretic" meme indoctrination and overcome his complete tactical ineptitude and inconsistent inability to use explosive weapons safely.
This guy's such a faggot he made Littlepip and pals take a detour out of their adventure to save his life. Do you think he keeps a padded helmet under that Power Armour?
For such a grim and dark and edgy setting, something like this... it's unintentionally hilarious.
Speaking of hilarious, Spongebob Squarepants. Merriwether Williams worked on it and FIM. In a parallel universe, mainstream bronies probably obsessed over that show instead. Sandy Cheeks porn became more common than Pokemon porn and instead of making up names for background ponies like Derpy and Bastion Yorsets they made up names for the background fish like the Health Inspector from Nasty Patties and the "What did you do to my drink?" Fish and the My Leg guy. Self insert harem power fantasies are written by lonely teens who fantasize about dying and reincarnating into Bikini Bottom as an all-powerful OC who gets to annoy Squidward and fuck all the bitches just like the similar Pokemon and Blue People Avatar fics. 35000 word Accusation Fics are written where authors beat the shit out of Patrick Star and call him a cunt for being a cunt to Gary in Petsitter Pat. Fallout Bikini Bottom became the most popular fanfic in the spongebob fanfiction community on FishFiction.net, and in the same vein as what Fallout Equestria does with Poison Joke, the Snail Plasma from that season 1 episode was injected into a thermonuclear bomb shaped bubble that was dropped on Rock Bottom to turn the eldritch monsters into helpless snails during an underwater war, and Spongebob's insane cartoon physics moments are explained with "he invented crack mints made from bubble mixture and snail food".
Edgy Spongebob... what a crazy idea. Like those pics of Sonic posing with knives or an edgy gun-toting gangster-tattooed Bugs Bunny in nigger clothes. Weird how western cartoon chars get edgy fanart but Naruto, who comes from a dark and edgy show already, gets photoshopped into absurdly expensive tacky nigger fashion.
Come to think of it, why did Steelcunt start out all "It is an honour to die for the glorious Marey Sue of Stable 69" but then as soon as Littlepip suggested risking her own life and the lives of her friends to try and get something that could possibly save this guy's life (if fixing a auto-inject healing potion system is enough to fix a caved-in fucked-up chunk of suit armour) he suddenly wants to be saved? If he was willing to die to save her then, why does he love the idea of her risking her life to potentially save him now when there's no guarantee she would make it? What if she was permanently scarred or crippled from this adventure? Obviously she'll pass this test with flying colours but he's just a book character. He shouldn't know what we and the author know.
And another thing, why is it that when Littlepip listens to the radio we don't hear every single song and every annoying comment from DJ Pon3? The ponies here are tired and wounded and on a fucking time limit so they should say some hilarious bollocks right now and yell at each other. Littlepip needs Sweetie Belle on this radio and she shouldn't get it until she's bored to tears and hilariously mad.
When the radio plays Johnny Ponyguitar or Heartache By The Poners yet again or plays What's New Ponycat 13 times then one It's Trot Unusual then one more What's New Ponycat it should piss these characters off as tensions get higher. Somepony should call Littlepip's plan retarded prompting LP to say "Do you have any better ideas or are you relying on me to do all the thinking yet again, you pretentious fucking karaeoke-loving whore?"
Also this would be a terrible time for lore in Littlepip's eyes but if the radio host started a lengthy talk-radio podcast infodumping session it would let LP taste a fraction of the rage I feel when this story starts randomly infodumping without making any of it good or interesting or meaningful or smart or relevant to the story.
Her agonized "slam own face against wall" reaction would be the perfect comedic contrast to an infodump that foreshadows a big future story event almost as cleverly as Ratchet and Clank 2's "Behind The Hero" ads about Qwark.
LP could even openly yell something like "I GET IT, I GET IT! SOME PRE-WAR PONY DIED HORRIBLY. WHAT A SHOCKER. WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH ANYTHING?"
And then for meta commentary, the DJ could announce the moral of this story and the reason why he wants everyone to know this particular tragic tale. And the moral taken from the edgy story is completely and utterly wrong for maximum comedy, prompting Velvet to rant. Bonus points if she rants hypocritically as her friends stare, making her say "what?".
Alternatively while Littlepip waits for a not-sweetie-belle song to finish she could talk to Calamity and ask him for more info on the Dashites. Even if he doesn't want to talk about his time as a Pegafaggot Team LP might run into one and info about the Dashites/Skyfaggots could be useful and necessary. And good foreshadowing and a clever way to set up info so an infodump won't be needed if more skyfags/dashites show up later in the story but she shouldn't say that part out loud.
Out of nowhere Littlepip gets attacked by not one, not two, but three alicorns. And then a super mecha badass in a fighting robot power armour Iron Man suit pops up out of nowhere and helps kill them. Except he's a faggot with terrible aim and preparation skills who's so "eager" to kill alicorns and save Muh Stable Dweller he forgot to make sure he doesn't hurt the Stable Dweller or her friends or himself.
He's kind of a total fucking retard. And it's not intentional. This isn't a character trait the author knows about. This robofag won't grow over time and learn the value of restraint and abandon some made-up "hurr durr crusade heretic" meme indoctrination and overcome his complete tactical ineptitude and inconsistent inability to use explosive weapons safely.
This guy's such a faggot he made Littlepip and pals take a detour out of their adventure to save his life. Do you think he keeps a padded helmet under that Power Armour?
For such a grim and dark and edgy setting, something like this... it's unintentionally hilarious.
Speaking of hilarious, Spongebob Squarepants. Merriwether Williams worked on it and FIM. In a parallel universe, mainstream bronies probably obsessed over that show instead. Sandy Cheeks porn became more common than Pokemon porn and instead of making up names for background ponies like Derpy and Bastion Yorsets they made up names for the background fish like the Health Inspector from Nasty Patties and the "What did you do to my drink?" Fish and the My Leg guy. Self insert harem power fantasies are written by lonely teens who fantasize about dying and reincarnating into Bikini Bottom as an all-powerful OC who gets to annoy Squidward and fuck all the bitches just like the similar Pokemon and Blue People Avatar fics. 35000 word Accusation Fics are written where authors beat the shit out of Patrick Star and call him a cunt for being a cunt to Gary in Petsitter Pat. Fallout Bikini Bottom became the most popular fanfic in the spongebob fanfiction community on FishFiction.net, and in the same vein as what Fallout Equestria does with Poison Joke, the Snail Plasma from that season 1 episode was injected into a thermonuclear bomb shaped bubble that was dropped on Rock Bottom to turn the eldritch monsters into helpless snails during an underwater war, and Spongebob's insane cartoon physics moments are explained with "he invented crack mints made from bubble mixture and snail food".
Edgy Spongebob... what a crazy idea. Like those pics of Sonic posing with knives or an edgy gun-toting gangster-tattooed Bugs Bunny in nigger clothes. Weird how western cartoon chars get edgy fanart but Naruto, who comes from a dark and edgy show already, gets photoshopped into absurdly expensive tacky nigger fashion.
Come to think of it, why did Steelcunt start out all "It is an honour to die for the glorious Marey Sue of Stable 69" but then as soon as Littlepip suggested risking her own life and the lives of her friends to try and get something that could possibly save this guy's life (if fixing a auto-inject healing potion system is enough to fix a caved-in fucked-up chunk of suit armour) he suddenly wants to be saved? If he was willing to die to save her then, why does he love the idea of her risking her life to potentially save him now when there's no guarantee she would make it? What if she was permanently scarred or crippled from this adventure? Obviously she'll pass this test with flying colours but he's just a book character. He shouldn't know what we and the author know.
And another thing, why is it that when Littlepip listens to the radio we don't hear every single song and every annoying comment from DJ Pon3? The ponies here are tired and wounded and on a fucking time limit so they should say some hilarious bollocks right now and yell at each other. Littlepip needs Sweetie Belle on this radio and she shouldn't get it until she's bored to tears and hilariously mad.
When the radio plays Johnny Ponyguitar or Heartache By The Poners yet again or plays What's New Ponycat 13 times then one It's Trot Unusual then one more What's New Ponycat it should piss these characters off as tensions get higher. Somepony should call Littlepip's plan retarded prompting LP to say "Do you have any better ideas or are you relying on me to do all the thinking yet again, you pretentious fucking karaeoke-loving whore?"
Also this would be a terrible time for lore in Littlepip's eyes but if the radio host started a lengthy talk-radio podcast infodumping session it would let LP taste a fraction of the rage I feel when this story starts randomly infodumping without making any of it good or interesting or meaningful or smart or relevant to the story.
Her agonized "slam own face against wall" reaction would be the perfect comedic contrast to an infodump that foreshadows a big future story event almost as cleverly as Ratchet and Clank 2's "Behind The Hero" ads about Qwark.
LP could even openly yell something like "I GET IT, I GET IT! SOME PRE-WAR PONY DIED HORRIBLY. WHAT A SHOCKER. WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH ANYTHING?"
And then for meta commentary, the DJ could announce the moral of this story and the reason why he wants everyone to know this particular tragic tale. And the moral taken from the edgy story is completely and utterly wrong for maximum comedy, prompting Velvet to rant. Bonus points if she rants hypocritically as her friends stare, making her say "what?".
Alternatively while Littlepip waits for a not-sweetie-belle song to finish she could talk to Calamity and ask him for more info on the Dashites. Even if he doesn't want to talk about his time as a Pegafaggot Team LP might run into one and info about the Dashites/Skyfaggots could be useful and necessary. And good foreshadowing and a clever way to set up info so an infodump won't be needed if more skyfags/dashites show up later in the story but she shouldn't say that part out loud.
When youre done with this are you gonna do Project Horizons?
>>297925
If Glim does, at least he'll have some ACTUAL FUCKING DIALOGUE and STORY to read at least until some parts of it go full silly mode. Then again he might also die of accumulated aneurysms from both this pile of shit and dealing with that quarter-jew Nigel's literal 'tism prisms.
If Glim does, at least he'll have some ACTUAL FUCKING DIALOGUE and STORY to read at least until some parts of it go full silly mode. Then again he might also die of accumulated aneurysms from both this pile of shit and dealing with that quarter-jew Nigel's literal 'tism prisms.
>>297925
Let's see if he makes it all the way through the original first and not mention the fact that PH is three times as long.
Let's see if he makes it all the way through the original first and not mention the fact that PH is three times as long.
>>295632
>>295821
>>297970
https://www.wikihow.com/Find-a-Hobby
>>297925
>>297999
Speaking of Project Horizons, I hear one of the main characters from that specifically uses a grenade launcher because "you have to think before you fire it". Perhaps that was a subtle dig at this story's reckless videogamey use of explosives.
Also it's absurd that Littlepip and pals don't mind getting caught in the collateral damage from Steelcunt's reckless explosive attack. They don't comment on it or complain that they had to use up their limited supply of healing items, possibly even the last of their healing items. Sure, Steelcunt could defend his actions with "Those three alicorns definitely would have killed you, healing items couldn't have saved you from what they would have done to you if I hadn't showed up!" but it's absurd that Littlepoop would treat her and her team's wounds and reduced number of healing items like a gamer desperate to move on with the plot would. Up until now, Littlepoop's fangirled over Velvet almost every day. But suddenly, she won't even comment on the source of her wounds or think a single negative thought about him?
And it's not just that this is a rescue Team LP shouldn't've liked. This "rescue" forced Team LP to take a diversion from their main path to rescue this dumbass who thought throwing big easily-grabbed grenades/missiles at a psychic foe aware of his location would end well for him. Slaves at the slave camp might die during the time this mission takes up. Littlepip and pals might die during this trek through a potentially-hazard-filled Stable. If there's been something heavy over its manhole cover all this time, there's a good chance that if the ponies maintaining the Stable died, the Stable itself is barren and devoid of life. Yet it could still have automated turret/robot defenses and the author could forget about food/water requirements while filling a destroyed and inhospitable stable with massive monsters "To make it extra-deadly" even though realistically those massive monsters would starve or eat each other in such a food-free environment.
This mission will only take a handful of minutes to a few hours if the author interprets the short and nonsensically enemy-filled "Skyrim Dungeon" design of F3's Vaults literally when designing this Stable like it's a fucking Total Wipeout meets Annihilation Nation deathcourse. They're going to search a fucking massive place for something tiny that might not even be there so it should take a fucking long time for well-trained and organized teams of expert scavengers to find. It will only be easy to find if it is conveniently placed in clear sight yet inconveniently placed at the end of a linear death-trap-filled dungeon crawl.
>>295821
>>297970
https://www.wikihow.com/Find-a-Hobby
>>297925
>>297999
Speaking of Project Horizons, I hear one of the main characters from that specifically uses a grenade launcher because "you have to think before you fire it". Perhaps that was a subtle dig at this story's reckless videogamey use of explosives.
Also it's absurd that Littlepip and pals don't mind getting caught in the collateral damage from Steelcunt's reckless explosive attack. They don't comment on it or complain that they had to use up their limited supply of healing items, possibly even the last of their healing items. Sure, Steelcunt could defend his actions with "Those three alicorns definitely would have killed you, healing items couldn't have saved you from what they would have done to you if I hadn't showed up!" but it's absurd that Littlepoop would treat her and her team's wounds and reduced number of healing items like a gamer desperate to move on with the plot would. Up until now, Littlepoop's fangirled over Velvet almost every day. But suddenly, she won't even comment on the source of her wounds or think a single negative thought about him?
And it's not just that this is a rescue Team LP shouldn't've liked. This "rescue" forced Team LP to take a diversion from their main path to rescue this dumbass who thought throwing big easily-grabbed grenades/missiles at a psychic foe aware of his location would end well for him. Slaves at the slave camp might die during the time this mission takes up. Littlepip and pals might die during this trek through a potentially-hazard-filled Stable. If there's been something heavy over its manhole cover all this time, there's a good chance that if the ponies maintaining the Stable died, the Stable itself is barren and devoid of life. Yet it could still have automated turret/robot defenses and the author could forget about food/water requirements while filling a destroyed and inhospitable stable with massive monsters "To make it extra-deadly" even though realistically those massive monsters would starve or eat each other in such a food-free environment.
This mission will only take a handful of minutes to a few hours if the author interprets the short and nonsensically enemy-filled "Skyrim Dungeon" design of F3's Vaults literally when designing this Stable like it's a fucking Total Wipeout meets Annihilation Nation deathcourse. They're going to search a fucking massive place for something tiny that might not even be there so it should take a fucking long time for well-trained and organized teams of expert scavengers to find. It will only be easy to find if it is conveniently placed in clear sight yet inconveniently placed at the end of a linear death-trap-filled dungeon crawl.
>>297844
>Also in the news: got another report of hellhounds attacking travelers in the wasteland between Manehattan and Fillydelphia. Honestly, ponies, if you have to travel that way, make sure you have a heavily armed escort.
Hurr durr that's where we're going, I wonder if that's going to be relevant?
Anyway, eventually the DJ plays a Sweetie Belle song, and I guess that was the last voice they needed. The author still doesn't bother to tell us who the other two voices are, nor does he explain the logic LP used to figure out which voices were needed. He does, however, provide the text of the recordings, so I guess anyone who was astute enough could go back, find those specific lines of text earlier in the book, and look to see who they were attributed to.
>“The override code for opening the door to Stable Two is... CMC3BFF.”
This was apparently spoken by Applebloom.
>“Hello! My name is Scootaloo. You probably know me (since I am pretty famous) for my awesome performances at events like last year’s GALLoPS, or maybe just as the founder of Red Racer…”
This one at the very least contains a name.
>I turned to find Velvet Remedy walking past me to face the door. The gorgeous mare had donned her beautiful dress and groomed her mane. I shot a look to Calamity, who merely shrugged. “um… Velvet?” The dress hid most of her bandages.
What? So...apparently Velvet had time to put on her fancy dress at some point and clean herself up a bit. I'll ignore the question of how or when, because the most pertinent question is why?
>“We’re meeting the ponies of another Stable for the first time. We want to put our best hoof forward,” she said aristocratically. “Especially if they’ve never had outside visitors before. We want to look like diplomats,” her eye moved to look at me without turning her head. “If you two went in first, we’d look like invaders.”
*sigh*
*rubs temples*
*chugs half a bottle of tequila*
*sighs and rubs temples again*
The group is entering an unknown stable. The last stable they entered was filled with radioactive cats. Granted, Velvet wasn't along for that trip, but we can assume she's probably heard the story at some point during their travels. Why would she assume that there would be anyone in here they could reason with? In fact, why even assume it would be inhabited? Again, the last stable they visited had been empty and abandoned for what seemed like decades. In fact, here is what we read about this stable just a few short paragraphs ago:
>“Well, this was a bust,” he proclaimed. It looked like Stable Twenty-Nine had never opened. And without an override password, it was unlikely that we would be getting in.
>It looked like Stable Twenty-Nine had never opened.
>never opened.
This strongly implies that the stable they are entering was built, but never occupied. Thus, my assumption has been that they are probably about to enter an empty stable that has either been hermetically sealed for 200 years, or else has been broken into and occupied by monsters or raiders as was the case with the last one. Either way, they would be entering a potentially dangerous situation. Frankly, the idea that this stable would be occupied in the same way that the one LP came from was occupied had never even crossed my mind, though in retrospect I suppose it's logical. Actually, if the party was assuming that the stable is a friendly place, it might explain this rather bat-shit-crazy idea of diving headfirst into a dungeon when they all have like 2 HP each god damn it now he's got me thinking like a vidya game sperg.
Anyway, Velvet at some point got all dolled up to introduce herself to what is probably an abandoned cavern filled with rapacious raiders, and nonchalantly strolls inside as soon as the door opens.
> Calamity limped up to me as I watched her disappear inside. “She’s really somethin’, ain’t she.”
>“Yes…” I said, feeling a little dumbstruck. I glanced at Calamity, who was staring through the door at Velvet. “…she…” I did a double-take. Calamity wasn’t looking at Velvet Remedy, he was looking at her. Something broke in my brain. “…no!”
And in other news, the last horse has finally crossed the finish line. I've always wanted to use that expression literally :^)
Anyway, there is a page break here. When the next scene starts, Littlepoop is silently fuming to herself over only just now realizing that Calamity wants to stick his hoo hoo dilly into Velvet's cha cha. Meanwhile, they just forced open the door to this hermetically sealed stable which could contain raiders, friendlies, monsters, or anything in between, but this seems to be the furthest thing from her mind.
This author has a really weird approach to developing his various subplots. This story mostly follows a pattern, where Littlepoop will chug along from adventure to adventure, mostly fixating on whatever external goal she has at that moment or whatever crap she's looting, and then she will just randomly blurt out something about Mint-als (which I guess she is supposed to be addicted to, even though she rarely if ever thinks about them), or Velvet (with whom she claims to be in love, even though she never seems to behave that way towards her in any of their interactions). It feels even weirder when he drops these bombs at inappropriate times, case in point. Obviously, the love triangle between these characters was going to reach this point eventually, but is now really the right moment? Literally at the precise second when the door to an unknown and potentially hostile location swings open, Littlepoop is getting paranoid about Velvet and Calamity getting together? I mean, the love triangle isn't a bad idea, and there's plenty the author can do with it, but there's a time to focus on side-plots and a time to focus on what's happening in the here and now. Even putting this in there a few seconds before the door opened would have been fine.
>Also in the news: got another report of hellhounds attacking travelers in the wasteland between Manehattan and Fillydelphia. Honestly, ponies, if you have to travel that way, make sure you have a heavily armed escort.
Hurr durr that's where we're going, I wonder if that's going to be relevant?
Anyway, eventually the DJ plays a Sweetie Belle song, and I guess that was the last voice they needed. The author still doesn't bother to tell us who the other two voices are, nor does he explain the logic LP used to figure out which voices were needed. He does, however, provide the text of the recordings, so I guess anyone who was astute enough could go back, find those specific lines of text earlier in the book, and look to see who they were attributed to.
>“The override code for opening the door to Stable Two is... CMC3BFF.”
This was apparently spoken by Applebloom.
>“Hello! My name is Scootaloo. You probably know me (since I am pretty famous) for my awesome performances at events like last year’s GALLoPS, or maybe just as the founder of Red Racer…”
This one at the very least contains a name.
>I turned to find Velvet Remedy walking past me to face the door. The gorgeous mare had donned her beautiful dress and groomed her mane. I shot a look to Calamity, who merely shrugged. “um… Velvet?” The dress hid most of her bandages.
What? So...apparently Velvet had time to put on her fancy dress at some point and clean herself up a bit. I'll ignore the question of how or when, because the most pertinent question is why?
>“We’re meeting the ponies of another Stable for the first time. We want to put our best hoof forward,” she said aristocratically. “Especially if they’ve never had outside visitors before. We want to look like diplomats,” her eye moved to look at me without turning her head. “If you two went in first, we’d look like invaders.”
*sigh*
*rubs temples*
*chugs half a bottle of tequila*
*sighs and rubs temples again*
The group is entering an unknown stable. The last stable they entered was filled with radioactive cats. Granted, Velvet wasn't along for that trip, but we can assume she's probably heard the story at some point during their travels. Why would she assume that there would be anyone in here they could reason with? In fact, why even assume it would be inhabited? Again, the last stable they visited had been empty and abandoned for what seemed like decades. In fact, here is what we read about this stable just a few short paragraphs ago:
>“Well, this was a bust,” he proclaimed. It looked like Stable Twenty-Nine had never opened. And without an override password, it was unlikely that we would be getting in.
>It looked like Stable Twenty-Nine had never opened.
>never opened.
This strongly implies that the stable they are entering was built, but never occupied. Thus, my assumption has been that they are probably about to enter an empty stable that has either been hermetically sealed for 200 years, or else has been broken into and occupied by monsters or raiders as was the case with the last one. Either way, they would be entering a potentially dangerous situation. Frankly, the idea that this stable would be occupied in the same way that the one LP came from was occupied had never even crossed my mind, though in retrospect I suppose it's logical. Actually, if the party was assuming that the stable is a friendly place, it might explain this rather bat-shit-crazy idea of diving headfirst into a dungeon when they all have like 2 HP each god damn it now he's got me thinking like a vidya game sperg.
Anyway, Velvet at some point got all dolled up to introduce herself to what is probably an abandoned cavern filled with rapacious raiders, and nonchalantly strolls inside as soon as the door opens.
> Calamity limped up to me as I watched her disappear inside. “She’s really somethin’, ain’t she.”
>“Yes…” I said, feeling a little dumbstruck. I glanced at Calamity, who was staring through the door at Velvet. “…she…” I did a double-take. Calamity wasn’t looking at Velvet Remedy, he was looking at her. Something broke in my brain. “…no!”
And in other news, the last horse has finally crossed the finish line. I've always wanted to use that expression literally :^)
Anyway, there is a page break here. When the next scene starts, Littlepoop is silently fuming to herself over only just now realizing that Calamity wants to stick his hoo hoo dilly into Velvet's cha cha. Meanwhile, they just forced open the door to this hermetically sealed stable which could contain raiders, friendlies, monsters, or anything in between, but this seems to be the furthest thing from her mind.
This author has a really weird approach to developing his various subplots. This story mostly follows a pattern, where Littlepoop will chug along from adventure to adventure, mostly fixating on whatever external goal she has at that moment or whatever crap she's looting, and then she will just randomly blurt out something about Mint-als (which I guess she is supposed to be addicted to, even though she rarely if ever thinks about them), or Velvet (with whom she claims to be in love, even though she never seems to behave that way towards her in any of their interactions). It feels even weirder when he drops these bombs at inappropriate times, case in point. Obviously, the love triangle between these characters was going to reach this point eventually, but is now really the right moment? Literally at the precise second when the door to an unknown and potentially hostile location swings open, Littlepoop is getting paranoid about Velvet and Calamity getting together? I mean, the love triangle isn't a bad idea, and there's plenty the author can do with it, but there's a time to focus on side-plots and a time to focus on what's happening in the here and now. Even putting this in there a few seconds before the door opened would have been fine.
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>>298014
>I took the mental image of Calamity successfully wooing Velvet Remedy when I could not and shoved it into a deep dark hole.
At this point, I think the author should consider doing something similar with this entire text. Also, it's worth noting that she hasn't actually attempted to woo Velvet Remedy yet; she's basically giving up without even putting in a marginal effort.
Anyway, LP sets her feelings aside and turns her attention to their immediate situation. The stable actually appears to be something like what I was originally envisioning, which is well-preserved but empty and abandoned. Unsurprisingly, there is a skeleton hanging in front of the door.
>This was an ominous start.
Again, I really don't see why they would have been expecting anything different. Every other place they've explored has been full of skeletons, ffs, even the place that actually had ponies living in it had a damn cabinet full of them.
>My Eyes-Forward Sparkle was clear of any red. For that matter, it was completely clear of anything other than my two companions. There was no life in this Stable. At least, not within the range of my PipBuck’s spell. The Stable was utterly silent, save for the ever-present high-pitched hum of the lights and the gentle rumble of the generators.
And again, it seems like they should have been more or less expecting this. The entrance to the stable was located underneath an abandoned train car in a bombed-out city, the door had never been opened, and there have been no indications of life or civilization anywhere in the area. Add to that the fact that nearly every other place they visit is either abandoned or full of enemies. What exactly did they expect to find down here?
Anyway, they've got two different options for which way they can go: maintenance, or atrium. Maintenance would take them to the PipBuck stall, where they would be most likely to find the key thingy they are looking for, but they also are in dire need of medical supplies, which they could find by going the other way. So, they head for the atrium first.
>Stepping in, my eyes immediately fell on the skeletons of at least three dozen other ponies.
At this point, they should be surprised when they enter a location and don't find three dozen skeletons.
>I had to use telekinesis to create a path through the bones of the ponies “lucky enough” to have made it into a Stable before the megaspell destroyed Manehattan. I felt anger biting at the back of my head. I reminded myself it wasn’t my Stable.
What exactly is she angry about here? What is the implication? She doesn't know how any of these ponies died, or why. There seems to be an implication that some sort of tremendous injustice occurred in this place, and that it somehow feeds into whatever LP's hang up about stables in general is, which actually hasn't been very well-explained either. Velvet also seems to disapprove of them, though that seems to be tied to her whole "I don't want to be le caged" thing.
Overall, the story seems to be leading us towards some idea that the stables were somehow insidious places that exploited or killed the ponies they purported to help. However, we haven't seen any direct evidence of this yet. LP's stable seemed like a nice enough place to live, at least as far as this setting goes, and the only other stable they've been to was the abandoned one filled with monster cats. However, the cats were the result of a freak accident that can't really be blamed on anyone, and apart from all that weird stuff about gender roles it seemed like it had been a relatively normal place as well.
>“Do you think they…?” Velvet’s voice trailed off. She was looking behind us, just above the door we had come through. Two automated security turrets were mounted on the wall. They had power, but didn’t seem to be tracking us. My E.F.S. claimed they were not a threat. The room suggested that had not always been the case.
Whatever Velvet is implying here is not clear, and it's never explained. Maybe the turrets shot them? Idk.
>Behind me, I heard Calamity whispering to Velvet, “She’s had bad reactions to a Stable before.” What, was I that obvious? “We better keep an eye on her.”
Again, I'm having a hard time figuring out what exactly LP's deal here is supposed to be. The last time around, the issue was that she was exploring an abandoned stable filled with dead ponies and monsters, and it bothered her to see a place that so closely resembled her home in such a state. Okay, I can understand that. So is the same thing happening again here? You'd think she'd be pretty used to skeletons and carnage and shit by now, and the simple coincidence of the building resembling the place she used to live shouldn't really bother her this much. What exactly is up her ass?
Part of it seems to be what she noticed about Velvet and Calamity earlier. Also, I'm assuming she is still dealing with the comedown from the crack mints. At this point, she suggests they split up:
>Velvet, why don’t you raid the clinic.” It was safe. I could see into the clinic through the Atrium window. Calamity and I will head down to maintenance.”
The author is missing a quotation mark at "Calamity and I." Also, if she's jealous, she ought to suggest that she and Velvet team up and Calamity fuck off. Sending the pony she supposedly loves off by herself to deal with a potentially dangerous situation while she hangs out with her romantic rival doesn't make a ton of sense.
Anyway, Velvet objects to this, saying that she needs to examine Calamity's bone as soon as possible :^). Littlepoop gets pissy, but realizes that she can't really vocalize why she's pissy without giving her feelings for Velvet away, so she says "fine" and goes off to the PipBuck repair station to find the whatever-key they came down here for. There is a pretty cringe-worthy dialogue exchange, in which Calamity and Velvet pretend they don't actually like each other, and then the scene ends with a page break.
>I took the mental image of Calamity successfully wooing Velvet Remedy when I could not and shoved it into a deep dark hole.
At this point, I think the author should consider doing something similar with this entire text. Also, it's worth noting that she hasn't actually attempted to woo Velvet Remedy yet; she's basically giving up without even putting in a marginal effort.
Anyway, LP sets her feelings aside and turns her attention to their immediate situation. The stable actually appears to be something like what I was originally envisioning, which is well-preserved but empty and abandoned. Unsurprisingly, there is a skeleton hanging in front of the door.
>This was an ominous start.
Again, I really don't see why they would have been expecting anything different. Every other place they've explored has been full of skeletons, ffs, even the place that actually had ponies living in it had a damn cabinet full of them.
>My Eyes-Forward Sparkle was clear of any red. For that matter, it was completely clear of anything other than my two companions. There was no life in this Stable. At least, not within the range of my PipBuck’s spell. The Stable was utterly silent, save for the ever-present high-pitched hum of the lights and the gentle rumble of the generators.
And again, it seems like they should have been more or less expecting this. The entrance to the stable was located underneath an abandoned train car in a bombed-out city, the door had never been opened, and there have been no indications of life or civilization anywhere in the area. Add to that the fact that nearly every other place they visit is either abandoned or full of enemies. What exactly did they expect to find down here?
Anyway, they've got two different options for which way they can go: maintenance, or atrium. Maintenance would take them to the PipBuck stall, where they would be most likely to find the key thingy they are looking for, but they also are in dire need of medical supplies, which they could find by going the other way. So, they head for the atrium first.
>Stepping in, my eyes immediately fell on the skeletons of at least three dozen other ponies.
At this point, they should be surprised when they enter a location and don't find three dozen skeletons.
>I had to use telekinesis to create a path through the bones of the ponies “lucky enough” to have made it into a Stable before the megaspell destroyed Manehattan. I felt anger biting at the back of my head. I reminded myself it wasn’t my Stable.
What exactly is she angry about here? What is the implication? She doesn't know how any of these ponies died, or why. There seems to be an implication that some sort of tremendous injustice occurred in this place, and that it somehow feeds into whatever LP's hang up about stables in general is, which actually hasn't been very well-explained either. Velvet also seems to disapprove of them, though that seems to be tied to her whole "I don't want to be le caged" thing.
Overall, the story seems to be leading us towards some idea that the stables were somehow insidious places that exploited or killed the ponies they purported to help. However, we haven't seen any direct evidence of this yet. LP's stable seemed like a nice enough place to live, at least as far as this setting goes, and the only other stable they've been to was the abandoned one filled with monster cats. However, the cats were the result of a freak accident that can't really be blamed on anyone, and apart from all that weird stuff about gender roles it seemed like it had been a relatively normal place as well.
>“Do you think they…?” Velvet’s voice trailed off. She was looking behind us, just above the door we had come through. Two automated security turrets were mounted on the wall. They had power, but didn’t seem to be tracking us. My E.F.S. claimed they were not a threat. The room suggested that had not always been the case.
Whatever Velvet is implying here is not clear, and it's never explained. Maybe the turrets shot them? Idk.
>Behind me, I heard Calamity whispering to Velvet, “She’s had bad reactions to a Stable before.” What, was I that obvious? “We better keep an eye on her.”
Again, I'm having a hard time figuring out what exactly LP's deal here is supposed to be. The last time around, the issue was that she was exploring an abandoned stable filled with dead ponies and monsters, and it bothered her to see a place that so closely resembled her home in such a state. Okay, I can understand that. So is the same thing happening again here? You'd think she'd be pretty used to skeletons and carnage and shit by now, and the simple coincidence of the building resembling the place she used to live shouldn't really bother her this much. What exactly is up her ass?
Part of it seems to be what she noticed about Velvet and Calamity earlier. Also, I'm assuming she is still dealing with the comedown from the crack mints. At this point, she suggests they split up:
>Velvet, why don’t you raid the clinic.” It was safe. I could see into the clinic through the Atrium window. Calamity and I will head down to maintenance.”
The author is missing a quotation mark at "Calamity and I." Also, if she's jealous, she ought to suggest that she and Velvet team up and Calamity fuck off. Sending the pony she supposedly loves off by herself to deal with a potentially dangerous situation while she hangs out with her romantic rival doesn't make a ton of sense.
Anyway, Velvet objects to this, saying that she needs to examine Calamity's bone as soon as possible :^). Littlepoop gets pissy, but realizes that she can't really vocalize why she's pissy without giving her feelings for Velvet away, so she says "fine" and goes off to the PipBuck repair station to find the whatever-key they came down here for. There is a pretty cringe-worthy dialogue exchange, in which Calamity and Velvet pretend they don't actually like each other, and then the scene ends with a page break.
>>298014
>I spent the rest of the trip down through Stable Maintenance reminding myself that it actually was a good thing that my friends got along, that it was stupid to be jealous when I’d had no real chance to begin with, and that if I wanted to keep those friends, I’d best bury these feelings in that same dark hole.
This is actually a pretty reasonable reaction, and is in line with how LP ought to be feeling right about now. However, I'd actually like to back up a little and examine the cringe-worthy dialog exchange between Calamity and Velvet that I mentioned above.
From the way she's behaving, Calamity and Velvet can clearly see that Littlepoop has some sand in her vagina, and they ask her what the fuck. She responds thusly:
>I waved a hoof. “Oh yes. I’m just… feeling a little drained. Blood loss, you know.” I put on a good smile. She looked like she was trying to be convinced. “Okay, I’m a bit surprised. But I’m happy. It’s a good thing that my two friends like each other.”
It doesn't feel like an appropriate time for her to be this blunt about what she sees between them. Velvet and Calamity clearly have feelings for each other, but neither of them seem to have openly declared it or even directly acknowledged it to themselves. For her part, Littlepoop has not made her feelings about Velvet known at all; in fact, I don't think either of them would even realize that she likes girls from her behavior thus far. Blurting it out like this not only gives her own feelings away, it calls direct attention to what's obviously developing between Velvet and Calamity, which is only going to hasten things along by making the two of them realize it and face it. Not even Littlepoop could possibly be that dumb.
If the author wanted to, he could take this little burst of jealousy from Littlepoop and mine a lot of comedy from it being misinterpreted. Since, again, Littlepoop hasn't declared any affection for Velvet and hasn't really made it apparent that she's into munching pony box, the natural assumption here would be that she is jealous because she likes Calamity, not Velvet. This misunderstanding could develop into a pretty hilarious side plot. Velvet, who obviously likes Calamity but doesn't appear to realize it yet, would think that LP likes him and might try to play matchmaker between them or something, which is obviously not what LP wants. Calamity seems to openly desire Velvet at this point, but hasn't really noticed Littlepoop. If he suddenly had reason to think LP was into him, it might change this; he'd start to notice LP more, and would probably be flattered at the thought of having his two female companions fighting over him. The whole thing could turn into an absolute mess, which would be perfect; the more convoluted you make this sort of thing, the more entertaining it tends to get.
Anyway, the next bit is where it starts to go off the rails somewhat:
> Calamity coughed. “Wait, what?” He nickered, “She’s a self-righteous, self-idolizin’ elitist who’d rather fix up our enemies than shoot ‘em.”
This isn't really an accurate characterization of Velvet, and Calamity has never said or indicated that he feels this way about her before. In the rare instances where she actually takes a moral stand on something she can be a little self-righteous, but this is actually far from being her worst quality.
>self-idolizing
She's never shown signs of having an unreasonably high opinion of herself or her talents.
>elitist
She certainly has never indicated she considers some ponies to be socially beneath her.
Now, here is what she has to say about Calamity:
>Velvet Remedy shot him a scowl. “And he’s an impulsive ruffian who thinks he can fix the wasteland by drowning it in blood.”
This is completely inaccurate, at least from what we've seen. To be fair, the author has given Calamity almost no distinct personality at all, and we don't know much about his past beyond that he's a "Dashite" (whatever the hell that is). So, nearly any characterization of him would feel inaccurate.
>impulsive
If you asked me to say the first word that popped into my head when I think of this character, "impulsive" wouldn't be it. He actually seems fairly level-headed for the most part.
>fix the wasteland by drowning it in blood
Hoo boy, if irony were strawberries, kkat would be chugging a lot of strawberry-flavored cum right now. This statement doesn't apply to Calamity at all, but it's a highly accurate characterization of Littlepoop. Calamity really hasn't explained why he does any of what he does. He doesn't seem to have any sort of overarching goals or objectives in life, he hasn't expressed any strong beliefs or principles one way or the other; he's mostly just been a presence in this story without really making any serious contributions to it. As I've often commented, it's a little perplexing why he even chose to tag along with LP in the first place. She's the one with the holy-roller mission to purge the Wasteland of all its icky badness, and who doesn't care who or whom :^) she has to slaughter in order to accomplish this. Calamity's use of violence seems to be mostly practical; he kills when he needs to, but he isn't a sadist about it. He strikes me as a pretty typical resident of the Wasteland, really; he lives day to day, mostly focuses on his own survival, and doesn't really concern himself with big-picture goals or missions.
Anyway, you'll recall from the tangent I went off on earlier about RomComs that this kind of odd-couple chemistry is a staple in romance stories. Two characters who clearly like each other will often behave as if they don't, and will often fight or be adversaries in the early part of the story. This is clearly what the author is trying to do here, but unfortunately it doesn't work, as these characters have not had anything resembling that sort of chemistry up until this point. To my memory they've never had an argument or butted heads on anything, actually.
>I spent the rest of the trip down through Stable Maintenance reminding myself that it actually was a good thing that my friends got along, that it was stupid to be jealous when I’d had no real chance to begin with, and that if I wanted to keep those friends, I’d best bury these feelings in that same dark hole.
This is actually a pretty reasonable reaction, and is in line with how LP ought to be feeling right about now. However, I'd actually like to back up a little and examine the cringe-worthy dialog exchange between Calamity and Velvet that I mentioned above.
From the way she's behaving, Calamity and Velvet can clearly see that Littlepoop has some sand in her vagina, and they ask her what the fuck. She responds thusly:
>I waved a hoof. “Oh yes. I’m just… feeling a little drained. Blood loss, you know.” I put on a good smile. She looked like she was trying to be convinced. “Okay, I’m a bit surprised. But I’m happy. It’s a good thing that my two friends like each other.”
It doesn't feel like an appropriate time for her to be this blunt about what she sees between them. Velvet and Calamity clearly have feelings for each other, but neither of them seem to have openly declared it or even directly acknowledged it to themselves. For her part, Littlepoop has not made her feelings about Velvet known at all; in fact, I don't think either of them would even realize that she likes girls from her behavior thus far. Blurting it out like this not only gives her own feelings away, it calls direct attention to what's obviously developing between Velvet and Calamity, which is only going to hasten things along by making the two of them realize it and face it. Not even Littlepoop could possibly be that dumb.
If the author wanted to, he could take this little burst of jealousy from Littlepoop and mine a lot of comedy from it being misinterpreted. Since, again, Littlepoop hasn't declared any affection for Velvet and hasn't really made it apparent that she's into munching pony box, the natural assumption here would be that she is jealous because she likes Calamity, not Velvet. This misunderstanding could develop into a pretty hilarious side plot. Velvet, who obviously likes Calamity but doesn't appear to realize it yet, would think that LP likes him and might try to play matchmaker between them or something, which is obviously not what LP wants. Calamity seems to openly desire Velvet at this point, but hasn't really noticed Littlepoop. If he suddenly had reason to think LP was into him, it might change this; he'd start to notice LP more, and would probably be flattered at the thought of having his two female companions fighting over him. The whole thing could turn into an absolute mess, which would be perfect; the more convoluted you make this sort of thing, the more entertaining it tends to get.
Anyway, the next bit is where it starts to go off the rails somewhat:
> Calamity coughed. “Wait, what?” He nickered, “She’s a self-righteous, self-idolizin’ elitist who’d rather fix up our enemies than shoot ‘em.”
This isn't really an accurate characterization of Velvet, and Calamity has never said or indicated that he feels this way about her before. In the rare instances where she actually takes a moral stand on something she can be a little self-righteous, but this is actually far from being her worst quality.
>self-idolizing
She's never shown signs of having an unreasonably high opinion of herself or her talents.
>elitist
She certainly has never indicated she considers some ponies to be socially beneath her.
Now, here is what she has to say about Calamity:
>Velvet Remedy shot him a scowl. “And he’s an impulsive ruffian who thinks he can fix the wasteland by drowning it in blood.”
This is completely inaccurate, at least from what we've seen. To be fair, the author has given Calamity almost no distinct personality at all, and we don't know much about his past beyond that he's a "Dashite" (whatever the hell that is). So, nearly any characterization of him would feel inaccurate.
>impulsive
If you asked me to say the first word that popped into my head when I think of this character, "impulsive" wouldn't be it. He actually seems fairly level-headed for the most part.
>fix the wasteland by drowning it in blood
Hoo boy, if irony were strawberries, kkat would be chugging a lot of strawberry-flavored cum right now. This statement doesn't apply to Calamity at all, but it's a highly accurate characterization of Littlepoop. Calamity really hasn't explained why he does any of what he does. He doesn't seem to have any sort of overarching goals or objectives in life, he hasn't expressed any strong beliefs or principles one way or the other; he's mostly just been a presence in this story without really making any serious contributions to it. As I've often commented, it's a little perplexing why he even chose to tag along with LP in the first place. She's the one with the holy-roller mission to purge the Wasteland of all its icky badness, and who doesn't care who or whom :^) she has to slaughter in order to accomplish this. Calamity's use of violence seems to be mostly practical; he kills when he needs to, but he isn't a sadist about it. He strikes me as a pretty typical resident of the Wasteland, really; he lives day to day, mostly focuses on his own survival, and doesn't really concern himself with big-picture goals or missions.
Anyway, you'll recall from the tangent I went off on earlier about RomComs that this kind of odd-couple chemistry is a staple in romance stories. Two characters who clearly like each other will often behave as if they don't, and will often fight or be adversaries in the early part of the story. This is clearly what the author is trying to do here, but unfortunately it doesn't work, as these characters have not had anything resembling that sort of chemistry up until this point. To my memory they've never had an argument or butted heads on anything, actually.
>>298005
I dont think it would be entirely reasonable to suggest that Somber picked one the characters weapons that he only obtains like after the length of kkats foe and a significant amount of charachter development.
P-21 out the gate is so fucking assmad about stable99's... err society he's like a school shooter, and it scares him so its a big step for him to use the grenade rifle
I dont think it would be entirely reasonable to suggest that Somber picked one the characters weapons that he only obtains like after the length of kkats foe and a significant amount of charachter development.
P-21 out the gate is so fucking assmad about stable99's... err society he's like a school shooter, and it scares him so its a big step for him to use the grenade rifle
>>296515
>I never finished PH but I heard it ends in a literal multi-phase videogame boss battle where Blackjack the canonical child rapist fights a big evil blob monster that's responsible for everything that ever went wrong
Isnt Blackjack canonically like 16 or something? Also that isnt where it ends and ames isnt responsibile for everything that ever went wrong, and if i remember correctly his boss killed him.
>I never finished PH but I heard it ends in a literal multi-phase videogame boss battle where Blackjack the canonical child rapist fights a big evil blob monster that's responsible for everything that ever went wrong
Isnt Blackjack canonically like 16 or something? Also that isnt where it ends and ames isnt responsibile for everything that ever went wrong, and if i remember correctly his boss killed him.
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>>298070
That guy's a tsundere with a crush on me, but he just can't spit it out or realize I'm not interested in him. I'm joking, I don't actually know what his problem with me is. But if you ignore him he'll go away for a while until he feels like yelling something like this again. He doesn't call me a faggot because there's something about me he thinks I should change. He calls me a jew because he thinks if he says it enough times, others will assume it's true and join in. I was born in the UK and I'm so white I get sunburns during cloudy winter days, but if we were on a lefty site right now he'd call me a nazi instead.
>>298014
> Calamity limped up to me as I watched her disappear inside. “She’s really somethin’, ain’t she.”
>“Yes…” I said, feeling a little dumbstruck. I glanced at Calamity, who was staring through the door at Velvet. “…she…” I did a double-take. Calamity wasn’t looking at Velvet Remedy, he was looking at her. Something broke in my brain. “…no!”
Something definitely broke in Kkat's brain.
>Calamity wasn’t looking at Velvet Remedy, he was looking at her
...Her what? Her ass? Her hooves? He is Calamity and She is Velvet Remedy. How can Calamity not look at Velvet while he instead looks at her?
This has to be a typo.
Perhaps he meant to write "He was looking at her..." and then trail off?
Still fucking faggoted. This fic went through 22 proof-readers or something, right? People can buy this online and order print runs. It wouldn't surprise me if someone out there bought this at a charity store after it was given away.
>#notmystable
Littlepip and Kkat are such faggots.
He insufficiently explained her dislike of fucked vaults- I mean "Stables" and made it an insufficiently big thing.
Littlepip grew up in an underground vault made by the same company that made numerous other vaults. When she goes through an abandoned and destroyed Vault, it should be pure suffering for her. The memories should leap out and bite at her psyche like sharks made of lava lurking beneath the surface of lava. She turns down a familiar hallway, sees some familiar doors, and has to stop and tell herself she isn't back home and the third door on her left does not lead to the bedroom of the only filly who ever invited her to a slumber party and only once. It's like a funhouse-mirror version of the home she grew up in, the underground complex that was all she ever knew until she started this stupid quest. It's like a hellish mockery of the familiar ever-clean and boringly sterile environment of her home.
It's so painfully similar to her home that if she closes her eyes and ignores the smell it almost feels like nothing's changed at all. Dust and dirt and scars and blood and skeletons should bother her more than they do. She doesn't know how her home is doing and the sight of just one vault that easily fell into disrepair and became a monster-infested deathtrap should leave her terrified that her vault might suffer the same fate. Every second, she should desperately try to tell herself "This isn't my home, my home's fine". Any differences from her "hometown" of a vault just like this one should leap out at her and stretch her suspension of disbelief. And LP's memories of this place aren't entirely happy like ex-celebrity Velvet's were.
LP acts like an amateur roleplayer whose character grew up in a normal vault. So when she encounters a fucked vault, she comments on it once or twice since Kkat thinks that's something this character should do. But realistically this should be a fucking massive deal for her every time she comes to one of these shitholes.
It's like if you came from a town and left it long ago, only to return a while later to see it's been taken over by monsters and coated in filth and decay. Except you know there are countless other towns out there that started eerily similar to yours and they've probably all gone to shit.
The sight of her first destroyed Stable full of monsters should shake her greatly and make her count her blessings that her Stable didn't suffer from a random chimp event or random mutant cat infestation or have some random goofily-written men-in-charge gimmick. She didn't react enough to this when she was a newfag, so all the time spent focusing on it now makes her look weird.
The sight of her second destroyed Stable should hurt her hope and make her fear that all Stables out there are fucked in some way. Her name, "The Stable Dweller", should also stick out to her and make her think "Oh fuck, being from a Stable is considered noteworthy enough to be your epithet in this world. Were all Stables fucked, or are they just peacefully existing underground? I may never know but I wish I knew!"
Instead of callously clearing a path through skeletons coating the floors like dirty laundry coats the bedroom of a messy faggot, the sight of areas where ponies gathered for no reason before dying together for no reason should make her cry. At least fucking once. And then grow tougher skin over time so wasteland shit EVENTUALLY stops bothering her as much as it should bother a realistically-written civilian newfag to the post-apocalyptic lifestyle. Kkat's inconsistent writing makes all of his "UwU this is the saddest scariest edgiest thing ever and it bothers me so much" moments jarring compared to all the shit that doesn't bother her but should.
Littlepip's nosy obsession with unearthing the secrets behind why and how pre-war places went to shit is so fucking retarded, too.
Kkat had the perfect excuse dropped in his own lap, by himself. He wrote that Scootaloo turned most vaults into experiments. So if Littlepip thought about this and said "I must learn the secrets behind the fall of these Stables so future generations can learn from their mistakes!" it would be good writing for once.
That guy's a tsundere with a crush on me, but he just can't spit it out or realize I'm not interested in him. I'm joking, I don't actually know what his problem with me is. But if you ignore him he'll go away for a while until he feels like yelling something like this again. He doesn't call me a faggot because there's something about me he thinks I should change. He calls me a jew because he thinks if he says it enough times, others will assume it's true and join in. I was born in the UK and I'm so white I get sunburns during cloudy winter days, but if we were on a lefty site right now he'd call me a nazi instead.
>>298014
> Calamity limped up to me as I watched her disappear inside. “She’s really somethin’, ain’t she.”
>“Yes…” I said, feeling a little dumbstruck. I glanced at Calamity, who was staring through the door at Velvet. “…she…” I did a double-take. Calamity wasn’t looking at Velvet Remedy, he was looking at her. Something broke in my brain. “…no!”
Something definitely broke in Kkat's brain.
>Calamity wasn’t looking at Velvet Remedy, he was looking at her
...Her what? Her ass? Her hooves? He is Calamity and She is Velvet Remedy. How can Calamity not look at Velvet while he instead looks at her?
This has to be a typo.
Perhaps he meant to write "He was looking at her..." and then trail off?
Still fucking faggoted. This fic went through 22 proof-readers or something, right? People can buy this online and order print runs. It wouldn't surprise me if someone out there bought this at a charity store after it was given away.
>#notmystable
Littlepip and Kkat are such faggots.
He insufficiently explained her dislike of fucked vaults- I mean "Stables" and made it an insufficiently big thing.
Littlepip grew up in an underground vault made by the same company that made numerous other vaults. When she goes through an abandoned and destroyed Vault, it should be pure suffering for her. The memories should leap out and bite at her psyche like sharks made of lava lurking beneath the surface of lava. She turns down a familiar hallway, sees some familiar doors, and has to stop and tell herself she isn't back home and the third door on her left does not lead to the bedroom of the only filly who ever invited her to a slumber party and only once. It's like a funhouse-mirror version of the home she grew up in, the underground complex that was all she ever knew until she started this stupid quest. It's like a hellish mockery of the familiar ever-clean and boringly sterile environment of her home.
It's so painfully similar to her home that if she closes her eyes and ignores the smell it almost feels like nothing's changed at all. Dust and dirt and scars and blood and skeletons should bother her more than they do. She doesn't know how her home is doing and the sight of just one vault that easily fell into disrepair and became a monster-infested deathtrap should leave her terrified that her vault might suffer the same fate. Every second, she should desperately try to tell herself "This isn't my home, my home's fine". Any differences from her "hometown" of a vault just like this one should leap out at her and stretch her suspension of disbelief. And LP's memories of this place aren't entirely happy like ex-celebrity Velvet's were.
LP acts like an amateur roleplayer whose character grew up in a normal vault. So when she encounters a fucked vault, she comments on it once or twice since Kkat thinks that's something this character should do. But realistically this should be a fucking massive deal for her every time she comes to one of these shitholes.
It's like if you came from a town and left it long ago, only to return a while later to see it's been taken over by monsters and coated in filth and decay. Except you know there are countless other towns out there that started eerily similar to yours and they've probably all gone to shit.
The sight of her first destroyed Stable full of monsters should shake her greatly and make her count her blessings that her Stable didn't suffer from a random chimp event or random mutant cat infestation or have some random goofily-written men-in-charge gimmick. She didn't react enough to this when she was a newfag, so all the time spent focusing on it now makes her look weird.
The sight of her second destroyed Stable should hurt her hope and make her fear that all Stables out there are fucked in some way. Her name, "The Stable Dweller", should also stick out to her and make her think "Oh fuck, being from a Stable is considered noteworthy enough to be your epithet in this world. Were all Stables fucked, or are they just peacefully existing underground? I may never know but I wish I knew!"
Instead of callously clearing a path through skeletons coating the floors like dirty laundry coats the bedroom of a messy faggot, the sight of areas where ponies gathered for no reason before dying together for no reason should make her cry. At least fucking once. And then grow tougher skin over time so wasteland shit EVENTUALLY stops bothering her as much as it should bother a realistically-written civilian newfag to the post-apocalyptic lifestyle. Kkat's inconsistent writing makes all of his "UwU this is the saddest scariest edgiest thing ever and it bothers me so much" moments jarring compared to all the shit that doesn't bother her but should.
Littlepip's nosy obsession with unearthing the secrets behind why and how pre-war places went to shit is so fucking retarded, too.
Kkat had the perfect excuse dropped in his own lap, by himself. He wrote that Scootaloo turned most vaults into experiments. So if Littlepip thought about this and said "I must learn the secrets behind the fall of these Stables so future generations can learn from their mistakes!" it would be good writing for once.
>>298017
>“She's had bad reactions to a Stable before. We better keep an eye on her.”
She disliked walking through an enemy-filled hellhole full of poisonous abominations. But she still speedran one to get you the antidote once your dumb ass got poisoned, Calamity, and she still blew it up and saved your ass. How the fuck is that a "bad reaction"? She didn't blow it up because she wanted to, she blew it up because she didn't want the monsters to spread! Are you talking about her "bad reaction" to a Stable where men are in charge? The author clumsily had her insist she doesn't have a problem with men in charge but hates the propaganda posters where mares cower in fear from a clogged sink only a heroic stallion could save them from. Calamity's talking like they're walking through a knife shop and Littlepip is known for slicing her wrists open for attention!
>misunderstanding where they think LP likes Calamity
You're a motherfucking genius! No homo but I love you. This would elevate this story and make slogging through all the edge and goomershit worth it to get to the love triangle moments!
>Calamity and Velvet's characterizations of each other
I wonder what these characters would say about Littlepip.
They'd probably take turns sucking her dick and calling her impressive while giving her all the credit for what the team did together.
But if Calamity's supposed to be a simple guy, Kkat should lean into that and make this an actual character trait. Write him talking to Littlepip about her higher ideals with curiousity while he says he's never thought much about higher ideals. He could mention he once knew ponies who had grand ideals, but got killed by them. Or say he used to believe in high ideals before the world decided to beat it out of him. Could write him arguing with Velvet, so he's mad at her for being inefficient and she's mad at him for not having her civilian morality.
Deep-ass discussions on dreams and goals and the future are great ways to characterize your characters. But only if it's written like an actual conversation where they comment on each other's dreams according to their personalities. If they just take turns spelling out their names and backstories and characterizations and goals for the audience artificially it's gay.
If you're going to do it artificially, just make the narrator spell shit out the characters would never mention on their own, like in Jojo's Bizarre Adventure pt5. It'd probably be improved if the Passione gang told each other their backstories during a "getting closer to each other" scene but it was a fast-paced story arc with little time for stuff like that.
Naruto had a great scene near the start where Kakashi asked his new team of 3 rookie ninjas for their names, likes, dislikes, and dreams. Solidifying who they are and what their dynamic will be for the audience's benefit. It makes sense since they were all strangers to him and he was genuinely trying to get to know them.
Naruto says he wants to be the next Ninja-President, Sakura says she wants Sasuke and hates Naruto and her dream is Sasuke(She was shallow back then), and Sasuke edgily says he likes nothing, hates a lot of things, and his dream is to kill his evil big brother.
Then Kakashi "Introduces himself" by telling them absolutely nothing about himself and he unexpectedly says he hates them all. Funny scene.
>>298069
Makes sense. I've heard things about the story but never read it. Couldn't get past the first chapter, fictional fully-female-dominated societies piss me off more than they probably should.
>>298077
I was told that character groomed/fucked someone way below her age but I've got no idea if it's correct or not.
>“She's had bad reactions to a Stable before. We better keep an eye on her.”
She disliked walking through an enemy-filled hellhole full of poisonous abominations. But she still speedran one to get you the antidote once your dumb ass got poisoned, Calamity, and she still blew it up and saved your ass. How the fuck is that a "bad reaction"? She didn't blow it up because she wanted to, she blew it up because she didn't want the monsters to spread! Are you talking about her "bad reaction" to a Stable where men are in charge? The author clumsily had her insist she doesn't have a problem with men in charge but hates the propaganda posters where mares cower in fear from a clogged sink only a heroic stallion could save them from. Calamity's talking like they're walking through a knife shop and Littlepip is known for slicing her wrists open for attention!
>misunderstanding where they think LP likes Calamity
You're a motherfucking genius! No homo but I love you. This would elevate this story and make slogging through all the edge and goomershit worth it to get to the love triangle moments!
>Calamity and Velvet's characterizations of each other
I wonder what these characters would say about Littlepip.
They'd probably take turns sucking her dick and calling her impressive while giving her all the credit for what the team did together.
But if Calamity's supposed to be a simple guy, Kkat should lean into that and make this an actual character trait. Write him talking to Littlepip about her higher ideals with curiousity while he says he's never thought much about higher ideals. He could mention he once knew ponies who had grand ideals, but got killed by them. Or say he used to believe in high ideals before the world decided to beat it out of him. Could write him arguing with Velvet, so he's mad at her for being inefficient and she's mad at him for not having her civilian morality.
Deep-ass discussions on dreams and goals and the future are great ways to characterize your characters. But only if it's written like an actual conversation where they comment on each other's dreams according to their personalities. If they just take turns spelling out their names and backstories and characterizations and goals for the audience artificially it's gay.
If you're going to do it artificially, just make the narrator spell shit out the characters would never mention on their own, like in Jojo's Bizarre Adventure pt5. It'd probably be improved if the Passione gang told each other their backstories during a "getting closer to each other" scene but it was a fast-paced story arc with little time for stuff like that.
Naruto had a great scene near the start where Kakashi asked his new team of 3 rookie ninjas for their names, likes, dislikes, and dreams. Solidifying who they are and what their dynamic will be for the audience's benefit. It makes sense since they were all strangers to him and he was genuinely trying to get to know them.
Naruto says he wants to be the next Ninja-President, Sakura says she wants Sasuke and hates Naruto and her dream is Sasuke(She was shallow back then), and Sasuke edgily says he likes nothing, hates a lot of things, and his dream is to kill his evil big brother.
Then Kakashi "Introduces himself" by telling them absolutely nothing about himself and he unexpectedly says he hates them all. Funny scene.
>>298069
Makes sense. I've heard things about the story but never read it. Couldn't get past the first chapter, fictional fully-female-dominated societies piss me off more than they probably should.
>>298077
I was told that character groomed/fucked someone way below her age but I've got no idea if it's correct or not.
>>298100
Theyre probably referring to the scene where scotch tape fucked bastard in the space ship like, less then 10 feet from her. Scotch tape is like 12, I think it makes sense given both of their backgrounds since theyre from stable 99 where they had... less then kino views about sex.
Other then that I cant think of anything. Blackjack will fuck just about anything that will move and would be jailbait in real life.
Theyre probably referring to the scene where scotch tape fucked bastard in the space ship like, less then 10 feet from her. Scotch tape is like 12, I think it makes sense given both of their backgrounds since theyre from stable 99 where they had... less then kino views about sex.
Other then that I cant think of anything. Blackjack will fuck just about anything that will move and would be jailbait in real life.
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>>298099
Nigel, for the love of god. We know you're never gonna learn. You have made evident that you're like the guy from Memento, where a few day(a week at best) you'll 'learn your lesson' until the heat dies down, and then you'll go back to derailing and sperging about what the fuck ever.
But please, PLEASE stop gaslighting posters, proffering your "Nigel is a gud boi, he dindu nuffin" delusions. You know exactly why he has an issue with you. He and others - self included - have spelled it out to you in painstaking detail over a thousand times by now.
But you wont, you'll feign innocence, cool your jets for a few days, maybe a week, and then test the boundaries once again until you're back up to full speed.
Because you've been doing it for almost 4 years now. Its exhausting. Have some fucking decency.
But it's always someone else who has a problem, it's never anything you do. You're a gud boi, you dindu nuffin
Nigel, for the love of god. We know you're never gonna learn. You have made evident that you're like the guy from Memento, where a few day(a week at best) you'll 'learn your lesson' until the heat dies down, and then you'll go back to derailing and sperging about what the fuck ever.
But please, PLEASE stop gaslighting posters, proffering your "Nigel is a gud boi, he dindu nuffin" delusions. You know exactly why he has an issue with you. He and others - self included - have spelled it out to you in painstaking detail over a thousand times by now.
But you wont, you'll feign innocence, cool your jets for a few days, maybe a week, and then test the boundaries once again until you're back up to full speed.
Because you've been doing it for almost 4 years now. Its exhausting. Have some fucking decency.
But it's always someone else who has a problem, it's never anything you do. You're a gud boi, you dindu nuffin
>>298112
Sometimes I accidentally make off-topic posts but I work hard to make sure I don't do that any more. If my haters hated me for a valid reason, they would only rage at me when I did something wrong and they would clearly point out what is wrong in the moment. They wouldn't need to use vague terms and buzzwords to make their arguments for them. Dindu check, gaslighting check, movie reference for emotional reaction check, sperging check, delusion check, is this a record for the most buzzwords used in a guilt-slinging low-quality accusation of guilt? I'm surprised you didn't accuse me of being a jew in this post. I've been more on-topic in this thread than my haters. When I actually make mistakes, good people point them out clearly and explain how I can avoid doing them again in the future because that's constructive. Yelling at me when I do nothing wrong is not constructive. Trying to demonize and dehumanize me and paint me as someone who's calculating everything to troll everyone is not constructive. If I was a troll I wouldn't be a very good one. A troll takes pleasure from annoying others, and I don't give a fuck how my haters feel. It's best to ignore them and their attempts to trick others into joining in the dogpile. Nobody smart would fall for such obvious emotional manipulation anyway.
>>298104
That makes sense. That story sounds like a clusterfuck, do you think we'd be allowed to review it here if we skipped over the sex scenes?
>>298017
Come to think of it, does Littlepip's overpowered PipBuck and its enemy-detecting and map-making ability ruin the thrill and terror and uncertainty of exploring new dungeons?
That Pipbuck can detect enemies long before LP's eyes and ears can. She can't get jumpscared by enemies because she will always have that warning on her radar. She will always have a compass mark magically telling her where her Quwst Objective is too, making exploring an area to find something specific way too easy. I guess the author could build on that for terror by making her hide from hyper dangerous enemies in a locker or something while quietly and fearfully watching the pipbuck compass mark and hoping they would go away.
Sometimes I accidentally make off-topic posts but I work hard to make sure I don't do that any more. If my haters hated me for a valid reason, they would only rage at me when I did something wrong and they would clearly point out what is wrong in the moment. They wouldn't need to use vague terms and buzzwords to make their arguments for them. Dindu check, gaslighting check, movie reference for emotional reaction check, sperging check, delusion check, is this a record for the most buzzwords used in a guilt-slinging low-quality accusation of guilt? I'm surprised you didn't accuse me of being a jew in this post. I've been more on-topic in this thread than my haters. When I actually make mistakes, good people point them out clearly and explain how I can avoid doing them again in the future because that's constructive. Yelling at me when I do nothing wrong is not constructive. Trying to demonize and dehumanize me and paint me as someone who's calculating everything to troll everyone is not constructive. If I was a troll I wouldn't be a very good one. A troll takes pleasure from annoying others, and I don't give a fuck how my haters feel. It's best to ignore them and their attempts to trick others into joining in the dogpile. Nobody smart would fall for such obvious emotional manipulation anyway.
>>298104
That makes sense. That story sounds like a clusterfuck, do you think we'd be allowed to review it here if we skipped over the sex scenes?
>>298017
Come to think of it, does Littlepip's overpowered PipBuck and its enemy-detecting and map-making ability ruin the thrill and terror and uncertainty of exploring new dungeons?
That Pipbuck can detect enemies long before LP's eyes and ears can. She can't get jumpscared by enemies because she will always have that warning on her radar. She will always have a compass mark magically telling her where her Quwst Objective is too, making exploring an area to find something specific way too easy. I guess the author could build on that for terror by making her hide from hyper dangerous enemies in a locker or something while quietly and fearfully watching the pipbuck compass mark and hoping they would go away.
>>298015
Compared to how the vaults were presented in Fallout, FoE's conception of stables is... odd.
In the Fallout series, the vaults were marketed as comfortable long-term survival shelters for the population in the event of a nuclear war. Deep state actors who would eventually go on to become the Enclave after the war didn't truly believe that a nuclear exchange would occur, and secretly designed many of the vaults to include "social experiments" intended to study how humans behave in a closed environment. The vault experiments became more and more extreme and unethical as the series went on, particularly once Bethesda got their hands on it. As a result, most of the vaults eventually wound up abandoned (by choice, or because their residents all died). The few successful vaults that actually served their supposed purpose and weren't pillaged for their resources became the hearts of new population centers in the decades following the war, like Vault City in Fo1.
Vault 101's experiment was that it would never reopen - in practice, this just means it opened very late to justify Bethesda's giant timeskip in Fallout 3. Naturally, this is also the vault Stable 2 was based on. Other vault experiments included things like "what if we induce aggression in the population with white noise?" and "what if the entire population were retarded clones of one guy?"
So from the perspective of someone who's played the games, it's fair to expect abandoned vaults/stables whose residents died from wacky and gruesome experiments in a Fallout crossover. On paper at least, exploring a stable could make for a fun and/or spooky distraction. Fallout 3's conception of the vaults was essentially the precursor to Skyrim's dungeons, so the sidequest-style stable trips are at least predictable. But the ethical question of the stables being built around experiments casts a very dubious light on pre-apocalypse Equestria, to the story's detriment. I have *opinions* on this - Scootaloo is easily the most morally depraved character in FoE's wartime cast, for example; appropriately, Pip decides to take her as a moral role model. But I'll hold that back until it's relevant.
>>297837
>First of all, SteelWank is in a near-death condition as far as I can tell, and will probably die in a very short time if he doesn't receive medical attention.
Heh.
>>298100
>Makes sense. I've heard things about the story but never read it. Couldn't get past the first chapter, fictional fully-female-dominated societies piss me off more than they probably should.
If it helps, virtually everyone in Stable 99 ends up dead because the raider aids gets into their food supply. PH has bigger problems, but this isn't the thread for it.
Compared to how the vaults were presented in Fallout, FoE's conception of stables is... odd.
In the Fallout series, the vaults were marketed as comfortable long-term survival shelters for the population in the event of a nuclear war. Deep state actors who would eventually go on to become the Enclave after the war didn't truly believe that a nuclear exchange would occur, and secretly designed many of the vaults to include "social experiments" intended to study how humans behave in a closed environment. The vault experiments became more and more extreme and unethical as the series went on, particularly once Bethesda got their hands on it. As a result, most of the vaults eventually wound up abandoned (by choice, or because their residents all died). The few successful vaults that actually served their supposed purpose and weren't pillaged for their resources became the hearts of new population centers in the decades following the war, like Vault City in Fo1.
Vault 101's experiment was that it would never reopen - in practice, this just means it opened very late to justify Bethesda's giant timeskip in Fallout 3. Naturally, this is also the vault Stable 2 was based on. Other vault experiments included things like "what if we induce aggression in the population with white noise?" and "what if the entire population were retarded clones of one guy?"
So from the perspective of someone who's played the games, it's fair to expect abandoned vaults/stables whose residents died from wacky and gruesome experiments in a Fallout crossover. On paper at least, exploring a stable could make for a fun and/or spooky distraction. Fallout 3's conception of the vaults was essentially the precursor to Skyrim's dungeons, so the sidequest-style stable trips are at least predictable. But the ethical question of the stables being built around experiments casts a very dubious light on pre-apocalypse Equestria, to the story's detriment. I have *opinions* on this - Scootaloo is easily the most morally depraved character in FoE's wartime cast, for example; appropriately, Pip decides to take her as a moral role model. But I'll hold that back until it's relevant.
>>297837
>First of all, SteelWank is in a near-death condition as far as I can tell, and will probably die in a very short time if he doesn't receive medical attention.
Heh.
>>298100
>Makes sense. I've heard things about the story but never read it. Couldn't get past the first chapter, fictional fully-female-dominated societies piss me off more than they probably should.
If it helps, virtually everyone in Stable 99 ends up dead because the raider aids gets into their food supply. PH has bigger problems, but this isn't the thread for it.
>>298017
Anyway, moving on.
>I wondered just how long this had been going on. Was it new? Had there been signs that I was too oblivious to catch? Or had I just not wanted to catch them?
Well, there actually were quite a few signs that LP was quite oblivious to, but in any event I don't get the impression Velvet and Calamity are actually together at this point. So far they just seem to be in the flirty, liking-each-other-but-not-saying-it-out-loud stage.
The idea with this sort of romance plot is usually that the reader is supposed to pick up on things that blindside the protagonist. It's similar to a mystery story, where the Dr. Watson character is designed to be just slightly more clueless than the average reader would be, so that the reader can have the satisfaction of solving the mystery before he does. That's how it normally works, anyway; with kkat, who knows?
>The idea of “catching them” brought an entirely unwanted mental image of Velvet and Calamity to mind that I quickly shredded and burned.
Again, I don't think there's much going on physically, and they really wouldn't have had many opportunities anyway. However, I think this is mostly just LP overreacting.
>You know what would make being cheerful for them easy? A little pony in my head waved a tin at me. Fuck that little pony. I wanted to wallow just a little longer.
Oh right, she's like a drug addict now or something. If only this was something that was factored into her character overall, instead of being some weird thing that just pops up during moments where getting high on crack mints would solve a particular problem and then recedes into the ether again.
Anyway, she's wandering down the halls thinking about shit like this, when she comes across some kind of maintenance bot that has apparently been keeping this giant empty stable clean for 200 years, a la Wall-E.
>The robot started to clean in my direction. I decided to get out of its way by ducking into the Robotics Technician stall. The room was filled with maintenance bots in various states of disrepair. There were enough tools in here to upgrade Calamity’s workshop plans. I began looting.
You know, Littlepoop, maybe if you took some of the energy you normally spend on plundering random, useless crap that doesn't belong to you, and applied it towards figuring out how to win over your crush, you wouldn't be singing the lesbo-pony blues and daydreaming about popping cocaine-flavored tic-tacs right now. Just a thought.
Anyway, we've been through this enough times to know the drill. The next several paragraphs are dedicated to LP's exploration of this room. She obtains some more junk, most of which has no evident use or value, but I'm guessing there are at least two or three items in the collection that will suddenly factor into the story in like nine chapters. Naturally, there is a safe in the wall, which naturally she breaks into, and it naturally contains, among other various odds and ends, a sound recording, which, being the nosy Nellie that she is, she naturally plugs into her wrist-mo-bob and listens to.
Again, this whole episode follows a pattern that should be old hat to us by now: LP & Co. enter a dungeon, they poke around, they steal stuff, and LP begins finding recordings here and there that tell the story of whatever happened to the place they're exploring. The story of Stable 29 seems to revolve around a detail that was mentioned earlier but I didn't highlight: the Atrium does not appear to have an office for the Overmare, which LP finds unusual. The recording details an incident in which a pony died horribly due to some kind of error made by one of the robots. The speaker seems to be of the opinion that the stable ought to have some kind of authority or governing body, with the implication being that this error was due to some kind of lack of standards or authority or something.
I'm beginning to see a pattern. Each of these stables seems to have some kind of uniquely unusual characteristic, which suggests that they may have been intended as social experiments as well as being shelters from the magic-nuclear-explosion-whatever. This isn't entirely the product of my own reasoning; some of the spoilers people in the thread have dropped I believe have also suggested this, like this anon for example >>298180 . The last one had something to do with establishing a male-dominant society; this one so far seems to be some kind of experiment in anarchy, or at least in allowing a contained population to make its own decisions without formal rules or structure.
>I tried to shove the mental image of Cannikin out of my head, centering my thoughts instead on the idea of a Stable without an Overmare at all. A Stable run remotely by Stable-Tec.
Apparently this is what the author is getting at. Stable-Tec, I guess, owns and/or controls most of these places, but in this case they are deliberately taking a hands-off hooves-off, whatever approach.
There is a page break, and in the next scene Littlepoop has found the PipBuck technician room. She finds the key she needs quite easily, along with a few other tools that could come in handy should she ever need to do any advanced repair work on a PipBuck. She takes all of them, and on the way out she finds another recording sitting on the technician's desk, which contains yet another out of context sound clip. This one appears to deal with some kind of gun accident that occurred in the Stable. In the aftermath of this incident, some of the citizens I guess tried to form some sort of safety or rules commission, which I guess had to get approved by Stable-Tec or something.
As with most of this story's mythology, the purpose of Stable-Tec is not particularly well explained, nor is it clear what Littlepoop can be expected to know about it. As far as I can tell, it was a company that existed before/during the war. It may have been run by the CMC, and it is responsible for, among other things, the stables and the PipBucks.
Anyway, moving on.
>I wondered just how long this had been going on. Was it new? Had there been signs that I was too oblivious to catch? Or had I just not wanted to catch them?
Well, there actually were quite a few signs that LP was quite oblivious to, but in any event I don't get the impression Velvet and Calamity are actually together at this point. So far they just seem to be in the flirty, liking-each-other-but-not-saying-it-out-loud stage.
The idea with this sort of romance plot is usually that the reader is supposed to pick up on things that blindside the protagonist. It's similar to a mystery story, where the Dr. Watson character is designed to be just slightly more clueless than the average reader would be, so that the reader can have the satisfaction of solving the mystery before he does. That's how it normally works, anyway; with kkat, who knows?
>The idea of “catching them” brought an entirely unwanted mental image of Velvet and Calamity to mind that I quickly shredded and burned.
Again, I don't think there's much going on physically, and they really wouldn't have had many opportunities anyway. However, I think this is mostly just LP overreacting.
>You know what would make being cheerful for them easy? A little pony in my head waved a tin at me. Fuck that little pony. I wanted to wallow just a little longer.
Oh right, she's like a drug addict now or something. If only this was something that was factored into her character overall, instead of being some weird thing that just pops up during moments where getting high on crack mints would solve a particular problem and then recedes into the ether again.
Anyway, she's wandering down the halls thinking about shit like this, when she comes across some kind of maintenance bot that has apparently been keeping this giant empty stable clean for 200 years, a la Wall-E.
>The robot started to clean in my direction. I decided to get out of its way by ducking into the Robotics Technician stall. The room was filled with maintenance bots in various states of disrepair. There were enough tools in here to upgrade Calamity’s workshop plans. I began looting.
You know, Littlepoop, maybe if you took some of the energy you normally spend on plundering random, useless crap that doesn't belong to you, and applied it towards figuring out how to win over your crush, you wouldn't be singing the lesbo-pony blues and daydreaming about popping cocaine-flavored tic-tacs right now. Just a thought.
Anyway, we've been through this enough times to know the drill. The next several paragraphs are dedicated to LP's exploration of this room. She obtains some more junk, most of which has no evident use or value, but I'm guessing there are at least two or three items in the collection that will suddenly factor into the story in like nine chapters. Naturally, there is a safe in the wall, which naturally she breaks into, and it naturally contains, among other various odds and ends, a sound recording, which, being the nosy Nellie that she is, she naturally plugs into her wrist-mo-bob and listens to.
Again, this whole episode follows a pattern that should be old hat to us by now: LP & Co. enter a dungeon, they poke around, they steal stuff, and LP begins finding recordings here and there that tell the story of whatever happened to the place they're exploring. The story of Stable 29 seems to revolve around a detail that was mentioned earlier but I didn't highlight: the Atrium does not appear to have an office for the Overmare, which LP finds unusual. The recording details an incident in which a pony died horribly due to some kind of error made by one of the robots. The speaker seems to be of the opinion that the stable ought to have some kind of authority or governing body, with the implication being that this error was due to some kind of lack of standards or authority or something.
I'm beginning to see a pattern. Each of these stables seems to have some kind of uniquely unusual characteristic, which suggests that they may have been intended as social experiments as well as being shelters from the magic-nuclear-explosion-whatever. This isn't entirely the product of my own reasoning; some of the spoilers people in the thread have dropped I believe have also suggested this, like this anon for example >>298180 . The last one had something to do with establishing a male-dominant society; this one so far seems to be some kind of experiment in anarchy, or at least in allowing a contained population to make its own decisions without formal rules or structure.
>I tried to shove the mental image of Cannikin out of my head, centering my thoughts instead on the idea of a Stable without an Overmare at all. A Stable run remotely by Stable-Tec.
Apparently this is what the author is getting at. Stable-Tec, I guess, owns and/or controls most of these places, but in this case they are deliberately taking a hands-off hooves-off, whatever approach.
There is a page break, and in the next scene Littlepoop has found the PipBuck technician room. She finds the key she needs quite easily, along with a few other tools that could come in handy should she ever need to do any advanced repair work on a PipBuck. She takes all of them, and on the way out she finds another recording sitting on the technician's desk, which contains yet another out of context sound clip. This one appears to deal with some kind of gun accident that occurred in the Stable. In the aftermath of this incident, some of the citizens I guess tried to form some sort of safety or rules commission, which I guess had to get approved by Stable-Tec or something.
As with most of this story's mythology, the purpose of Stable-Tec is not particularly well explained, nor is it clear what Littlepoop can be expected to know about it. As far as I can tell, it was a company that existed before/during the war. It may have been run by the CMC, and it is responsible for, among other things, the stables and the PipBucks.
>>298189
There is another page break, and LP is back at the clinic with Velvet.
>Velvet Remedy pushed three jars of extra-strength restoration potion over to me. “Drink these. You’ll be in perfect health in ten minutes.”
I really, really hate the way medicine works in this story. As if the magical cure-all potions we've encountered thus far weren't ridiculous enough, there apparently exists an "extra-strength" version. You know, for when you're really mortally wounded.
>Velvet Remedy shook her head. She was looking a lot better. She had stowed away her dress and removed her bandages; her hide was perfect, her coat looked pristine and healthy.
Have you been mortally wounded by a grenade launcher? Did you have half of your skin torn off by shrapnel? Is most of your blood currently watering the grass of the killing fields? When ordinary magical bandages and potions just won't cut it, you need to reach for a bottle of Extra-Strength Magical Clusterfuck Cure-All Panacea Butthole Salve™! Just rub a tiny palmful of this magic elixir all over your butthole, and in just minutes even the toughest mortal wounds will disappear without a trace. Were your legs blown off? Don't worry! Was your body ripped apart at the torso? We can cure that! Have you been decapitated and torn to shreds, with your various body parts express-mailed to different parts of the globe, where they were then dissolved in hydrofluoric acid, sealed into separate canisters, and launched into the cold vacuum of space? Don't even sweat it! As long as your butthole survived and someone can rub this elixir on it, you'll be just fine by morning.
In all seriousness, at this point I'm starting to have my doubts about this entire fandom (MLP I mean, not necessarily Fallout). Back when I was merely a spectator and not a participant, I remember being mostly puzzled by the brony phenomenon, and occasionally asking anons what the appeal was. One of the things I heard mentioned multiple times was the amount of fanfiction that had been written, and this story specifically was often cited as the best of the best. The show itself is enjoyable enough for what it is, and the shitposty aspects of the fandom are lots of fun, but I really have to question the intelligence of anyone who could read something like FoE and actually see it as a serious, high-quality work of fiction.
I wouldn't mind the ridiculousness so much if it didn't take itself seriously, but as far as I can tell the author is 100% serious about all of this. This premise could work as many different things: a campy hack and slash adventure, an action-comedy, or even as a satire of its own concept. Hell, even if the author wanted to go all grimdark with it and turn it into a serious "horrors of war" story it could be done, but in that case he'd have to drop the video game elements and melodrama and make it at least halfway believable, which he so far refuses to do. As far as I can tell, what he's trying to do is mash up a dark, serious video game with a colorful show about ponies, in order to create a story that deals with dark and serious themes and explores complex moral issues in the setting of a children's cartoon show.
Again, I fully believe it would be possible to do this well, but in this case it fails bigly. The author insists on taking the source material of both franchises 100% literally, which means that absurd cartoon elements from the series (ponies pulling a running steam train, for instance) as well as absurd video game elements from Fallout (healing potions for instance) are included as serious elements in a world that attempts to be serious. However, the result is so absurd it's impossible to take most of the story seriously.
For instance, despite being grievously wounded, the party just discovered enough of this magical panacea-potion to completely heal themselves. This shit was just sitting in a storage room. So what the hell is up with that atrium full of skeletons? Those ponies had access to the same magic elixir that LP & Co. just rubbed all over their buttholes. What happened there? How did all of these ponies die? Were they just not able to rub it on their buttholes in time, or what? Did someone lose the key to the storage closet? It just doesn't make any sense. The same goes for just about every death in this story. As I've said before, in a world where practically any injury can be healed just by downing a couple of potions, it's hard to take any threat seriously.
>I downed two of the extra-strength restoration potions and slipped the third into my saddlebags. Memories of Velvet, her hide shredded and bloody, had resurfaced in my mind. I could handle being mostly healed if it meant I had one of these ready in case of an emergency.
See, this shit right here is exactly what I'm talking about. Velvet's hide was shredded and bloody just a few short scenes ago, but now she's fine, and all she had to do was swallow a couple of teaspoons of some mysterious cure-all potion. Whatever sympathy we might have felt for Littlepoop after seeing her love interest nearly killed is completely negated if her injuries can be cured this easily. Having half of your hide torn off is about as serious as skinning your knee in this world, so the attempted drama feels maudlin and silly, and the vivid descriptions of blood loss and torn skin just sounds like the author being an over-the-top edgelord.
What are we supposed to take away from this? Velvet tells LP to swallow three magical cure-alls in order to completely heal all of her grievous injuries, but she only downs two of them, while saving the third in case Velvet gets injured again on the field, and we're supposed to see this as a tender act of self-sacrifice? It makes no sense. The storage room seems to be full of these things, and LP's saddlebag is basically it's own pocket dimension; there's no apparent limit to how many of these potions they can carry, so why not take as many as possible?
There is another page break, and LP is back at the clinic with Velvet.
>Velvet Remedy pushed three jars of extra-strength restoration potion over to me. “Drink these. You’ll be in perfect health in ten minutes.”
I really, really hate the way medicine works in this story. As if the magical cure-all potions we've encountered thus far weren't ridiculous enough, there apparently exists an "extra-strength" version. You know, for when you're really mortally wounded.
>Velvet Remedy shook her head. She was looking a lot better. She had stowed away her dress and removed her bandages; her hide was perfect, her coat looked pristine and healthy.
Have you been mortally wounded by a grenade launcher? Did you have half of your skin torn off by shrapnel? Is most of your blood currently watering the grass of the killing fields? When ordinary magical bandages and potions just won't cut it, you need to reach for a bottle of Extra-Strength Magical Clusterfuck Cure-All Panacea Butthole Salve™! Just rub a tiny palmful of this magic elixir all over your butthole, and in just minutes even the toughest mortal wounds will disappear without a trace. Were your legs blown off? Don't worry! Was your body ripped apart at the torso? We can cure that! Have you been decapitated and torn to shreds, with your various body parts express-mailed to different parts of the globe, where they were then dissolved in hydrofluoric acid, sealed into separate canisters, and launched into the cold vacuum of space? Don't even sweat it! As long as your butthole survived and someone can rub this elixir on it, you'll be just fine by morning.
In all seriousness, at this point I'm starting to have my doubts about this entire fandom (MLP I mean, not necessarily Fallout). Back when I was merely a spectator and not a participant, I remember being mostly puzzled by the brony phenomenon, and occasionally asking anons what the appeal was. One of the things I heard mentioned multiple times was the amount of fanfiction that had been written, and this story specifically was often cited as the best of the best. The show itself is enjoyable enough for what it is, and the shitposty aspects of the fandom are lots of fun, but I really have to question the intelligence of anyone who could read something like FoE and actually see it as a serious, high-quality work of fiction.
I wouldn't mind the ridiculousness so much if it didn't take itself seriously, but as far as I can tell the author is 100% serious about all of this. This premise could work as many different things: a campy hack and slash adventure, an action-comedy, or even as a satire of its own concept. Hell, even if the author wanted to go all grimdark with it and turn it into a serious "horrors of war" story it could be done, but in that case he'd have to drop the video game elements and melodrama and make it at least halfway believable, which he so far refuses to do. As far as I can tell, what he's trying to do is mash up a dark, serious video game with a colorful show about ponies, in order to create a story that deals with dark and serious themes and explores complex moral issues in the setting of a children's cartoon show.
Again, I fully believe it would be possible to do this well, but in this case it fails bigly. The author insists on taking the source material of both franchises 100% literally, which means that absurd cartoon elements from the series (ponies pulling a running steam train, for instance) as well as absurd video game elements from Fallout (healing potions for instance) are included as serious elements in a world that attempts to be serious. However, the result is so absurd it's impossible to take most of the story seriously.
For instance, despite being grievously wounded, the party just discovered enough of this magical panacea-potion to completely heal themselves. This shit was just sitting in a storage room. So what the hell is up with that atrium full of skeletons? Those ponies had access to the same magic elixir that LP & Co. just rubbed all over their buttholes. What happened there? How did all of these ponies die? Were they just not able to rub it on their buttholes in time, or what? Did someone lose the key to the storage closet? It just doesn't make any sense. The same goes for just about every death in this story. As I've said before, in a world where practically any injury can be healed just by downing a couple of potions, it's hard to take any threat seriously.
>I downed two of the extra-strength restoration potions and slipped the third into my saddlebags. Memories of Velvet, her hide shredded and bloody, had resurfaced in my mind. I could handle being mostly healed if it meant I had one of these ready in case of an emergency.
See, this shit right here is exactly what I'm talking about. Velvet's hide was shredded and bloody just a few short scenes ago, but now she's fine, and all she had to do was swallow a couple of teaspoons of some mysterious cure-all potion. Whatever sympathy we might have felt for Littlepoop after seeing her love interest nearly killed is completely negated if her injuries can be cured this easily. Having half of your hide torn off is about as serious as skinning your knee in this world, so the attempted drama feels maudlin and silly, and the vivid descriptions of blood loss and torn skin just sounds like the author being an over-the-top edgelord.
What are we supposed to take away from this? Velvet tells LP to swallow three magical cure-alls in order to completely heal all of her grievous injuries, but she only downs two of them, while saving the third in case Velvet gets injured again on the field, and we're supposed to see this as a tender act of self-sacrifice? It makes no sense. The storage room seems to be full of these things, and LP's saddlebag is basically it's own pocket dimension; there's no apparent limit to how many of these potions they can carry, so why not take as many as possible?
>>298193
>Calamity was also looking much better. He complained that after Velvet Remedy’s mending spell, the brace wasn’t really necessary, but she insisted he keep it on for at least another day.
This too. On some level I think the author realizes he's made medicine too powerful, so he feels the need to limit it. However, he can only do so with lukewarm measures like this one: Calamity breaks his leg, and it can be healed with magic and potions and stuff, but it's not completely healed; he still has to wear a brace for a couple of days. It was the same way with his wing when that was injured, as I recall, and it will probably be the same way with whatever he breaks next. None of this shit even matters anyway; even when the party is injured it doesn't seem to actually affect them. If you break your leg you can still walk, if you injure your wing you can still fly, if you lose half your skin and most of your blood you can still do just about anything you could before.
Anyway, I forget if I mentioned this or not but apparently while Velvet was looting supplies, she came across another one of those dumb sound recordings that Littlepoop collects because she's a nosy klepto. As soon as she chugs her healing potions, LP goes off to listen to it because it's not like she has anything better to do. I mean, it's not like some cyborg soldier who risked himself to save her is currently lying immobilized somewhere, slowly and painfully dying of internal bleeding, while these retards are wandering around this abandoned stable looking for extra band-aids.
So, you might as well poke around and see if there are any old cassette tapes lying around that you might want, eh LP? If you find any rare black metal demos or anything let me know.
>I found a chemistry lab in the back of the clinic. For a moment, all thoughts of the recording fled my mind. Looking over the drugs and supplies, I realized that along with what I had already, I had all the ingredients to cook up my own batch of Party-Time Mint-als!
Oh, and while you're at it, why don't you see if they've got the stuff you need to set up your own meth lab? You've got nothing but time, LP, nothing but time.
>And having the ability and opportunity, I couldn’t resist. It would have been silly to.
Kkat, I think you and I are working from radically different definitions of the word "silly."
>As I started work, I remembered why I had come back here.
To find some kind of key so you could open the utility panel for that guy's armor so he doesn't die, even though between all the walking and napping and exploring and looting and now meth cooking you've been doing he's probably been dead for hours by now? Oh wait, you found that key already. So wait a minute, why are you still down here again?
>I let the recording play as I ground down the regular, boring old Mint-als into a fine powder.
Oh that's what you meant. When you said "I remembered why I had come back here," I was assuming you were talking about the important, time-sensitive, life-and-death task you were supposed to be carrying out right now. However, you were talking about the reason you had specifically entered this room, which was to pop your headphones on and listen to some complete stranger's diary from 200 years ago. Sorry, my bad.
>The voice was so filled with raw despair that I quickly shut the recording off. I didn’t want to hear that.
I was just shitposting earlier, but maybe she actually did find an old black metal tape.
Anyway, she goes back to cooking her fucking drugs, but sooner or later her nosy Nellie side gets the best of her, and she plays the tape. The contents are about what you'd expect: there was some kind of malfunction with the fire suppression system, and it sounds like it flooded the clinic or something and drowned whoever was inside.
>I shut it off again. My heart was twisted up in knots. Part of me wanted to cry. Part wanted to rage at something. But there wasn’t anything obvious to rage at.
If you're looking for something to rage at, you could probably start with the fact that you came down here to find something you need to save a guy's life, and here you are cooking drugs and listening to old tapes.
Oh, why do I even care? We all know perfectly well the soldier's not dead. This is FoE; injuries here don't actually kill you. When the party returns to the spot where they left Roboponer, he's going to be in exactly the same state as he was before. Littlepoop will use her new key-thingy to open up his armor-panel-whoosit, and then she can repair his 200 year old cybernetic life-support system using only the skills she picked up as an apprentice technician fixing a type of device that is basically just a glorified Nintendo-DS. Everything will be just fine; she could stay down here goofing around for another ten years and absolutely nothing on the surface world will have changed.
Anyway, while she's occupied with all this retarded bullshit, she suddenly hears machine guns firing and runs off to rescue Velvet's sexy ass from whatever horrible stable-monster is attacking it inb4 it turns out that Calamity has a robotic penis that sounds like a machine gun when he ejaculates. She runs back to wherever she was before, the clinic I guess, and sees that for no apparent reason the gun turrets that I guess are in there have become active and started attacking them because why not. However, this turns out to be no big deal, because Littlepoop destroys them both with literally two shots. Yes, you read that correctly. Two giant-ass robotic gun turrets. Destroyed with two shots. One shot each. From her revolver.
Also, she gets injured by the turrets, but let's face it; that hardly matters. All she has to do is rub some elixir on her butthole and she'll be right as rain, and she's surrounded by literal gallons of the stuff. Instead, she focuses on what's really important: making sure her drugs don't overcook. The scene ends with a page break.
>Calamity was also looking much better. He complained that after Velvet Remedy’s mending spell, the brace wasn’t really necessary, but she insisted he keep it on for at least another day.
This too. On some level I think the author realizes he's made medicine too powerful, so he feels the need to limit it. However, he can only do so with lukewarm measures like this one: Calamity breaks his leg, and it can be healed with magic and potions and stuff, but it's not completely healed; he still has to wear a brace for a couple of days. It was the same way with his wing when that was injured, as I recall, and it will probably be the same way with whatever he breaks next. None of this shit even matters anyway; even when the party is injured it doesn't seem to actually affect them. If you break your leg you can still walk, if you injure your wing you can still fly, if you lose half your skin and most of your blood you can still do just about anything you could before.
Anyway, I forget if I mentioned this or not but apparently while Velvet was looting supplies, she came across another one of those dumb sound recordings that Littlepoop collects because she's a nosy klepto. As soon as she chugs her healing potions, LP goes off to listen to it because it's not like she has anything better to do. I mean, it's not like some cyborg soldier who risked himself to save her is currently lying immobilized somewhere, slowly and painfully dying of internal bleeding, while these retards are wandering around this abandoned stable looking for extra band-aids.
So, you might as well poke around and see if there are any old cassette tapes lying around that you might want, eh LP? If you find any rare black metal demos or anything let me know.
>I found a chemistry lab in the back of the clinic. For a moment, all thoughts of the recording fled my mind. Looking over the drugs and supplies, I realized that along with what I had already, I had all the ingredients to cook up my own batch of Party-Time Mint-als!
Oh, and while you're at it, why don't you see if they've got the stuff you need to set up your own meth lab? You've got nothing but time, LP, nothing but time.
>And having the ability and opportunity, I couldn’t resist. It would have been silly to.
Kkat, I think you and I are working from radically different definitions of the word "silly."
>As I started work, I remembered why I had come back here.
To find some kind of key so you could open the utility panel for that guy's armor so he doesn't die, even though between all the walking and napping and exploring and looting and now meth cooking you've been doing he's probably been dead for hours by now? Oh wait, you found that key already. So wait a minute, why are you still down here again?
>I let the recording play as I ground down the regular, boring old Mint-als into a fine powder.
Oh that's what you meant. When you said "I remembered why I had come back here," I was assuming you were talking about the important, time-sensitive, life-and-death task you were supposed to be carrying out right now. However, you were talking about the reason you had specifically entered this room, which was to pop your headphones on and listen to some complete stranger's diary from 200 years ago. Sorry, my bad.
>The voice was so filled with raw despair that I quickly shut the recording off. I didn’t want to hear that.
I was just shitposting earlier, but maybe she actually did find an old black metal tape.
Anyway, she goes back to cooking her fucking drugs, but sooner or later her nosy Nellie side gets the best of her, and she plays the tape. The contents are about what you'd expect: there was some kind of malfunction with the fire suppression system, and it sounds like it flooded the clinic or something and drowned whoever was inside.
>I shut it off again. My heart was twisted up in knots. Part of me wanted to cry. Part wanted to rage at something. But there wasn’t anything obvious to rage at.
If you're looking for something to rage at, you could probably start with the fact that you came down here to find something you need to save a guy's life, and here you are cooking drugs and listening to old tapes.
Oh, why do I even care? We all know perfectly well the soldier's not dead. This is FoE; injuries here don't actually kill you. When the party returns to the spot where they left Roboponer, he's going to be in exactly the same state as he was before. Littlepoop will use her new key-thingy to open up his armor-panel-whoosit, and then she can repair his 200 year old cybernetic life-support system using only the skills she picked up as an apprentice technician fixing a type of device that is basically just a glorified Nintendo-DS. Everything will be just fine; she could stay down here goofing around for another ten years and absolutely nothing on the surface world will have changed.
Anyway, while she's occupied with all this retarded bullshit, she suddenly hears machine guns firing and runs off to rescue Velvet's sexy ass from whatever horrible stable-monster is attacking it inb4 it turns out that Calamity has a robotic penis that sounds like a machine gun when he ejaculates. She runs back to wherever she was before, the clinic I guess, and sees that for no apparent reason the gun turrets that I guess are in there have become active and started attacking them because why not. However, this turns out to be no big deal, because Littlepoop destroys them both with literally two shots. Yes, you read that correctly. Two giant-ass robotic gun turrets. Destroyed with two shots. One shot each. From her revolver.
Also, she gets injured by the turrets, but let's face it; that hardly matters. All she has to do is rub some elixir on her butthole and she'll be right as rain, and she's surrounded by literal gallons of the stuff. Instead, she focuses on what's really important: making sure her drugs don't overcook. The scene ends with a page break.
>>298189
>>You know what would make being cheerful for them easy? A little pony in my head waved a tin at me.
This author is really bad at integrating her crack mint addiction into the story and her internal monologue.
>Fuck that little pony.
No, fuck THIS little pony! Littlepip fucking SUCKS!
>I wanted to wallow just a little longer
Littlepip: Leave me alone to wallow in whatever it is mary sues wallow in!
>The robot started to clean in my direction
IF THERE'S A CLEANING BOT AROUND HERE WHY ARE THERE SKELETONS
WHY WOULDN'T IT CLEAN THE SKELETONS
AND SHOVE THEM INTO A RANDOM LOCKER SO WHEN LITTLEPIP OPENS IT, THE SKELETONS FALL ON HER
AND SHE GETS THOROUGHLY SPOOKED
>If healing items are so effective and plentiful why do people die? Why are there any still around after 200 years?
The lore of the games solved this problem by saying health-restoring "Stimpaks" and inferior tribal "Healing Powder" can be manufactured even in the post-apocalypse. Kkat forgot about this by making do-anything potions so much better than they should be and only rare when he wants them to be.
So much of this story is written like he never wanted to do a second draft that stripped out the loot that couldn't be looted and didn't turn out to be important later.
If he didn't want LP and friends to take all of this healing potion, why did he put it there? Why not say "All of these health potions were made by a mechanical doctor that fucked up the recipe, creating poison that smells like healing potion and the only useable health potion here was hoofmade with that chemistry set"?
What, is team LP going to leave most of the healing potions behind and then come back for them once they have a car?
"We must travel light and avoid picking up too much junk" would make sense in a realistic world where carrying 20 pounds on your back is hard. BUT LITTLEPIP LIFTED BOXCARS! Go get her a boxcar-sized flat metal tray and she could carry all the health potions she wanted.
There are "New-U Stations" in Borderlands. They're respawn points just like in The Godfather and Spongebob Squarepants: Battle For Bikini Bottom, but with a dumb joke voice line that plays every time you respawn like "We here at Hyperion are always happy to revive you and take your money!".
That dumb joke and respawn fee and early-game tutorial "Characters explain videogame functions and vending machines" scenes means they canonically exist within the world so shitloads of players are unable to take emotional death scenes seriously. If I respawn when shot, why don't the NPCs who die during cutscenes?
Nobody goes out of their way to depower or imprison or cripple a foe specifically because "The second that bastard dies, he respawns at the nearest New-U Station in peak physical condition! So he needs to stay in this prison and not die!"
You'll eventually meet the NPCs behind the health vending machines and guns vending machines, and the Catch A Ride station that infinitely respawns your cars canonically exists, so you expect the respawn vending machine to also exist. Yet the whole world functions as if it doesn't, despite how much attention was drawn to it.
It's incredibly jarring and probably the biggest moment of bad writing in these games if you don't count spoiler stuff.
There comes a point where you're better off not drawing attention to videogamey things like respawn points, or +1 Life Pickups or Reviver seeds, or an impossibly all-knowing HUD that can tell you the names of important people while giving disposable randomly-generated NPCs names like Raider Scavver and Defias Cutpurse, or your arbitrary maximum inventory size, or level-ups and RPG stats, or dice-roll based bullshit, or your ability to save and pause and reload a game, or how the player character's insane luck makes him more likely to find a fully loaded military-grade gun in a random bizarre spot than you are to find a penny on the street.
And if something like this isn't it, what is?
If you don't have a clever meta justification for this unrealistic bullshit, shut up about it and let gamers willingly suspend their disbelief for it, and don't take this bullshit with you into literature unless the world's SUPPOSED to work like an easily-exploitable RPG.
And if this world IS supposed to work like a RPG, why isn't Littlepoop reloading her gun faster by switching weapons?
>Having half of your hide torn off is about as serious as skinning your knee in this world, so the attempted drama feels maudlin and silly, and the vivid descriptions of blood loss and torn skin just sounds like the author being an over-the-top edgelord
Could be worse. Littlepip could be a group of five or more ordinary human teenagers in the 90s given the power to morph into animals by a scorpion-tailed blue centaur alien, but despite the constant nearly-fatal hyper-edgy child-unfriendly wounds inflicted by assorted aliens and rayguns, changing from human to animal and back will insta-heal you and cause a spontaneous gratuitous body horror scene for everyone except your mary sue who gets to look pretty/cute when morphing because Kunt A. Assholegate says so.
>>298196
Wait a fucking second, a "Chemistry set" could be used to make 5 free Stimpaks or a set of free drugs (1 each of Psycho, Jet, Steady, Buffout, Rebound, and Mentats) in FNV during the opening tutorial.
Elijah's one in Dead Money only made Cloud Residue (it's a long story but i deleted it for being off-topic) but if this fucking Chemistry Set is so great it can be used to make any drug whenever she wants, why is she making crack mints instead of MORE HEALTH POTIONS?
What's with this "JESSE WE NEED TO COOK!" moment?!
Realistically, a single health potion should be worth its weight in gold! Or better yet, bullets and sweet guns!
Unless health potions are easier to produce than bread once you have the required parts and tools to make it, making it cheaper than chips in isolated walled cities with "civilization" and dark secrets yet painfully rare out there in the wastes.
>turrets
LP why u no hack turrets
>>You know what would make being cheerful for them easy? A little pony in my head waved a tin at me.
This author is really bad at integrating her crack mint addiction into the story and her internal monologue.
>Fuck that little pony.
No, fuck THIS little pony! Littlepip fucking SUCKS!
>I wanted to wallow just a little longer
Littlepip: Leave me alone to wallow in whatever it is mary sues wallow in!
>The robot started to clean in my direction
IF THERE'S A CLEANING BOT AROUND HERE WHY ARE THERE SKELETONS
WHY WOULDN'T IT CLEAN THE SKELETONS
AND SHOVE THEM INTO A RANDOM LOCKER SO WHEN LITTLEPIP OPENS IT, THE SKELETONS FALL ON HER
AND SHE GETS THOROUGHLY SPOOKED
>If healing items are so effective and plentiful why do people die? Why are there any still around after 200 years?
The lore of the games solved this problem by saying health-restoring "Stimpaks" and inferior tribal "Healing Powder" can be manufactured even in the post-apocalypse. Kkat forgot about this by making do-anything potions so much better than they should be and only rare when he wants them to be.
So much of this story is written like he never wanted to do a second draft that stripped out the loot that couldn't be looted and didn't turn out to be important later.
If he didn't want LP and friends to take all of this healing potion, why did he put it there? Why not say "All of these health potions were made by a mechanical doctor that fucked up the recipe, creating poison that smells like healing potion and the only useable health potion here was hoofmade with that chemistry set"?
What, is team LP going to leave most of the healing potions behind and then come back for them once they have a car?
"We must travel light and avoid picking up too much junk" would make sense in a realistic world where carrying 20 pounds on your back is hard. BUT LITTLEPIP LIFTED BOXCARS! Go get her a boxcar-sized flat metal tray and she could carry all the health potions she wanted.
There are "New-U Stations" in Borderlands. They're respawn points just like in The Godfather and Spongebob Squarepants: Battle For Bikini Bottom, but with a dumb joke voice line that plays every time you respawn like "We here at Hyperion are always happy to revive you and take your money!".
That dumb joke and respawn fee and early-game tutorial "Characters explain videogame functions and vending machines" scenes means they canonically exist within the world so shitloads of players are unable to take emotional death scenes seriously. If I respawn when shot, why don't the NPCs who die during cutscenes?
Nobody goes out of their way to depower or imprison or cripple a foe specifically because "The second that bastard dies, he respawns at the nearest New-U Station in peak physical condition! So he needs to stay in this prison and not die!"
You'll eventually meet the NPCs behind the health vending machines and guns vending machines, and the Catch A Ride station that infinitely respawns your cars canonically exists, so you expect the respawn vending machine to also exist. Yet the whole world functions as if it doesn't, despite how much attention was drawn to it.
It's incredibly jarring and probably the biggest moment of bad writing in these games if you don't count spoiler stuff.
There comes a point where you're better off not drawing attention to videogamey things like respawn points, or +1 Life Pickups or Reviver seeds, or an impossibly all-knowing HUD that can tell you the names of important people while giving disposable randomly-generated NPCs names like Raider Scavver and Defias Cutpurse, or your arbitrary maximum inventory size, or level-ups and RPG stats, or dice-roll based bullshit, or your ability to save and pause and reload a game, or how the player character's insane luck makes him more likely to find a fully loaded military-grade gun in a random bizarre spot than you are to find a penny on the street.
And if something like this isn't it, what is?
If you don't have a clever meta justification for this unrealistic bullshit, shut up about it and let gamers willingly suspend their disbelief for it, and don't take this bullshit with you into literature unless the world's SUPPOSED to work like an easily-exploitable RPG.
And if this world IS supposed to work like a RPG, why isn't Littlepoop reloading her gun faster by switching weapons?
>Having half of your hide torn off is about as serious as skinning your knee in this world, so the attempted drama feels maudlin and silly, and the vivid descriptions of blood loss and torn skin just sounds like the author being an over-the-top edgelord
Could be worse. Littlepip could be a group of five or more ordinary human teenagers in the 90s given the power to morph into animals by a scorpion-tailed blue centaur alien, but despite the constant nearly-fatal hyper-edgy child-unfriendly wounds inflicted by assorted aliens and rayguns, changing from human to animal and back will insta-heal you and cause a spontaneous gratuitous body horror scene for everyone except your mary sue who gets to look pretty/cute when morphing because Kunt A. Assholegate says so.
>>298196
Wait a fucking second, a "Chemistry set" could be used to make 5 free Stimpaks or a set of free drugs (1 each of Psycho, Jet, Steady, Buffout, Rebound, and Mentats) in FNV during the opening tutorial.
Elijah's one in Dead Money only made Cloud Residue (it's a long story but i deleted it for being off-topic) but if this fucking Chemistry Set is so great it can be used to make any drug whenever she wants, why is she making crack mints instead of MORE HEALTH POTIONS?
What's with this "JESSE WE NEED TO COOK!" moment?!
Realistically, a single health potion should be worth its weight in gold! Or better yet, bullets and sweet guns!
Unless health potions are easier to produce than bread once you have the required parts and tools to make it, making it cheaper than chips in isolated walled cities with "civilization" and dark secrets yet painfully rare out there in the wastes.
>turrets
LP why u no hack turrets
>>298265
>Could be worse. Littlepip could be a group of five or more ordinary human teenagers in the 90s given the power to morph into animals by a scorpion-tailed blue centaur alien, but despite the constant nearly-fatal hyper-edgy child-unfriendly wounds inflicted by assorted aliens and rayguns, changing from human to animal and back will insta-heal you and cause a spontaneous gratuitous body horror scene for everyone except your mary sue who gets to look pretty/cute when morphing because Kunt A. Assholegate says so.
Shut your whore mouth, yeerkfucker. Animorphs was great.
>Could be worse. Littlepip could be a group of five or more ordinary human teenagers in the 90s given the power to morph into animals by a scorpion-tailed blue centaur alien, but despite the constant nearly-fatal hyper-edgy child-unfriendly wounds inflicted by assorted aliens and rayguns, changing from human to animal and back will insta-heal you and cause a spontaneous gratuitous body horror scene for everyone except your mary sue who gets to look pretty/cute when morphing because Kunt A. Assholegate says so.
Shut your whore mouth, yeerkfucker. Animorphs was great.
>>298196
>The Atrium door had closed and locked. We were sealed inside.
Considering what this place was designed for, it's unlikely the door was meant to stand open for a long period of time. It probably has some sort of timer on it that closes it automatically after a few minutes. In fact, I'd be amazed if all of the stables didn't have something like this.
>It was more of an aggravation than a real worry. I knew that I should be able to override every door in this place from the Security station.
Of course. I'd hate to think the author was going to give this group any sort of actual challenge to overcome; his time would be far better spent writing out a long, detailed list of all the random crap that Littlepoop finds in some old desk drawer.
>But reaching it meant getting past several more points where the suddenly trigger-happy security system could attack us.
Oh, okay, so there's kind of a challenge. Well, that's something I guess.
>I looked to my companions. By now, I was beginning to think of us as seasoned warriors of the wasteland (well, at least Calamity and I).
I notice that Littlepoop seems to regard Velvet with a certain amount of disdain whenever she's assessing the group's combat abilities. It's true enough that Velvet isn't much of a fighter, or a fighter at all, but condescension doesn't seem like the right attitude for her to have towards a pony she's supposed to be in love with.
Generally, when you've got a tough-guy or girl, I suppose hero character who sees a smaller, weaker, gentler character as a romantic interest, the hero usually develops protective feelings for her. However, with Littlepoop this is a little weird anyway, since even though she's supposed to be the tough, seasoned hero and Velvet is the gentle, naive pacifist who has to be rescued all the time, we also have this dynamic that was established earlier, in which Velvet is the sexy, sophisticated pop star and Littlepoop is just a mousy little fangirl who has a crush on her. What's weird is that LP seems to slip in and out of these modes at random; sometimes she's the tough, hardened warrior getting angry at Velvet for being too weak and sentimental, but then a scene or two later she's back to gibbering, lovestruck fangirl mode. Really the whole romance dynamic between these two feels completely insincere anyway, and a big part of it is that neither of these characters are particularly well developed to begin with.
Also, it's pretty damned arrogant for Littlepoop to be thinking of herself as a "seasoned warrior of the wasteland." She uses her S.A.T.S. to handle her targeting 95% of the time; if she had to rely entirely on her own aim she wouldn't be able to kill shit. Her PipBuck also has built-in radar that helpfully tells her the location of all of her enemies before she encounters them, so it's virtually impossible for anyone to get the drop on her. Most of her tactical advantages in battle come from her having a PipBuck, and the rest is just bullshit that comes from her being the author's favored Mary Sue OC, like her hacking ability and her lockpicking ability and her inexplicable ability to levitate preposterously huge things like boxcars. If a serious writer were to put this character in a serious version of this setting and take away her PipBuck, Littlepoop would probably be dead by the end of the second or third chapter.
>Velvet Remedy was looking at me sadly. I think I was fast enough, but I was guessing that she suspected what I was up to in the chemistry lab. She hadn’t taken her eyes off me since, and the reproachful look was burning into my soul.
Velvet's pity for Littlepoop's newfound drug addiction feels almost as tacked on as Littlepoop's newfound drug addiction.
Anyway, the problem now is that the door is locked, and the only way to open it apparently involves going to the security room in the special VIP area that apparently replaces the Overmare's quarters in this particular stable. Calamity finds a map, and they head off in that direction.
>We moved towards the stairs, stopping at a bulletin board covered in the usual notices. I shrank back; somepony had written “STOP KILLING US!” across the board in what looked like blood.
Sacrebleu! Le edge!
>“Oh my,” Velvet whispered. To my surprise, she magically tugged one of the notices off the board, floating it closer for inspection. The notice had been between a posting of new safety regulations and a flier for two missing fillies whose smiling faces had stared into an atrium of corpses for centuries.
Mon dieu! Le edge! LE EDGE!!
Anyway, apparently this flyer that Velvet finds is advertising an old concert with none other than Vinyl Scratch as the DJ. Why this information would be important enough that any of them would stop and take notice of it is the kind of question I should probably have learned to stop asking by now. Calamity notes with mild surprise that it looks like Vinyl had survived the balefire bomb after all. Littlepoop grumbles to herself about how much she dislikes stables, and then there's a page break.
>Between stealth and Little Macintosh, the other turrets proved little threat.
Oh, good. I'd really hate to have the story sidetracked by something as mundane as a trek through a creepy abandoned bunker where murder-turrets could attack at any given moment. Anything that distracts from descriptions of Littlepoop manufacturing homemade drugs or cracking old safes open is just a waste of page space, in my opinion. Come on, kkat! Get to the looting already! What does LP find in the security room? An old shoe? A 200 year old can of Bush's™ Baked Beans? More drugs? Come on, I need to know! Does she ever find all the crap she needs to build that stupid needle gun she's trying to make? The suspense is killing me! Quit wasting our time with all of this action and adventure and just get to the important stuff, for land's sake.
>The Atrium door had closed and locked. We were sealed inside.
Considering what this place was designed for, it's unlikely the door was meant to stand open for a long period of time. It probably has some sort of timer on it that closes it automatically after a few minutes. In fact, I'd be amazed if all of the stables didn't have something like this.
>It was more of an aggravation than a real worry. I knew that I should be able to override every door in this place from the Security station.
Of course. I'd hate to think the author was going to give this group any sort of actual challenge to overcome; his time would be far better spent writing out a long, detailed list of all the random crap that Littlepoop finds in some old desk drawer.
>But reaching it meant getting past several more points where the suddenly trigger-happy security system could attack us.
Oh, okay, so there's kind of a challenge. Well, that's something I guess.
>I looked to my companions. By now, I was beginning to think of us as seasoned warriors of the wasteland (well, at least Calamity and I).
I notice that Littlepoop seems to regard Velvet with a certain amount of disdain whenever she's assessing the group's combat abilities. It's true enough that Velvet isn't much of a fighter, or a fighter at all, but condescension doesn't seem like the right attitude for her to have towards a pony she's supposed to be in love with.
Generally, when you've got a tough-guy or girl, I suppose hero character who sees a smaller, weaker, gentler character as a romantic interest, the hero usually develops protective feelings for her. However, with Littlepoop this is a little weird anyway, since even though she's supposed to be the tough, seasoned hero and Velvet is the gentle, naive pacifist who has to be rescued all the time, we also have this dynamic that was established earlier, in which Velvet is the sexy, sophisticated pop star and Littlepoop is just a mousy little fangirl who has a crush on her. What's weird is that LP seems to slip in and out of these modes at random; sometimes she's the tough, hardened warrior getting angry at Velvet for being too weak and sentimental, but then a scene or two later she's back to gibbering, lovestruck fangirl mode. Really the whole romance dynamic between these two feels completely insincere anyway, and a big part of it is that neither of these characters are particularly well developed to begin with.
Also, it's pretty damned arrogant for Littlepoop to be thinking of herself as a "seasoned warrior of the wasteland." She uses her S.A.T.S. to handle her targeting 95% of the time; if she had to rely entirely on her own aim she wouldn't be able to kill shit. Her PipBuck also has built-in radar that helpfully tells her the location of all of her enemies before she encounters them, so it's virtually impossible for anyone to get the drop on her. Most of her tactical advantages in battle come from her having a PipBuck, and the rest is just bullshit that comes from her being the author's favored Mary Sue OC, like her hacking ability and her lockpicking ability and her inexplicable ability to levitate preposterously huge things like boxcars. If a serious writer were to put this character in a serious version of this setting and take away her PipBuck, Littlepoop would probably be dead by the end of the second or third chapter.
>Velvet Remedy was looking at me sadly. I think I was fast enough, but I was guessing that she suspected what I was up to in the chemistry lab. She hadn’t taken her eyes off me since, and the reproachful look was burning into my soul.
Velvet's pity for Littlepoop's newfound drug addiction feels almost as tacked on as Littlepoop's newfound drug addiction.
Anyway, the problem now is that the door is locked, and the only way to open it apparently involves going to the security room in the special VIP area that apparently replaces the Overmare's quarters in this particular stable. Calamity finds a map, and they head off in that direction.
>We moved towards the stairs, stopping at a bulletin board covered in the usual notices. I shrank back; somepony had written “STOP KILLING US!” across the board in what looked like blood.
Sacrebleu! Le edge!
>“Oh my,” Velvet whispered. To my surprise, she magically tugged one of the notices off the board, floating it closer for inspection. The notice had been between a posting of new safety regulations and a flier for two missing fillies whose smiling faces had stared into an atrium of corpses for centuries.
Mon dieu! Le edge! LE EDGE!!
Anyway, apparently this flyer that Velvet finds is advertising an old concert with none other than Vinyl Scratch as the DJ. Why this information would be important enough that any of them would stop and take notice of it is the kind of question I should probably have learned to stop asking by now. Calamity notes with mild surprise that it looks like Vinyl had survived the balefire bomb after all. Littlepoop grumbles to herself about how much she dislikes stables, and then there's a page break.
>Between stealth and Little Macintosh, the other turrets proved little threat.
Oh, good. I'd really hate to have the story sidetracked by something as mundane as a trek through a creepy abandoned bunker where murder-turrets could attack at any given moment. Anything that distracts from descriptions of Littlepoop manufacturing homemade drugs or cracking old safes open is just a waste of page space, in my opinion. Come on, kkat! Get to the looting already! What does LP find in the security room? An old shoe? A 200 year old can of Bush's™ Baked Beans? More drugs? Come on, I need to know! Does she ever find all the crap she needs to build that stupid needle gun she's trying to make? The suspense is killing me! Quit wasting our time with all of this action and adventure and just get to the important stuff, for land's sake.
>>298362
>I sat down to hack the terminal, trying to be respectful as I floated the pony skeleton off of it and laid it down in the corner near the others.
You know, it occurs to me that they might be misinterpreting history a bit here. Did it ever occur to any of these ponies that old Edgequestria might have been ruled by a noble race of skeletons, and they're all under a sleeping spell right now?
Anyway, Littlepoop of course effortlessly hacks the terminal, and of course the first thing she does is open the door to the armory so Calamity can loot it. While she's at it, she of course decides to root around in the old security logs.
The logs she finds are pretty much standard fare by now. Apparently the Stable developed some sort of artificial intelligence and began attacking the ponies inside for no reason; either that, or the Stable-Tec guys who were remotely controlling it got bored and decided to have some fun. It actually appears to be the latter. In any event, blood and guts and carnage abound, and no explanation is given for why Stable-Tec would want to do this to them exactly.
It's not clear whether the logs are text files or audio files, but I'm guessing audio as Velvet seems to be affected by them as well. Littlepoop becomes overwhelmed by emotion as she sifts through the various files.
>I reached to trigger another when Velvet Remedy physically pulled me away from the terminal.
>"WHAT!?" I yelled in pure rage, my body shaking so hard I felt like I would explode.
>"Littlepip," she said, and I realized she was crying, "You need to stop."
I literally burst out laughing when I read this. Most writers would take that as a warning flag that maybe they didn't convey quite the emotional timbre they were going for.
So, if I'm understanding it correctly, the situation here is that Stable-Tec put all of these ponies down here, locked them in with no Overmare, and then started shooting at them and killing them all of a sudden. One question springs to mind: WHY?
It doesn't seem like it, but this is really not that difficult a question to answer. The trick is to realize that you're not supposed to actually think about it. That some giant corporation would go to all the trouble of building a huge facility that probably cost billions of dollars bits, whatever, just so they could throw a few ponies in there and murder them for no reason, would provoke curiosity in a normal person. However, once you understand the logic of Fallout: Equestria, it becomes quite simple.
Stable-Tec murdered the inhabitants of this stable for the same reason that the slavers round up children and the raiders decorate their bedrooms with the guts of their enemies: they're bad baddies, who do bad things because they are bad. Their only role in the story is to be as edgy and evil as they possibly can. In other words, it's pure shock value. The reader is supposed to be so utterly horrified by the horrors of this horrible horror that they never realize that the whole scenario is absurd to the point of being actually funny.
Earlier I mentioned the movie Crank as an example of a story that is completely absurd, but still manages to be entertaining and fun. The secret of a story like that is that it's aware of how ridiculous it is, and it deliberately pushes its ridiculousness to the furthest extreme possible. A formula like that could easily work with a premise like this, since frankly the premise is completely ridiculous to begin with. However, it would need some self-awareness to be able to do this.
A film like Crank is in the category of "bad on purpose." Sure it's bad, but it knows its bad, and it's trying to be bad, and that's why it's fun to watch. Meanwhile, the sort of film you could compare FoE to would probably be something like The Room; a terrible, pointless story written by a complete hack who has no idea that he's a hack, and who legitimately believes he has something beautiful and important to share with the world.
Nearly everything in FoE is completely and obviously ridiculous, yet it presents these absurd situations without any apparent irony or humor. As far as I can tell, the author is trying for a serious, heart-wrenching moment here; the story of Stable 29 is supposed to be horrifying beyond belief, and we are meant to genuinely feel for Littlepoop's reaction here. Some big bad meanie corporation rounded up thousands of ponies and stuck them in an underground bunker and then gruesomely murdered them for no obvious reason, and now Littlepoop, who is listening to a recording that someone, for some reason, made of this event and then saved on their computer terminal, is tearing her hair out and screaming "oh the horror of it all!" while Velvet sobs in the background. The fact that this entire scene is being acted out by cartoon ponies pushes it completely over the edge for me; this scene is quite possibly the funniest fucking thing I've read all year.
It keeps going after the page break, too:
>I was seeing red like never before, and I couldn't even attack the source of my anger because they were all dead. Dead decades and centuries ago. My body hadn't stopped shaking.
You read it here folks: Littlepoop is literally shaking right now.
Anyway, while she is in this state of whatever the fuck, she randomly comes across Vinyl Scratch's old room, because why the hell not?
>The room inside had been untouched since the night of the party, three months after the door of Stable Twenty-Nine closed, trapping everypony inside.
And she knows this how? I went back over the sound recordings, and I didn't see anything in there that provided any of these details. The only clue I can see about the three month thing is that the flyer calls it a "three month survival party," which I suppose implies that the party took place three months after the group entered the stable. Assuming they were locked in from the very beginning this would make sense.
>I sat down to hack the terminal, trying to be respectful as I floated the pony skeleton off of it and laid it down in the corner near the others.
You know, it occurs to me that they might be misinterpreting history a bit here. Did it ever occur to any of these ponies that old Edgequestria might have been ruled by a noble race of skeletons, and they're all under a sleeping spell right now?
Anyway, Littlepoop of course effortlessly hacks the terminal, and of course the first thing she does is open the door to the armory so Calamity can loot it. While she's at it, she of course decides to root around in the old security logs.
The logs she finds are pretty much standard fare by now. Apparently the Stable developed some sort of artificial intelligence and began attacking the ponies inside for no reason; either that, or the Stable-Tec guys who were remotely controlling it got bored and decided to have some fun. It actually appears to be the latter. In any event, blood and guts and carnage abound, and no explanation is given for why Stable-Tec would want to do this to them exactly.
It's not clear whether the logs are text files or audio files, but I'm guessing audio as Velvet seems to be affected by them as well. Littlepoop becomes overwhelmed by emotion as she sifts through the various files.
>I reached to trigger another when Velvet Remedy physically pulled me away from the terminal.
>"WHAT!?" I yelled in pure rage, my body shaking so hard I felt like I would explode.
>"Littlepip," she said, and I realized she was crying, "You need to stop."
I literally burst out laughing when I read this. Most writers would take that as a warning flag that maybe they didn't convey quite the emotional timbre they were going for.
So, if I'm understanding it correctly, the situation here is that Stable-Tec put all of these ponies down here, locked them in with no Overmare, and then started shooting at them and killing them all of a sudden. One question springs to mind: WHY?
It doesn't seem like it, but this is really not that difficult a question to answer. The trick is to realize that you're not supposed to actually think about it. That some giant corporation would go to all the trouble of building a huge facility that probably cost billions of dollars bits, whatever, just so they could throw a few ponies in there and murder them for no reason, would provoke curiosity in a normal person. However, once you understand the logic of Fallout: Equestria, it becomes quite simple.
Stable-Tec murdered the inhabitants of this stable for the same reason that the slavers round up children and the raiders decorate their bedrooms with the guts of their enemies: they're bad baddies, who do bad things because they are bad. Their only role in the story is to be as edgy and evil as they possibly can. In other words, it's pure shock value. The reader is supposed to be so utterly horrified by the horrors of this horrible horror that they never realize that the whole scenario is absurd to the point of being actually funny.
Earlier I mentioned the movie Crank as an example of a story that is completely absurd, but still manages to be entertaining and fun. The secret of a story like that is that it's aware of how ridiculous it is, and it deliberately pushes its ridiculousness to the furthest extreme possible. A formula like that could easily work with a premise like this, since frankly the premise is completely ridiculous to begin with. However, it would need some self-awareness to be able to do this.
A film like Crank is in the category of "bad on purpose." Sure it's bad, but it knows its bad, and it's trying to be bad, and that's why it's fun to watch. Meanwhile, the sort of film you could compare FoE to would probably be something like The Room; a terrible, pointless story written by a complete hack who has no idea that he's a hack, and who legitimately believes he has something beautiful and important to share with the world.
Nearly everything in FoE is completely and obviously ridiculous, yet it presents these absurd situations without any apparent irony or humor. As far as I can tell, the author is trying for a serious, heart-wrenching moment here; the story of Stable 29 is supposed to be horrifying beyond belief, and we are meant to genuinely feel for Littlepoop's reaction here. Some big bad meanie corporation rounded up thousands of ponies and stuck them in an underground bunker and then gruesomely murdered them for no obvious reason, and now Littlepoop, who is listening to a recording that someone, for some reason, made of this event and then saved on their computer terminal, is tearing her hair out and screaming "oh the horror of it all!" while Velvet sobs in the background. The fact that this entire scene is being acted out by cartoon ponies pushes it completely over the edge for me; this scene is quite possibly the funniest fucking thing I've read all year.
It keeps going after the page break, too:
>I was seeing red like never before, and I couldn't even attack the source of my anger because they were all dead. Dead decades and centuries ago. My body hadn't stopped shaking.
You read it here folks: Littlepoop is literally shaking right now.
Anyway, while she is in this state of whatever the fuck, she randomly comes across Vinyl Scratch's old room, because why the hell not?
>The room inside had been untouched since the night of the party, three months after the door of Stable Twenty-Nine closed, trapping everypony inside.
And she knows this how? I went back over the sound recordings, and I didn't see anything in there that provided any of these details. The only clue I can see about the three month thing is that the flyer calls it a "three month survival party," which I suppose implies that the party took place three months after the group entered the stable. Assuming they were locked in from the very beginning this would make sense.
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>>298362
>Velvet pities the junkie
Is it really right for Velvet to take pity on a junkie?
She's a formerly-rich bitch celebrity from her stable's upper crust.
If she wasn't constantly surrounded by drug-taking celebrity faggots who ruined their boring lives through addiction, she should have an absolute hatred for drugs and the 'lowlife lowborn stable-scum' that takes them for fun.
>VIP area
If there is no leader, why even have a VIP area or name it such? If it's necessary for something as important as opening and closing the vault door that keeps your stable protected from the outside world, why not put the security specialists/experts in charge of it?
Also, Kkat's a faggot for badly writing this leaderless Vault. Leaderless zones don't stay leaderless for long. Eventually someone good at managing and planning and getting others to listen to him basically ends up in charge of (at the very least) a good chunk of the zone. If someone good at managing doesn't take over, someone who thinks he should manage things eventually will.
Why the hell would the absence of an "Overseer", the all-powerful boss with "Watch the cameras everywhere" as his job, the faggot who's in charge of the all-powerful "Stable Security" militarized police force, result in the stable lacking any kind of authority or responsibility?
If the automated security starts fucking up, which mechanic is in charge of fixing it? Which mechanic is the boss of other mechanics in charge of training new mechanics, if one exists?
If you think the automated security system is malfunctioning and killing innocents, what's stopping you from bugfixing that or getting a mob to destroy the easily-smashed gun turrets if it's not whoever's really in charge?
And if this Stable gets its orders directly from Stable-Tec instead of a local Overseer...
1. How did Stable-Tec survive? In a normal experiment-free stable of their own?
2. What the fuck kind of experiment in "Anarchy" does that make this, if this civilization needs the permission of a company to wipe its own ass and/or was effectively ruled by the facility's own guns?
3. When the gun turrets got this genocidal, how did they stay functional for this long if it's easy enough for Littlepoop to take them out with her mediocre hunting pistol? During the start of this Kung Flu panic, people smashed up 5G towers thinking they had something to do with it. And possibly smashed up some power lines that looked like 5G towers but there might have been feds doing that instead to make the anti-5G guys look bad.
4. AIs don't just "happen" and come out of nowhere like a videogame spawning in a new enemy. AIs are fucking hard to make! What retarded fucking Assman-tier Anti-Humanist Transhumanist Double-Nigger Moment of anti-logic caused a robot to think genociding all of its poners was its job?
>"Littlepip," she said, and I realized she was crying, "You need to stop. Your crack addiction is tearing this family apart!"
Littlepip: There are spiders under my skin and secrets to uncover in the journals and terminal entries of long-dead ponies!!!
This reminds me of a Vault in Fallout NV that seems brilliant at first but falls apart once you think about it. It's that Vault where the Overseer is elected for a year, then killed.
So big Voting Blocs form to rule the vault and vote for anyone who displeases them, and posters saying "Carl is a communist sympathizer, vote Carl for overseer!" coat the walls.
This shit went on for about 200 years without any change.
Eventually one person got voted into power and decided to actually use the Overseer's absolute power to replace voting with a random lottery. So a civil war happened and fucktons died.
All but 6ish vault occupants died. They agreed to vote nobody in as Overseer even if it gets them killed.
The vault said "Congratulations! You've proven humans will not execute one human a year even if we tell them to."
Sad, the survivors agreed to make an edgy audio log and leave it on the floor so random looters can find it. Then they all kill themselves except I think some chickened out.
Anyway this vault sounds smart and deep at first but was really dumb and edgy in retrospect. It's like this Stable, because at first it's horrifying but then you realize it's kind of funny.
But it's still a step above this piece of shit Stable where poners exist in an underground facility that gradually kills them over time for no fucking reason. Come on, where's the GLADOS AI that likes testing stuff even if it kills? Where's the lesson here, besides "Not everyone can write"?
At least Shadow The Hedgehog's stupid "Everyone in this expensive facility was killed for no reason" backstory got aliens retconned in to be less retarded.
>be Eggman's grandfather
>daughter has super-AIDS named NIDS
>take her to Space Colony Arc
>make giant lizard and Shadow The Hedgehog while trying to cure her Space AIDS
>collab with genocidal alien Devil Doom and his race the Black Arms on Shadow
>Guardian Unit of Nations (GUN) slaughters everyone on the ARK including Maria
>brainwash+freeze Shadow until Sonic Adventure 2
Remember that time Littlepip linked her PipBuck's targeting program to some turrets, so they'd open fire on anything her PipBuck considered an enemy to her while sparing her and her friends?
Bet the dead poners wish they thought of that.
If LP did that upon entering the stable, she wouldn't have to purge the vault of anything violent towards her like the gun-turrets.
Her PipBuck's never fucked up and labelled a potential friend as a Hostile(TM) before, so it's not like doing this would make a spiteful Dungeon Master say "This vault actually had survivors who were starving so badly they'd rob anyone they encountered... but they could have totally been reasoned with if you tossed some food their way. Unfortunately your trick made the automated turrets kill them all. Yes, even though these turrets were already killing ponies so these survivors would have no reason to go near the damn things. Shut the fuck up and enjoy the edge."
>Velvet pities the junkie
Is it really right for Velvet to take pity on a junkie?
She's a formerly-rich bitch celebrity from her stable's upper crust.
If she wasn't constantly surrounded by drug-taking celebrity faggots who ruined their boring lives through addiction, she should have an absolute hatred for drugs and the 'lowlife lowborn stable-scum' that takes them for fun.
>VIP area
If there is no leader, why even have a VIP area or name it such? If it's necessary for something as important as opening and closing the vault door that keeps your stable protected from the outside world, why not put the security specialists/experts in charge of it?
Also, Kkat's a faggot for badly writing this leaderless Vault. Leaderless zones don't stay leaderless for long. Eventually someone good at managing and planning and getting others to listen to him basically ends up in charge of (at the very least) a good chunk of the zone. If someone good at managing doesn't take over, someone who thinks he should manage things eventually will.
Why the hell would the absence of an "Overseer", the all-powerful boss with "Watch the cameras everywhere" as his job, the faggot who's in charge of the all-powerful "Stable Security" militarized police force, result in the stable lacking any kind of authority or responsibility?
If the automated security starts fucking up, which mechanic is in charge of fixing it? Which mechanic is the boss of other mechanics in charge of training new mechanics, if one exists?
If you think the automated security system is malfunctioning and killing innocents, what's stopping you from bugfixing that or getting a mob to destroy the easily-smashed gun turrets if it's not whoever's really in charge?
And if this Stable gets its orders directly from Stable-Tec instead of a local Overseer...
1. How did Stable-Tec survive? In a normal experiment-free stable of their own?
2. What the fuck kind of experiment in "Anarchy" does that make this, if this civilization needs the permission of a company to wipe its own ass and/or was effectively ruled by the facility's own guns?
3. When the gun turrets got this genocidal, how did they stay functional for this long if it's easy enough for Littlepoop to take them out with her mediocre hunting pistol? During the start of this Kung Flu panic, people smashed up 5G towers thinking they had something to do with it. And possibly smashed up some power lines that looked like 5G towers but there might have been feds doing that instead to make the anti-5G guys look bad.
4. AIs don't just "happen" and come out of nowhere like a videogame spawning in a new enemy. AIs are fucking hard to make! What retarded fucking Assman-tier Anti-Humanist Transhumanist Double-Nigger Moment of anti-logic caused a robot to think genociding all of its poners was its job?
>"Littlepip," she said, and I realized she was crying, "You need to stop. Your crack addiction is tearing this family apart!"
Littlepip: There are spiders under my skin and secrets to uncover in the journals and terminal entries of long-dead ponies!!!
This reminds me of a Vault in Fallout NV that seems brilliant at first but falls apart once you think about it. It's that Vault where the Overseer is elected for a year, then killed.
So big Voting Blocs form to rule the vault and vote for anyone who displeases them, and posters saying "Carl is a communist sympathizer, vote Carl for overseer!" coat the walls.
This shit went on for about 200 years without any change.
Eventually one person got voted into power and decided to actually use the Overseer's absolute power to replace voting with a random lottery. So a civil war happened and fucktons died.
All but 6ish vault occupants died. They agreed to vote nobody in as Overseer even if it gets them killed.
The vault said "Congratulations! You've proven humans will not execute one human a year even if we tell them to."
Sad, the survivors agreed to make an edgy audio log and leave it on the floor so random looters can find it. Then they all kill themselves except I think some chickened out.
Anyway this vault sounds smart and deep at first but was really dumb and edgy in retrospect. It's like this Stable, because at first it's horrifying but then you realize it's kind of funny.
But it's still a step above this piece of shit Stable where poners exist in an underground facility that gradually kills them over time for no fucking reason. Come on, where's the GLADOS AI that likes testing stuff even if it kills? Where's the lesson here, besides "Not everyone can write"?
At least Shadow The Hedgehog's stupid "Everyone in this expensive facility was killed for no reason" backstory got aliens retconned in to be less retarded.
>be Eggman's grandfather
>daughter has super-AIDS named NIDS
>take her to Space Colony Arc
>make giant lizard and Shadow The Hedgehog while trying to cure her Space AIDS
>collab with genocidal alien Devil Doom and his race the Black Arms on Shadow
>Guardian Unit of Nations (GUN) slaughters everyone on the ARK including Maria
>brainwash+freeze Shadow until Sonic Adventure 2
Remember that time Littlepip linked her PipBuck's targeting program to some turrets, so they'd open fire on anything her PipBuck considered an enemy to her while sparing her and her friends?
Bet the dead poners wish they thought of that.
If LP did that upon entering the stable, she wouldn't have to purge the vault of anything violent towards her like the gun-turrets.
Her PipBuck's never fucked up and labelled a potential friend as a Hostile(TM) before, so it's not like doing this would make a spiteful Dungeon Master say "This vault actually had survivors who were starving so badly they'd rob anyone they encountered... but they could have totally been reasoned with if you tossed some food their way. Unfortunately your trick made the automated turrets kill them all. Yes, even though these turrets were already killing ponies so these survivors would have no reason to go near the damn things. Shut the fuck up and enjoy the edge."
>>298363
What isn't clear, though, is why this room would be untouched since the night of the party, or how LP would know this for a fact. For this to be the case, Vinyl would have to have died on the night of the party, or at least stopped using this room after the party. Is the implication here that the night of the party was the same night that all the brutal slaughter detailed in the last batch of recordings took place?
As usual, timelines here are vague; all we really know is that Stable-Tec, for some bizarre reason, was using its remote control of the stable to murder all of its inhabitants. It started off by killing a few here and there using events that appeared to be accidents, but eventually it just unleashed an all-out bloodbath, using the automated gun turrets that were placed all around (this seems like kind of a strange design feature in the first place). However, we don't know how long this took or when any of these events occurred. It's possible that the accidents took place over the course of three months, and the bloodbath occurred on the night of the party; however, if this is the case it's not clearly stated anywhere. They could have just as easily been down there for years and years before any of this started happening.
However, what I think the author is getting at is that the "accidental" killings were taking place over the first three months, and then at the concert Stable-Tec decided to kill everyone at once. More than likely, the concert was held in the atrium and this is probably what all the skeletons in there are supposed to be about.
Anyway, Littlepoop wanders around Vinyl's old room, looking at all of her stacks of records and DJ equipment and whatever the fuck, thinking to herself that she could just randomly break all of this shit to relieve some of the stress she is feeling about all the ancient murders or whatever. However, she doesn't quite feel right about destroying the beloved possessions of a pony who was just another victim of the evil meanie-pants baddie corporation that was bad because badness. So, she decides to do the decent thing: steal those possessions instead. She goes through Vinyl's old record collection, takes whatever the fuck she wants because she's a goddamn klepto, and wanders off, once again feeling as though she has somehow done something noble here.
>When I returned to the others, I would have Velvet Remedy lock them in one of her medical boxes where it would be safe from bullet fire. I still remembered that apple.
If transporting vinyl records or wax 78s or whatever the fuck they have in Equestria across the wasteland is such a complex and delicate task, why not just leave them where they are? Why do you need these records? Why do you need any of the junk you pick up? You need help, girl.
Also, what apple? What the fuck are you even babbling about, you loony twat?
Since it wouldn't be a room in Fallout: Equestria if there wasn't a safe, Littlepoop of course finds a safe. She of course "hesitates," because she "doesn't feel quite right about this," but of course this feeling doesn't ultimately stop her. She breaks into the safe, which of course just contains sentimental objects of Vinyl's that are of no practical use to Littlepoop or anyone in her party.
However, for no obvious reason, there are also four memory orbs in there. One of them is called "Pinkie Pie's Last Party," so she takes that one and leaves everything else.
After doing this, she leaves Vinyl's room, and goes to another room marked "Shadowhorn," which I guess was the name of someone important in Stable 29. The name was mentioned a few times in the recordings. Since LP has apparently completely forgotten about both her friends and the probably now dead cyborg soldier she was supposed to be trying to rescue, and since she can hardly resist the opportunity to rifle through another dead stranger's belongings, she goes inside.
>The mare in charge of maintenance was a V.I.P. in the Stable? Even in the midst of my barely-reined fury at Stable-Tec, my pure hatred towards whom could not be told, part of my brain recognized that seemed odd.
I had to read this like five times before I figured out what the hell the author was trying to say here. This is easily one of the most awkwardly-written sentences in the entire book.
Anyway, she goes into this dead cunt's room and, surprise surprise, there's another goddamn safe in there, which she of course breaks into. There is another recording inside.
>When the safe opened, it revealed another recording. This one looked startlingly similar to the one I found in the Overstallion’s office.
Couple of things here. For one, I thought there was no Overstallion here, and that was the whole point of this place. For another, since it specifically says Overstallion and not Overmare, I'm assuming what the author means is that the recording resembles the one LP found earlier at the other stable, the one that was so shocking because it had a boy leader instead of a girl leader. Since that happened like forty forevers ago and I don't even remember what that recording was even about, let alone what it looked like, we should probably go back and see what the description of the first one was.
>But within his locked safe, I found both it and the recipe, as well as an old recording. My guess was that it was his last words.
This is literally all the text has to say about the Overstallion's recording found all the way back in Chapter 5. So, if a description of the first recording is never given, how exactly is it helpful to tell us later that a second recording resembles it? The answer: it's not helpful. It's not helpful at all. It's also not helpful that the text has yet to even give us a description of any recording; the only reason I have even a vague idea of what these mystery objects look like is because a helpful anon in this thread gave a brief description of the ones in the game.
What isn't clear, though, is why this room would be untouched since the night of the party, or how LP would know this for a fact. For this to be the case, Vinyl would have to have died on the night of the party, or at least stopped using this room after the party. Is the implication here that the night of the party was the same night that all the brutal slaughter detailed in the last batch of recordings took place?
As usual, timelines here are vague; all we really know is that Stable-Tec, for some bizarre reason, was using its remote control of the stable to murder all of its inhabitants. It started off by killing a few here and there using events that appeared to be accidents, but eventually it just unleashed an all-out bloodbath, using the automated gun turrets that were placed all around (this seems like kind of a strange design feature in the first place). However, we don't know how long this took or when any of these events occurred. It's possible that the accidents took place over the course of three months, and the bloodbath occurred on the night of the party; however, if this is the case it's not clearly stated anywhere. They could have just as easily been down there for years and years before any of this started happening.
However, what I think the author is getting at is that the "accidental" killings were taking place over the first three months, and then at the concert Stable-Tec decided to kill everyone at once. More than likely, the concert was held in the atrium and this is probably what all the skeletons in there are supposed to be about.
Anyway, Littlepoop wanders around Vinyl's old room, looking at all of her stacks of records and DJ equipment and whatever the fuck, thinking to herself that she could just randomly break all of this shit to relieve some of the stress she is feeling about all the ancient murders or whatever. However, she doesn't quite feel right about destroying the beloved possessions of a pony who was just another victim of the evil meanie-pants baddie corporation that was bad because badness. So, she decides to do the decent thing: steal those possessions instead. She goes through Vinyl's old record collection, takes whatever the fuck she wants because she's a goddamn klepto, and wanders off, once again feeling as though she has somehow done something noble here.
>When I returned to the others, I would have Velvet Remedy lock them in one of her medical boxes where it would be safe from bullet fire. I still remembered that apple.
If transporting vinyl records or wax 78s or whatever the fuck they have in Equestria across the wasteland is such a complex and delicate task, why not just leave them where they are? Why do you need these records? Why do you need any of the junk you pick up? You need help, girl.
Also, what apple? What the fuck are you even babbling about, you loony twat?
Since it wouldn't be a room in Fallout: Equestria if there wasn't a safe, Littlepoop of course finds a safe. She of course "hesitates," because she "doesn't feel quite right about this," but of course this feeling doesn't ultimately stop her. She breaks into the safe, which of course just contains sentimental objects of Vinyl's that are of no practical use to Littlepoop or anyone in her party.
However, for no obvious reason, there are also four memory orbs in there. One of them is called "Pinkie Pie's Last Party," so she takes that one and leaves everything else.
After doing this, she leaves Vinyl's room, and goes to another room marked "Shadowhorn," which I guess was the name of someone important in Stable 29. The name was mentioned a few times in the recordings. Since LP has apparently completely forgotten about both her friends and the probably now dead cyborg soldier she was supposed to be trying to rescue, and since she can hardly resist the opportunity to rifle through another dead stranger's belongings, she goes inside.
>The mare in charge of maintenance was a V.I.P. in the Stable? Even in the midst of my barely-reined fury at Stable-Tec, my pure hatred towards whom could not be told, part of my brain recognized that seemed odd.
I had to read this like five times before I figured out what the hell the author was trying to say here. This is easily one of the most awkwardly-written sentences in the entire book.
Anyway, she goes into this dead cunt's room and, surprise surprise, there's another goddamn safe in there, which she of course breaks into. There is another recording inside.
>When the safe opened, it revealed another recording. This one looked startlingly similar to the one I found in the Overstallion’s office.
Couple of things here. For one, I thought there was no Overstallion here, and that was the whole point of this place. For another, since it specifically says Overstallion and not Overmare, I'm assuming what the author means is that the recording resembles the one LP found earlier at the other stable, the one that was so shocking because it had a boy leader instead of a girl leader. Since that happened like forty forevers ago and I don't even remember what that recording was even about, let alone what it looked like, we should probably go back and see what the description of the first one was.
>But within his locked safe, I found both it and the recipe, as well as an old recording. My guess was that it was his last words.
This is literally all the text has to say about the Overstallion's recording found all the way back in Chapter 5. So, if a description of the first recording is never given, how exactly is it helpful to tell us later that a second recording resembles it? The answer: it's not helpful. It's not helpful at all. It's also not helpful that the text has yet to even give us a description of any recording; the only reason I have even a vague idea of what these mystery objects look like is because a helpful anon in this thread gave a brief description of the ones in the game.
>>298367
Anyway, she plays the recording itself, and...hoo boy. Let's just say that the actual truth of what happened here is different from what the text has thus far been hinting at, but it's no less ridiculous. In fact, it may actually be more ridiculous. This recording is probably worth going through closely, because there's quite a bit of information in here.
>Hello, Shadowhorn! The following is for your ears only. I am speaking to you because you have been selected for a very important job, due to your sense of loyalty and duty both to this company and the ponies around you.
This appears to be another super-sekrit message from Vice President Scootaloo at Stable-Tec to the Overmare, or Chief Security Officer, or Designated Shitting Pony, or whatever, from this particular stable. The format resembles the one which opened Chapter Six, if anyone gives enough of a shit to go back and read it.
>Hello, my name is Scootaloo, and I’m the vice-president of Stable-Tec. If you’re hearing this, that means that the Omega-Level Threat Protocols have been enacted...
Blah blah blah, the magical nukes went off and everyone is dead now, time to implement Plan 9 from Outer Space.
Anyway, after her preamble, Scoots basically tells Shadowfax that in addition to being a survival bunker, Stable 29 has been selected to participate in some kind of social experiment:
>but there is a higher purpose to your Stable, beyond saving individual ponies. We here at Stable-Tec understand that it doesn’t do ponykind any good to save ourselves now only to annihilate each other later. We must figure out where we went wrong. We must find a better way. And we must be ready to implement it as soon as possible once the Stable doors open.
Normally, a speech like this would imply that Stable-Tec probably wants #29 to implement some kind of bullshit common-core style learning program in which tolerance and friendship and shit is taught to the young, in order that the next generation of little ponies won't want to annihilate each other with nuclear missiles or whatever the fuck. However, in this story, I'm assuming it will be something about rampaging killbots instead.
She goes off on a bit of a tangent after this, mostly spouting cliched lines like:
>dammit. How did we come to this?
and
>Bad decisions, emotional decisions… they’ve dragged us into a war nopony wanted. They’ve pushed us to the brink of extinction
and
>dammit all to hell. Damn us all to hell.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WQCoPL3-wo
Anyway, she eventually gets back on topic, and once she does we get some interesting tidbits of information:
>Your Stable has a very exceptional design. Despite the official documents, this Stable has no remote connection to Stable-Tec whatsoever. Instead, replacing the normal Overmare position, we have fitted Stable Twenty-Nine with a Crusader-class computer system.
So, apparently, it wasn't Stable-Tec who intentionally murdered everypony for no reason.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LGu1sOvxYs
The question now, of course, is who did?
>The Crusader-class Maneframe is the most advanced supercomputer ever created by ponykind, using the greatest available improvements in arcano-technology. The Crusader is capable of independent thought, creativity and learning.
Oh, sweet baby Jesus. I think I see where this is going. Also: "maneframe?" Seriously? There's a time when cutesy horse puns are appropriate, and now does not feel like one of those times.
>The goal of this social experiment it to remove the emotional, fallible pony from the equation. To see if we can do better through a pragmatic and logical system of government that is not subject to our own faults.
Yep, it's basically what I was afraid of. This is another "artificially intelligent supercomputer goes awry and kills everyone" episode. It's a first for this story, but it's bringing back some unpleasant memories of Assman and his "Celest-AI" spergery.
Anyway, there's some other shit in here that I'll get to in a minute, but the long and short of it is that the Cutie Mark Crusaders built some kind of magic supercomputer, which they gave to this stable in order to test as part of some kind of experiment in AI government. Naturally, this machine went amok and killed everyone in the stable.
What happened specifically is that some little kid accidentally shot the magic crystal thingy that generates drinking water (this is mentioned in one of the earlier recordings), and he caused some kind of permanent damage to it. The diminishing supply of drinking water caused the computer to reason that the population needed to be reduced, so it killed a few of the ponies. However, since the water crystal couldn't be repaired, the supply kept dwindling so the computer had to kill more ponies. Eventually the supply ran out completely, so it decided to just kill all the ponies at once.
There are several WTFs here. First of all, it seems like a pretty stupid idea to do something like this in the first place. If this AI has never been tested before, it makes little sense to test it in the middle of a life or death survival situation where literally thousands of things can go wrong. However, I get the impression that this was basically the author's point, so we can probably skip that one.
More pertinent is that the latter part of the recording details measures that this Shadowbolt character could use to manually take control of the system if it ever went awry. If it started killing ponies a few at a time, it seems like it should have been obvious to Shadowcat that it was doing something it shouldn't, so why weren't the override controls implemented? However, I actuallysuspect hope the author may be going somewhere with this, so I'll skip that one for now as well.
I'm running out of space, so I will finish this thought in a new post.
Anyway, she plays the recording itself, and...hoo boy. Let's just say that the actual truth of what happened here is different from what the text has thus far been hinting at, but it's no less ridiculous. In fact, it may actually be more ridiculous. This recording is probably worth going through closely, because there's quite a bit of information in here.
>Hello, Shadowhorn! The following is for your ears only. I am speaking to you because you have been selected for a very important job, due to your sense of loyalty and duty both to this company and the ponies around you.
This appears to be another super-sekrit message from Vice President Scootaloo at Stable-Tec to the Overmare, or Chief Security Officer, or Designated Shitting Pony, or whatever, from this particular stable. The format resembles the one which opened Chapter Six, if anyone gives enough of a shit to go back and read it.
>Hello, my name is Scootaloo, and I’m the vice-president of Stable-Tec. If you’re hearing this, that means that the Omega-Level Threat Protocols have been enacted...
Blah blah blah, the magical nukes went off and everyone is dead now, time to implement Plan 9 from Outer Space.
Anyway, after her preamble, Scoots basically tells Shadowfax that in addition to being a survival bunker, Stable 29 has been selected to participate in some kind of social experiment:
>but there is a higher purpose to your Stable, beyond saving individual ponies. We here at Stable-Tec understand that it doesn’t do ponykind any good to save ourselves now only to annihilate each other later. We must figure out where we went wrong. We must find a better way. And we must be ready to implement it as soon as possible once the Stable doors open.
Normally, a speech like this would imply that Stable-Tec probably wants #29 to implement some kind of bullshit common-core style learning program in which tolerance and friendship and shit is taught to the young, in order that the next generation of little ponies won't want to annihilate each other with nuclear missiles or whatever the fuck. However, in this story, I'm assuming it will be something about rampaging killbots instead.
She goes off on a bit of a tangent after this, mostly spouting cliched lines like:
>dammit. How did we come to this?
and
>Bad decisions, emotional decisions… they’ve dragged us into a war nopony wanted. They’ve pushed us to the brink of extinction
and
>dammit all to hell. Damn us all to hell.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WQCoPL3-wo
Anyway, she eventually gets back on topic, and once she does we get some interesting tidbits of information:
>Your Stable has a very exceptional design. Despite the official documents, this Stable has no remote connection to Stable-Tec whatsoever. Instead, replacing the normal Overmare position, we have fitted Stable Twenty-Nine with a Crusader-class computer system.
So, apparently, it wasn't Stable-Tec who intentionally murdered everypony for no reason.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LGu1sOvxYs
The question now, of course, is who did?
>The Crusader-class Maneframe is the most advanced supercomputer ever created by ponykind, using the greatest available improvements in arcano-technology. The Crusader is capable of independent thought, creativity and learning.
Oh, sweet baby Jesus. I think I see where this is going. Also: "maneframe?" Seriously? There's a time when cutesy horse puns are appropriate, and now does not feel like one of those times.
>The goal of this social experiment it to remove the emotional, fallible pony from the equation. To see if we can do better through a pragmatic and logical system of government that is not subject to our own faults.
Yep, it's basically what I was afraid of. This is another "artificially intelligent supercomputer goes awry and kills everyone" episode. It's a first for this story, but it's bringing back some unpleasant memories of Assman and his "Celest-AI" spergery.
Anyway, there's some other shit in here that I'll get to in a minute, but the long and short of it is that the Cutie Mark Crusaders built some kind of magic supercomputer, which they gave to this stable in order to test as part of some kind of experiment in AI government. Naturally, this machine went amok and killed everyone in the stable.
What happened specifically is that some little kid accidentally shot the magic crystal thingy that generates drinking water (this is mentioned in one of the earlier recordings), and he caused some kind of permanent damage to it. The diminishing supply of drinking water caused the computer to reason that the population needed to be reduced, so it killed a few of the ponies. However, since the water crystal couldn't be repaired, the supply kept dwindling so the computer had to kill more ponies. Eventually the supply ran out completely, so it decided to just kill all the ponies at once.
There are several WTFs here. First of all, it seems like a pretty stupid idea to do something like this in the first place. If this AI has never been tested before, it makes little sense to test it in the middle of a life or death survival situation where literally thousands of things can go wrong. However, I get the impression that this was basically the author's point, so we can probably skip that one.
More pertinent is that the latter part of the recording details measures that this Shadowbolt character could use to manually take control of the system if it ever went awry. If it started killing ponies a few at a time, it seems like it should have been obvious to Shadowcat that it was doing something it shouldn't, so why weren't the override controls implemented? However, I actually
I'm running out of space, so I will finish this thought in a new post.
>>298376
>What happened specifically is that some little kid accidentally shot the magic crystal thingy that generates drinking water (this is mentioned in one of the earlier recordings), and he caused some kind of permanent damage to it. The diminishing supply of drinking water caused the computer to reason that the population needed to be reduced, so it killed a few of the ponies. However, since the water crystal couldn't be repaired, the supply kept dwindling so the computer had to kill more ponies. Eventually the supply ran out completely, so it decided to just kill all the ponies at once.
I'll give Kkat one tiny bit of credit here - this ties together a handful of things from the Fallout games quite cleverly. Janky, homicidal AIs suffering from logic errors show up frequently in all of the games so this sort of scenario isn't out of place in a Fallout story. Fallout 1 establishes that vaults rely on a small but vital component known as a 'water chip' to process their water supplies. And in Fallout 3, the shooting tutorial is framed as your (character's) father taking your ten year old self down to the maintenance level to practice with the BB gun he gives you for your birthday. Broadly speaking, the scenario makes a degree of sense and a tragic story could probably be spun out of it with a little effort.
However, as with most things in FoE it's integrated with the rest of the story in a very slipshod manner.
>What happened specifically is that some little kid accidentally shot the magic crystal thingy that generates drinking water (this is mentioned in one of the earlier recordings), and he caused some kind of permanent damage to it. The diminishing supply of drinking water caused the computer to reason that the population needed to be reduced, so it killed a few of the ponies. However, since the water crystal couldn't be repaired, the supply kept dwindling so the computer had to kill more ponies. Eventually the supply ran out completely, so it decided to just kill all the ponies at once.
I'll give Kkat one tiny bit of credit here - this ties together a handful of things from the Fallout games quite cleverly. Janky, homicidal AIs suffering from logic errors show up frequently in all of the games so this sort of scenario isn't out of place in a Fallout story. Fallout 1 establishes that vaults rely on a small but vital component known as a 'water chip' to process their water supplies. And in Fallout 3, the shooting tutorial is framed as your (character's) father taking your ten year old self down to the maintenance level to practice with the BB gun he gives you for your birthday. Broadly speaking, the scenario makes a degree of sense and a tragic story could probably be spun out of it with a little effort.
However, as with most things in FoE it's integrated with the rest of the story in a very slipshod manner.
>>298376
The big issue as I see it is that the water crystal was damaged beyond repair. This whole tragedy is being presented as the end result of some monumental error in judgement on Stable-Tec's part, but neither Stable-Tec nor their AI are ultimately responsible for what happened. The crystal was damaged by accident, but once it was damaged it was irreparable, so everyone would have died sooner or later anyway. While I'm sure being suddenly murdered by killbots in the middle of a rave must have been unpleasant for most of these little poners, it was probably a lot less agonizing than slowly dying of thirst would have been. This was basically a situation where death was inevitable for everyone; the only choice would be when and how.
The author seems to want to emphasize the horror of this soulless machine ruthlessly murdering the living beings under its care because it made some calculation and determined that it was necessary. The message, such as it is, seems to tie in to what I have heard others in this thread refer to as the main theme of this work: that good intentions can lead to evil results. Here, the implication seems to be that Stable-Tec meant well: they created a government AI in the hopes that a purely rational machine wouldn't make the same impulsive and emotional decisions that a pony would. But, their good intentions ultimately produced this horrible result. That seems to be what the author is trying to communicate, as far as I can tell.
However, as I said, the reality is that whether this stable was being run by a machine or a pony, the leadership would have needed to deal with the same reality, which is that the water-jiggy was broken, it couldn't be repaired, and everypony was going to die one way or the other. The computer didn't break the water-whoosit, nor did the kid who shot it do so deliberately, but the end result was ultimately the same: it was irreparably damaged, and everyone in the stable was therefore doomed.
You could look at it this way: the machine probably made the right call by putting everyone to death quickly and...eh...relatively...painlessly with a mass shooting, instead of letting them all die slowly of dehydration. If the water had been allowed to simply run out, eventually the ponies would have noticed, and there would have been a panic. Ponies would probably start hoarding what water they had, and killing each other to obtain water hoarded by others. Some would probably try to leave the stable (if that were possible) and would die of radiation or whatever on the outside. In the end, whatever measures were taken, all paths would end in the death of every single pony in the stable. Killing everyone swiftly and at once was probably the best call here, and a machine could figure this out easily. A flesh and blood pony would have struggled with it and possibly would have chosen a path that, despite their good intentions see what I did there?, would have produced a far more gruesome end for most of these poners than simply getting shot by the turrets.
Let's look at exactly what happened with the water-doodle:
>Shadowhorn called us into a meeting this morning. We nearly had a major disaster yesterday. That idiot Buckbright built his colt a BB gun for his birthday, then brought the kid down to the reactor level for target practice. What was he thinking? Kid missed a radroach and punched a small hole in the environmental system. Actually nicked the water talisman. Thankfully, it’s working fine, but another half an inch and the whole Stable would be in serious trouble.
You will notice that even though it was done unintentionally, the damage done to the water-whatsit was the direct result of bad judgement on the father's part. So basically, this tragedy that the author seems to want to blame on the cold, heartless machine was actually the result of human error pony error, whatever. It was ultimately Buckbright who was responsible for the deaths of everypony in Stable 29, since he was the one who allowed his kid to fire a BB gun in the reactor area. You'll also notice another crucial error made by a pony: the narrator of the journal says that thetalisman water-kerfluffle was fine and the damage wasn't serious; it actually turned out to be quite serious. Perhaps if the situation was understood and addressed sooner something could have been done. In any case, the...*sigh*..."maneframe"...in this situation is essentially blameless; it was faced with an impossible decision and made the best choice it could make.
I know I literally just bantzed the crap out of this story for being ridiculous a few posts ago, and in my defense this story is indeed very ridiculous most of the time, but now that I've read the whole section I will grudgingly give the author a few points here. Whatever he may have been trying to do, he wound up creating an interesting ethical dilemma with no good solution.
The irony is that kkack actually touches on something much deeper here than he realizes. His intended message appears to be "good intentions can lead to evil results," but in this case it was a completely unintentional act that led to a deadly no-exit scenario. If anything, it illustrates the ultimate indifference of the universe to man's pony's, whatever intentions in the first place. The tendency of humans and/or ponies is to look at the world like a puzzle, with the assumption that some "right" action is always available that will lead to a perfect outcome, and it's just a matter of figuring out which action is right. In reality, there is no right-action and wrong-action; all actions simply have consequences, and often they are too complex to predict the result. If the author really wants to use this story as a vessel for exploring complex moral issues, he'd be better off abandoning the white-hat vs. black-hat melodrama he's written so far, and delving deeper into questions like this instead.
The big issue as I see it is that the water crystal was damaged beyond repair. This whole tragedy is being presented as the end result of some monumental error in judgement on Stable-Tec's part, but neither Stable-Tec nor their AI are ultimately responsible for what happened. The crystal was damaged by accident, but once it was damaged it was irreparable, so everyone would have died sooner or later anyway. While I'm sure being suddenly murdered by killbots in the middle of a rave must have been unpleasant for most of these little poners, it was probably a lot less agonizing than slowly dying of thirst would have been. This was basically a situation where death was inevitable for everyone; the only choice would be when and how.
The author seems to want to emphasize the horror of this soulless machine ruthlessly murdering the living beings under its care because it made some calculation and determined that it was necessary. The message, such as it is, seems to tie in to what I have heard others in this thread refer to as the main theme of this work: that good intentions can lead to evil results. Here, the implication seems to be that Stable-Tec meant well: they created a government AI in the hopes that a purely rational machine wouldn't make the same impulsive and emotional decisions that a pony would. But, their good intentions ultimately produced this horrible result. That seems to be what the author is trying to communicate, as far as I can tell.
However, as I said, the reality is that whether this stable was being run by a machine or a pony, the leadership would have needed to deal with the same reality, which is that the water-jiggy was broken, it couldn't be repaired, and everypony was going to die one way or the other. The computer didn't break the water-whoosit, nor did the kid who shot it do so deliberately, but the end result was ultimately the same: it was irreparably damaged, and everyone in the stable was therefore doomed.
You could look at it this way: the machine probably made the right call by putting everyone to death quickly and...eh...relatively...painlessly with a mass shooting, instead of letting them all die slowly of dehydration. If the water had been allowed to simply run out, eventually the ponies would have noticed, and there would have been a panic. Ponies would probably start hoarding what water they had, and killing each other to obtain water hoarded by others. Some would probably try to leave the stable (if that were possible) and would die of radiation or whatever on the outside. In the end, whatever measures were taken, all paths would end in the death of every single pony in the stable. Killing everyone swiftly and at once was probably the best call here, and a machine could figure this out easily. A flesh and blood pony would have struggled with it and possibly would have chosen a path that, despite their good intentions see what I did there?, would have produced a far more gruesome end for most of these poners than simply getting shot by the turrets.
Let's look at exactly what happened with the water-doodle:
>Shadowhorn called us into a meeting this morning. We nearly had a major disaster yesterday. That idiot Buckbright built his colt a BB gun for his birthday, then brought the kid down to the reactor level for target practice. What was he thinking? Kid missed a radroach and punched a small hole in the environmental system. Actually nicked the water talisman. Thankfully, it’s working fine, but another half an inch and the whole Stable would be in serious trouble.
You will notice that even though it was done unintentionally, the damage done to the water-whatsit was the direct result of bad judgement on the father's part. So basically, this tragedy that the author seems to want to blame on the cold, heartless machine was actually the result of human error pony error, whatever. It was ultimately Buckbright who was responsible for the deaths of everypony in Stable 29, since he was the one who allowed his kid to fire a BB gun in the reactor area. You'll also notice another crucial error made by a pony: the narrator of the journal says that the
I know I literally just bantzed the crap out of this story for being ridiculous a few posts ago, and in my defense this story is indeed very ridiculous most of the time, but now that I've read the whole section I will grudgingly give the author a few points here. Whatever he may have been trying to do, he wound up creating an interesting ethical dilemma with no good solution.
The irony is that kkack actually touches on something much deeper here than he realizes. His intended message appears to be "good intentions can lead to evil results," but in this case it was a completely unintentional act that led to a deadly no-exit scenario. If anything, it illustrates the ultimate indifference of the universe to man's pony's, whatever intentions in the first place. The tendency of humans and/or ponies is to look at the world like a puzzle, with the assumption that some "right" action is always available that will lead to a perfect outcome, and it's just a matter of figuring out which action is right. In reality, there is no right-action and wrong-action; all actions simply have consequences, and often they are too complex to predict the result. If the author really wants to use this story as a vessel for exploring complex moral issues, he'd be better off abandoning the white-hat vs. black-hat melodrama he's written so far, and delving deeper into questions like this instead.
>>298383
>Janky, homicidal AIs suffering from logic errors show up frequently in all of the games so this sort of scenario isn't out of place in a Fallout story. Fallout 1 establishes that vaults rely on a small but vital component known as a 'water chip' to process their water supplies. And in Fallout 3, the shooting tutorial is framed as your (character's) father taking your ten year old self down to the maintenance level to practice with the BB gun he gives you for your birthday. Broadly speaking, the scenario makes a degree of sense and a tragic story could probably be spun out of it with a little effort.
Several things in this chapter are a bit clearer in light of this information
>Janky, homicidal AIs suffering from logic errors show up frequently in all of the games so this sort of scenario isn't out of place in a Fallout story. Fallout 1 establishes that vaults rely on a small but vital component known as a 'water chip' to process their water supplies. And in Fallout 3, the shooting tutorial is framed as your (character's) father taking your ten year old self down to the maintenance level to practice with the BB gun he gives you for your birthday. Broadly speaking, the scenario makes a degree of sense and a tragic story could probably be spun out of it with a little effort.
Several things in this chapter are a bit clearer in light of this information
>>298390
It's also the author yelling "Fuck you!" at the opening of Fallout 3 where you play as a child, your dad gives you a BB gun, and in a maintenance room underground you shoot some targets and shoot one Radroach that somehow conveniently got into the vault and that underground level at the perfect moment. Guess Kkat thought firing a BB gun down there should be dangerous.
The stuff about the water chip was "inspired by" a mix of Fallout 1's "Our water chip is fucked and there is no workaround. Go into the Wasteland solo and get us a new one" main quest and the role played by the player's father in Fallout 3.
In that game your dad left the vault to enter the wasteland and work on Project Purity, a big water purifier that cleanses all the water in the Ptolomac (logically the irradiated riverbed would be unchanged but Bethesda didn't realize riverbeds can be irradiated) and also magically un-irradiate all the water in all of post-apocalyptic Washington DC. oh and the purifier relies on a magic matter reassembling doohickey that'd be put to better use making food from dirt. You get him the doohickey with the help of a giant overpowered GMPC who could have done everything for you.
Guess Kkat thought it would be extra funny and ironic and tragic if your character from Fallout 3 and his dad voiced by Liam Neeson, the life-giving water-bringing heroes, fucked up the vault for everyone and prompted the Robo-Overseer to decide killing everyone quick would be better than any other method of getting or purifying water. It's a shame the vault RepairBots couldn't fix anything.
Doesn't it feel weird for Kkat to spit on Fallout 3's characters and plot when so much of the shit in this story was ripped straight from Fallout 3 and then clumsily shoved into his edgy take on ponyland?
We can't know the robot chose the right option. Any of this vault's ponies could have been the next Littlepip. The vault only needed one good reliable water source. How about groundwater or purified ocean/rainwater? The robot chose the quickest and easiest defeatist option, but would a human (pony, whatever) have tried harder to survive? Would a pony overseer pin all her hopes and dreams on one random character kicked out of the Vault and hope for the best? An AI programmed to minimize suffering might choose mass euthenasia at the earliest opportunity, but is that right? Is that what robots, the children of man (pony, whatever) should aspire to be? Isn't a tiny chance at success better than guaranteed failure? What did mankind or ponykind ever strive for, if there ever comes a day when we all agree with a machine that thinks giving up is better than trying? That "Maneframe" computer should have some ebooks on water talismans and engineering and magic. Why not gather the best unicorns and engineers in the vault and try to replicate another water talisman or summon water from the aether or create a portal to a realm of water or trap a filled water cooler in a time loop so it's always full no matter how much you take from it, or anything else that can be attempted with magic's limitless possibilities? That damn machine didn't even have the decency to construct a fake Ponyville and fill it with brain-scanned knockoffs of the Vault's inhabitants before giving up on life.
It's also the author yelling "Fuck you!" at the opening of Fallout 3 where you play as a child, your dad gives you a BB gun, and in a maintenance room underground you shoot some targets and shoot one Radroach that somehow conveniently got into the vault and that underground level at the perfect moment. Guess Kkat thought firing a BB gun down there should be dangerous.
The stuff about the water chip was "inspired by" a mix of Fallout 1's "Our water chip is fucked and there is no workaround. Go into the Wasteland solo and get us a new one" main quest and the role played by the player's father in Fallout 3.
In that game your dad left the vault to enter the wasteland and work on Project Purity, a big water purifier that cleanses all the water in the Ptolomac (logically the irradiated riverbed would be unchanged but Bethesda didn't realize riverbeds can be irradiated) and also magically un-irradiate all the water in all of post-apocalyptic Washington DC. oh and the purifier relies on a magic matter reassembling doohickey that'd be put to better use making food from dirt. You get him the doohickey with the help of a giant overpowered GMPC who could have done everything for you.
Guess Kkat thought it would be extra funny and ironic and tragic if your character from Fallout 3 and his dad voiced by Liam Neeson, the life-giving water-bringing heroes, fucked up the vault for everyone and prompted the Robo-Overseer to decide killing everyone quick would be better than any other method of getting or purifying water. It's a shame the vault RepairBots couldn't fix anything.
Doesn't it feel weird for Kkat to spit on Fallout 3's characters and plot when so much of the shit in this story was ripped straight from Fallout 3 and then clumsily shoved into his edgy take on ponyland?
We can't know the robot chose the right option. Any of this vault's ponies could have been the next Littlepip. The vault only needed one good reliable water source. How about groundwater or purified ocean/rainwater? The robot chose the quickest and easiest defeatist option, but would a human (pony, whatever) have tried harder to survive? Would a pony overseer pin all her hopes and dreams on one random character kicked out of the Vault and hope for the best? An AI programmed to minimize suffering might choose mass euthenasia at the earliest opportunity, but is that right? Is that what robots, the children of man (pony, whatever) should aspire to be? Isn't a tiny chance at success better than guaranteed failure? What did mankind or ponykind ever strive for, if there ever comes a day when we all agree with a machine that thinks giving up is better than trying? That "Maneframe" computer should have some ebooks on water talismans and engineering and magic. Why not gather the best unicorns and engineers in the vault and try to replicate another water talisman or summon water from the aether or create a portal to a realm of water or trap a filled water cooler in a time loop so it's always full no matter how much you take from it, or anything else that can be attempted with magic's limitless possibilities? That damn machine didn't even have the decency to construct a fake Ponyville and fill it with brain-scanned knockoffs of the Vault's inhabitants before giving up on life.
>>298392
One more thing...
Isn't it ironic that what Kkat would call masculine behaviour (Teaching your son to shoot) ended up destroying a Stable with "Ruled by a robot" as its gimmick, but a Stable themed around ManDom and Masculinity ruling only failed because some mutant monster cats were created?
One more thing...
Isn't it ironic that what Kkat would call masculine behaviour (Teaching your son to shoot) ended up destroying a Stable with "Ruled by a robot" as its gimmick, but a Stable themed around ManDom and Masculinity ruling only failed because some mutant monster cats were created?
>>298177
I dunno, maybe. most of the "Action" happens "off-screen" In the aforementioned scotch tape scene we have scotch acting like a thirsty cunt, Blackjack puts on the perceptitron thingie, accidentally joins her mind for a second
>Oh now i know hes not hurting her
And thats the end of it. Seahorse abstracts it quite a bit and every other sexual encounter is a cut-to-black experiance.
I dunno, maybe. most of the "Action" happens "off-screen" In the aforementioned scotch tape scene we have scotch acting like a thirsty cunt, Blackjack puts on the perceptitron thingie, accidentally joins her mind for a second
>Oh now i know hes not hurting her
And thats the end of it. Seahorse abstracts it quite a bit and every other sexual encounter is a cut-to-black experiance.
>>298401
Huh, neat.
What writing lessons do you think can be taken from Project Horizons?
Btw was thinking more about the "an evil mastermind or god did it and dies in the end" cliche. Starting to think it's lame now. If everything was part of one villain's machinations, did anyone have free will? Would everything have turned out fine without that villain's involvement? A moral like "geeed is bad" gets thrown in the trash and replaced with "don't get manipulated or mind controlled by a god or asshole or asshole god".
It takes everything that could have been said with the story and everything the heroes could have grown from and throws it away to turn the entire story into the tale of one baddie and the puppet show he was able to put on for himself until he got shot in the dick. Trying to make the final boss the biggest spectacle like that is a cheap writing trick and that's all "I was actually responsible for everything all the other villains did and the creation of those villains" is also cheap spectacle whenever it isn't a clever reveal that was subtly hinted at. In the books I've read so far the best final bosses are more than baddies who do bad because they are bad or told to be bad by the big bad god of evil. Punching out a dark god of darkness with raw firepower is some Kirby/Sonic shit. Not some Fallout or Pony shit. Fallout would have a choice between deep smart dialogue and a firefight and maybe some clever third thing like a self-destruct base button to trigger and run without ever meeting the final boss. And poners would solve the problem with glowy friendship lasers.
Huh, neat.
What writing lessons do you think can be taken from Project Horizons?
Btw was thinking more about the "an evil mastermind or god did it and dies in the end" cliche. Starting to think it's lame now. If everything was part of one villain's machinations, did anyone have free will? Would everything have turned out fine without that villain's involvement? A moral like "geeed is bad" gets thrown in the trash and replaced with "don't get manipulated or mind controlled by a god or asshole or asshole god".
It takes everything that could have been said with the story and everything the heroes could have grown from and throws it away to turn the entire story into the tale of one baddie and the puppet show he was able to put on for himself until he got shot in the dick. Trying to make the final boss the biggest spectacle like that is a cheap writing trick and that's all "I was actually responsible for everything all the other villains did and the creation of those villains" is also cheap spectacle whenever it isn't a clever reveal that was subtly hinted at. In the books I've read so far the best final bosses are more than baddies who do bad because they are bad or told to be bad by the big bad god of evil. Punching out a dark god of darkness with raw firepower is some Kirby/Sonic shit. Not some Fallout or Pony shit. Fallout would have a choice between deep smart dialogue and a firefight and maybe some clever third thing like a self-destruct base button to trigger and run without ever meeting the final boss. And poners would solve the problem with glowy friendship lasers.
>>298491
>Btw was thinking more about the "an evil mastermind or god did it and dies in the end"
I dont think that accurately explains anything. Goldenblood had his dirty mitts on everything but he wasnt responsible for the goddess. You can argue that his interference with Gardens was what led to the Goddess, but it was 100% twilights fault. The enclave and red-eye are almost entirely seperate.
If youre referring to the Eater or his dragon, the eater didnt actively do anything until the very end, and his dragon is basically only confirmed to be responsible for littlehorn.
Goldenblood isnt the final boss, the dragon actually was killed with a speech check by way of the eater, and Tom was the one who killed the eater. Blackjack only got her there.
If the Eater wasnt there, the dragon probably would still have caused littlehorn which was the inciting incident to the war. If the dragon wasnt there, its still reasonable to expect that the war would still escalate to where it ended. If goldenblood wasnt around, One of the more hawkish nobles at the time probably would have made everything go boom faster. Most of the events of KKat's backstory probably still happen.
KKat's equestria has quite a few manipulative monsters
>Btw was thinking more about the "an evil mastermind or god did it and dies in the end"
I dont think that accurately explains anything. Goldenblood had his dirty mitts on everything but he wasnt responsible for the goddess. You can argue that his interference with Gardens was what led to the Goddess, but it was 100% twilights fault. The enclave and red-eye are almost entirely seperate.
If youre referring to the Eater or his dragon, the eater didnt actively do anything until the very end, and his dragon is basically only confirmed to be responsible for littlehorn.
Goldenblood isnt the final boss, the dragon actually was killed with a speech check by way of the eater, and Tom was the one who killed the eater. Blackjack only got her there.
If the Eater wasnt there, the dragon probably would still have caused littlehorn which was the inciting incident to the war. If the dragon wasnt there, its still reasonable to expect that the war would still escalate to where it ended. If goldenblood wasnt around, One of the more hawkish nobles at the time probably would have made everything go boom faster. Most of the events of KKat's backstory probably still happen.
KKat's equestria has quite a few manipulative monsters
>>298491
>geeed
*greed
Persona 5 did the God Copout and it sucked but saying why would take many off-topic posts.
>>298492
Thank you. Some day I really should read that fic.
>>298493
Sorry, I'll stop.
To try and get this thread back on-track, Calamity and Velvet's shared "I hate that self-righteous elitist prick/impulsive ruffian prick" moment seems like bad writing since they've gotten along great until now. They disagreed over how to handle the Stone Prison Arc since Velvet thought killing because a merc told you to was wrong but aside from that, they got along great. They even started singing cheesy made-up songs together!
Did the author decide he got them too close together too quickly for a proper "will they won't they" romance arc, and use this scene to retcon their relationship status? Perhaps Velvet could secretly resent him but so far Calamity doesn't seem like the type to hold grudges in secret.
This kind of "Fuck this fancy bitch/unfancy bastard" talk probably should have been moved up earlier in the story, before they bond over a shared love of music with some cheesy campfire scene where Calamity whips out a beaten-up acoustic guitar and tells Velvet dad taught him how to play.
>geeed
*greed
Persona 5 did the God Copout and it sucked but saying why would take many off-topic posts.
>>298492
Thank you. Some day I really should read that fic.
>>298493
Sorry, I'll stop.
To try and get this thread back on-track, Calamity and Velvet's shared "I hate that self-righteous elitist prick/impulsive ruffian prick" moment seems like bad writing since they've gotten along great until now. They disagreed over how to handle the Stone Prison Arc since Velvet thought killing because a merc told you to was wrong but aside from that, they got along great. They even started singing cheesy made-up songs together!
Did the author decide he got them too close together too quickly for a proper "will they won't they" romance arc, and use this scene to retcon their relationship status? Perhaps Velvet could secretly resent him but so far Calamity doesn't seem like the type to hold grudges in secret.
This kind of "Fuck this fancy bitch/unfancy bastard" talk probably should have been moved up earlier in the story, before they bond over a shared love of music with some cheesy campfire scene where Calamity whips out a beaten-up acoustic guitar and tells Velvet dad taught him how to play.
>>298005
>>298099
Okay quarter-jew britcuck. I've got hobbies, duties, a family, and a home to take care of. Your only goal in life is literally being retarded while having absolutely zero solvency whatsoever aside from sperging out like a common crackwhore nigger. Also, great job at trying to poison the well since you clearly cannot even BEGIN to realize how many anons hate how fucking stupid you are! You're worse than the average leaf, which is an amazing feat. "M-O-O-N" spells dipshit britnigger.
>>298070
I take it you haven't seen enough of Nigel's rants on this Cambodian equine hoof care site to understand. If not, don't bother. His mere existence is enough to give even the most hardened channer such massive degrees of turbo cancer that the fatality rate is over 100%.
>>298389
The problem here is K "I can't stop sucking dicks long enough to breath" Kunt tried to pull BOTH a giant "Dues Ex Machina" and reverse-write-in a reversal at the same time while pretending that his 'story' was coherent to begin with. Destroying any nuclear reactor with a standard BB rifle is so far beyond a DEM situation that it would be a one in a negligible attempt. Only a complete moron would place sensitive equipmarent in an exposed position. The "ethical dilemma" is not only utterly shoehorned into the story without any TRUE repercussions (aside from the faux-emotional state of those that "experience it") and the fact that another vault is 'lost to the sands'. Oh, so a vault was destroyed because of someone being trained in a location that isn't perfectly secure? Too bad, that's the Wasteland for ya! Oh so that same vault is gonna be annihilated by a defective robot that makes an error which wasn't programmed out/was flawed to begin with? Too bad, that's UNStable-Tec for ya! The entire """tragedy""" is worthless except for being nothing more than shitty animu filler episode material. Pic painfully related in this case.
tl;dr: the only 'moral' that one can even bother taking from this is: don't be a shitty, retarded wannabe-writer like kkunt.
>>298099
Okay quarter-jew britcuck. I've got hobbies, duties, a family, and a home to take care of. Your only goal in life is literally being retarded while having absolutely zero solvency whatsoever aside from sperging out like a common crackwhore nigger. Also, great job at trying to poison the well since you clearly cannot even BEGIN to realize how many anons hate how fucking stupid you are! You're worse than the average leaf, which is an amazing feat. "M-O-O-N" spells dipshit britnigger.
>>298070
I take it you haven't seen enough of Nigel's rants on this Cambodian equine hoof care site to understand. If not, don't bother. His mere existence is enough to give even the most hardened channer such massive degrees of turbo cancer that the fatality rate is over 100%.
>>298389
The problem here is K "I can't stop sucking dicks long enough to breath" Kunt tried to pull BOTH a giant "Dues Ex Machina" and reverse-write-in a reversal at the same time while pretending that his 'story' was coherent to begin with. Destroying any nuclear reactor with a standard BB rifle is so far beyond a DEM situation that it would be a one in a negligible attempt. Only a complete moron would place sensitive equipmarent in an exposed position. The "ethical dilemma" is not only utterly shoehorned into the story without any TRUE repercussions (aside from the faux-emotional state of those that "experience it") and the fact that another vault is 'lost to the sands'. Oh, so a vault was destroyed because of someone being trained in a location that isn't perfectly secure? Too bad, that's the Wasteland for ya! Oh so that same vault is gonna be annihilated by a defective robot that makes an error which wasn't programmed out/was flawed to begin with? Too bad, that's UNStable-Tec for ya! The entire """tragedy""" is worthless except for being nothing more than shitty animu filler episode material. Pic painfully related in this case.
tl;dr: the only 'moral' that one can even bother taking from this is: don't be a shitty, retarded wannabe-writer like kkunt.
It's okay to not say anything.
>>298500
God fucking damnit. Nearly every single post you've made is off topic. Yes he needs to constrain and limit the words to the utmost pinpoint they could be.
Just post the damn good post detail how it's a damn good post and make the shit work. It's been years, that method isn't working so move on to something that does. You wanted a better poster so suit up.
Both of your actions are well enough laid out yes it's frustrating at times and frankly I've had it. I have nothing to say on the story besides what has already been said. I've already said what I would have said and repeating what I'll said again ad infinitum is redundant.
Sorry I'm a bit short at the moment I'm sure I'll grow out of it soon.
Sometimes not saing anything is better than filling in the companionable silence.
Have a poner everyone.
>>298500
God fucking damnit. Nearly every single post you've made is off topic. Yes he needs to constrain and limit the words to the utmost pinpoint they could be.
Just post the damn good post detail how it's a damn good post and make the shit work. It's been years, that method isn't working so move on to something that does. You wanted a better poster so suit up.
Both of your actions are well enough laid out yes it's frustrating at times and frankly I've had it. I have nothing to say on the story besides what has already been said. I've already said what I would have said and repeating what I'll said again ad infinitum is redundant.
Sorry I'm a bit short at the moment I'm sure I'll grow out of it soon.
Sometimes not saing anything is better than filling in the companionable silence.
Have a poner everyone.
>>298500
Please try harder to focus on the thread topic instead of trying to start a tiresome pissing contest between us. It doesn't help anyone when you insist I'm a part-jew that gives people turbo-cancer or some gaslighting mastermind out to ruin your day or any other delusion. What's next, will you say I breathe fire? I know I'm not perfect, but this is absurd. I know I'm not perfect, but I'm working on that. When I do something that pisses you off, tell me what it is so I know why you're upset and what I could do about it. Simply expressing how upset you are with these tantrums isn't constructive. When you scream and cry at me because you sometimes find me annoying, it is immature and unhelpful. Offense is taken, not given. It's not my job to manage your mood, but if you want me to do so anyway, communicate better.
Anyway, a nuclear reactor wasn't damaged by a BB gun. It's worse.
The child aimed at a RadRoach that somehow got into this "Perfectly-sealed underground location" (Did the first ponies to get into this vault take roaches in with them? Where did the roaches get the radiation they needed to mutate?)
and he missed.
He missed the dog-sized roach on the floor, punching a small hole in "the environmental system", damaging the water talisman.
Are those armour-piercing BBs?
These "Lmao it worked in Fallout 3 so it must work in real life" moments are fucking retarded. Yes, in Fallout 3 a BB Gun is a deadly weapon that can kill an adult in only slightly fewer shots than better guns with better damage numbers. But IRL, BBs aren't going through steel unless something's gone very wrong. Pics related, it's where your dad took you to shoot in Fallout 3. Sorry about the watermarks.
Shortly after saying this crap about the water chip, the text also ruins this Vault's "Everyone here thinks they're relying on Stable-Tec for their orders and thinks they must continue to do so" premise.
>“As head of Maintenance, Shadowhorn laid down a whole new series of safety protocols. They aren’t official until she gets them passed through Stable-Tec, but we’re going to follow them anyway. If Stable-Tec doesn’t like somepony giving the orders for them, well they can trot themselves down here and say differently.”
Despite all this time without a local leader for an Overseer, despite all this time spent obeying a computer they thought was Stable-Tec, they suddenly decide they can make up their own rules and follow them and enforce them without needing the permission of "Stable-Tec" aka the machine guiding them. That makes the prior "There are no safety rules because nopony is in charge down here! If only someone was in charge to tell us to be safe!" part of the chapter really fucking stupid.
Why the fuck would the "Stable-Tec" robot "Maneframe" take so long to guide them that they start to bitch about how long Stable-Tec takes to tell them anything/permit them to do stuff?
Why would the rule of an all-seeing all-knowing AI in charge of this underground facility and its gun-turrets take such a hooves-off approach to managing things?
It's an AI in a book that doesn't understand how AIs work, so it can make decisions faster than people can despite making retarded leaps of logic like "Reducing pony population didn't prevent water starvation. Must continue reducing population until 0 is reached!".
If anything, shouldn't an AI like this micromanage its populace until their yoke starts to chafe?
And what's with the way that maintenance ponies think the water talisman is fine at first, but then the AI decides it's fucked and the water supply's fucked and water-recycling is a myth and the population needs culling, Green New Insanity-style?
Team Littlepip is only here to get that McGuffin they need to save SteelCunt's life, and get the fuck out.
So they should act like they're on a strict time limit.
But instead, they scavenge for supplies and get some health potions, so they can see another hint to the fate of a Stable they have no reason to care about.
Then Littlepip makes drugs so Velvet can think she's a faggot.
And then the door suddenly closes just so the heroes have to go to the door switch, and of course they stop to investigate everything about the Stable along the way, just so Kkat can show off all the "work" he put into this stupid stable and its lore.
He can't just give us a handful of clues and expect us to work it out, maybe coming back to it in another side story. No, he feels the need to walk you through absolutely fucking everything and spell it all out, no matter how many words that wastes.
Everything about this stupid Stable feels like it was hastily written around a desire to piss on Fallout 3 elements and include an evil supercomputer just like the ones in Fallout 3 somewhere, despite the hypocrisy of pissing on the heroes of a game that served as your primary source when writing something this creatively bankrupt.
But Kkat couldn't think of any ways to turn "Stable ruled by an evil AI" and "Stable doomed because of the Water Bois from DC and their taste in makeshift gun range locations" into two distinct and interesting Vaults that failed due to separate lessons the ponies failed to learn in time.
So they're shoved together even though it means neither are compelling.
The lack of leadership, safety restrictions/protocols, and realistic physics meant BBs went through steel and fucked up irreplaceable magitech bullshit.
An AI could either send ponies into the wastes for a new water chip- I mean water talisman or commit die and take its whole stable with it to the sound of DJ Pon3 music.
And now Team Littlepip is only down here in this particular Stable because they need to save the soldier bleeding out on their watch, and they found more than enough healing potion for him plus the McGuffin needed to unarmor him (why didn't LP psychically take Steelcunt down here with them?) but they're acting like they have all the time in the motherfucking world to learn exactly why this little social experiment failed.
Please try harder to focus on the thread topic instead of trying to start a tiresome pissing contest between us. It doesn't help anyone when you insist I'm a part-jew that gives people turbo-cancer or some gaslighting mastermind out to ruin your day or any other delusion. What's next, will you say I breathe fire? I know I'm not perfect, but this is absurd. I know I'm not perfect, but I'm working on that. When I do something that pisses you off, tell me what it is so I know why you're upset and what I could do about it. Simply expressing how upset you are with these tantrums isn't constructive. When you scream and cry at me because you sometimes find me annoying, it is immature and unhelpful. Offense is taken, not given. It's not my job to manage your mood, but if you want me to do so anyway, communicate better.
Anyway, a nuclear reactor wasn't damaged by a BB gun. It's worse.
The child aimed at a RadRoach that somehow got into this "Perfectly-sealed underground location" (Did the first ponies to get into this vault take roaches in with them? Where did the roaches get the radiation they needed to mutate?)
and he missed.
He missed the dog-sized roach on the floor, punching a small hole in "the environmental system", damaging the water talisman.
Are those armour-piercing BBs?
These "Lmao it worked in Fallout 3 so it must work in real life" moments are fucking retarded. Yes, in Fallout 3 a BB Gun is a deadly weapon that can kill an adult in only slightly fewer shots than better guns with better damage numbers. But IRL, BBs aren't going through steel unless something's gone very wrong. Pics related, it's where your dad took you to shoot in Fallout 3. Sorry about the watermarks.
Shortly after saying this crap about the water chip, the text also ruins this Vault's "Everyone here thinks they're relying on Stable-Tec for their orders and thinks they must continue to do so" premise.
>“As head of Maintenance, Shadowhorn laid down a whole new series of safety protocols. They aren’t official until she gets them passed through Stable-Tec, but we’re going to follow them anyway. If Stable-Tec doesn’t like somepony giving the orders for them, well they can trot themselves down here and say differently.”
Despite all this time without a local leader for an Overseer, despite all this time spent obeying a computer they thought was Stable-Tec, they suddenly decide they can make up their own rules and follow them and enforce them without needing the permission of "Stable-Tec" aka the machine guiding them. That makes the prior "There are no safety rules because nopony is in charge down here! If only someone was in charge to tell us to be safe!" part of the chapter really fucking stupid.
Why the fuck would the "Stable-Tec" robot "Maneframe" take so long to guide them that they start to bitch about how long Stable-Tec takes to tell them anything/permit them to do stuff?
Why would the rule of an all-seeing all-knowing AI in charge of this underground facility and its gun-turrets take such a hooves-off approach to managing things?
It's an AI in a book that doesn't understand how AIs work, so it can make decisions faster than people can despite making retarded leaps of logic like "Reducing pony population didn't prevent water starvation. Must continue reducing population until 0 is reached!".
If anything, shouldn't an AI like this micromanage its populace until their yoke starts to chafe?
And what's with the way that maintenance ponies think the water talisman is fine at first, but then the AI decides it's fucked and the water supply's fucked and water-recycling is a myth and the population needs culling, Green New Insanity-style?
Team Littlepip is only here to get that McGuffin they need to save SteelCunt's life, and get the fuck out.
So they should act like they're on a strict time limit.
But instead, they scavenge for supplies and get some health potions, so they can see another hint to the fate of a Stable they have no reason to care about.
Then Littlepip makes drugs so Velvet can think she's a faggot.
And then the door suddenly closes just so the heroes have to go to the door switch, and of course they stop to investigate everything about the Stable along the way, just so Kkat can show off all the "work" he put into this stupid stable and its lore.
He can't just give us a handful of clues and expect us to work it out, maybe coming back to it in another side story. No, he feels the need to walk you through absolutely fucking everything and spell it all out, no matter how many words that wastes.
Everything about this stupid Stable feels like it was hastily written around a desire to piss on Fallout 3 elements and include an evil supercomputer just like the ones in Fallout 3 somewhere, despite the hypocrisy of pissing on the heroes of a game that served as your primary source when writing something this creatively bankrupt.
But Kkat couldn't think of any ways to turn "Stable ruled by an evil AI" and "Stable doomed because of the Water Bois from DC and their taste in makeshift gun range locations" into two distinct and interesting Vaults that failed due to separate lessons the ponies failed to learn in time.
So they're shoved together even though it means neither are compelling.
The lack of leadership, safety restrictions/protocols, and realistic physics meant BBs went through steel and fucked up irreplaceable magitech bullshit.
An AI could either send ponies into the wastes for a new water chip- I mean water talisman or commit die and take its whole stable with it to the sound of DJ Pon3 music.
And now Team Littlepip is only down here in this particular Stable because they need to save the soldier bleeding out on their watch, and they found more than enough healing potion for him plus the McGuffin needed to unarmor him (why didn't LP psychically take Steelcunt down here with them?) but they're acting like they have all the time in the motherfucking world to learn exactly why this little social experiment failed.
>>298547
>Everything about this stupid Stable feels like it was hastily written around a desire to piss on Fallout 3 elements and include an evil supercomputer just like the ones in Fallout 3 somewhere, despite the hypocrisy of pissing on the heroes of a game that served as your primary source when writing something this creatively bankrupt.
On the contrary, I get the impression that Kkat absolutely LOVES Fallout, particularly 3, and wants to cram as many things based on or directly lifted from the game as possible. That's not a recipe for good writing, but it's an understandable goal for an amateur writing a crossover fanfic. The main problem is that Kkat doesn't have a good grasp of how to establish stakes or maintain tension, because he gets his understanding of storytelling from open world RPGs he's sunk dozens/hundreds of hours into rather than books.
This diversion does at least serve to introduce the concept of crusader mane(ugh)frames, which show up again later as part of the main plot.
>Everything about this stupid Stable feels like it was hastily written around a desire to piss on Fallout 3 elements and include an evil supercomputer just like the ones in Fallout 3 somewhere, despite the hypocrisy of pissing on the heroes of a game that served as your primary source when writing something this creatively bankrupt.
On the contrary, I get the impression that Kkat absolutely LOVES Fallout, particularly 3, and wants to cram as many things based on or directly lifted from the game as possible. That's not a recipe for good writing, but it's an understandable goal for an amateur writing a crossover fanfic. The main problem is that Kkat doesn't have a good grasp of how to establish stakes or maintain tension, because he gets his understanding of storytelling from open world RPGs he's sunk dozens/hundreds of hours into rather than books.
This diversion does at least serve to introduce the concept of crusader mane(ugh)frames, which show up again later as part of the main plot.
>>298599
That makes sense. I guess we'll never really know if he considers "And then the heroes from my favourite game semi-indirectly caused the death of everyone they ever knew and loved long before the heroes from my fanfic got here" to be a loving cameo tribute unless he says so. Wee know he's bad with implications because of the Zebra stuff. Not that I have a problem with an author painting african-inspired creatures as 100% evil apart from one obligatory good one who's specifically good because she acts un-african. But it didn't seem like he intentionally wanted to write the Zebras that way.
I wish he did some kind of "Behind the scenes" series of journal posts on Fimfic.net where he describes his writing process, what he was thinking when he wrote this, and what he wanted each chapter to accomplish. That would be hilarious.
That makes sense. I guess we'll never really know if he considers "And then the heroes from my favourite game semi-indirectly caused the death of everyone they ever knew and loved long before the heroes from my fanfic got here" to be a loving cameo tribute unless he says so. Wee know he's bad with implications because of the Zebra stuff. Not that I have a problem with an author painting african-inspired creatures as 100% evil apart from one obligatory good one who's specifically good because she acts un-african. But it didn't seem like he intentionally wanted to write the Zebras that way.
I wish he did some kind of "Behind the scenes" series of journal posts on Fimfic.net where he describes his writing process, what he was thinking when he wrote this, and what he wanted each chapter to accomplish. That would be hilarious.
>>298602
>I wish he did some kind of "Behind the scenes" series of journal posts on Fimfic.net where he describes his writing process, what he was thinking when he wrote this, and what he wanted each chapter to accomplish.
Kkat has written *extensively* on FoE in his fimfic blog over the years. It's quite a trip.
>I wish he did some kind of "Behind the scenes" series of journal posts on Fimfic.net where he describes his writing process, what he was thinking when he wrote this, and what he wanted each chapter to accomplish.
Kkat has written *extensively* on FoE in his fimfic blog over the years. It's quite a trip.
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>>298733
For real? Awesome! Does it spoil upcoming events in the story? Does he organize his thoughts on different chapters, organize his posts by specific topics in the story, or just post whatever he thinks of without organizing any of it?
If he did a "Writer's Commentary" thing where after each chapter he tells people what he was thinking when he wrote this, that would be perfect for a "Review the chapter, and then what he said his goals were when writing it" format.
Reviewers like the Angry Video Game Nerd often ask "What were they thinking?" rhetorically, but this is a great opportunity to see exactly what they were thinking and criticize how he went about attempting what he said he wanted to accomplish with this character, or that chapter, or this faction, or that abrupt dump of a tragic backstory.
Environmental storytelling is about suggesting what might have happened here, not spelling it out for the audience in one of eighty collectable tape recordings/diaries detailing every last detail especially ones that weren't suggested in the environment at all. It's about making people speculate over what could have happened somewhere, and making it a rare treat when we get enough information to definitively figure it all out. Not just putting hugging skeletons in well-travelled and entirely-expected and often even currently-inhabited places that have somehow been undisturbed for 200+ years along with a journal to painstakingly explain everything for BugthEAsderp's target audience. It's about suggesting there's more going on in the world than the player's adventures, not leaving collectible journal pages around that only the player character can pick up or see or hear. People still talk about Lavender Tower and Cinnabar Island. Nobody gives a fuck about the random skeletons in Fallout 3 or 4, and by the time 76 rolled out it featured so many skeletons and Dead Guy Journal holotapes everyone got sick of it.
Also I forgot if I've already said "I hate how Littlepip goes out of her way to learn how random poners died but never tries to take any kind of logical wisdom from it/fulfill their last requests/carry on their legacy" or not, but I still hate it. Littlepip doesn't have an in-character reason to be such a nosy cunt, but she should. It's jarring when LP reads some dead pony's diary because she's never given us or herself or her friends any excuses for it, and her friends never call her out for it so we want to do it ourselves.
She's got no excuse to have such an entirely random knowledge of the pre-war world. Sometimes she doesn't know something she should know, giving characters an excuse to exposit things to her (and us). Sometimes she does know things, but can't mention it until it's time to awkwardly expositionate about it to her friends (who already know) and us.
They could have fixed the "Velvet and Littlepip expositing to us" problem by making Calamity play dumb about the pre-war world to hide the fact that he's a Dashite at first, giving them excuses to fill "him" (us) in.
Maybe my "Littlepip and Velvet should have been raised on hyper-simplistic Pony Propaganda, Calamity should know more than he lets on to add to his mysteriousness and hint at his Dashiteness, and LP should believe learning of what really happened before the war is the best way to make sure whatever killed Equestria never happens again" idea isn't the perfect solution for this problem.
Someone else could probably think of a better solution than that.
Anyway, this problem needs fixing because it makes LP's love of holotapes and diaries (which the author relies on to tell the audience what he did with this canon character and that location and this fallout element and that fanon meme) stupid. "My OC needs to do this because I want her to and gamers did it in Fallout 3" is stupid.
Give your characters reasons to do shit! They can be bad ones! They can be fucking shit reasons! But they need to be good enough to convince your character to do shit, and convince your audience that your character would be convinced by a reason like that.
Although with how hyper-edgy and hyper-bleak this world is written, are there any societal lessons Littlepip could take from the dead that aren't obvious things like "Don't be in a prison full of rapists when nukes fall and society ends" or "If you want to make a slavery-free town, don't make it at the end of a slaver-operated railroad track that leads straight to a slaver city" or "Don't play with a BB gun in an absurdly fragile maintenance room"?
For real? Awesome! Does it spoil upcoming events in the story? Does he organize his thoughts on different chapters, organize his posts by specific topics in the story, or just post whatever he thinks of without organizing any of it?
If he did a "Writer's Commentary" thing where after each chapter he tells people what he was thinking when he wrote this, that would be perfect for a "Review the chapter, and then what he said his goals were when writing it" format.
Reviewers like the Angry Video Game Nerd often ask "What were they thinking?" rhetorically, but this is a great opportunity to see exactly what they were thinking and criticize how he went about attempting what he said he wanted to accomplish with this character, or that chapter, or this faction, or that abrupt dump of a tragic backstory.
Environmental storytelling is about suggesting what might have happened here, not spelling it out for the audience in one of eighty collectable tape recordings/diaries detailing every last detail especially ones that weren't suggested in the environment at all. It's about making people speculate over what could have happened somewhere, and making it a rare treat when we get enough information to definitively figure it all out. Not just putting hugging skeletons in well-travelled and entirely-expected and often even currently-inhabited places that have somehow been undisturbed for 200+ years along with a journal to painstakingly explain everything for BugthEAsderp's target audience. It's about suggesting there's more going on in the world than the player's adventures, not leaving collectible journal pages around that only the player character can pick up or see or hear. People still talk about Lavender Tower and Cinnabar Island. Nobody gives a fuck about the random skeletons in Fallout 3 or 4, and by the time 76 rolled out it featured so many skeletons and Dead Guy Journal holotapes everyone got sick of it.
Also I forgot if I've already said "I hate how Littlepip goes out of her way to learn how random poners died but never tries to take any kind of logical wisdom from it/fulfill their last requests/carry on their legacy" or not, but I still hate it. Littlepip doesn't have an in-character reason to be such a nosy cunt, but she should. It's jarring when LP reads some dead pony's diary because she's never given us or herself or her friends any excuses for it, and her friends never call her out for it so we want to do it ourselves.
She's got no excuse to have such an entirely random knowledge of the pre-war world. Sometimes she doesn't know something she should know, giving characters an excuse to exposit things to her (and us). Sometimes she does know things, but can't mention it until it's time to awkwardly expositionate about it to her friends (who already know) and us.
They could have fixed the "Velvet and Littlepip expositing to us" problem by making Calamity play dumb about the pre-war world to hide the fact that he's a Dashite at first, giving them excuses to fill "him" (us) in.
Maybe my "Littlepip and Velvet should have been raised on hyper-simplistic Pony Propaganda, Calamity should know more than he lets on to add to his mysteriousness and hint at his Dashiteness, and LP should believe learning of what really happened before the war is the best way to make sure whatever killed Equestria never happens again" idea isn't the perfect solution for this problem.
Someone else could probably think of a better solution than that.
Anyway, this problem needs fixing because it makes LP's love of holotapes and diaries (which the author relies on to tell the audience what he did with this canon character and that location and this fallout element and that fanon meme) stupid. "My OC needs to do this because I want her to and gamers did it in Fallout 3" is stupid.
Give your characters reasons to do shit! They can be bad ones! They can be fucking shit reasons! But they need to be good enough to convince your character to do shit, and convince your audience that your character would be convinced by a reason like that.
Although with how hyper-edgy and hyper-bleak this world is written, are there any societal lessons Littlepip could take from the dead that aren't obvious things like "Don't be in a prison full of rapists when nukes fall and society ends" or "If you want to make a slavery-free town, don't make it at the end of a slaver-operated railroad track that leads straight to a slaver city" or "Don't play with a BB gun in an absurdly fragile maintenance room"?
>>298389
Anyway, what I've provided is a rough summation of what happened to Stable 29. This information was obtained from both Scootaloo's message to Shadowcunt, as well as a short subchapter section that follows this message. To be thorough, I'll briefly go after the second subchapter.
After listening to Scoot's recording, Littlepoop goes to investigate the security junction she mentioned:
>There is an access junction between the Security station and the V.I.P. rooms through which you can access the Crusader Maneframe.
She locates the junction. We are not told how she found it or where she found it, only that it was easy to find. This seems a little strange, since one would think that a security override that would allow a pony to take control of the entire stable is the sort of thing that would be well-hidden and well-protected, but at this point I don't think a detail like this matters too much. At present, Littlepoop only knows that the stable's population was killed by the AI acting alone, and that neither StableTec nor any of the ponies ostensibly in charge of this stable are to blame. However, she does not know the full story, and she is curious. Once again, her curiosity about some 200 year old tragedy supersedes her actual mission (which at present happens to be saving Private Cyborg, which I'll once again protest should logically be a time-sensitive goal).
Anyway, she opens the junction box and finds some kind of device inside that allows a PipBuck to connect. From one of the previous recordings, she knows that one of the other ponies was electrocuted attempting to connect to this box:
>Shadowhorn passed away last night from complications after being nearly electrocuted early yesterday morning while trying to access the junction behind a security panel with her PipBuck.
This text is from the recording she found before she found the Scootaloo recording, the one that had her freaking out and kicking at walls. Between this information and what she just learned from Scoot's message, she can reasonably surmise that Shadowtwat was attempting to override the AI, and the AI somehow detected this and killed her. This is a satisfactory answer to my earlier question of why the security override controls weren't implemented. There is, however, a minor logical issue here: if the purpose of the override is to allow a pony to take control of the stable in the event that the AI has gone haywire, it would stand to reason that the AI should be blocked from interfering with this process by design. The override system should be something that the AI is prevented from tampering with; however, this assumes that the system was sensibly designed. It's entirely possible that StableTec is just incompetent.
Anyway, in order to bypass this danger, Littlepoop takes out Velvet's old PipBuck, which she is still carrying around with her for some reason, and jacks into the control panel while levitating it a safe distance away from herself.
>I pulled out Velvet Remedy’s PipBuck for the first time since shortly after I found her. It was a thing of beauty, but I realized it had a less pleasant meaning to her.
I'm not sure why she describes it as a thing of beauty; I don't remember there being anything special about this particular PipBuck. As to what the "less pleasant meaning" it has to Velvet is all about, I have no idea. My guess is that it's tied into her whole "I don't want to be in le cage" deal somehow. In any event, this sentence is vague and awkward; I would either rewrite it or delete it.
Anyway, she jacks into this thing and manages to not get electrocuted. Inside, she finds a log of the AI's actions, and discovers what it did and the reasoning behind it. As I've already explained, the issue was basically that the water-thingy was damaged and was not repairable, and the AI determined that the solution was to gradually cull the population until the water eventually ran out entirely. At that point, it decided to kill everyone.
Nigel has brought up some decent points that contest the logic of this, namely that the water-dealy would need to be both very delicate and basically unprotected in order for a low-velocity projectile like a BB to fatally damage it. The text doesn't go into detail about the reactor level or how things in this area were designed and/or armored, but if it was possible to damage something this important this easily, it seems like another serious design flaw on StableTec's part. There is also the question of how a rad-roach would have made it into the stable in the first place, since the whole point of the structure is that it is supposed to be hermetically sealed so that nothing from the irradiated outside world can get in.
These are both reasonable points, to which I will add an objection of my own: if all of the critical stuff kept in this area is indeed this poorly protected, it seems like it would be a pretty dumb place to practice target shooting in the first place. Buckbright ought to have known this and thus it makes little sense for him to have taken his son down there for that purpose. It would have made far more sense for the kid to have just gone down there on his own without telling anyone, and nicked the water-bippityboop by accident. This actually could have made the situation more plausible, since being a child he wouldn't understand the severity of what he'd done, he'd simply be afraid of getting in trouble, so he would likely have just fled the area and not told anyone about shooting the water-whatchamacalit. Since the AI was entirely in charge, only it would have known about the damage, and it would have handled the situation in its own way, leaving Shadowcack and whoever else to simply guess at why it was killing everypony.
My guess is that kkack simply wanted to emulate the scene in Fallout where the player's father takes him shooting mentioned by another anon, so that is why he chose to do things this way.
Anyway, what I've provided is a rough summation of what happened to Stable 29. This information was obtained from both Scootaloo's message to Shadowcunt, as well as a short subchapter section that follows this message. To be thorough, I'll briefly go after the second subchapter.
After listening to Scoot's recording, Littlepoop goes to investigate the security junction she mentioned:
>There is an access junction between the Security station and the V.I.P. rooms through which you can access the Crusader Maneframe.
She locates the junction. We are not told how she found it or where she found it, only that it was easy to find. This seems a little strange, since one would think that a security override that would allow a pony to take control of the entire stable is the sort of thing that would be well-hidden and well-protected, but at this point I don't think a detail like this matters too much. At present, Littlepoop only knows that the stable's population was killed by the AI acting alone, and that neither StableTec nor any of the ponies ostensibly in charge of this stable are to blame. However, she does not know the full story, and she is curious. Once again, her curiosity about some 200 year old tragedy supersedes her actual mission (which at present happens to be saving Private Cyborg, which I'll once again protest should logically be a time-sensitive goal).
Anyway, she opens the junction box and finds some kind of device inside that allows a PipBuck to connect. From one of the previous recordings, she knows that one of the other ponies was electrocuted attempting to connect to this box:
>Shadowhorn passed away last night from complications after being nearly electrocuted early yesterday morning while trying to access the junction behind a security panel with her PipBuck.
This text is from the recording she found before she found the Scootaloo recording, the one that had her freaking out and kicking at walls. Between this information and what she just learned from Scoot's message, she can reasonably surmise that Shadowtwat was attempting to override the AI, and the AI somehow detected this and killed her. This is a satisfactory answer to my earlier question of why the security override controls weren't implemented. There is, however, a minor logical issue here: if the purpose of the override is to allow a pony to take control of the stable in the event that the AI has gone haywire, it would stand to reason that the AI should be blocked from interfering with this process by design. The override system should be something that the AI is prevented from tampering with; however, this assumes that the system was sensibly designed. It's entirely possible that StableTec is just incompetent.
Anyway, in order to bypass this danger, Littlepoop takes out Velvet's old PipBuck, which she is still carrying around with her for some reason, and jacks into the control panel while levitating it a safe distance away from herself.
>I pulled out Velvet Remedy’s PipBuck for the first time since shortly after I found her. It was a thing of beauty, but I realized it had a less pleasant meaning to her.
I'm not sure why she describes it as a thing of beauty; I don't remember there being anything special about this particular PipBuck. As to what the "less pleasant meaning" it has to Velvet is all about, I have no idea. My guess is that it's tied into her whole "I don't want to be in le cage" deal somehow. In any event, this sentence is vague and awkward; I would either rewrite it or delete it.
Anyway, she jacks into this thing and manages to not get electrocuted. Inside, she finds a log of the AI's actions, and discovers what it did and the reasoning behind it. As I've already explained, the issue was basically that the water-thingy was damaged and was not repairable, and the AI determined that the solution was to gradually cull the population until the water eventually ran out entirely. At that point, it decided to kill everyone.
Nigel has brought up some decent points that contest the logic of this, namely that the water-dealy would need to be both very delicate and basically unprotected in order for a low-velocity projectile like a BB to fatally damage it. The text doesn't go into detail about the reactor level or how things in this area were designed and/or armored, but if it was possible to damage something this important this easily, it seems like another serious design flaw on StableTec's part. There is also the question of how a rad-roach would have made it into the stable in the first place, since the whole point of the structure is that it is supposed to be hermetically sealed so that nothing from the irradiated outside world can get in.
These are both reasonable points, to which I will add an objection of my own: if all of the critical stuff kept in this area is indeed this poorly protected, it seems like it would be a pretty dumb place to practice target shooting in the first place. Buckbright ought to have known this and thus it makes little sense for him to have taken his son down there for that purpose. It would have made far more sense for the kid to have just gone down there on his own without telling anyone, and nicked the water-bippityboop by accident. This actually could have made the situation more plausible, since being a child he wouldn't understand the severity of what he'd done, he'd simply be afraid of getting in trouble, so he would likely have just fled the area and not told anyone about shooting the water-whatchamacalit. Since the AI was entirely in charge, only it would have known about the damage, and it would have handled the situation in its own way, leaving Shadowcack and whoever else to simply guess at why it was killing everypony.
My guess is that kkack simply wanted to emulate the scene in Fallout where the player's father takes him shooting mentioned by another anon, so that is why he chose to do things this way.
>>298846
>After three months, the water talisman failed altogether. The Crusader acted accordingly. To preserve Pony Life.
And with this, the subchapter concludes in a page break.
The next scene opens with Littlepoop drowning her sorrows in liquor:
>I poured what was left of a bottle of apple whiskey down my throat, enjoying the burn. The rage had drained from me, replaced by a numbness that was even worse.
It's unclear where she is in physical space at this point. Is she still by the junction box, which incidentally we don't even know the location of? Is she back in Shadowbutt's room, or maybe Vinyl's? Where did she get the whiskey? Was this just something she was carrying around with her, or did she find it in the stable somewhere? These are all minor questions, but answering them would make it easier for the reader to visualize what's happening.
At this point I'm just assuming it's stupid to ask if she still gives a shit about getting back to Roboponer before he dies. If the actual reason she is exploring this vault in the first place is anywhere near the forefront of her mind, she doesn't mention it in her narrative. Anyway, traumatized by the contents of the recordings she just wasted a fair chunk of time listening to, she now decides to waste even more time by delving into the memory orb she found, which the astute reader will recall is titled "Pinkie Pie's Last Party."
The memory appears to be Vinyl's. LP finds herself looking through the DJ's eyes at the dance floor of a large party. Rainbow Dash is apparently in attendance; she flies up and compliments Vinyl on her choice of beats:
>“Awesome beat, Vinyl Scratch!” she grinned, “Your rhythms always makes for the best parties!”
"Your rhythms always make for the best parties" would be the technically correct way of wording this, although the sentence is still awkwardly worded. I'd probably have her say something like "You always know what music to play," or "The music at your parties is always the best," or "I want to stick my tongue in your butthole."
>And, whoa, was Vinyl Scratch checking her out? She had my gaze going up and down… No, wait, that’s just headbobbing.
Hurr durr lesbian hoerses.
Anyway, another pony, clearly Applejack though her name is only given as AJ, approaches Rainbow Dash. She identifies her by name, and they talk about drinking and drugs sacrebleu! this story is so le dark and so le mature!. AJ is attending the party with a stallion whom Dash identifies as her boyfriend, one Sergeant ‘SteelHooves’ Applesnack. Since this story doesn't seem to have a problem with preposterously implausible coincidences, I'm going to assume this is the same 'SteelHooves' who is currently bleeding to death on a lonely battlefield, while the pony who was supposed to be bringing him medicine is sitting here watching this stupid memory orb.
Vinyl's attention is at this point diverted from AJ and RD's conversation to a nearby balcony, where an argument is going on between a pony that LP recognizes as Pinkie Pie and a second pony whom she does not recognize. The second pony is described as a "purple unicorn," and a few lines later Pinkie addresses her as Twilight. It's not clear what exactly they are fighting about, but Twilight seems to have a problem with Pinkie's behavior. A moment later it becomes clear that Pinkie has developed an addiction to the very same crack-mints that Littlepoop is apparently now addicted to, and Twilight feels that her mint-abuse has gotten out of control. She also implies that it is becoming a wide-spread problem at Pinkie's parties mon dieu! le drugs and le sex and le violence in le pink and pastel pony cartoon! so much le edge!!.
Anyway, Twilight loses her shit on Pinkie Pie and tells her that if she doesn't get her mint problem under control they can't be friends anymore. She storms out of the party, and the memory ends. It is actually a pretty decent scene, but like most of these flashbacks it has no apparent connection to the main story (to the extent that there is one).
>One thought hit me as I collapsed from the memory like I had been kicked in the stomach. (I had, in fact, vomited on myself.)
This is a very, very awkward sentence, but I'm too lazy to go over it in detail. At this point if kkack wants technical help he can pay a professional to wade through this clusterfuck, though I don't envy the poor soul that takes the job.
>Leaning against the wall, I assured myself, “I’m not that bad…”
>“But I have to be careful with you,” I said to the Party-Time Mint-als in my saddlebags. “I can’t let Calamity or Velvet Remedy get to thinking I have a problem with you. I don’t want to lose my friends because they think I’m addicted.”
The author attempts, rather weakly, to connect this disjointed scene to Littlepoop's own supposed drug addiction. Again, I don't disapprove of the addiction as a part of her character, but I do object to the way it's been rather gracelessly tacked on. We have not seen her use these mints more than a couple of times, hardly enough to constitute serious abuse, and her "addiction" has barely factored into the story. Also, while I actually thought the memory orb scene was decently written, it is unfortunately just another random event from the past that has little bearing on the present.
Pinkie and Twilight are complete strangers to LP, and she has no real reason to be emotionally affected by any of this. Moreover, this scene shifts the focus rather abruptly from the tragedy that occurred in Stable 29 to the issue of LP's supposed drug addiction, and her investigation of the Stable 29 incident is itself a diversion from her primary objective of helping Roboponer. Far from adding depth and emotional resonance to the story, these layered subplots feel like the author is bouncing around randomly from idea to idea, like a kid with ADD aggressively flipping through channels instead of just finding something to watch and watching it.
>After three months, the water talisman failed altogether. The Crusader acted accordingly. To preserve Pony Life.
And with this, the subchapter concludes in a page break.
The next scene opens with Littlepoop drowning her sorrows in liquor:
>I poured what was left of a bottle of apple whiskey down my throat, enjoying the burn. The rage had drained from me, replaced by a numbness that was even worse.
It's unclear where she is in physical space at this point. Is she still by the junction box, which incidentally we don't even know the location of? Is she back in Shadowbutt's room, or maybe Vinyl's? Where did she get the whiskey? Was this just something she was carrying around with her, or did she find it in the stable somewhere? These are all minor questions, but answering them would make it easier for the reader to visualize what's happening.
At this point I'm just assuming it's stupid to ask if she still gives a shit about getting back to Roboponer before he dies. If the actual reason she is exploring this vault in the first place is anywhere near the forefront of her mind, she doesn't mention it in her narrative. Anyway, traumatized by the contents of the recordings she just wasted a fair chunk of time listening to, she now decides to waste even more time by delving into the memory orb she found, which the astute reader will recall is titled "Pinkie Pie's Last Party."
The memory appears to be Vinyl's. LP finds herself looking through the DJ's eyes at the dance floor of a large party. Rainbow Dash is apparently in attendance; she flies up and compliments Vinyl on her choice of beats:
>“Awesome beat, Vinyl Scratch!” she grinned, “Your rhythms always makes for the best parties!”
"Your rhythms always make for the best parties" would be the technically correct way of wording this, although the sentence is still awkwardly worded. I'd probably have her say something like "You always know what music to play," or "The music at your parties is always the best," or "I want to stick my tongue in your butthole."
>And, whoa, was Vinyl Scratch checking her out? She had my gaze going up and down… No, wait, that’s just headbobbing.
Hurr durr lesbian hoerses.
Anyway, another pony, clearly Applejack though her name is only given as AJ, approaches Rainbow Dash. She identifies her by name, and they talk about drinking and drugs sacrebleu! this story is so le dark and so le mature!. AJ is attending the party with a stallion whom Dash identifies as her boyfriend, one Sergeant ‘SteelHooves’ Applesnack. Since this story doesn't seem to have a problem with preposterously implausible coincidences, I'm going to assume this is the same 'SteelHooves' who is currently bleeding to death on a lonely battlefield, while the pony who was supposed to be bringing him medicine is sitting here watching this stupid memory orb.
Vinyl's attention is at this point diverted from AJ and RD's conversation to a nearby balcony, where an argument is going on between a pony that LP recognizes as Pinkie Pie and a second pony whom she does not recognize. The second pony is described as a "purple unicorn," and a few lines later Pinkie addresses her as Twilight. It's not clear what exactly they are fighting about, but Twilight seems to have a problem with Pinkie's behavior. A moment later it becomes clear that Pinkie has developed an addiction to the very same crack-mints that Littlepoop is apparently now addicted to, and Twilight feels that her mint-abuse has gotten out of control. She also implies that it is becoming a wide-spread problem at Pinkie's parties mon dieu! le drugs and le sex and le violence in le pink and pastel pony cartoon! so much le edge!!.
Anyway, Twilight loses her shit on Pinkie Pie and tells her that if she doesn't get her mint problem under control they can't be friends anymore. She storms out of the party, and the memory ends. It is actually a pretty decent scene, but like most of these flashbacks it has no apparent connection to the main story (to the extent that there is one).
>One thought hit me as I collapsed from the memory like I had been kicked in the stomach. (I had, in fact, vomited on myself.)
This is a very, very awkward sentence, but I'm too lazy to go over it in detail. At this point if kkack wants technical help he can pay a professional to wade through this clusterfuck, though I don't envy the poor soul that takes the job.
>Leaning against the wall, I assured myself, “I’m not that bad…”
>“But I have to be careful with you,” I said to the Party-Time Mint-als in my saddlebags. “I can’t let Calamity or Velvet Remedy get to thinking I have a problem with you. I don’t want to lose my friends because they think I’m addicted.”
The author attempts, rather weakly, to connect this disjointed scene to Littlepoop's own supposed drug addiction. Again, I don't disapprove of the addiction as a part of her character, but I do object to the way it's been rather gracelessly tacked on. We have not seen her use these mints more than a couple of times, hardly enough to constitute serious abuse, and her "addiction" has barely factored into the story. Also, while I actually thought the memory orb scene was decently written, it is unfortunately just another random event from the past that has little bearing on the present.
Pinkie and Twilight are complete strangers to LP, and she has no real reason to be emotionally affected by any of this. Moreover, this scene shifts the focus rather abruptly from the tragedy that occurred in Stable 29 to the issue of LP's supposed drug addiction, and her investigation of the Stable 29 incident is itself a diversion from her primary objective of helping Roboponer. Far from adding depth and emotional resonance to the story, these layered subplots feel like the author is bouncing around randomly from idea to idea, like a kid with ADD aggressively flipping through channels instead of just finding something to watch and watching it.
>>298850
Anyway, that was the end of Chapter Fourteen.
Chapter Fifteen: Whispers in the Darkness
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>“Psst! Pinkie Pie, are you asleep yet?”
This quote, evidently, was spoken by Pinkie Pie's rapacious Uncle Jeff, who would periodically sneak into her bedroom on the farm and shove entire pineapples up her plot-hole, and long story short that's why she developed a mint-abuse problem later in life. Actually I'm just kidding; as is the norm with these epitaphs, I don't have the slightest fucking idea who spoke this line or what the context is.
Anyway, the chapter opens with another of Littlepoop's dream sequences. She's having nightmares about all the fucked-up shit she's learned about the wasteland during the unspecified amount of time she's spent here (at this point I'm estimating about 3 weeks). The details of the dream aren't particularly important and mostly deal with events we already know about.
As I've complained many times before, the disconnected episodes from the past that LP keeps digging into have very little to do with the events of the present. Though they seem like they would be compelling enough stories on their own, there has been absolutely nothing done to connect any of these events to the main story involving Littlepoop and her friends. What makes all of this even worse is that there (still) is no main story; since she left the stable, LP has done nothing but wander around getting into random fights with random bad guys, without any hint of a larger overarching plot.
What makes all of this so vexing is that the author, as far as I can tell, is far more interested in writing about the history of the war that led to the apocalypse than he is in writing about anything going on in the post-apocalypse present he chose to set the story in. Moreover, most of these episodes from the past seem like they would be considerably more interesting to read about than the present story, which is painfully dull. Littlepoop is not a particularly interesting or likable protagonist, and she doesn't really do much besides wander around collecting junk and picking fights with random enemies. Her friends are not particularly well thought out characters and there is little interesting chemistry between any of them; it's not even clear why the three of them are friends. None of them have any tangible goals or objectives, so the story has nowhere to go. As I've complained before, the author seems to want to use Littlepoop's explorations of the present, ruined world as a framing device to reveal what happened in the past, but as I've also complained before, she has no obvious reason to even want to dig up the past, so this story just feels like a bunch of disconnected anecdotes that hint at a considerably more interesting story than the one we're actually reading.
The episode we just witnessed in the memory orb, for example, was actually a pretty well developed scene. We see several of the canon MLP characters at a much later stage in life, and while they appear to be partying and having a good time, it's clear that everything is not well. Pinkie Pie's exuberant personality seems to have led her to a life of constant pleasure-seeking, which has led to addiction. Her problem has gotten bad enough that it is affecting her friendships; there is also an implication that the availability of drugs in Equestria is becoming a broader social problem, and that Ponk is somehow responsible. Twilight Sparkle, one of her best and oldest friends, has just given her an ultimatum to either get her shit together or they're finished.
Not only is this a good scene, there's a lot of material here for a compelling character arc. Pinkie is a character who loves fun and parties and good times; addiction is often born from chasing a continuous dopamine rush, and chemicals that produce this affect artificially would plausibly be attractive to her. It's easy to see how she could become addicted to something like cocaine-mints. If I had to place a bet on which which mane 6 character would be most likely to have an addictive personality, Ponk would be my choice.
Now compare this to Littlepoop's supposed "addiction" to the same substance: basically, we have a pony with no prior history suggesting she might have addictive tendencies, who just tries the mints one day and then suddenly gets addicted to them. Is it plausible? Sure; if a substance is addictive enough nearly anyone could get hooked. But from a literary perspective, it's not interesting.
With Pinkie Pie, the author has explored some possible dark sides to her established character. You could easily do this with any of the mane 6, btw; the trick is to simply take the traits they are known for and push them towards extremes that turn them negative. Twilight's smarty-pants bookishness and obsessive organization could turn her into a tyrannical bureaucrat a la Barack Obama or Angela Merkel. Rarity's vanity and desire for popularity could turn her into a shallow social climber; her obsession with her fashion enterprise could turn her into a workaholic. You could pretty much go down the list and do this with all of them.
The mane 6 are examples of well-built characters: they each have their strengths and weaknesses, and you can easily pull their arcs in a positive or negative direction depending on what you emphasize. The series itself focuses on developing their strengths or at least what the later writing staff interpreted as their strengths, but with a story like this, where the tone is darker, it would make sense to focus on and draw out their weaknesses.
Unfortunately, kkat's OCs haven't been developed in this way, so there is nowhere to take them. So, we get this meandering bullshit about a bunch of random boring characters who become friends by default for no reason other than convenience, and then wander around the wasteland for 500,000 excruciating words, looting and killing because reasons.
Anyway, that was the end of Chapter Fourteen.
Chapter Fifteen: Whispers in the Darkness
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>“Psst! Pinkie Pie, are you asleep yet?”
This quote, evidently, was spoken by Pinkie Pie's rapacious Uncle Jeff, who would periodically sneak into her bedroom on the farm and shove entire pineapples up her plot-hole, and long story short that's why she developed a mint-abuse problem later in life. Actually I'm just kidding; as is the norm with these epitaphs, I don't have the slightest fucking idea who spoke this line or what the context is.
Anyway, the chapter opens with another of Littlepoop's dream sequences. She's having nightmares about all the fucked-up shit she's learned about the wasteland during the unspecified amount of time she's spent here (at this point I'm estimating about 3 weeks). The details of the dream aren't particularly important and mostly deal with events we already know about.
As I've complained many times before, the disconnected episodes from the past that LP keeps digging into have very little to do with the events of the present. Though they seem like they would be compelling enough stories on their own, there has been absolutely nothing done to connect any of these events to the main story involving Littlepoop and her friends. What makes all of this even worse is that there (still) is no main story; since she left the stable, LP has done nothing but wander around getting into random fights with random bad guys, without any hint of a larger overarching plot.
What makes all of this so vexing is that the author, as far as I can tell, is far more interested in writing about the history of the war that led to the apocalypse than he is in writing about anything going on in the post-apocalypse present he chose to set the story in. Moreover, most of these episodes from the past seem like they would be considerably more interesting to read about than the present story, which is painfully dull. Littlepoop is not a particularly interesting or likable protagonist, and she doesn't really do much besides wander around collecting junk and picking fights with random enemies. Her friends are not particularly well thought out characters and there is little interesting chemistry between any of them; it's not even clear why the three of them are friends. None of them have any tangible goals or objectives, so the story has nowhere to go. As I've complained before, the author seems to want to use Littlepoop's explorations of the present, ruined world as a framing device to reveal what happened in the past, but as I've also complained before, she has no obvious reason to even want to dig up the past, so this story just feels like a bunch of disconnected anecdotes that hint at a considerably more interesting story than the one we're actually reading.
The episode we just witnessed in the memory orb, for example, was actually a pretty well developed scene. We see several of the canon MLP characters at a much later stage in life, and while they appear to be partying and having a good time, it's clear that everything is not well. Pinkie Pie's exuberant personality seems to have led her to a life of constant pleasure-seeking, which has led to addiction. Her problem has gotten bad enough that it is affecting her friendships; there is also an implication that the availability of drugs in Equestria is becoming a broader social problem, and that Ponk is somehow responsible. Twilight Sparkle, one of her best and oldest friends, has just given her an ultimatum to either get her shit together or they're finished.
Not only is this a good scene, there's a lot of material here for a compelling character arc. Pinkie is a character who loves fun and parties and good times; addiction is often born from chasing a continuous dopamine rush, and chemicals that produce this affect artificially would plausibly be attractive to her. It's easy to see how she could become addicted to something like cocaine-mints. If I had to place a bet on which which mane 6 character would be most likely to have an addictive personality, Ponk would be my choice.
Now compare this to Littlepoop's supposed "addiction" to the same substance: basically, we have a pony with no prior history suggesting she might have addictive tendencies, who just tries the mints one day and then suddenly gets addicted to them. Is it plausible? Sure; if a substance is addictive enough nearly anyone could get hooked. But from a literary perspective, it's not interesting.
With Pinkie Pie, the author has explored some possible dark sides to her established character. You could easily do this with any of the mane 6, btw; the trick is to simply take the traits they are known for and push them towards extremes that turn them negative. Twilight's smarty-pants bookishness and obsessive organization could turn her into a tyrannical bureaucrat a la Barack Obama or Angela Merkel. Rarity's vanity and desire for popularity could turn her into a shallow social climber; her obsession with her fashion enterprise could turn her into a workaholic. You could pretty much go down the list and do this with all of them.
The mane 6 are examples of well-built characters: they each have their strengths and weaknesses, and you can easily pull their arcs in a positive or negative direction depending on what you emphasize. The series itself focuses on developing their strengths or at least what the later writing staff interpreted as their strengths, but with a story like this, where the tone is darker, it would make sense to focus on and draw out their weaknesses.
Unfortunately, kkat's OCs haven't been developed in this way, so there is nowhere to take them. So, we get this meandering bullshit about a bunch of random boring characters who become friends by default for no reason other than convenience, and then wander around the wasteland for 500,000 excruciating words, looting and killing because reasons.
1610995569.png (292.3 KB, 725x629, d4qhw5l-fab4eff1-2706-4c4a-a1cc-44ad71e1e47f.png)
>>298852
Anyway, I got a little sidetracked there. Continuing with the actual story.
The chapter opens with Littlepoop having a bad dream, and then she suddenly wakes up. Once again, we have absolutely no idea where she is or how much time has passed since the end of the previous chapter. This is the information we are given:
>I was laying… somewhere. A bed. But every time I tried to remember exactly where I was, or how I got there, the memories slipped away. I opened my eyes. The room was dark, but light poured in through a cracked-open door. I didn’t recognize the walls with their shadowed posters or the roof with its still and silent turret.
Maybe Pinkie's uncle slipped her a roofie.
Anyway, it's clear that there's something wrong with her, but it's impossible to say what. She was drinking whiskey the last time we saw her, so it's possible she got drunk and blacked out, and had to be carried...somewhere. It could also be the comedown from the crack mints, I guess. It could be any number of things, really, since we have absolutely no sense of time or space here. For all I know, six years have passed since the end of Chapter Fourteen, the party lives in Saddle Arabia now, and Littlepoop caught pony AIDS from being gang-raped by a bunch of raiders on motorcycles.
These are her symptoms:
>My body felt wrong. I ached, I felt horribly weak. I had chills when I wasn’t sweating profusely. My stomach churned. My mouth tasted strange and mushy.
Meanwhile, Velvet and Calamity are talking outside, and LP overhears some of their conversation. They mostly seem to be discussing her the way they would a sick child, which LP takes as something of a blow to her self esteem.
>My stomach convulsed violently. I wanted to cry. My eyelids were too heavy to look around anymore, and I didn’t fight them as they closed on their own. I turned away from the slice of light coming through the door, falling again into fitful sleep.
This ends the subchapter.
I have to say, when I read the first few paragraphs of this chapter, I had to go back and make sure I was actually on the right chapter. It legitimately feels like we just skipped a huge chunk of the story here. I know this author is into these weird time-skips, but this seems like a major skip even by his standards. Absolutely nothing from the previous chapter has been resolved; we have no idea how (or even if) they made it out of Stable 29, we don't know whether Roboponer got his medicine or died or what, we don't even know why Littlepoop was unconscious or what's wrong with her or how she came to be in this state.
It would be one thing if the chapter had ended with Littlepoop getting clonked on the head or blacking out from booze or injected with some kind of mystery serum or something; waking up in a strange location after a time skip would be appropriate in one of those situations. However, the chapter just ended with her thinking to herself that she needed to keep her drug use in check so her friends don't treat her as an addict. The chapter had gone completely off the rails by the time it ended, but that doesn't mean the author can just abandon the story where it's at and pick up at some random point in the future; you need to at least make an attempt to resolve things before ending a storyline and moving on to a new one.
Their location right now is a complete mystery. Since I haven't been told otherwise, I would assume they are still somewhere in Stable 29, but that doesn't feel right somehow. They could be on the moon for all I know. Let's take another look at the description the author gives us of LP's immediate surroundings:
>The room was dark, but light poured in through a cracked-open door. I didn’t recognize the walls with their shadowed posters or the roof with its still and silent turret.
"Walls with shadowed posters" could describe any number of locations in this story, but I'm particularly confused about this part:
>the roof with its still and silent turret.
The roof? How the hell can she see the roof? She's in a dark room, which would imply either that there are no windows, or that it's night outside. The last place we saw her in was underground, so strictly speaking there shouldn't even be a roof. Did the author mean to say "the ceiling?" But that doesn't make sense either; why the hell would there be a turret on the ceiling? I have no idea what the fuck is even going on anymore.
Oh well, let's keep reading and maybe we'll figure it out. Together we can solve the puzzle.
When the next subchapter opens things are unfortunately not any clearer. LP is still in some kind of mental fog, and we learn from Velvet that she has a fever. Calamity and Velvet seem to be deepening their romantic bond over their mutual concern for LP, which is actually pretty funny. I'll give the author 20 points if he has them fuck on top of her unconscious body.
Anyway, they banter back and forth for a bit, but nothing of any serious importance is discussed. Calamity tries to convince Velvet that she needs to start wearing armor. She is vehemently opposed to wearing raider or slaver armor, but Calamity informs her that, believe it or not, there are other types of armor and they can probably buy some when they get to Tenpony. Why they are going to Tenpony or when it was decided that they were going there has never been mentioned to my recollection.
As long as I'm complaining, I'd like to point out that this scene is yet another example of how absurd medicine is in this story. Littlepoop has some inexplicable fever that seems to have downed her for the time being, yet all it took to heal the mortal wounds that she and Velvet sustained during their fight earlier was a few swallows of magic potion. Does that shit just not work on ordinary illnesses? In all the years of developing all-powerful healing potions and crack mints and all the other weird shit they have in this world, it never occurred to any of the Equestrian scientists to cook up something like Tylenol?
Anyway, I got a little sidetracked there. Continuing with the actual story.
The chapter opens with Littlepoop having a bad dream, and then she suddenly wakes up. Once again, we have absolutely no idea where she is or how much time has passed since the end of the previous chapter. This is the information we are given:
>I was laying… somewhere. A bed. But every time I tried to remember exactly where I was, or how I got there, the memories slipped away. I opened my eyes. The room was dark, but light poured in through a cracked-open door. I didn’t recognize the walls with their shadowed posters or the roof with its still and silent turret.
Maybe Pinkie's uncle slipped her a roofie.
Anyway, it's clear that there's something wrong with her, but it's impossible to say what. She was drinking whiskey the last time we saw her, so it's possible she got drunk and blacked out, and had to be carried...somewhere. It could also be the comedown from the crack mints, I guess. It could be any number of things, really, since we have absolutely no sense of time or space here. For all I know, six years have passed since the end of Chapter Fourteen, the party lives in Saddle Arabia now, and Littlepoop caught pony AIDS from being gang-raped by a bunch of raiders on motorcycles.
These are her symptoms:
>My body felt wrong. I ached, I felt horribly weak. I had chills when I wasn’t sweating profusely. My stomach churned. My mouth tasted strange and mushy.
Meanwhile, Velvet and Calamity are talking outside, and LP overhears some of their conversation. They mostly seem to be discussing her the way they would a sick child, which LP takes as something of a blow to her self esteem.
>My stomach convulsed violently. I wanted to cry. My eyelids were too heavy to look around anymore, and I didn’t fight them as they closed on their own. I turned away from the slice of light coming through the door, falling again into fitful sleep.
This ends the subchapter.
I have to say, when I read the first few paragraphs of this chapter, I had to go back and make sure I was actually on the right chapter. It legitimately feels like we just skipped a huge chunk of the story here. I know this author is into these weird time-skips, but this seems like a major skip even by his standards. Absolutely nothing from the previous chapter has been resolved; we have no idea how (or even if) they made it out of Stable 29, we don't know whether Roboponer got his medicine or died or what, we don't even know why Littlepoop was unconscious or what's wrong with her or how she came to be in this state.
It would be one thing if the chapter had ended with Littlepoop getting clonked on the head or blacking out from booze or injected with some kind of mystery serum or something; waking up in a strange location after a time skip would be appropriate in one of those situations. However, the chapter just ended with her thinking to herself that she needed to keep her drug use in check so her friends don't treat her as an addict. The chapter had gone completely off the rails by the time it ended, but that doesn't mean the author can just abandon the story where it's at and pick up at some random point in the future; you need to at least make an attempt to resolve things before ending a storyline and moving on to a new one.
Their location right now is a complete mystery. Since I haven't been told otherwise, I would assume they are still somewhere in Stable 29, but that doesn't feel right somehow. They could be on the moon for all I know. Let's take another look at the description the author gives us of LP's immediate surroundings:
>The room was dark, but light poured in through a cracked-open door. I didn’t recognize the walls with their shadowed posters or the roof with its still and silent turret.
"Walls with shadowed posters" could describe any number of locations in this story, but I'm particularly confused about this part:
>the roof with its still and silent turret.
The roof? How the hell can she see the roof? She's in a dark room, which would imply either that there are no windows, or that it's night outside. The last place we saw her in was underground, so strictly speaking there shouldn't even be a roof. Did the author mean to say "the ceiling?" But that doesn't make sense either; why the hell would there be a turret on the ceiling? I have no idea what the fuck is even going on anymore.
Oh well, let's keep reading and maybe we'll figure it out. Together we can solve the puzzle.
When the next subchapter opens things are unfortunately not any clearer. LP is still in some kind of mental fog, and we learn from Velvet that she has a fever. Calamity and Velvet seem to be deepening their romantic bond over their mutual concern for LP, which is actually pretty funny. I'll give the author 20 points if he has them fuck on top of her unconscious body.
Anyway, they banter back and forth for a bit, but nothing of any serious importance is discussed. Calamity tries to convince Velvet that she needs to start wearing armor. She is vehemently opposed to wearing raider or slaver armor, but Calamity informs her that, believe it or not, there are other types of armor and they can probably buy some when they get to Tenpony. Why they are going to Tenpony or when it was decided that they were going there has never been mentioned to my recollection.
As long as I'm complaining, I'd like to point out that this scene is yet another example of how absurd medicine is in this story. Littlepoop has some inexplicable fever that seems to have downed her for the time being, yet all it took to heal the mortal wounds that she and Velvet sustained during their fight earlier was a few swallows of magic potion. Does that shit just not work on ordinary illnesses? In all the years of developing all-powerful healing potions and crack mints and all the other weird shit they have in this world, it never occurred to any of the Equestrian scientists to cook up something like Tylenol?
>>298846
Bit curious to but with the radroach how did it actually mutate into that so soon. Sure got magic and all but the water purifier breaking seems to have happened only a few weeks after the stable was sealed since it was that 3 month anniversary party when the population was killed. Seems like damn near the moment the bombs dropped immeditly every endemic creature mutated into giant hostile monsters. Makes some more sense in Fallout 3 since it's 2 centuries after the war so plenty of time for things to mutate and could assume the vaults would have some stuff break allowing them to scurry inside.
Bit curious to but with the radroach how did it actually mutate into that so soon. Sure got magic and all but the water purifier breaking seems to have happened only a few weeks after the stable was sealed since it was that 3 month anniversary party when the population was killed. Seems like damn near the moment the bombs dropped immeditly every endemic creature mutated into giant hostile monsters. Makes some more sense in Fallout 3 since it's 2 centuries after the war so plenty of time for things to mutate and could assume the vaults would have some stuff break allowing them to scurry inside.
>>298846
Considering all the absurd combat advantages given to Littlepip by her PipBuck, Velvet's a retard for not wanting to wear it.
If LP and Velvet travel together, and the Overmare for their old Stable can track Velvet's pipbuck, the Overmare knows where Velvet is.
Velvet's all "I don't want to wear that thing, it's a shackle! It reminds me of my time in the Stable!" but that's retarded.
This thing saves Littlepip's life constantly.
Kkat knows if Velvet also wore one of these, she'd have the same enemy radar and the same HUD/Eyes-Forward Sparkle. She'd instantly become the same SATS-target-assisted instant-badass Littlepip is, perhaps an even better one, because Littlepip's combat prowess is 69% Pipbuck, 30% overpowered gear she conveniently has, and 1% retarded moments of "Creative thinking" that only work because the author's dumb enough to decide hiding yourself with a cumstained sheet makes you invisible and not a single Alicorn ever encountered or heard of a memory orb, not even their leader.
Littlepip should want Velvet to wear her Pipbuck. She faced the goddamn Wasteland to bring it to her!
Calamity should want Velvet to wear her Pipbuck, because SATS can bail you out of any combat situation that goes bad and practically carry you through them.
Velvet in a Pipbuck would steal Littlepip's thunder. Hard to pretend wearing something special on your wrist means your protagonist's a "Veteran badass Wasteland master" when anypony else could wear their own copy of the damn thing to get the same overpowered bonuses.
The Pipbuck, its automatic map, and the way it puts markers on your map and in your HUD for you to follow... That was briefly and cleverly mocked in Fallout NV's Dead Money DLC, where a big blue fecker named God says your pipbuck and easy-to-follow quest objective markers makes you a dog on a leash. Or something like that.
But it's a leash that binds you to your current objective. And you hold your leash's handle when you decide which quests you complete and how, and which quests you ignore.
Velvet has no excuse to be so pretentious and virtue-signally over not wearing such a blatantly overpowered god-watch.
>AI's action log
A convenient log that spells out everything wrong the robot ever did? Sweet. Bet the ponies of this vault wish they saw this sooner. Bet any nice ponies at Stable-Tec, if they exist, wish they stopped this robot upon seeing that log.
>Applesnack
This name is so stupid it's like something canon Sweetie Belle or maybe Scootaloo would come up with after trying to think of an apple pony name for DND night.
There are websites out there that list EVERY TYPE OF APPLE EVER! I know, because I looked at one when trying to figure out how I could subtly give my character a name that's an incredibly subtle reference to his actual identity as a cowboy apple pony, but also something he'd choose to name himself given the chance. I didn't even know Star Apples existed until the day I saw that site. Silver stars bring sherrifs to mind, and silvery-white stars in the sky, so the name Silver Star blends in over in Canterlot while sticking out if you know what to look for. Fuck Kkat for doing absolutely no research on apples and their silly names and the creative things you can do with pony names.
Doing something dumb/lazy and then making your characters snark about it is the laziest and gayest joke possible. If your own subconscious telld you this is uncreative and dumb, why go through with it anyway?
>Steelhooves keeps bleeding, keeps keeps bleeding and uh
LP's lifted heavier shit, she should have psychically picked him up like another gun and carried him through the dungeon. Or dragged him behind them, if too tired for that. It'd mean dragging him closer to the health potion/Suit Unlocking Spell Matrix they're after. And if they leave him outside, there's always a chance some Raider/Bandit/Slaver or non-union criminal without the uniform or training might decide to finish him off and take whatever goods can be found in his steel-coated pockets.
>"Pinkie, your crack addiction is tearing this family apart!"
why are fandoms so unfunny? Why do they repeat the same simple jokes until they drive them into the ground?
"Hahaha Italy likes tomatoes"
"Hahaha Akechi likes pancakes"
"Hahaha Deadpool likes chimichangas"
"Hahaha Jeremiah Gottswald likes oranges"
"Hahaha Celestia likes cake and Twilight loves books"
"Hahaha Sonic likes chili dogs"
Then when those stop amusing the fandom they get taken further but not in a funny way.
"Sonic only eats chili dogs and all the framed photographs in his house are of him with chili dogs"
"Celestia wants to fuck cake"
"Pinkie does crack and Twilight is legally married to a book"
>Velvet should wear armour
Yeah, and her fucking Pipbuck.
>>298862
Good point.
Considering all the absurd combat advantages given to Littlepip by her PipBuck, Velvet's a retard for not wanting to wear it.
If LP and Velvet travel together, and the Overmare for their old Stable can track Velvet's pipbuck, the Overmare knows where Velvet is.
Velvet's all "I don't want to wear that thing, it's a shackle! It reminds me of my time in the Stable!" but that's retarded.
This thing saves Littlepip's life constantly.
Kkat knows if Velvet also wore one of these, she'd have the same enemy radar and the same HUD/Eyes-Forward Sparkle. She'd instantly become the same SATS-target-assisted instant-badass Littlepip is, perhaps an even better one, because Littlepip's combat prowess is 69% Pipbuck, 30% overpowered gear she conveniently has, and 1% retarded moments of "Creative thinking" that only work because the author's dumb enough to decide hiding yourself with a cumstained sheet makes you invisible and not a single Alicorn ever encountered or heard of a memory orb, not even their leader.
Littlepip should want Velvet to wear her Pipbuck. She faced the goddamn Wasteland to bring it to her!
Calamity should want Velvet to wear her Pipbuck, because SATS can bail you out of any combat situation that goes bad and practically carry you through them.
Velvet in a Pipbuck would steal Littlepip's thunder. Hard to pretend wearing something special on your wrist means your protagonist's a "Veteran badass Wasteland master" when anypony else could wear their own copy of the damn thing to get the same overpowered bonuses.
The Pipbuck, its automatic map, and the way it puts markers on your map and in your HUD for you to follow... That was briefly and cleverly mocked in Fallout NV's Dead Money DLC, where a big blue fecker named God says your pipbuck and easy-to-follow quest objective markers makes you a dog on a leash. Or something like that.
But it's a leash that binds you to your current objective. And you hold your leash's handle when you decide which quests you complete and how, and which quests you ignore.
Velvet has no excuse to be so pretentious and virtue-signally over not wearing such a blatantly overpowered god-watch.
>AI's action log
A convenient log that spells out everything wrong the robot ever did? Sweet. Bet the ponies of this vault wish they saw this sooner. Bet any nice ponies at Stable-Tec, if they exist, wish they stopped this robot upon seeing that log.
>Applesnack
This name is so stupid it's like something canon Sweetie Belle or maybe Scootaloo would come up with after trying to think of an apple pony name for DND night.
There are websites out there that list EVERY TYPE OF APPLE EVER! I know, because I looked at one when trying to figure out how I could subtly give my character a name that's an incredibly subtle reference to his actual identity as a cowboy apple pony, but also something he'd choose to name himself given the chance. I didn't even know Star Apples existed until the day I saw that site. Silver stars bring sherrifs to mind, and silvery-white stars in the sky, so the name Silver Star blends in over in Canterlot while sticking out if you know what to look for. Fuck Kkat for doing absolutely no research on apples and their silly names and the creative things you can do with pony names.
Doing something dumb/lazy and then making your characters snark about it is the laziest and gayest joke possible. If your own subconscious telld you this is uncreative and dumb, why go through with it anyway?
>Steelhooves keeps bleeding, keeps keeps bleeding and uh
LP's lifted heavier shit, she should have psychically picked him up like another gun and carried him through the dungeon. Or dragged him behind them, if too tired for that. It'd mean dragging him closer to the health potion/Suit Unlocking Spell Matrix they're after. And if they leave him outside, there's always a chance some Raider/Bandit/Slaver or non-union criminal without the uniform or training might decide to finish him off and take whatever goods can be found in his steel-coated pockets.
>"Pinkie, your crack addiction is tearing this family apart!"
why are fandoms so unfunny? Why do they repeat the same simple jokes until they drive them into the ground?
"Hahaha Italy likes tomatoes"
"Hahaha Akechi likes pancakes"
"Hahaha Deadpool likes chimichangas"
"Hahaha Jeremiah Gottswald likes oranges"
"Hahaha Celestia likes cake and Twilight loves books"
"Hahaha Sonic likes chili dogs"
Then when those stop amusing the fandom they get taken further but not in a funny way.
"Sonic only eats chili dogs and all the framed photographs in his house are of him with chili dogs"
"Celestia wants to fuck cake"
"Pinkie does crack and Twilight is legally married to a book"
>Velvet should wear armour
Yeah, and her fucking Pipbuck.
>>298862
Good point.
>>298852
Oh I think I know the origins of that quote! Not sure what the context is for the story but I think that was from the episode when they first visit Appleossa and are on the train ride at night with the girls unable to fall asleep. Can't remember the full context but AJ had that giant apple tree with them in the car which I recall was making the others uncomfortable.
Oh I think I know the origins of that quote! Not sure what the context is for the story but I think that was from the episode when they first visit Appleossa and are on the train ride at night with the girls unable to fall asleep. Can't remember the full context but AJ had that giant apple tree with them in the car which I recall was making the others uncomfortable.
>>298855
>I felt doomed to wander until either I found my place in this hellish outside, or… or I fixed it. At least, as much as I could. I supposed I was searching for my virtue, as Watcher had suggested, like a filly trying to invoke her cutie mark. But Calamity and Velvet Remedy were not burdened by my quest, or my sense of being utterly lost. Why wouldn’t they leave me to it on my own once they had found some place to stay? Tenpony Tower, for instance. Why shouldn’t they?
Once again, the author demonstrates that he is aware of exactly what's wrong with this story, and specifically with this character, and yet once again rather than taking this as a signal that he ought to rewrite the story in order to correct the problem, he instead chooses to simply take note of it and move on. In this rare moment of introspection, Littlepoop attempts to look inside herself, only to discover that there is basically nothing in there. Not only does she lack external goals, she does not have any internal drive or motivation either.
For comparison, let's look at Applejack for a moment. She, too, is a character without external goals; this is a big part of why the show's later writers had so much trouble figuring out what to do with her once it became an event-driven story. However, the gulf between AJ and LP is yuge. Applejack is pure zen; she doesn't have external goals because she doesn't need them. AJ's life revolves around her family, their farm, and the community of Ponyville at large, and in the day to day tasks that go into maintaining that existence. In other words, she finds meaning in life itself, without the need to pursue anything beyond what she has already.
Littlepoop, by contrast, has nothing of the sort. We hear briefly about her mother at the beginning of the story, but she hasn't mentioned her or thought about her since then, so we can only assume they aren't particularly close. She doesn't seem to miss any of the ponies she used to live with in the stable, nor does it seem to bother her that she just walked away from the only life she's ever known. If she had some concrete external goal, like a quest or an archenemy or something, the author could probably get away with having a one-dimensional protagonist; it's been done often enough. As I've said before, this premise would work just fine as campy action-adventure, and characters don't really need much depth if the whole story is just about fighting.
However, LP has no such external objective, nor does she have any inner motivation to keep her going, and these two things combined make her a depressingly empty character. Who is Littlepoop? What is she struggling for, or against? What reason does this pony even have to drag her sorry self out of bed in the morning? Her friends? Her "love" for Velvet? Puh-lease. Her friends are as empty as she is, and anyway the three of them are barely even friends; allies or traveling companions would be more like it. Her love for Velvet is an adolescent crush based mostly on physical attraction and proximity. The two have done little serious bonding even though they've been traveling together for some time now. So apart from this, what else does she have? Her cocaine-mint addiction? She even manages to do that half-assed.
All of this is made even more depressing by the fact that LP herself is aware of how empty she is. She asks herself what she's even trying to do, and can come up with nothing better than this abstract desire to "fix the wasteland." Fix it how? For what reason? Once she's "fixed" everything, what then? She doesn't know.
Littlepoop has nothing she actually cares about, so she throws all of her energy into the maudlin false-empathy she displays for the ponies whose voices she hears in the recordings she collects. She convinces herself that these centuries-dead ponies to whom she has no direct connection are lost souls crying out for justice that only she can provide. So, she goes around beating up every slaver and firebombing every raider camp and looting every stable, because "justice." Ironically, all of this only serves to depress her further, because the more of this shit she does, the more she realizes that even this is a pointless goal; the past can never be changed, she still has nothing to live for in the present, and even if she succeeds in "fixing" the wasteland, she will still be the same boring, empty, purposeless twat she was to begin with. So, she keeps going, not because of some deep-rooted inner drive to do good, but simply because she has no better use for her time. She ruthlessly murders anypony her tacked-on boilerplate sense of morality tells her is "bad," and then wanders around the wasteland collecting random junk, because she's bored and empty and she can't think of anything better to do.
Ironically, once again, the author has actually managed to make a much deeper statement than he ever intended or even realized he was making. Littlepoop is pretty much the quintessential modern millennial; in fact she is probably a subconscious self-insert for the author. Bored and rootless, depressed and directionless, completely lacking any serious sense of purpose, no strong ties to family or community, no meaningful friendships. LP's bloody crusade against raiders and slavers and the horrors of the wasteland can easily be likened to BLM riots or anti-Blumpfh protests. She has no serious values; she's just hurling bricks because she's depressed and empty and miserable, and deep down she knows that once the "wrongs of history" have all been righted she will still be miserable.
Oh, and the bit about being on a quest to "find her virtue," or whatever? That's a crock of shit too. It's no different than some vapid twat jetting off to Europe to "find herself," only to end up spending six months wandering around Prague, blowing strangers and taking pictures of her meals to post on Instagram.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ivOvQBlaRIQ
>I felt doomed to wander until either I found my place in this hellish outside, or… or I fixed it. At least, as much as I could. I supposed I was searching for my virtue, as Watcher had suggested, like a filly trying to invoke her cutie mark. But Calamity and Velvet Remedy were not burdened by my quest, or my sense of being utterly lost. Why wouldn’t they leave me to it on my own once they had found some place to stay? Tenpony Tower, for instance. Why shouldn’t they?
Once again, the author demonstrates that he is aware of exactly what's wrong with this story, and specifically with this character, and yet once again rather than taking this as a signal that he ought to rewrite the story in order to correct the problem, he instead chooses to simply take note of it and move on. In this rare moment of introspection, Littlepoop attempts to look inside herself, only to discover that there is basically nothing in there. Not only does she lack external goals, she does not have any internal drive or motivation either.
For comparison, let's look at Applejack for a moment. She, too, is a character without external goals; this is a big part of why the show's later writers had so much trouble figuring out what to do with her once it became an event-driven story. However, the gulf between AJ and LP is yuge. Applejack is pure zen; she doesn't have external goals because she doesn't need them. AJ's life revolves around her family, their farm, and the community of Ponyville at large, and in the day to day tasks that go into maintaining that existence. In other words, she finds meaning in life itself, without the need to pursue anything beyond what she has already.
Littlepoop, by contrast, has nothing of the sort. We hear briefly about her mother at the beginning of the story, but she hasn't mentioned her or thought about her since then, so we can only assume they aren't particularly close. She doesn't seem to miss any of the ponies she used to live with in the stable, nor does it seem to bother her that she just walked away from the only life she's ever known. If she had some concrete external goal, like a quest or an archenemy or something, the author could probably get away with having a one-dimensional protagonist; it's been done often enough. As I've said before, this premise would work just fine as campy action-adventure, and characters don't really need much depth if the whole story is just about fighting.
However, LP has no such external objective, nor does she have any inner motivation to keep her going, and these two things combined make her a depressingly empty character. Who is Littlepoop? What is she struggling for, or against? What reason does this pony even have to drag her sorry self out of bed in the morning? Her friends? Her "love" for Velvet? Puh-lease. Her friends are as empty as she is, and anyway the three of them are barely even friends; allies or traveling companions would be more like it. Her love for Velvet is an adolescent crush based mostly on physical attraction and proximity. The two have done little serious bonding even though they've been traveling together for some time now. So apart from this, what else does she have? Her cocaine-mint addiction? She even manages to do that half-assed.
All of this is made even more depressing by the fact that LP herself is aware of how empty she is. She asks herself what she's even trying to do, and can come up with nothing better than this abstract desire to "fix the wasteland." Fix it how? For what reason? Once she's "fixed" everything, what then? She doesn't know.
Littlepoop has nothing she actually cares about, so she throws all of her energy into the maudlin false-empathy she displays for the ponies whose voices she hears in the recordings she collects. She convinces herself that these centuries-dead ponies to whom she has no direct connection are lost souls crying out for justice that only she can provide. So, she goes around beating up every slaver and firebombing every raider camp and looting every stable, because "justice." Ironically, all of this only serves to depress her further, because the more of this shit she does, the more she realizes that even this is a pointless goal; the past can never be changed, she still has nothing to live for in the present, and even if she succeeds in "fixing" the wasteland, she will still be the same boring, empty, purposeless twat she was to begin with. So, she keeps going, not because of some deep-rooted inner drive to do good, but simply because she has no better use for her time. She ruthlessly murders anypony her tacked-on boilerplate sense of morality tells her is "bad," and then wanders around the wasteland collecting random junk, because she's bored and empty and she can't think of anything better to do.
Ironically, once again, the author has actually managed to make a much deeper statement than he ever intended or even realized he was making. Littlepoop is pretty much the quintessential modern millennial; in fact she is probably a subconscious self-insert for the author. Bored and rootless, depressed and directionless, completely lacking any serious sense of purpose, no strong ties to family or community, no meaningful friendships. LP's bloody crusade against raiders and slavers and the horrors of the wasteland can easily be likened to BLM riots or anti-Blumpfh protests. She has no serious values; she's just hurling bricks because she's depressed and empty and miserable, and deep down she knows that once the "wrongs of history" have all been righted she will still be miserable.
Oh, and the bit about being on a quest to "find her virtue," or whatever? That's a crock of shit too. It's no different than some vapid twat jetting off to Europe to "find herself," only to end up spending six months wandering around Prague, blowing strangers and taking pictures of her meals to post on Instagram.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ivOvQBlaRIQ
>>298920
Anyway, Littlepoop continues to whine to herself and wallow in her own pointless misery. That single paragraph I highlighted is about as much introspection as she can manage; she now diverts her attention towards her false empathy for the long-dead ponies of Stable 29, to whom she has no responsibility and for whom she can do nothing. She purposelessly racks her brain to try and think up a possible solution to their problem, and the best she can come up with is to reduce the strain on the water-whoosafudge somehow, so that the collapse of the stable could be padded out across several decades though it would still eventually collapse; thus she is still arguably just prolonging everyone's suffering. However, this would apparently still require some loss of life. The details of her plan are never revealed, because she apparently considers whatever she thought up to be too horrible to imagine, so she quickly dismisses it. Eventually she falls asleep again.
Page break. When we rejoin her, she is still in the same situation. We get some more graphic descriptions of her fucked-up dreams, which aren't really worth going over in detail. Most of it has to do with her anxiety over Calamity and Velvet's budding relationship. Then, she wakes up again.
>Despair tainted my hope, like a cupcake with ashes mixed into the batter.
How the hell do you write a sentence like this and not burst out laughing?
>Grey daylight seeping between heavy curtains (were they armored mesh?) raised the ambient illumination in the room.
This, at the very least, gives us a better picture of the setting. She appears to be in an above-ground room somewhere, so presumably they left the stable at some point.
>Relief was like a flood of painkiller, numbing the irrational fears of my night terrors which clung to me like leeches.
Kkat, you're no longer allowed to attempt simile or metaphor. Your prose is a warm stream of diarrhea flowing endlessly from your warped imagination to the page, much as the previous night's saag paneer will flow from the butthole of an Indian man to the designated street beneath him.
Anyway, this shit just keeps going and going. Littlepoop is delirious, feverish and sad, and much of her emotional energy is directed towards wondering what Calamity and Velvet's relationship has progressed to during the time that she has been unconscious. All of this would be fine, if it weren't for the fact that we were just dropped into this scene with absolutely no preamble. As I said, nothing in the previous chapter was in any way resolved, we don't know where she is or how she got there, and we don't know what's wrong with her or what made her sick.
We are gradually given information, but it's fed to us in very small doses in between LP's obnoxious, stream-of-consciousness whining. Eventually we learn that she is in SteelHooves' shack:
>On the opposite wall was another copy of the recruitment poster. (“You too can be a Steel Ranger!”) I realized where I must be. Lifting my PipBuck, I checked the automap. SteelHooves Shack. I collapsed back onto the bed, feeling unbearably exhausted, physically and mentally.
First of all, if she had just checked her stupid PipBuck to begin with, she would already have this information. Second, this still doesn't answer any of the pertinent questions. Namely, did they actually save SteelHooves as they had planned, or did they just commandeer his shack after he died waiting for them? My understanding is LP's technician skills were required in order to save him, and if she's been in some kind of weird fever this entire time, I don't see how he could have lived.
>And, even worse, I felt horny. Which was not a sensation that mixed well with illness. Maybe it was having Velvet Remedy so close, her head pressing against my flank as she slept partially on my bed. My stomach twisted in warning. I didn’t care.
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention; the last time she woke up she found that Velvet was sleeping platonically next to her.
Anyway, as she notes above, Littlepoop is sexually aroused, and decides that she needs to masturbate. She spends several nauseating paragraphs babbling autistically to herself as she tries to decide which dead pony from the past she should fantasize about, and eventually settles on Rarity. She clops for half an hour?!? with Velvet in the bed next to her, and then suddenly realizes that Rarity is some distant relative of Velvet's, and this ruins the fantasy for her. Before she can settle on a new victim for her sordid fantasies, she suddenly vomits. I swear to God, I am not exaggerating or making any of this up; literally all of this revolting autism is actually in the text.
Naturally, this is the point where Velvet wakes up. She gets LP a drink of water and then cleans up her puke. This, of course, is fairly humiliating for her, since vomiting in front of your crush is considered a faux pas in most circles, and being pitied by your crush is even worse. In spite of everything I hate about her, I almost (almost) want to feel sorry for Littlepoop here, but everything else that's wrong with this scene makes this very difficult.
>Velvet Remedy returned to give me water, to clean the wall and floor of my vomit, to bathe me and replace the sheets on my bed. I was in no state to enjoy any of it. But I could properly marvel that she took the time on somepony like me.
This right here is almost (almost) a "d'awww" moment. However, this line:
>But I could properly marvel that she took the time on somepony like me.
This line is just too much. For most of this story, LP has behaved as if she has an unreasonably high opinion of herself, so this just comes across as obnoxious self-pity. It's possible that whatever happened to her in the mysterious interim period between chapters has humbled her somewhat, and if that's the case then great; it's about time something smacked her down from her pedestal. But I still can't sympathize with her.
Anyway, Littlepoop continues to whine to herself and wallow in her own pointless misery. That single paragraph I highlighted is about as much introspection as she can manage; she now diverts her attention towards her false empathy for the long-dead ponies of Stable 29, to whom she has no responsibility and for whom she can do nothing. She purposelessly racks her brain to try and think up a possible solution to their problem, and the best she can come up with is to reduce the strain on the water-whoosafudge somehow, so that the collapse of the stable could be padded out across several decades though it would still eventually collapse; thus she is still arguably just prolonging everyone's suffering. However, this would apparently still require some loss of life. The details of her plan are never revealed, because she apparently considers whatever she thought up to be too horrible to imagine, so she quickly dismisses it. Eventually she falls asleep again.
Page break. When we rejoin her, she is still in the same situation. We get some more graphic descriptions of her fucked-up dreams, which aren't really worth going over in detail. Most of it has to do with her anxiety over Calamity and Velvet's budding relationship. Then, she wakes up again.
>Despair tainted my hope, like a cupcake with ashes mixed into the batter.
How the hell do you write a sentence like this and not burst out laughing?
>Grey daylight seeping between heavy curtains (were they armored mesh?) raised the ambient illumination in the room.
This, at the very least, gives us a better picture of the setting. She appears to be in an above-ground room somewhere, so presumably they left the stable at some point.
>Relief was like a flood of painkiller, numbing the irrational fears of my night terrors which clung to me like leeches.
Kkat, you're no longer allowed to attempt simile or metaphor. Your prose is a warm stream of diarrhea flowing endlessly from your warped imagination to the page, much as the previous night's saag paneer will flow from the butthole of an Indian man to the designated street beneath him.
Anyway, this shit just keeps going and going. Littlepoop is delirious, feverish and sad, and much of her emotional energy is directed towards wondering what Calamity and Velvet's relationship has progressed to during the time that she has been unconscious. All of this would be fine, if it weren't for the fact that we were just dropped into this scene with absolutely no preamble. As I said, nothing in the previous chapter was in any way resolved, we don't know where she is or how she got there, and we don't know what's wrong with her or what made her sick.
We are gradually given information, but it's fed to us in very small doses in between LP's obnoxious, stream-of-consciousness whining. Eventually we learn that she is in SteelHooves' shack:
>On the opposite wall was another copy of the recruitment poster. (“You too can be a Steel Ranger!”) I realized where I must be. Lifting my PipBuck, I checked the automap. SteelHooves Shack. I collapsed back onto the bed, feeling unbearably exhausted, physically and mentally.
First of all, if she had just checked her stupid PipBuck to begin with, she would already have this information. Second, this still doesn't answer any of the pertinent questions. Namely, did they actually save SteelHooves as they had planned, or did they just commandeer his shack after he died waiting for them? My understanding is LP's technician skills were required in order to save him, and if she's been in some kind of weird fever this entire time, I don't see how he could have lived.
>And, even worse, I felt horny. Which was not a sensation that mixed well with illness. Maybe it was having Velvet Remedy so close, her head pressing against my flank as she slept partially on my bed. My stomach twisted in warning. I didn’t care.
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention; the last time she woke up she found that Velvet was sleeping platonically next to her.
Anyway, as she notes above, Littlepoop is sexually aroused, and decides that she needs to masturbate. She spends several nauseating paragraphs babbling autistically to herself as she tries to decide which dead pony from the past she should fantasize about, and eventually settles on Rarity. She clops for half an hour?!? with Velvet in the bed next to her, and then suddenly realizes that Rarity is some distant relative of Velvet's, and this ruins the fantasy for her. Before she can settle on a new victim for her sordid fantasies, she suddenly vomits. I swear to God, I am not exaggerating or making any of this up; literally all of this revolting autism is actually in the text.
Naturally, this is the point where Velvet wakes up. She gets LP a drink of water and then cleans up her puke. This, of course, is fairly humiliating for her, since vomiting in front of your crush is considered a faux pas in most circles, and being pitied by your crush is even worse. In spite of everything I hate about her, I almost (almost) want to feel sorry for Littlepoop here, but everything else that's wrong with this scene makes this very difficult.
>Velvet Remedy returned to give me water, to clean the wall and floor of my vomit, to bathe me and replace the sheets on my bed. I was in no state to enjoy any of it. But I could properly marvel that she took the time on somepony like me.
This right here is almost (almost) a "d'awww" moment. However, this line:
>But I could properly marvel that she took the time on somepony like me.
This line is just too much. For most of this story, LP has behaved as if she has an unreasonably high opinion of herself, so this just comes across as obnoxious self-pity. It's possible that whatever happened to her in the mysterious interim period between chapters has humbled her somewhat, and if that's the case then great; it's about time something smacked her down from her pedestal. But I still can't sympathize with her.
>>298922
Anyway, in the next subchapter, her fever breaks and she's more or less back to normal again. Hopefully we can finally learn what the fuck happened and how all the shit from Chapter Fourteen resolved.
>As I floated the canteen from the bedpost, the deep, resonating voice of SteelHooves carried in from the other room. “Sorry, but I just don’t buy it.”
What? So that guy's still alive? Did LP cure him before she got sick, or what? Sorry to keep returning to the Ch 14-15 issue, but this is seriously one of the most jarring scene changes in the entire text; it feels like I'm reading a book that has had several pages torn out of it, and I have to figure out what happened during the missing part of the story.
Seriously, there are so many unanswered questions here. How did they get out of the stable? Last time we saw them the doors had self-locked and they were sealed in. What happened to SteelHooves? Obviously he's not dead, but he was lying in the middle of a fucking field with serious wounds for a period of literal hours; it feels like whatever they did to revive him at the very least deserves a quick scene. And what the hell is wrong with Littlepoop? When did she get sick? How did she get sick? None of this makes any sense.
Anyway, the author either has no intention of explaining any of this shit, or he isn't planning to explain it just yet. SteelHooves, meanwhile, offers us this:
>“Your group is like the beginning of a bad joke,” SteelHooves elaborated. “A covert agent, a princess descended from pre-war aristocracy and an outcast from an advanced civilization trot into a saloon and try to tell ponies that they’re completely normal.”
An "outcast from an advanced civilization" presumably refers to Littlepoop, and I guess it's more or less accurate. Velvet's being a princess and Calamity's being a secret agent is news to me, though.
This next bit of their conversation is yet another of those weird little episodes where the author displays self-awareness about how ridiculous his ideas are, but chooses to simply point them out instead of correcting them. Here, I'll just quote it:
>That alicorn was at full strength, unimpaired, her magical shield shrugging off grenades. Then, a moment later, she was dead,” the low voice gave a grave accounting of our meeting battle like a schoolteacher reading test scores. “A single bullet hole, right through the brain. You want me to believe some innocent young mare just weeks out of a Stable did that? Do you even believe that?
This is referring to her takedown of the alicorn during the fight in which SteelHooves was wounded (and where he sustained the fatal injuries that he has mysteriously recovered from during the undefined time lapse between Chapters 14 and 15). And yes, as I've often pointed out, Littlepoop's ability to just magically hit anything she wants to with dead-on accuracy is obnoxious as fuck. It's unclear whether Roboponer knows about her PipBuck's abilities yet, but it seems like he ought to, since his suit apparently uses similar technology and she was talking about being a PipBuck technician earlier.
>“An innocent young mare,” SteelHooves repeated, “Just out of a Stable. With refined criminal skills that let her pick every lock and hack every computer, even when nopony else in two hundred years has managed the feat.”
I've been grousing about this for almost the entire book. These bizarre little flashes of self-awareness on the author's part come out of left field sometimes.
>I frowned. I had to admit, I’d wondered about the lack of other skilled lockpickers myself. But then, I also knew that I had honed my skill in precise telekinetic lockpicking over years as part of my attempt to conjure my cutie mark. My C.A.T. proved that my natural talents were focused towards mundane and arcane sciences, and my studies as a PipBuck technician and the tools of my trade gave me the education to manipulate terminals that few outsiders would have. But most of all, I knew that I hadn’t been anywhere near as good at either of these things when I left Stable Two as I had become since. I had been reading books and getting a lot of practice.
tl;dr, she is Mary of Sue, the Great One whom the scriptures foretold.
In all seriousness, I'm beginning to wonder if people in whatever forum he originally published this on were giving him shit about his character being a Mary Sue, and he felt the need to cook up some kind of in-world explanation for it. If he was just publishing this as he was writing it, it might explain his tendency to try to justify problems instead of revising and correcting them. I know this text was posted on FimFiction after it was already completed but wasn't published there initially, and I'm a little curious as to where and how this was originally released to the public.
Anyway, SteelHooves is apparently of the opinion that someone as talented and amazing as Littlepoop must be an agent from the Ministry of Awesome or some similar black-ops organization apparently the Ministry of Awesome is a black-ops organization, because there's no way she could just be a regular-ass civilian. Calamity assures him this is not the case, and they go back and forth like this for awhile. The conversation is completely pointless, and does absolutely nothing to clarify any of the points that still need clarification, nor does it provide any other particularly useful information (it's mostly just a recap of events we've already seen). We finally get real confirmation that Velvet's ancestor Sweetie Belle was in fact one of the three founders of StableTec, which has never technically been clarified (though it's obvious enough at this point), so that's something I guess.
The scene ends on a strange note:
Calamity:
>“Did you know that when Littlepip sleeps, she has a cute little snore?”
Littlepoop (eavesdropping, speaking to herself):
>I do not sn… oh crap!
I'm not quite sure what this exclamation is supposed to imply.
Anyway, in the next subchapter, her fever breaks and she's more or less back to normal again. Hopefully we can finally learn what the fuck happened and how all the shit from Chapter Fourteen resolved.
>As I floated the canteen from the bedpost, the deep, resonating voice of SteelHooves carried in from the other room. “Sorry, but I just don’t buy it.”
What? So that guy's still alive? Did LP cure him before she got sick, or what? Sorry to keep returning to the Ch 14-15 issue, but this is seriously one of the most jarring scene changes in the entire text; it feels like I'm reading a book that has had several pages torn out of it, and I have to figure out what happened during the missing part of the story.
Seriously, there are so many unanswered questions here. How did they get out of the stable? Last time we saw them the doors had self-locked and they were sealed in. What happened to SteelHooves? Obviously he's not dead, but he was lying in the middle of a fucking field with serious wounds for a period of literal hours; it feels like whatever they did to revive him at the very least deserves a quick scene. And what the hell is wrong with Littlepoop? When did she get sick? How did she get sick? None of this makes any sense.
Anyway, the author either has no intention of explaining any of this shit, or he isn't planning to explain it just yet. SteelHooves, meanwhile, offers us this:
>“Your group is like the beginning of a bad joke,” SteelHooves elaborated. “A covert agent, a princess descended from pre-war aristocracy and an outcast from an advanced civilization trot into a saloon and try to tell ponies that they’re completely normal.”
An "outcast from an advanced civilization" presumably refers to Littlepoop, and I guess it's more or less accurate. Velvet's being a princess and Calamity's being a secret agent is news to me, though.
This next bit of their conversation is yet another of those weird little episodes where the author displays self-awareness about how ridiculous his ideas are, but chooses to simply point them out instead of correcting them. Here, I'll just quote it:
>That alicorn was at full strength, unimpaired, her magical shield shrugging off grenades. Then, a moment later, she was dead,” the low voice gave a grave accounting of our meeting battle like a schoolteacher reading test scores. “A single bullet hole, right through the brain. You want me to believe some innocent young mare just weeks out of a Stable did that? Do you even believe that?
This is referring to her takedown of the alicorn during the fight in which SteelHooves was wounded (and where he sustained the fatal injuries that he has mysteriously recovered from during the undefined time lapse between Chapters 14 and 15). And yes, as I've often pointed out, Littlepoop's ability to just magically hit anything she wants to with dead-on accuracy is obnoxious as fuck. It's unclear whether Roboponer knows about her PipBuck's abilities yet, but it seems like he ought to, since his suit apparently uses similar technology and she was talking about being a PipBuck technician earlier.
>“An innocent young mare,” SteelHooves repeated, “Just out of a Stable. With refined criminal skills that let her pick every lock and hack every computer, even when nopony else in two hundred years has managed the feat.”
I've been grousing about this for almost the entire book. These bizarre little flashes of self-awareness on the author's part come out of left field sometimes.
>I frowned. I had to admit, I’d wondered about the lack of other skilled lockpickers myself. But then, I also knew that I had honed my skill in precise telekinetic lockpicking over years as part of my attempt to conjure my cutie mark. My C.A.T. proved that my natural talents were focused towards mundane and arcane sciences, and my studies as a PipBuck technician and the tools of my trade gave me the education to manipulate terminals that few outsiders would have. But most of all, I knew that I hadn’t been anywhere near as good at either of these things when I left Stable Two as I had become since. I had been reading books and getting a lot of practice.
tl;dr, she is Mary of Sue, the Great One whom the scriptures foretold.
In all seriousness, I'm beginning to wonder if people in whatever forum he originally published this on were giving him shit about his character being a Mary Sue, and he felt the need to cook up some kind of in-world explanation for it. If he was just publishing this as he was writing it, it might explain his tendency to try to justify problems instead of revising and correcting them. I know this text was posted on FimFiction after it was already completed but wasn't published there initially, and I'm a little curious as to where and how this was originally released to the public.
Anyway, SteelHooves is apparently of the opinion that someone as talented and amazing as Littlepoop must be an agent from the Ministry of Awesome or some similar black-ops organization apparently the Ministry of Awesome is a black-ops organization, because there's no way she could just be a regular-ass civilian. Calamity assures him this is not the case, and they go back and forth like this for awhile. The conversation is completely pointless, and does absolutely nothing to clarify any of the points that still need clarification, nor does it provide any other particularly useful information (it's mostly just a recap of events we've already seen). We finally get real confirmation that Velvet's ancestor Sweetie Belle was in fact one of the three founders of StableTec, which has never technically been clarified (though it's obvious enough at this point), so that's something I guess.
The scene ends on a strange note:
Calamity:
>“Did you know that when Littlepip sleeps, she has a cute little snore?”
Littlepoop (eavesdropping, speaking to herself):
>I do not sn… oh crap!
I'm not quite sure what this exclamation is supposed to imply.
>>298920
Up until now I saw her as the kind of dull-eyed "gamer" that slogs through the filler of Open World games while telling himself he's enjoying collecting all 998 pinecones and caring creatly about all 400 of the audio logs he's collecting in the name of getting the 120% completion achievement even though he still hasn't gotten past the introduction to the main plot yet. The kind of prick who treats DND like it's Skyrim, a game where you stealth-archer shoot and murderhobo and accept random quests from whoever you can't kill and steal without any thought for the story you're telling. The kind of guy who says he "plays games for the story" to justify playing on Hyper Easy mode even though it's really because it makes getting the game over and done with quicker. I saw her as the kind of faggot who would call Fallout 3 good just because it took 400 hours to fully complete.
But you're right, it goes deeper than that. Littlepip isn't just bored and boring, she's empty and fundamentally unfinished as a character.
>Littlepip clops for 30 minutes
Remember her sexual stamina for later. It's a plot point unfortunately.
Neon Genesis Evangelion or its remake had a scene where Shinji jacked it to Asuka's unconscious body in a hospital and then says "I'm so fucked up" and feels bad.
That scene was there because the author hated his fandom for embracing his work as an escapist fantasy when he wanted his story to say "escapism is bad and dads like Gendo are shit and guys like Shinji need to get out of their shells no matter how the world treats them because embracin' da world is gud uwu, also chicks like Rei and Asuka and the drunk one are fucking messes even though anime typically romanticizes these three character types"
The author wanted to make the audience uncomfortable and say "Hey, remember when you fucked your Asuka body pillow or jacked off to Asuka doujinshi porn manga comics? Fuck you for that".
It's why the remake had the New Rei who was every bit the soulless robotic tool Original Rei was supposed to represent as a "fuck you" to the Japanese ideal of beauty and perfection named Yamato Nadeshiko or something.
Anyway, while these choices were made by a smart director to make the audience uncomfortable with themselves and the story told on purpose, this right here is just the author trying to make you feel bad for Littlepoop while assuring you she is totally not an invincible goddess but is also totally justified in having her godly skill.
Ten bucks says LP will turn out to be Rainbow Dash's x100 great granddaughter or something.
LP deciding to masturbate to Velvet's sleeping form or hump her horn or whatever it would be disgusting but if she felt bad later it could be deep commentary on the coombrained bronies who call anything deep writing if it pleases their egos or dicks. If Velvet caught her cooming and got disgusted and started yelling at her it could make the target audience feel bad for all the times they nutted to waifus who would probably hate the idea of being used as fapping material by absolute strangers.
Or it could trigger a feral rage in the degenerate coomer bronies, the one that comes on whenever they feel their waifu show is "under attack" from any form of criticism. This work could be a masterpiece in subverting expectations smartly and making deep commentary by telling the tale of a bored hollow "badass" who gets all her skill from a wristwatch and never gets the girl.
>LP killed an alicorn
Shooting the stunned Alicorn in the face was the easy part. She had all the time in the world to line up her shot and deliver it as calmly as a surgeon administering anaesthetic.
The alicorn was not "at full strength and unimpaired" when the kill happened. The Alicorn fell for a trick any Alicorn in the hive mind should have learned about long ago. The Alicorn's final hours were spent trapped in somepony else's memories adter triggering a memory orb by holding it with magic which is only sometimes okay to do.
LP shooting a sitting duck is not the absurd part here. LP turning the deadly alicorn into a sitting duck is the absurd part. "you must be a badass commando oper8r or something" doesnt explain why the whole fucking world gets stupider and easier to dupe whenever Littlepip needs to outsmart somepony.
>muh lockpicking
Surely it's not a stretch to say a Wastelander might find himself overencumbered with sick loot and decide a sturdy wall safe in the middle of a random crumbling building would be a great place to stash and lock away some loot he thinks he can return to later without any monsters or new building occupants taking residence in the building or anything bad happening to him on his way to find a trader to sell some junk to.
That could explain some of why Littlepoop sometimes finds wildly inappropriate items in what seems to be a safe not opened once in 200 years. It could even explain why post-war drugs are sometimes found in pre-war places. But the author never thought of that.
"I was fucking bored and felt like getting good at lockpicking because it seemed like a skill that would impress bitches and get me laid and possibly save my life someday plus a fictional character I like was great at it" would work great as a justification for Littlepoop's status as The Master Of Unlocking. Plenty of people learn random shit for some or all of those justifications.
Alternatively Kkunt could go the extra mile and say Littlepip learned lockpicking from a friend or mentor character she misses from the vault. When LP asked how he learned lockpicking, "Don't ask" was her answer.
Or could just say "I worked 9 to 5 at a Pipbuck Repair shop. I did all the work and had to practice my lockpicking on the store's supplies of spare Pipbuck locks because it could be useful for my job".
>curious
I hear this work was originally posted chapter by chapter on Google Docs and shilled by Equestria Daily every chapter. Nepotism lol. I also hear EQD refused non-FOE FIM+Fallout content to promote this.
>i snore? Crap!
gay
Up until now I saw her as the kind of dull-eyed "gamer" that slogs through the filler of Open World games while telling himself he's enjoying collecting all 998 pinecones and caring creatly about all 400 of the audio logs he's collecting in the name of getting the 120% completion achievement even though he still hasn't gotten past the introduction to the main plot yet. The kind of prick who treats DND like it's Skyrim, a game where you stealth-archer shoot and murderhobo and accept random quests from whoever you can't kill and steal without any thought for the story you're telling. The kind of guy who says he "plays games for the story" to justify playing on Hyper Easy mode even though it's really because it makes getting the game over and done with quicker. I saw her as the kind of faggot who would call Fallout 3 good just because it took 400 hours to fully complete.
But you're right, it goes deeper than that. Littlepip isn't just bored and boring, she's empty and fundamentally unfinished as a character.
>Littlepip clops for 30 minutes
Remember her sexual stamina for later. It's a plot point unfortunately.
Neon Genesis Evangelion or its remake had a scene where Shinji jacked it to Asuka's unconscious body in a hospital and then says "I'm so fucked up" and feels bad.
That scene was there because the author hated his fandom for embracing his work as an escapist fantasy when he wanted his story to say "escapism is bad and dads like Gendo are shit and guys like Shinji need to get out of their shells no matter how the world treats them because embracin' da world is gud uwu, also chicks like Rei and Asuka and the drunk one are fucking messes even though anime typically romanticizes these three character types"
The author wanted to make the audience uncomfortable and say "Hey, remember when you fucked your Asuka body pillow or jacked off to Asuka doujinshi porn manga comics? Fuck you for that".
It's why the remake had the New Rei who was every bit the soulless robotic tool Original Rei was supposed to represent as a "fuck you" to the Japanese ideal of beauty and perfection named Yamato Nadeshiko or something.
Anyway, while these choices were made by a smart director to make the audience uncomfortable with themselves and the story told on purpose, this right here is just the author trying to make you feel bad for Littlepoop while assuring you she is totally not an invincible goddess but is also totally justified in having her godly skill.
Ten bucks says LP will turn out to be Rainbow Dash's x100 great granddaughter or something.
LP deciding to masturbate to Velvet's sleeping form or hump her horn or whatever it would be disgusting but if she felt bad later it could be deep commentary on the coombrained bronies who call anything deep writing if it pleases their egos or dicks. If Velvet caught her cooming and got disgusted and started yelling at her it could make the target audience feel bad for all the times they nutted to waifus who would probably hate the idea of being used as fapping material by absolute strangers.
Or it could trigger a feral rage in the degenerate coomer bronies, the one that comes on whenever they feel their waifu show is "under attack" from any form of criticism. This work could be a masterpiece in subverting expectations smartly and making deep commentary by telling the tale of a bored hollow "badass" who gets all her skill from a wristwatch and never gets the girl.
>LP killed an alicorn
Shooting the stunned Alicorn in the face was the easy part. She had all the time in the world to line up her shot and deliver it as calmly as a surgeon administering anaesthetic.
The alicorn was not "at full strength and unimpaired" when the kill happened. The Alicorn fell for a trick any Alicorn in the hive mind should have learned about long ago. The Alicorn's final hours were spent trapped in somepony else's memories adter triggering a memory orb by holding it with magic which is only sometimes okay to do.
LP shooting a sitting duck is not the absurd part here. LP turning the deadly alicorn into a sitting duck is the absurd part. "you must be a badass commando oper8r or something" doesnt explain why the whole fucking world gets stupider and easier to dupe whenever Littlepip needs to outsmart somepony.
>muh lockpicking
Surely it's not a stretch to say a Wastelander might find himself overencumbered with sick loot and decide a sturdy wall safe in the middle of a random crumbling building would be a great place to stash and lock away some loot he thinks he can return to later without any monsters or new building occupants taking residence in the building or anything bad happening to him on his way to find a trader to sell some junk to.
That could explain some of why Littlepoop sometimes finds wildly inappropriate items in what seems to be a safe not opened once in 200 years. It could even explain why post-war drugs are sometimes found in pre-war places. But the author never thought of that.
"I was fucking bored and felt like getting good at lockpicking because it seemed like a skill that would impress bitches and get me laid and possibly save my life someday plus a fictional character I like was great at it" would work great as a justification for Littlepoop's status as The Master Of Unlocking. Plenty of people learn random shit for some or all of those justifications.
Alternatively Kkunt could go the extra mile and say Littlepip learned lockpicking from a friend or mentor character she misses from the vault. When LP asked how he learned lockpicking, "Don't ask" was her answer.
Or could just say "I worked 9 to 5 at a Pipbuck Repair shop. I did all the work and had to practice my lockpicking on the store's supplies of spare Pipbuck locks because it could be useful for my job".
>curious
I hear this work was originally posted chapter by chapter on Google Docs and shilled by Equestria Daily every chapter. Nepotism lol. I also hear EQD refused non-FOE FIM+Fallout content to promote this.
>i snore? Crap!
gay
>>298942
>she's empty and fundamentally unfinished as a character.
Yes.
>'Gamer'
It's supposed to be a vessel to house the interactions with a slight tint ment to resurface fond memories. By using the third party experiences it artificially increases its value of how good it is by setting up moments that would activate those memories. Mostly because it's a copy of the plot but with ponies and references that also dredge up those memories and hopes that the reader synthesizes a positive fabricated experience.
Does Kkat know that? I don't think so. It is more of a trip through memory lane that mashes things up in a simulacrum of a real meshed reality.
>>298923
>"Yes Lilpoop is an anomaly what is so weird about it?"
<"Look into her eyes! No soul, only clopping and a makeshift personality that's constantly falling apart."
>"But drug addiction... sometimes. Has internal conflicts. Maybe?"
<"..."
>"She snores!"
>she's empty and fundamentally unfinished as a character.
Yes.
>'Gamer'
It's supposed to be a vessel to house the interactions with a slight tint ment to resurface fond memories. By using the third party experiences it artificially increases its value of how good it is by setting up moments that would activate those memories. Mostly because it's a copy of the plot but with ponies and references that also dredge up those memories and hopes that the reader synthesizes a positive fabricated experience.
Does Kkat know that? I don't think so. It is more of a trip through memory lane that mashes things up in a simulacrum of a real meshed reality.
>>298923
>"Yes Lilpoop is an anomaly what is so weird about it?"
<"Look into her eyes! No soul, only clopping and a makeshift personality that's constantly falling apart."
>"But drug addiction... sometimes. Has internal conflicts. Maybe?"
<"..."
>"She snores!"
>>298946
That makes sense.
It would only take a few tweaks to make this a brilliant work of parody, a subtle intentional satire of its own concept.
Littlepip has three modes when it comes to doing things: Looty-shooty, doing what she's told, and trying to kill villains. Her plan for "fixing equestria" begins and ends at slaughtering everyone her civilian morality deems a villain and hoping this magically fixes things.
It's a good thing the author always goes along with what she wants and makes her right even when she shouldn't be. Covering yourself with a cum-soaked bedsheet to sneak past guards? Works perfectly! Killing all the baddies and exploring randomly until you find The World's Biggest Magical Undo Button right next to the smoldering wreckage of The World's Biggest Rubber Band Ball? That's perfect for undoing the apocalypse and instantly fixing everything ever so much that the next generation of ponies openly doubts that what their parents went through could ever happen (Even though Memory Orbs still exist but the author forgot about those)
Kkat could push Littlepip further over the edge with each kill while pointing out how killing desperate ponies trying to make ends meet and ensure they don't starve (Raiders) and desperate ponies who get paid to ensure SOMEBODY does constructive work in this hellish wasteland (Slavers) won't un-poison the land or un-choke the skies. With each kill, she could lose more of her excuse to kill.
>"I had to kill him and loot his pockets, Velvet! He was selling drugs on the street! And that's wrong!"
>"I had to kill him, Velvet! Sure, he was the only doctor for miles around besides you and he lived here for twenty years, but twenty two years ago he was one of many raider who killed the parents of a pony I met yesterday!"
>"We just risked our lives attacking this Slaver camp and slaughtered all the Slavers here. But it turns out the slaves we wanted to rescue were ex-raiders getting sent to a penal colony for raping fillies in Red-Eye's territory! So they had to die, Velvet!"
If baddies were easily able to manipulate Littlepip into committing atrocities just by pretending to be a good guy and throwing out a sob story, it would be the perfect commentary on the "I'll take any job" murderhobo-for-hire nature of most DND-style heroes. All of that bullshit with the Gem Prison and the DJ's "Fuck you, Littlepip, don't save Slavers/Raiders from Raiders/Slavers!" would have worked better if Gawd played nice but was secretly a villain playing Team LP like a violin to end up in charge of Talon Company and the gem prison before kicking LP out of her new prison.
How many innocents do action heroes injure or kill during their epic battles with villains? How many laws do they break? How many stories ended on happy music even though the next day should have been suffering/certain death/a bad ending for everyone involved/a mountain of paperwork to deal with? Littlepip is a SHIT action heroine. She's annoying and stupid. She's sometimes egotistical and sometimes obnoxiously mopey/emo. It's not her skills or experiences that make her a combat god, it's her factory-default mass-produced PipBuck and her uncanny ability to reduce the intelligence of everyone around her with her mary sue aura. Everypony back in her Stable had at least one PipBuck and could have been as great as Littlepip or greater if pushed. If the Overmare sent out a search team armed with PipBucks AND the best guns/armour Stable Security had to offer, they would be a strike team of combat gods in a world of poorly-armed scavengers. Littlepip hasn't earned her power and she has no idea what to do with it, but she can't give it up, just like she can't give up the drugs that enhance her power further.
No matter how "Exciting and Action-y" or tragic and gory Littlepip's fights become, and no matter how many Dead Pony Diaries or MGSV Cassette Tapes or Pagies or Terminal Entries or random pieces of garbage she collects, she will never bring back Equestria and it would take a Deus Ex Machina to do it for her.
Just picture Littlepip standing in the burning wreckage of Neo Canterlot, the Slaver capital of the world rebuilt by slave labour and Red Eye, after killing everypony she thought was evil. "We did it, Velvet!" She cries with glee, blood coating her face and gun as embers smolder around her, for the sound of ponies screaming in fear ceased by her hoof long ago. "We saved Equestria!"
She could fight Red-Eye expecting awesomeness, getting sadness instead. Like Old Snake VS Ocelot.
Take it a step further! Say the sex and drugs and guns and rape happened because some human asshole introduced sex an drugs and rock and roll to ponyland before being killed by a monster he created (a junkie who killed and robbed him). He couldn't appreciate the sweet innocent pony shows so he introduced them to the human vices he considered "fun", only for that to ruin Equestria and swallow him whole. Then it went on to swallow more innocents, because vice is bad and pony virtues are good or something. Just like in that Christmas movie where a human gets the elves to listen to non-Christmasish music on the radio, immediately turning them violent. Or in that propaganda movie where a good guy and slut get sucked into the TV and end up in his favourite old-world American sitcom where everything's perfect but once imperfect things like female masturbation and "sexual liberation" are introduced the perfect facade crumbles, white men can't play basketball right any more, and white men get iron marks on their suits.
When I saw The Pink Cloud in this story, an environmental hazard that fuses things together, I thought this story was doing meta commentary on itself and it would end in a mockery of its own premise. That or the "It was all the CMCs playing DND" thing. Especially when all exposure to Pink Cloud does to LP is fuse her Pip-Buck to her limb even though this changes nothing and doesn't hurt her and she never took the damn thing off anyway.
That makes sense.
It would only take a few tweaks to make this a brilliant work of parody, a subtle intentional satire of its own concept.
Littlepip has three modes when it comes to doing things: Looty-shooty, doing what she's told, and trying to kill villains. Her plan for "fixing equestria" begins and ends at slaughtering everyone her civilian morality deems a villain and hoping this magically fixes things.
It's a good thing the author always goes along with what she wants and makes her right even when she shouldn't be. Covering yourself with a cum-soaked bedsheet to sneak past guards? Works perfectly! Killing all the baddies and exploring randomly until you find The World's Biggest Magical Undo Button right next to the smoldering wreckage of The World's Biggest Rubber Band Ball? That's perfect for undoing the apocalypse and instantly fixing everything ever so much that the next generation of ponies openly doubts that what their parents went through could ever happen (Even though Memory Orbs still exist but the author forgot about those)
Kkat could push Littlepip further over the edge with each kill while pointing out how killing desperate ponies trying to make ends meet and ensure they don't starve (Raiders) and desperate ponies who get paid to ensure SOMEBODY does constructive work in this hellish wasteland (Slavers) won't un-poison the land or un-choke the skies. With each kill, she could lose more of her excuse to kill.
>"I had to kill him and loot his pockets, Velvet! He was selling drugs on the street! And that's wrong!"
>"I had to kill him, Velvet! Sure, he was the only doctor for miles around besides you and he lived here for twenty years, but twenty two years ago he was one of many raider who killed the parents of a pony I met yesterday!"
>"We just risked our lives attacking this Slaver camp and slaughtered all the Slavers here. But it turns out the slaves we wanted to rescue were ex-raiders getting sent to a penal colony for raping fillies in Red-Eye's territory! So they had to die, Velvet!"
If baddies were easily able to manipulate Littlepip into committing atrocities just by pretending to be a good guy and throwing out a sob story, it would be the perfect commentary on the "I'll take any job" murderhobo-for-hire nature of most DND-style heroes. All of that bullshit with the Gem Prison and the DJ's "Fuck you, Littlepip, don't save Slavers/Raiders from Raiders/Slavers!" would have worked better if Gawd played nice but was secretly a villain playing Team LP like a violin to end up in charge of Talon Company and the gem prison before kicking LP out of her new prison.
How many innocents do action heroes injure or kill during their epic battles with villains? How many laws do they break? How many stories ended on happy music even though the next day should have been suffering/certain death/a bad ending for everyone involved/a mountain of paperwork to deal with? Littlepip is a SHIT action heroine. She's annoying and stupid. She's sometimes egotistical and sometimes obnoxiously mopey/emo. It's not her skills or experiences that make her a combat god, it's her factory-default mass-produced PipBuck and her uncanny ability to reduce the intelligence of everyone around her with her mary sue aura. Everypony back in her Stable had at least one PipBuck and could have been as great as Littlepip or greater if pushed. If the Overmare sent out a search team armed with PipBucks AND the best guns/armour Stable Security had to offer, they would be a strike team of combat gods in a world of poorly-armed scavengers. Littlepip hasn't earned her power and she has no idea what to do with it, but she can't give it up, just like she can't give up the drugs that enhance her power further.
No matter how "Exciting and Action-y" or tragic and gory Littlepip's fights become, and no matter how many Dead Pony Diaries or MGSV Cassette Tapes or Pagies or Terminal Entries or random pieces of garbage she collects, she will never bring back Equestria and it would take a Deus Ex Machina to do it for her.
Just picture Littlepip standing in the burning wreckage of Neo Canterlot, the Slaver capital of the world rebuilt by slave labour and Red Eye, after killing everypony she thought was evil. "We did it, Velvet!" She cries with glee, blood coating her face and gun as embers smolder around her, for the sound of ponies screaming in fear ceased by her hoof long ago. "We saved Equestria!"
She could fight Red-Eye expecting awesomeness, getting sadness instead. Like Old Snake VS Ocelot.
Take it a step further! Say the sex and drugs and guns and rape happened because some human asshole introduced sex an drugs and rock and roll to ponyland before being killed by a monster he created (a junkie who killed and robbed him). He couldn't appreciate the sweet innocent pony shows so he introduced them to the human vices he considered "fun", only for that to ruin Equestria and swallow him whole. Then it went on to swallow more innocents, because vice is bad and pony virtues are good or something. Just like in that Christmas movie where a human gets the elves to listen to non-Christmasish music on the radio, immediately turning them violent. Or in that propaganda movie where a good guy and slut get sucked into the TV and end up in his favourite old-world American sitcom where everything's perfect but once imperfect things like female masturbation and "sexual liberation" are introduced the perfect facade crumbles, white men can't play basketball right any more, and white men get iron marks on their suits.
When I saw The Pink Cloud in this story, an environmental hazard that fuses things together, I thought this story was doing meta commentary on itself and it would end in a mockery of its own premise. That or the "It was all the CMCs playing DND" thing. Especially when all exposure to Pink Cloud does to LP is fuse her Pip-Buck to her limb even though this changes nothing and doesn't hurt her and she never took the damn thing off anyway.
>>298920
>Littlepoop has nothing she actually cares about, so she throws all of her energy into the maudlin false-empathy she displays for the ponies whose voices she hears in the recordings she collects. She convinces herself that these centuries-dead ponies to whom she has no direct connection are lost souls crying out for justice that only she can provide. So, she goes around beating up every slaver and firebombing every raider camp and looting every stable, because "justice." Ironically, all of this only serves to depress her further, because the more of this shit she does, the more she realizes that even this is a pointless goal; the past can never be changed, she still has nothing to live for in the present, and even if she succeeds in "fixing" the wasteland, she will still be the same boring, empty, purposeless twat she was to begin with. So, she keeps going, not because of some deep-rooted inner drive to do good, but simply because she has no better use for her time. She ruthlessly murders anypony her tacked-on boilerplate sense of morality tells her is "bad," and then wanders around the wasteland collecting random junk, because she's bored and empty and she can't think of anything better to do.
>Ironically, once again, the author has actually managed to make a much deeper statement than he ever intended or even realized he was making. Littlepoop is pretty much the quintessential modern millennial; in fact she is probably a subconscious self-insert for the author. Bored and rootless, depressed and directionless, completely lacking any serious sense of purpose, no strong ties to family or community, no meaningful friendships.
This is probably the most incisive breakdown of Littlepip I've seen in a while. Looking at her this way is pretty depressing - particularly with the knowledge of where the story eventually ends up going, and the fact that Kkat holds Pip in high esteem as a moral agent. The fact that Pip (and by extension Kkat) is actually subconsciously aware of just how vapid a person she is would be funny if it weren't also sad.
>All of this would be fine, if it weren't for the fact that we were just dropped into this scene with absolutely no preamble. As I said, nothing in the previous chapter was in any way resolved, we don't know where she is or how she got there, and we don't know what's wrong with her or what made her sick.
Skipping over the climaxes of major plotlines is a recurring pattern in this story, and it never stops.
>Naturally, this is the point where Velvet wakes up. She gets LP a drink of water and then cleans up her puke. This, of course, is fairly humiliating for her, since vomiting in front of your crush is considered a faux pas in most circles, and being pitied by your crush is even worse. In spite of everything I hate about her, I almost (almost) want to feel sorry for Littlepoop here, but everything else that's wrong with this scene makes this very difficult.
Case in point. Littlepip rubs one (or several) out next to a friend without her knowledge or consent, and we're supposed to feel sorry for how sick and pathetic she feels. You know, rather than contempt at the fact that she has no concept of decency or personal space, even with regard to the person she supposedly has romantic feelings for. This moment was probably intended as "see she's not a sue, she has moments of moral weakness!", but that's dubious as hell considering that she borderline molests Velvet here.
>An "outcast from an advanced civilization" presumably refers to Littlepoop, and I guess it's more or less accurate. Velvet's being a princess and Calamity's being a secret agent is news to me, though.
As clarified by the discussion of Pip's skills, he's referring to Pip, Velvet and Calamity respectively. This is one of the first indications that there's more to Calamity than meets the eye, which would be interesting it if wasn't immediately ignored and swept up in more wank about how incredibly skilled and powerful Pip is.
>I do not sn… oh crap!
Presumably this was supposed to have quotation marks somewhere.
>Littlepoop has nothing she actually cares about, so she throws all of her energy into the maudlin false-empathy she displays for the ponies whose voices she hears in the recordings she collects. She convinces herself that these centuries-dead ponies to whom she has no direct connection are lost souls crying out for justice that only she can provide. So, she goes around beating up every slaver and firebombing every raider camp and looting every stable, because "justice." Ironically, all of this only serves to depress her further, because the more of this shit she does, the more she realizes that even this is a pointless goal; the past can never be changed, she still has nothing to live for in the present, and even if she succeeds in "fixing" the wasteland, she will still be the same boring, empty, purposeless twat she was to begin with. So, she keeps going, not because of some deep-rooted inner drive to do good, but simply because she has no better use for her time. She ruthlessly murders anypony her tacked-on boilerplate sense of morality tells her is "bad," and then wanders around the wasteland collecting random junk, because she's bored and empty and she can't think of anything better to do.
>Ironically, once again, the author has actually managed to make a much deeper statement than he ever intended or even realized he was making. Littlepoop is pretty much the quintessential modern millennial; in fact she is probably a subconscious self-insert for the author. Bored and rootless, depressed and directionless, completely lacking any serious sense of purpose, no strong ties to family or community, no meaningful friendships.
This is probably the most incisive breakdown of Littlepip I've seen in a while. Looking at her this way is pretty depressing - particularly with the knowledge of where the story eventually ends up going, and the fact that Kkat holds Pip in high esteem as a moral agent. The fact that Pip (and by extension Kkat) is actually subconsciously aware of just how vapid a person she is would be funny if it weren't also sad.
>All of this would be fine, if it weren't for the fact that we were just dropped into this scene with absolutely no preamble. As I said, nothing in the previous chapter was in any way resolved, we don't know where she is or how she got there, and we don't know what's wrong with her or what made her sick.
Skipping over the climaxes of major plotlines is a recurring pattern in this story, and it never stops.
>Naturally, this is the point where Velvet wakes up. She gets LP a drink of water and then cleans up her puke. This, of course, is fairly humiliating for her, since vomiting in front of your crush is considered a faux pas in most circles, and being pitied by your crush is even worse. In spite of everything I hate about her, I almost (almost) want to feel sorry for Littlepoop here, but everything else that's wrong with this scene makes this very difficult.
Case in point. Littlepip rubs one (or several) out next to a friend without her knowledge or consent, and we're supposed to feel sorry for how sick and pathetic she feels. You know, rather than contempt at the fact that she has no concept of decency or personal space, even with regard to the person she supposedly has romantic feelings for. This moment was probably intended as "see she's not a sue, she has moments of moral weakness!", but that's dubious as hell considering that she borderline molests Velvet here.
>An "outcast from an advanced civilization" presumably refers to Littlepoop, and I guess it's more or less accurate. Velvet's being a princess and Calamity's being a secret agent is news to me, though.
As clarified by the discussion of Pip's skills, he's referring to Pip, Velvet and Calamity respectively. This is one of the first indications that there's more to Calamity than meets the eye, which would be interesting it if wasn't immediately ignored and swept up in more wank about how incredibly skilled and powerful Pip is.
>I do not sn… oh crap!
Presumably this was supposed to have quotation marks somewhere.
This scene is trying to make Littlepip look pathetic and vunlerable and imperfect. So why does Steelcunt suck her cock so goddamn hard with all this "your skills are in the top percentage and it makes no sense for a civilian to have them" talk?
Also how the fuck did Steelcunt survive? The Spell thingy they were trying to find just helped him get his suit unlocked so it could be repaired by a licensed PipBuck Repair Technician. Because as we all know... the skills mastered in civilian phone repair translate perfectly to the skills needed to repair military-grade 200-year-old pneumatic-assisted steel-plated murder suits enhanced further by magical healing systems and videogame HUD bullshit.
Did Pip heal him offscreen? Did he down some magocal healing elixir of life offscreen? Or is this the power of Ultra Plot Armour?
Also how the fuck did Steelcunt survive? The Spell thingy they were trying to find just helped him get his suit unlocked so it could be repaired by a licensed PipBuck Repair Technician. Because as we all know... the skills mastered in civilian phone repair translate perfectly to the skills needed to repair military-grade 200-year-old pneumatic-assisted steel-plated murder suits enhanced further by magical healing systems and videogame HUD bullshit.
Did Pip heal him offscreen? Did he down some magocal healing elixir of life offscreen? Or is this the power of Ultra Plot Armour?
>>299060
>Case in point. Littlepip rubs one (or several) out next to a friend without her knowledge or consent, and we're supposed to feel sorry for how sick and pathetic she feels. You know, rather than contempt at the fact that she has no concept of decency or personal space, even with regard to the person she supposedly has romantic feelings for. This moment was probably intended as "see she's not a sue, she has moments of moral weakness!", but that's dubious as hell considering that she borderline molests Velvet here.
This kind of thing seems more appropriate for a character like Floor Bored. Having no social skills or sense of propriety is a part of her character, and it could actually make her sympathetic since she might be making an honest attempt at intimacy without realizing how inappropriate it is. With Littlepoop though the act is just mildly nauseating.
>>298946
>"Yes Lilpoop is an anomaly what is so weird about it?"
<"Look into her eyes! No soul, only clopping and a makeshift personality that's constantly falling apart."
>"But drug addiction... sometimes. Has internal conflicts. Maybe?"
<"..."
>"She snores!"
This should be printed on the dustjacket of all future copies of Fallout: Equestria.
>>298942
>I hear this work was originally posted chapter by chapter on Google Docs and shilled by Equestria Daily every chapter. Nepotism lol. I also hear EQD refused non-FOE FIM+Fallout content to promote this.
That sounds about right. Equestria Daily seems to be the pony fandom equivalent of a publication like Vice or Buzzfeed, so I'm not even remotely surprised to learn they had a hand in popularizing this faggotry.
Also, it was the bit about the safes specifically that had me wondering if kkat had written in that dialogue specifically to address criticism he was receiving. Here, I'll quote it again:
>“An innocent young mare,” SteelHooves repeated, “Just out of a Stable. With refined criminal skills that let her pick every lock and hack every computer, even when nopony else in two hundred years has managed the feat.”
It's highly improbable that the locks on these safes are so sturdy that literally nopony has been able to figure them out for 200 years; that's completely silly. I don't claim to be an expert in locks or safe-cracking, but you know the old saying about 1000 monkeys and 1000 typewriters. Given a reasonably large population base with access to tools and enough time to experiment, it stands to reason that somepony would have figured out how to crack these safes eventually.
Kkat hasn't described the safes any better than he's described any of the other common elements in this world, but I'm not imagining bank-vault level security here. I'm picturing something closer to pic related. Also, if these things can be broken into using a bobby pin, it's definitely not high-level security. Also, at one point Littlepoop discovers a magazine on lockpicking, and uses the knowledge she gains from that to crack a more difficult safe. Even if it was a pre-war publication, it's still common knowledge that's floating around out there. Magazines are printed in high volume, so it stands to reason that there should be copies of this all over the place. Asking how or why she came to be so good at lockpicking is a reasonable question, but I can't imagine she's the only pony in the wasteland who ever figured it out, particularly when it doesn't even seem to be that hard to do in the first place.
The computer hacking is a little more of a unique skill. The technology is old, and I imagine hacking was not a common skill even when the tech was current, so I imagine there aren't too many ponies in the wasteland who know how to do it. Like the safes, the terminals are all over the place, but unlike the safes, they don't contain anything particularly valuable. Scavenging seems to be the chosen means of survival for most of the ponies in the wasteland, so it stands to reason they would be curious to crack open the locked metal boxes they keep finding scattered all over the place. The terminals, however, would be pretty useless, unless you're the sort of weird klepto who likes digging through 200 year old emails written by dead people. Ponies, whatever.
In any event, though, they are both skills that would probably be easy enough for most reasonably-intelligent unicorns to pick up if they had the time and inclination; neither one really singles out Littlepoop as any kind of prodigy.
>Shooting the stunned Alicorn in the face was the easy part. She had all the time in the world to line up her shot and deliver it as calmly as a surgeon administering anaesthetic.
>The alicorn was not "at full strength and unimpaired" when the kill happened. The Alicorn fell for a trick any Alicorn in the hive mind should have learned about long ago. The Alicorn's final hours were spent trapped in somepony else's memories adter triggering a memory orb by holding it with magic which is only sometimes okay to do.
>LP shooting a sitting duck is not the absurd part here. LP turning the deadly alicorn into a sitting duck is the absurd part. "you must be a badass commando oper8r or something" doesnt explain why the whole fucking world gets stupider and easier to dupe whenever Littlepip needs to outsmart somepony.
These are all good points.
>Case in point. Littlepip rubs one (or several) out next to a friend without her knowledge or consent, and we're supposed to feel sorry for how sick and pathetic she feels. You know, rather than contempt at the fact that she has no concept of decency or personal space, even with regard to the person she supposedly has romantic feelings for. This moment was probably intended as "see she's not a sue, she has moments of moral weakness!", but that's dubious as hell considering that she borderline molests Velvet here.
This kind of thing seems more appropriate for a character like Floor Bored. Having no social skills or sense of propriety is a part of her character, and it could actually make her sympathetic since she might be making an honest attempt at intimacy without realizing how inappropriate it is. With Littlepoop though the act is just mildly nauseating.
>>298946
>"Yes Lilpoop is an anomaly what is so weird about it?"
<"Look into her eyes! No soul, only clopping and a makeshift personality that's constantly falling apart."
>"But drug addiction... sometimes. Has internal conflicts. Maybe?"
<"..."
>"She snores!"
This should be printed on the dustjacket of all future copies of Fallout: Equestria.
>>298942
>I hear this work was originally posted chapter by chapter on Google Docs and shilled by Equestria Daily every chapter. Nepotism lol. I also hear EQD refused non-FOE FIM+Fallout content to promote this.
That sounds about right. Equestria Daily seems to be the pony fandom equivalent of a publication like Vice or Buzzfeed, so I'm not even remotely surprised to learn they had a hand in popularizing this faggotry.
Also, it was the bit about the safes specifically that had me wondering if kkat had written in that dialogue specifically to address criticism he was receiving. Here, I'll quote it again:
>“An innocent young mare,” SteelHooves repeated, “Just out of a Stable. With refined criminal skills that let her pick every lock and hack every computer, even when nopony else in two hundred years has managed the feat.”
It's highly improbable that the locks on these safes are so sturdy that literally nopony has been able to figure them out for 200 years; that's completely silly. I don't claim to be an expert in locks or safe-cracking, but you know the old saying about 1000 monkeys and 1000 typewriters. Given a reasonably large population base with access to tools and enough time to experiment, it stands to reason that somepony would have figured out how to crack these safes eventually.
Kkat hasn't described the safes any better than he's described any of the other common elements in this world, but I'm not imagining bank-vault level security here. I'm picturing something closer to pic related. Also, if these things can be broken into using a bobby pin, it's definitely not high-level security. Also, at one point Littlepoop discovers a magazine on lockpicking, and uses the knowledge she gains from that to crack a more difficult safe. Even if it was a pre-war publication, it's still common knowledge that's floating around out there. Magazines are printed in high volume, so it stands to reason that there should be copies of this all over the place. Asking how or why she came to be so good at lockpicking is a reasonable question, but I can't imagine she's the only pony in the wasteland who ever figured it out, particularly when it doesn't even seem to be that hard to do in the first place.
The computer hacking is a little more of a unique skill. The technology is old, and I imagine hacking was not a common skill even when the tech was current, so I imagine there aren't too many ponies in the wasteland who know how to do it. Like the safes, the terminals are all over the place, but unlike the safes, they don't contain anything particularly valuable. Scavenging seems to be the chosen means of survival for most of the ponies in the wasteland, so it stands to reason they would be curious to crack open the locked metal boxes they keep finding scattered all over the place. The terminals, however, would be pretty useless, unless you're the sort of weird klepto who likes digging through 200 year old emails written by dead people. Ponies, whatever.
In any event, though, they are both skills that would probably be easy enough for most reasonably-intelligent unicorns to pick up if they had the time and inclination; neither one really singles out Littlepoop as any kind of prodigy.
>Shooting the stunned Alicorn in the face was the easy part. She had all the time in the world to line up her shot and deliver it as calmly as a surgeon administering anaesthetic.
>The alicorn was not "at full strength and unimpaired" when the kill happened. The Alicorn fell for a trick any Alicorn in the hive mind should have learned about long ago. The Alicorn's final hours were spent trapped in somepony else's memories adter triggering a memory orb by holding it with magic which is only sometimes okay to do.
>LP shooting a sitting duck is not the absurd part here. LP turning the deadly alicorn into a sitting duck is the absurd part. "you must be a badass commando oper8r or something" doesnt explain why the whole fucking world gets stupider and easier to dupe whenever Littlepip needs to outsmart somepony.
These are all good points.
>>298923
There is a page break, and when the scene opens again Littlepoop is apparently over her mysterious ailment. We still don't know what disease she had or how she caught it, and I suspect the author has no intention of ever telling us (or more likely he just assumes we already know). We also still don't know what became of SteelHooves. It's obvious enough that he must have been healed somehow, but there are a lot of unanswered questions as to how exactly it happened. Again, I suspect the author simply feels that this does not require explanation, because once again he is just assuming that we can see whatever is in his head. In any event, who cares; Littlepoop isn't sick anymore, and SteelHooves is still alive for some reason. Moving on.
As Littlepoop is getting ready to hit the road, SteelHooves approaches her and informs her that he will be joining them:
>“I will be accompanying you to Tenpony Tower. After risking yourselves to save my life, escorting you safely to your destination is the least I can do.”
"After sustaining severe injuries in a battle I engaged in specifically to save you guys, I was lying in the throes of death. You left me there, completely exposed and in excruciating pain, for literal hours while you went goofing around in some abandoned stable, listening to old cassette tapes and watching memory orbs and cooking drugs and taking naps. Presumably, at some point, you eventually left the stable, wandered back to where I was, and presumably administered whatever treatment I required. I'm a little fuzzy on the details there for **some reason**. By some miracle I was still alive when you eventually wandered back, and for reasons that science could not possibly explain I have somehow made a complete recovery. I am apparently fine now, despite the fact that several of my vital organs were crushed and I was bleeding internally for, again, literal fucking hours while you faggots went dungeon-crawling. Apparently, either sepsis isn't a thing in Equestria, or else these potions literally do cure everything. Anyway, I really appreciate you guys apparently saving me when you finally got around to it, so I figured the absolute least I could do is risk life and limb for you again."
Wow, what a stand-up guy.
Also, I notice this group's destination seems to change around quite a bit. Tenpony Tower has been mentioned a few times before, and from what I gather it's the place where the DJ broadcasts from. I'm still not 100% clear on why they are doing this it's been explained by others in the thread that this is just another Fallout reference the author is assuming the reader will get, but as far as in-world logic goes LP's reasons for seeking the DJ are spotty at best, and moreover, they never seemed to actually settle on it as a destination. It seems like about half the time LP is talking about going to Tenpony Tower, and the rest of the time she seems to be following through with her original plan of going to Fillydelphia to bust up another slaver ring. They were in Manehattan earlier, and it was mentioned that Manehattan was on the way to Fillydelphia, so I assumed they had settled on Fillydelphia. However, now it seems like they're going to the tower again.
Part of the problem is that we don't know where any of these locations are in relation to each other. Is Tenpony Tower also on the way to Fillydelphia? If so, it would make sense as their next destination; however, this has never been clarified. I've been working under the assumption that the Tower was off in some other part of the world, and going there would be a complete detour. Shit like this is why a lot of fantasy authors will include a map of their setting in the back of the book. Fictional geography can be tough sometimes; your characters live in this world and presumably know where everything is located, but the reader does not. Even just a quickie MS-Paint map that shows approximately where everything is would make this story a lot easier to understand.
Anyway, for some unexplained reason, LP is ambivalent about accepting his offer.
>I frowned, looking about the room while I thought. The shack had three rooms, the bedroom, the main room, and a workroom in the back. Upon seeing the whole of it, I realized that SteelHooves had given me his own bed to sleep upon, and that everypony had slept on the floors save for me. It made me feel grateful and guilty.
Wow. So not only did this guy just lie there patiently, slowly bleeding to death while he waited for LP and her crew to finish screwing around in the stable, but he even gave Littlepoop his own bed to sleep in while she recovered from the flu or whatever the fuck she had. I can't imagine what about Littlepoop could possibly inspire this level of devotion on this soldier's part; literally everything bad that's happened to him recently is directly her fault. If he hadn't risked his life to save her from the alicorn trio, he could just be having a normal day right now, and so far she's mostly being a cunt to him. If I were in SteelHooves' position, I'd slip a timed explosive into her saddlebag when she wasn't looking and then send her on her merry way.
Anyway, she tells him to ask the others about it. He tells her that he already did, and they told him that she was their leader.
>What? Why? I was really the least qualified to be in charge. Because the radio kept saying so? I added that to the list of things to talk to DJ Pon3 about when we arrive to Tenpony Tower.
False modesty does not suit you, LP.
Anyway, this goes on for awhile. We get confirmation that SteelHooves is indeed the same pony who was dating Applejack in the memory orb earlier (he has some mementos of her around his house). How he has managed to live for more than 200 years is still a mystery, but I'm assuming it has something to do with his suit. Littlepoop tries to bring it up, but he plays it like he doesn't know what she's talking about.
There is a page break, and when the scene opens again Littlepoop is apparently over her mysterious ailment. We still don't know what disease she had or how she caught it, and I suspect the author has no intention of ever telling us (or more likely he just assumes we already know). We also still don't know what became of SteelHooves. It's obvious enough that he must have been healed somehow, but there are a lot of unanswered questions as to how exactly it happened. Again, I suspect the author simply feels that this does not require explanation, because once again he is just assuming that we can see whatever is in his head. In any event, who cares; Littlepoop isn't sick anymore, and SteelHooves is still alive for some reason. Moving on.
As Littlepoop is getting ready to hit the road, SteelHooves approaches her and informs her that he will be joining them:
>“I will be accompanying you to Tenpony Tower. After risking yourselves to save my life, escorting you safely to your destination is the least I can do.”
"After sustaining severe injuries in a battle I engaged in specifically to save you guys, I was lying in the throes of death. You left me there, completely exposed and in excruciating pain, for literal hours while you went goofing around in some abandoned stable, listening to old cassette tapes and watching memory orbs and cooking drugs and taking naps. Presumably, at some point, you eventually left the stable, wandered back to where I was, and presumably administered whatever treatment I required. I'm a little fuzzy on the details there for **some reason**. By some miracle I was still alive when you eventually wandered back, and for reasons that science could not possibly explain I have somehow made a complete recovery. I am apparently fine now, despite the fact that several of my vital organs were crushed and I was bleeding internally for, again, literal fucking hours while you faggots went dungeon-crawling. Apparently, either sepsis isn't a thing in Equestria, or else these potions literally do cure everything. Anyway, I really appreciate you guys apparently saving me when you finally got around to it, so I figured the absolute least I could do is risk life and limb for you again."
Wow, what a stand-up guy.
Also, I notice this group's destination seems to change around quite a bit. Tenpony Tower has been mentioned a few times before, and from what I gather it's the place where the DJ broadcasts from. I'm still not 100% clear on why they are doing this it's been explained by others in the thread that this is just another Fallout reference the author is assuming the reader will get, but as far as in-world logic goes LP's reasons for seeking the DJ are spotty at best, and moreover, they never seemed to actually settle on it as a destination. It seems like about half the time LP is talking about going to Tenpony Tower, and the rest of the time she seems to be following through with her original plan of going to Fillydelphia to bust up another slaver ring. They were in Manehattan earlier, and it was mentioned that Manehattan was on the way to Fillydelphia, so I assumed they had settled on Fillydelphia. However, now it seems like they're going to the tower again.
Part of the problem is that we don't know where any of these locations are in relation to each other. Is Tenpony Tower also on the way to Fillydelphia? If so, it would make sense as their next destination; however, this has never been clarified. I've been working under the assumption that the Tower was off in some other part of the world, and going there would be a complete detour. Shit like this is why a lot of fantasy authors will include a map of their setting in the back of the book. Fictional geography can be tough sometimes; your characters live in this world and presumably know where everything is located, but the reader does not. Even just a quickie MS-Paint map that shows approximately where everything is would make this story a lot easier to understand.
Anyway, for some unexplained reason, LP is ambivalent about accepting his offer.
>I frowned, looking about the room while I thought. The shack had three rooms, the bedroom, the main room, and a workroom in the back. Upon seeing the whole of it, I realized that SteelHooves had given me his own bed to sleep upon, and that everypony had slept on the floors save for me. It made me feel grateful and guilty.
Wow. So not only did this guy just lie there patiently, slowly bleeding to death while he waited for LP and her crew to finish screwing around in the stable, but he even gave Littlepoop his own bed to sleep in while she recovered from the flu or whatever the fuck she had. I can't imagine what about Littlepoop could possibly inspire this level of devotion on this soldier's part; literally everything bad that's happened to him recently is directly her fault. If he hadn't risked his life to save her from the alicorn trio, he could just be having a normal day right now, and so far she's mostly being a cunt to him. If I were in SteelHooves' position, I'd slip a timed explosive into her saddlebag when she wasn't looking and then send her on her merry way.
Anyway, she tells him to ask the others about it. He tells her that he already did, and they told him that she was their leader.
>What? Why? I was really the least qualified to be in charge. Because the radio kept saying so? I added that to the list of things to talk to DJ Pon3 about when we arrive to Tenpony Tower.
False modesty does not suit you, LP.
Anyway, this goes on for awhile. We get confirmation that SteelHooves is indeed the same pony who was dating Applejack in the memory orb earlier (he has some mementos of her around his house). How he has managed to live for more than 200 years is still a mystery, but I'm assuming it has something to do with his suit. Littlepoop tries to bring it up, but he plays it like he doesn't know what she's talking about.
>>299111
On a completely unrelated note, my brain has started reading all of SteelHooves' lines in the voice of the Cybernetic Ghost of Christmas Past from the Future, and it's one of the few things that's making this story bearable.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2a1LV1IeG8U
>DJ Pon3’s voice erupted from the back room. “Got your ears up, faithful listeners? Cuz I’ve been talkin’ and some of you ain’t been listenin’. For years now, I’ve been reminding you that ghouls and zombies ain’t the same thing. Ghouls are ponies who have had the misfortune of soaking up a major dose of magical radiation and not dying. That stuff twists and rots their bodies, but unlike zombies, their minds are still like those of any other pony, and they deserve t’ be treated as such.
This information would actually have been helpful like ten chapters ago; here it just feels completely out of left field.
This next bit could either be foreshadowing the plot of the next episode, or it could just be more random autism the author is bringing up that will never be mentioned again, or it could be something that seems like random autism that will never be mentioned again, but will actually be important in another seventy or eighty chapters when some obscure detail mentioned by the DJ here becomes mission-critical. You honestly never know with this cross-dressing faggot author, and I'm getting tired of trying to read his mind all the time. Anyway, in case it's important, here's this ridiculous bullshit:
>“Well, some of you ponies up in Tenpony Tower didn’t get the message. And when Sheriff Rottingtail kept pressin’ for him and his ghouls t’ be allowed inside, just cuz they were sick of being hounded by manticores an’ slaughtered by bloodwings, Chief Grim Star, the head of Tenpony security, responded by hiring a bunch of mercenaries to scour the tenements along the Celestia Line and wipe them all out.
>“In an interview, when asked how he had managed to be such a supreme douche bag, Chief Grim Star had this to say:”
>Another voice, gruff and irritated, came through the radio’s speakers. “Fuck off. I did what was right by those I swore to protect.”
>DJ Pon3’s voice returned. “Just warms the heart to know that there are ponies steadfastly defending prejudice and bigotry, doesn’t it? Thank you, Chief Grim Star and may Celestia bless you with a kiss from the sun.” The last certainly sounded like it was said through gritted teeth.
Hurr durr social commentary.
>I shook my head. On the one hoof, I actually felt relief to hear a news report that wasn’t about me. But on the other, I had experience with both ghoul-ponies like Ditzy Doo and actual zombie-ponies. I knew the difference. And the idea of somepony endorsing wholesale slaughter of innocent ghouls because they couldn’t be bothered to discern between them made me hurt and tinged my vision with red.
In other news, Littlepoop once again has sand in her vagina over some bullshit that has literally fuck-all to do with her. Who is she going to brutally murder in the name of justice this time? Stay tuned and find out.
Meanwhile, SteelHooves reads the expression on her face, and misinterprets her reaction to the DJ's comments. He assumes she is anti-ghoul, and is upset with the DJ for being pro-ghoul. Obviously, nothing could be further from the truth. She has this to say in response:
>“One of the wisest, kindest ponies I’ve met in this blasted hellscape is a ghoul-pony!” I spat at him. “Her name is Ditzy Doo, and she’s easily worth any three Steel Rangers put together. Not for fighting skills or fancy weapons, but for the quality of her character.” I stomped a forehoof hard enough to sprain it. “DJ Pon3 is right. And if you don’t get that, then you have no place traveling with us.”
"Yeah, don't trigger me you racist shitlord. It doesn't even matter that you mortally wounded yourself just to save me from alicorns who would have easily killed me if you hadn't been there, and then gave me your bed to sleep off my crack hangover or yeast infection or whatever the fuck was wrong with me for the first three sections of this chapter, even after I left you to die alone while I went dungeon exploring. The only thing that matters right now is that you're being prejudiced, and my off-the-shelf consumer-grade one-size-fits-all values system I ripped off the back of a cereal box and stapled to my sleeve to make up for my complete lack of actual convictions says prejudice is bad."
If nothing else, this story is proving to be an amusing psychological profile of its author.
Anyway, even though technically Littlepoop never said yea or nay to his coming along, it looks like SteelHooves has joined the party. Page break.
>I gazed at the leftover parts strewn across the workbench in Calamity’s wake. Now that I had all the parts to build my poisoned dart gun, I should use this opportunity to put it together.
Jesus Christ, is she still talking about building that stupid dart gun? At this point I'd like to see it get built just to eliminate it as a topic of discussion. The actual finished gun she can shove up her ass for all I care.
>The conversation from the night before still cast its shadow in my mind. I knew what Calamity and the Steel Ranger had talked about, and just how convincingly SteelHooves had woven doubts. Calamity knew I’d been eavesdropping. But neither of us had said anything.
It seems like the author is attempting to build some sort of tension between Calamity and Littlepoop. My guess is that he wants to have Calamity start doubting Littlepoop's intentions or identity or something, and this gradual mistrust on his part will eventually intersect with Littlepoop's jealousy over his relationship with Velvet. At some crucial moment in the plot, the tinder will explode and create an actual rift between them. At least that's what a competent writer would do; like I said, it's impossible to guess what this loony trap actually has in mind.
On a completely unrelated note, my brain has started reading all of SteelHooves' lines in the voice of the Cybernetic Ghost of Christmas Past from the Future, and it's one of the few things that's making this story bearable.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2a1LV1IeG8U
>DJ Pon3’s voice erupted from the back room. “Got your ears up, faithful listeners? Cuz I’ve been talkin’ and some of you ain’t been listenin’. For years now, I’ve been reminding you that ghouls and zombies ain’t the same thing. Ghouls are ponies who have had the misfortune of soaking up a major dose of magical radiation and not dying. That stuff twists and rots their bodies, but unlike zombies, their minds are still like those of any other pony, and they deserve t’ be treated as such.
This information would actually have been helpful like ten chapters ago; here it just feels completely out of left field.
This next bit could either be foreshadowing the plot of the next episode, or it could just be more random autism the author is bringing up that will never be mentioned again, or it could be something that seems like random autism that will never be mentioned again, but will actually be important in another seventy or eighty chapters when some obscure detail mentioned by the DJ here becomes mission-critical. You honestly never know with this cross-dressing faggot author, and I'm getting tired of trying to read his mind all the time. Anyway, in case it's important, here's this ridiculous bullshit:
>“Well, some of you ponies up in Tenpony Tower didn’t get the message. And when Sheriff Rottingtail kept pressin’ for him and his ghouls t’ be allowed inside, just cuz they were sick of being hounded by manticores an’ slaughtered by bloodwings, Chief Grim Star, the head of Tenpony security, responded by hiring a bunch of mercenaries to scour the tenements along the Celestia Line and wipe them all out.
>“In an interview, when asked how he had managed to be such a supreme douche bag, Chief Grim Star had this to say:”
>Another voice, gruff and irritated, came through the radio’s speakers. “Fuck off. I did what was right by those I swore to protect.”
>DJ Pon3’s voice returned. “Just warms the heart to know that there are ponies steadfastly defending prejudice and bigotry, doesn’t it? Thank you, Chief Grim Star and may Celestia bless you with a kiss from the sun.” The last certainly sounded like it was said through gritted teeth.
Hurr durr social commentary.
>I shook my head. On the one hoof, I actually felt relief to hear a news report that wasn’t about me. But on the other, I had experience with both ghoul-ponies like Ditzy Doo and actual zombie-ponies. I knew the difference. And the idea of somepony endorsing wholesale slaughter of innocent ghouls because they couldn’t be bothered to discern between them made me hurt and tinged my vision with red.
In other news, Littlepoop once again has sand in her vagina over some bullshit that has literally fuck-all to do with her. Who is she going to brutally murder in the name of justice this time? Stay tuned and find out.
Meanwhile, SteelHooves reads the expression on her face, and misinterprets her reaction to the DJ's comments. He assumes she is anti-ghoul, and is upset with the DJ for being pro-ghoul. Obviously, nothing could be further from the truth. She has this to say in response:
>“One of the wisest, kindest ponies I’ve met in this blasted hellscape is a ghoul-pony!” I spat at him. “Her name is Ditzy Doo, and she’s easily worth any three Steel Rangers put together. Not for fighting skills or fancy weapons, but for the quality of her character.” I stomped a forehoof hard enough to sprain it. “DJ Pon3 is right. And if you don’t get that, then you have no place traveling with us.”
"Yeah, don't trigger me you racist shitlord. It doesn't even matter that you mortally wounded yourself just to save me from alicorns who would have easily killed me if you hadn't been there, and then gave me your bed to sleep off my crack hangover or yeast infection or whatever the fuck was wrong with me for the first three sections of this chapter, even after I left you to die alone while I went dungeon exploring. The only thing that matters right now is that you're being prejudiced, and my off-the-shelf consumer-grade one-size-fits-all values system I ripped off the back of a cereal box and stapled to my sleeve to make up for my complete lack of actual convictions says prejudice is bad."
If nothing else, this story is proving to be an amusing psychological profile of its author.
Anyway, even though technically Littlepoop never said yea or nay to his coming along, it looks like SteelHooves has joined the party. Page break.
>I gazed at the leftover parts strewn across the workbench in Calamity’s wake. Now that I had all the parts to build my poisoned dart gun, I should use this opportunity to put it together.
Jesus Christ, is she still talking about building that stupid dart gun? At this point I'd like to see it get built just to eliminate it as a topic of discussion. The actual finished gun she can shove up her ass for all I care.
>The conversation from the night before still cast its shadow in my mind. I knew what Calamity and the Steel Ranger had talked about, and just how convincingly SteelHooves had woven doubts. Calamity knew I’d been eavesdropping. But neither of us had said anything.
It seems like the author is attempting to build some sort of tension between Calamity and Littlepoop. My guess is that he wants to have Calamity start doubting Littlepoop's intentions or identity or something, and this gradual mistrust on his part will eventually intersect with Littlepoop's jealousy over his relationship with Velvet. At some crucial moment in the plot, the tinder will explode and create an actual rift between them. At least that's what a competent writer would do; like I said, it's impossible to guess what this loony trap actually has in mind.
>>299114
Calamity notes that LP appears to have accepted SteelCock's offer to join them on theirmurderous rampage quest, and asks her what she thinks of him so far.
>I shrugged. I still wasn’t sure what to make of the Steel Ranger. I’d seen the shadows of both good and bad in him, but it was too soon to do anything more than to hop, skip and jump to conclusions.
Oh, blow me, you self-important cunt. You haven't seen the shadows of jack and shit; how could you have? You've barely exchanged three words with the guy.
In the previous chapter he was grievously wounded and most of the brief conversation centered around his injuries and how to cure them. We still don't know what took place after the chapter ended, but at the beginning of the current one LP is grievously ill. For that matter, we don't even know how she was able to ply her trade as a technician and repair his computer-powered-medical-thingy if she was delirious from fever. The more I think about it, this is actually a pretty serious plot hole; logically, this guy shouldn't even be alive right now, and that's not even taking into consideration the fact that he was bleeding internally for several hours before they even tried to save him. At any rate, the two of them haven't had enough interaction for LP to form any meaningful impression of him one way or the other. All that "shadows of good and bad" malarkey amounts to is this:
>good
he saved my life and let me sleep in his bed, even though I've done basically fuck-all for him
>bad
he said something politically-incorrect about ghouls and that makes him an icky-pants racist
Anyway, for some reason Calamity doesn't seem to trust SteelHooves either. Unless they're simply adhering to a general "don't trust strangers in the wasteland" mantra, I don't really see why either of them would be naturally suspicious of SteelHooves. He's done nothing that would suggest malicious intent, he saved their lives earlier, and he's letting them rest up in his house. He easily outguns all three of them, and if he wanted them dead he could have killed them by now, particularly since Littlepoop was borderline-unconscious with fever for the last several days and Velvet is basically useless in a fight. Moreover, he's going out of his way to help them despite the fact that they've caused him nothing but trouble so far. Seems pretty trustworthy to me; far more than Gawd, actually, to whom Littlepoop just handed over the keys to Shattered Hoof without a thought.
Anyway, the long and short of it is that neither of them trusts SteelHooves for whatever reason, but they agree that the ridiculous amount of firepower he seems to have will probably come in handy the next time they have to fight an alicorn.
>I nodded, having begun to worry about the next time we encountered those creatures. If my suspicions were right…
Also, while we're on the subject, Littlepoop, you can take your suspicions and blow them out your ass. You left the stable like three weeks ago tops, and since then you've done nothing but kill indiscriminately and sift through collections of moldy old tapes. You know literally fuck-all about this world or what's going on within it, and your assessment of virtually any situation is worthless; stop acting like you're some kind of battle-hardened combat specialist.
This line from Calamity might have something to do with his distrust of SteelHooves, at any rate:
>“Well, let’s jus’ say that the Steel Rangers ain’t exactly got a reputation as champions o’ the common pony.”
I'm not sure whether to read this as ominous foreshadowing, or if this is just another piece of Fallout lore that the author is assuming the reader will already know. In any case, for the time being he doesn't elaborate, and Littlepoop doesn't question him.
The scene ends with an insincere attempt at emotion. Calamity's mention of "reputations" calls to mind the conversation she overheard the previous night, which once again causes her to worry that he might now be doubting her. It appears that her primary fear at this point is being abandoned by Calamity and Velvet, and I suppose I don't blame her; if I were a dull, miserable little shit like Littlepoop, I wouldn't want to be left alone with myself either. Anyway, Calamity sees this in her expression, and reassures her that he trusts her. He gives a schmaltzy speech about how he knows she has a good heart:
>“Ah’ve seen yer heart, Li’lpip. Y’all genuinely want t’ help folk, an’ ya put yer own life at risk t’ do so, even when some of ‘em don’t deserve it. I ain’t gonna start questionin’ what I know ‘bout ya just cuz somepony who don’t know what he’s yappin’ ‘bout can get it twisted all up.”
This would probably not be my interpretation of her role in events thus far, but I'll leave that alone for the time being. What's more curious here is he seems to take it as a given that she is aware of what he and SteelHooves discussed, even though it was a private conversation that she only overheard by chance.
Anyway, after he says this Littlepoop gets all teary-eyed and hugs him. D'awww not really.
Page break. As the next scene opens, the party is (still) getting ready to leave. I forget whether I mentioned this or not, but SteelHooves has a memory orb on one of his shelves along with some mementos of Applejack. He notices Littlepoop staring at it, and tells her she can look into it if she wants. She does, and the scene dissolves into memory-land again.
Calamity notes that LP appears to have accepted SteelCock's offer to join them on their
>I shrugged. I still wasn’t sure what to make of the Steel Ranger. I’d seen the shadows of both good and bad in him, but it was too soon to do anything more than to hop, skip and jump to conclusions.
Oh, blow me, you self-important cunt. You haven't seen the shadows of jack and shit; how could you have? You've barely exchanged three words with the guy.
In the previous chapter he was grievously wounded and most of the brief conversation centered around his injuries and how to cure them. We still don't know what took place after the chapter ended, but at the beginning of the current one LP is grievously ill. For that matter, we don't even know how she was able to ply her trade as a technician and repair his computer-powered-medical-thingy if she was delirious from fever. The more I think about it, this is actually a pretty serious plot hole; logically, this guy shouldn't even be alive right now, and that's not even taking into consideration the fact that he was bleeding internally for several hours before they even tried to save him. At any rate, the two of them haven't had enough interaction for LP to form any meaningful impression of him one way or the other. All that "shadows of good and bad" malarkey amounts to is this:
>good
he saved my life and let me sleep in his bed, even though I've done basically fuck-all for him
>bad
he said something politically-incorrect about ghouls and that makes him an icky-pants racist
Anyway, for some reason Calamity doesn't seem to trust SteelHooves either. Unless they're simply adhering to a general "don't trust strangers in the wasteland" mantra, I don't really see why either of them would be naturally suspicious of SteelHooves. He's done nothing that would suggest malicious intent, he saved their lives earlier, and he's letting them rest up in his house. He easily outguns all three of them, and if he wanted them dead he could have killed them by now, particularly since Littlepoop was borderline-unconscious with fever for the last several days and Velvet is basically useless in a fight. Moreover, he's going out of his way to help them despite the fact that they've caused him nothing but trouble so far. Seems pretty trustworthy to me; far more than Gawd, actually, to whom Littlepoop just handed over the keys to Shattered Hoof without a thought.
Anyway, the long and short of it is that neither of them trusts SteelHooves for whatever reason, but they agree that the ridiculous amount of firepower he seems to have will probably come in handy the next time they have to fight an alicorn.
>I nodded, having begun to worry about the next time we encountered those creatures. If my suspicions were right…
Also, while we're on the subject, Littlepoop, you can take your suspicions and blow them out your ass. You left the stable like three weeks ago tops, and since then you've done nothing but kill indiscriminately and sift through collections of moldy old tapes. You know literally fuck-all about this world or what's going on within it, and your assessment of virtually any situation is worthless; stop acting like you're some kind of battle-hardened combat specialist.
This line from Calamity might have something to do with his distrust of SteelHooves, at any rate:
>“Well, let’s jus’ say that the Steel Rangers ain’t exactly got a reputation as champions o’ the common pony.”
I'm not sure whether to read this as ominous foreshadowing, or if this is just another piece of Fallout lore that the author is assuming the reader will already know. In any case, for the time being he doesn't elaborate, and Littlepoop doesn't question him.
The scene ends with an insincere attempt at emotion. Calamity's mention of "reputations" calls to mind the conversation she overheard the previous night, which once again causes her to worry that he might now be doubting her. It appears that her primary fear at this point is being abandoned by Calamity and Velvet, and I suppose I don't blame her; if I were a dull, miserable little shit like Littlepoop, I wouldn't want to be left alone with myself either. Anyway, Calamity sees this in her expression, and reassures her that he trusts her. He gives a schmaltzy speech about how he knows she has a good heart:
>“Ah’ve seen yer heart, Li’lpip. Y’all genuinely want t’ help folk, an’ ya put yer own life at risk t’ do so, even when some of ‘em don’t deserve it. I ain’t gonna start questionin’ what I know ‘bout ya just cuz somepony who don’t know what he’s yappin’ ‘bout can get it twisted all up.”
This would probably not be my interpretation of her role in events thus far, but I'll leave that alone for the time being. What's more curious here is he seems to take it as a given that she is aware of what he and SteelHooves discussed, even though it was a private conversation that she only overheard by chance.
Anyway, after he says this Littlepoop gets all teary-eyed and hugs him. D'awww not really.
Page break. As the next scene opens, the party is (still) getting ready to leave. I forget whether I mentioned this or not, but SteelHooves has a memory orb on one of his shelves along with some mementos of Applejack. He notices Littlepoop staring at it, and tells her she can look into it if she wants. She does, and the scene dissolves into memory-land again.
>>299114
I bet a proofreader told him he struggled to understand the Ghoul/Zombie stuff since the mindless feral ghouls were called Feral Ghouls in Fallout 3. So in the chapter he's writing now he adds some clarification because not even he wants to go back through this trash, even to add a paragraph explaining shit.
Is Kkat trying to reference the Fallout 3 "fuk da rich and racists" mission with this radio broadcast?
In Fallout 3, Tenpenny Tower exists and is full of mostly-white Haves. The nearby Have-Nots are ghouls living in filth who demand to be let into the tower. I think a rich asshole tells you to slaughter all those ghouls? And randomly blow up the town of Megaton which is made of scrap and scrap walls built around an unexploded nuke for no reason. There is one Atom Cultist fag in Megaton praising the bomb because bugthEAsderp think wacky=good writing. But if you do as the leader of the ghouls say and let them into the tower, the rich let these ghouls in without a fight. And then they slaughter all the rich and take over Tenpenny Tower for themselves. Even the nice rich people. The omniscient radio voice of DJ 3 Dog calls you a cunt if you don't let the ghouls take over. And if you get revenge by slaughtering the ghouls after they eat the rich DJ 3 Dog still calls you a cunt.
Kkat's attempt to fix this clumsy social commentary isn't much better. If you play the games you know it is right to ignore the ghouls or take them all out no matter what the radio nigger says about racism.
Also it's really fucking dumb that when Steeltoe (PAIN! STEEL! PAIN! STEEL!) Has this zigger moment where he assumes Littlepip is racist against Ghouls, it prompts her to think she saw his dark side or whatever.
If anything she should think "Pros: He is fucking strong and loyal and honourable. Cons: I know nothing of the Steel Rangers or their role in the world, he jumps to conclusions way too quickly, and he cannot avoid friendly fire when using explosives".
I bet a proofreader told him he struggled to understand the Ghoul/Zombie stuff since the mindless feral ghouls were called Feral Ghouls in Fallout 3. So in the chapter he's writing now he adds some clarification because not even he wants to go back through this trash, even to add a paragraph explaining shit.
Is Kkat trying to reference the Fallout 3 "fuk da rich and racists" mission with this radio broadcast?
In Fallout 3, Tenpenny Tower exists and is full of mostly-white Haves. The nearby Have-Nots are ghouls living in filth who demand to be let into the tower. I think a rich asshole tells you to slaughter all those ghouls? And randomly blow up the town of Megaton which is made of scrap and scrap walls built around an unexploded nuke for no reason. There is one Atom Cultist fag in Megaton praising the bomb because bugthEAsderp think wacky=good writing. But if you do as the leader of the ghouls say and let them into the tower, the rich let these ghouls in without a fight. And then they slaughter all the rich and take over Tenpenny Tower for themselves. Even the nice rich people. The omniscient radio voice of DJ 3 Dog calls you a cunt if you don't let the ghouls take over. And if you get revenge by slaughtering the ghouls after they eat the rich DJ 3 Dog still calls you a cunt.
Kkat's attempt to fix this clumsy social commentary isn't much better. If you play the games you know it is right to ignore the ghouls or take them all out no matter what the radio nigger says about racism.
Also it's really fucking dumb that when Steeltoe (PAIN! STEEL! PAIN! STEEL!) Has this zigger moment where he assumes Littlepip is racist against Ghouls, it prompts her to think she saw his dark side or whatever.
If anything she should think "Pros: He is fucking strong and loyal and honourable. Cons: I know nothing of the Steel Rangers or their role in the world, he jumps to conclusions way too quickly, and he cannot avoid friendly fire when using explosives".
>>299117
I noticed another detail to that could have made a good joke. Steel let her sleep on his bed and she decided in s horny fever state to furiously masturbate and vomit on it. Almost wish the story dwelled on them prepping to leave just so there could be a scene where he is cleaning up and noticed that little gift she left.
Also for the Steel Rangers not being known as heroes to the common folk that is a Fallout reference thing. The Brotherhood of Steel aren't the nicest people around and their sole concern is hoarding advanced technology to ensure no one else besides them has it since they don't trust anyone else to have it and not repeat the same mistakes of the past that doomed the world.
Of course that gets thrown out the window in Fallout 3 where they are super good guy Power Rangers who want to save the world. At least it's kind of retconed in Fallout 4 where they say the Chapter leader of the group in 3 was a bit of a renegade and took their group to DC to help with the Project Purity and didn't mind helping people.
I barely know anything about the Steel Rangers in Fallout Equestria though so not sure what their role is unless it's to hoard magical artifacts and devices for the same reason as the BoS with hunting alicorns as a side hustle.
I noticed another detail to that could have made a good joke. Steel let her sleep on his bed and she decided in s horny fever state to furiously masturbate and vomit on it. Almost wish the story dwelled on them prepping to leave just so there could be a scene where he is cleaning up and noticed that little gift she left.
Also for the Steel Rangers not being known as heroes to the common folk that is a Fallout reference thing. The Brotherhood of Steel aren't the nicest people around and their sole concern is hoarding advanced technology to ensure no one else besides them has it since they don't trust anyone else to have it and not repeat the same mistakes of the past that doomed the world.
Of course that gets thrown out the window in Fallout 3 where they are super good guy Power Rangers who want to save the world. At least it's kind of retconed in Fallout 4 where they say the Chapter leader of the group in 3 was a bit of a renegade and took their group to DC to help with the Project Purity and didn't mind helping people.
I barely know anything about the Steel Rangers in Fallout Equestria though so not sure what their role is unless it's to hoard magical artifacts and devices for the same reason as the BoS with hunting alicorns as a side hustle.
>>296834
>big final boss that causes everything bad to ever happen
not really no, the eater is more of an opportunist, and shooting it actually isnt how its defeated. the most you could say is that the eater helped amare get some of his abilities but what that entails and how that works is left to the reader to theorize. if you're talking about amare, he was defeated by his own hubris, insisting to his evil egotistical boss that he would be nothing without him.
>big final boss that causes everything bad to ever happen
not really no, the eater is more of an opportunist, and shooting it actually isnt how its defeated. the most you could say is that the eater helped amare get some of his abilities but what that entails and how that works is left to the reader to theorize. if you're talking about amare, he was defeated by his own hubris, insisting to his evil egotistical boss that he would be nothing without him.
>>299114
>>“Well, some of you ponies up in Tenpony Tower didn’t get the message. And when Sheriff Rottingtail kept pressin’ for him and his ghouls t’ be allowed inside, just cuz they were sick of being hounded by manticores an’ slaughtered by bloodwings, Chief Grim Star, the head of Tenpony security, responded by hiring a bunch of mercenaries to scour the tenements along the Celestia Line and wipe them all out.
>>“In an interview, when asked how he had managed to be such a supreme douche bag, Chief Grim Star had this to say:”
>>Another voice, gruff and irritated, came through the radio’s speakers. “Fuck off. I did what was right by those I swore to protect.”
>>DJ Pon3’s voice returned. “Just warms the heart to know that there are ponies steadfastly defending prejudice and bigotry, doesn’t it? Thank you, Chief Grim Star and may Celestia bless you with a kiss from the sun.” The last certainly sounded like it was said through gritted teeth.
As >>299135 alluded to, this is a reference to a quest from Fallout 3. In the game, Tenpenny Tower is a (relatively) intact apartment building that's been claimed as a personal palace by a rich wannabe-aristocrat and his mercenaries. Tenpenny himself is a snobbish eccentric who likes to blow up random settlements for fun, and will pay you to blow up the starter town if you're so inclined. There's a group of ghouls living in a nearby subway who want into the tower, and in short, you're given the option of either slaughtering the ghouls or helping them invade the tower. Either way one group dies, but neither is particularly sympathetic in the first place.
FoE does something a little different with Tenpony Tower, as we'll see, which is a refreshing change on one hand and creates a fountain of whole new problems in the story on the other. To give credit where it's due, this broadcast is actually fairly elegantly constructed - it's exposition, foreshadowing and a(n admittedly blunt) hint at something the story's been dancing around for the past couple of chapters all in the space of a short paragraph.
>>299117
>I'm not sure whether to read this as ominous foreshadowing, or if this is just another piece of Fallout lore that the author is assuming the reader will already know. In any case, for the time being he doesn't elaborate, and Littlepoop doesn't question him.
It's both. In Fallout, the Brotherhood of Steel - obvious inspiration for the Steel Rangers - are a quasi-religious paramiliary group descended from the remains of the US military. They control much of the wasteland's remaining technology, weapons included, and view it as their duty to safeguard such things from falling into the wrong hands. In practice, that generally just means that they salvage or steal every single shiny thing that they can find. Using that technology to actually help people is a distant, distant second priority if it occurs to them at all. Fallout 3 turns this upside down by making the local chapter of the BoS into good guys, but we'll get to that eventually.
With the above in mind, a BoS Knight/Steel Ranger living by himself in a hut in the middle of nowhere is unusual. Not that anyone in the story thinks to acknowledge that.
>“Ah’ve seen yer heart, Li’lpip. Y’all genuinely want t’ help folk, an’ ya put yer own life at risk t’ do so, even when some of ‘em don’t deserve it. I ain’t gonna start questionin’ what I know ‘bout ya just cuz somepony who don’t know what he’s yappin’ ‘bout can get it twisted all up.”
What is it with other characters sucking Pip's ego off at every turn? We've had the DJ, Steelhooves and now Calamity do it in rapid succession, but aside from Steelhooves correctly pointing out her implausible combat skills, it doesn't seem to bear out. From what we've seen so far, she's motivated by vaguely defined feelings of outrage and disgust, with her libido and on-again-off-again drug habit clocking in as a close second. Not exactly a beacon of nobility and altruism.
>>“Well, some of you ponies up in Tenpony Tower didn’t get the message. And when Sheriff Rottingtail kept pressin’ for him and his ghouls t’ be allowed inside, just cuz they were sick of being hounded by manticores an’ slaughtered by bloodwings, Chief Grim Star, the head of Tenpony security, responded by hiring a bunch of mercenaries to scour the tenements along the Celestia Line and wipe them all out.
>>“In an interview, when asked how he had managed to be such a supreme douche bag, Chief Grim Star had this to say:”
>>Another voice, gruff and irritated, came through the radio’s speakers. “Fuck off. I did what was right by those I swore to protect.”
>>DJ Pon3’s voice returned. “Just warms the heart to know that there are ponies steadfastly defending prejudice and bigotry, doesn’t it? Thank you, Chief Grim Star and may Celestia bless you with a kiss from the sun.” The last certainly sounded like it was said through gritted teeth.
As >>299135 alluded to, this is a reference to a quest from Fallout 3. In the game, Tenpenny Tower is a (relatively) intact apartment building that's been claimed as a personal palace by a rich wannabe-aristocrat and his mercenaries. Tenpenny himself is a snobbish eccentric who likes to blow up random settlements for fun, and will pay you to blow up the starter town if you're so inclined. There's a group of ghouls living in a nearby subway who want into the tower, and in short, you're given the option of either slaughtering the ghouls or helping them invade the tower. Either way one group dies, but neither is particularly sympathetic in the first place.
FoE does something a little different with Tenpony Tower, as we'll see, which is a refreshing change on one hand and creates a fountain of whole new problems in the story on the other. To give credit where it's due, this broadcast is actually fairly elegantly constructed - it's exposition, foreshadowing and a(n admittedly blunt) hint at something the story's been dancing around for the past couple of chapters all in the space of a short paragraph.
>>299117
>I'm not sure whether to read this as ominous foreshadowing, or if this is just another piece of Fallout lore that the author is assuming the reader will already know. In any case, for the time being he doesn't elaborate, and Littlepoop doesn't question him.
It's both. In Fallout, the Brotherhood of Steel - obvious inspiration for the Steel Rangers - are a quasi-religious paramiliary group descended from the remains of the US military. They control much of the wasteland's remaining technology, weapons included, and view it as their duty to safeguard such things from falling into the wrong hands. In practice, that generally just means that they salvage or steal every single shiny thing that they can find. Using that technology to actually help people is a distant, distant second priority if it occurs to them at all. Fallout 3 turns this upside down by making the local chapter of the BoS into good guys, but we'll get to that eventually.
With the above in mind, a BoS Knight/Steel Ranger living by himself in a hut in the middle of nowhere is unusual. Not that anyone in the story thinks to acknowledge that.
>“Ah’ve seen yer heart, Li’lpip. Y’all genuinely want t’ help folk, an’ ya put yer own life at risk t’ do so, even when some of ‘em don’t deserve it. I ain’t gonna start questionin’ what I know ‘bout ya just cuz somepony who don’t know what he’s yappin’ ‘bout can get it twisted all up.”
What is it with other characters sucking Pip's ego off at every turn? We've had the DJ, Steelhooves and now Calamity do it in rapid succession, but aside from Steelhooves correctly pointing out her implausible combat skills, it doesn't seem to bear out. From what we've seen so far, she's motivated by vaguely defined feelings of outrage and disgust, with her libido and on-again-off-again drug habit clocking in as a close second. Not exactly a beacon of nobility and altruism.
1611419896.gif (4.8 MB, 457x343, nohardfeelings-ithinkitsfunnythesedays.gif)
>>299457
>littlepip getting her dick sucked
Character Shilling is when characters shill another character, typically because the author really wants you to think "Littlepip is awesome!" or "Littlepip is so kind!" or "Littlepip is so self-sacrificing!".
Authors who do this writing mistake are typically idiots who don't know about "Show, don't tell".
Remember the Poochie episode of The Simpsons, Itchy and Scratchy kept sucking Poochie off?
>Scratchy: Wow. Poochie is one outrageous dude!
>Itchy: He's totally in my face!
It can be done well when it's not out-of-place or obnoxious, but well-earned and reasonable that characters would start talking about other characters in such a way.
In John Wick, the baddies suck John Wick's cock for a while by calling him a super-deadly mega-badass who's nicknamed The Baba Yaga - The Boogeyman. It makes sense that they'd say this because they're warning each other about what a big deal he is. Then he turns out to be worth all that hype. (even though Baba Yaga doesn't mean Boogeyman, Baba Yaga is a specific mythical character who's a saggy-tittied Russian witch who lives in a shitty home and eats innocent kids. Babay means boogeyman in russian. That's what my Russian friend told me anyway)
Same deal with The Joker from the Batman movies. Alfred is all "Some men like The Joker just want to watch the world burn" and yep, that's this version of The Joker. A smart prick who wants everything to fall apart, wants to corrupt the heroes and "prove" everyones a cunt deep down, and is implied to be ex-military(sniping skills, IED-making skills, CQC skills, he knew about rough interrogation and criticized Batman's head-slamming, he easily fits into a military dance number without the makeup, he has military gear, he even mentions soldiers when he says when soldiers get fucked it's business as usual but when someone who's not supposed to die dies everyone loses their mind).
Character shilling sucks when it's obnoxious, out-of-place, and entirely artificial. But it sucks the hardest when it's completely at odds with what we see with our own eyes. It sucks when we see a character who acts one way, and then characters tell him and the audience they see it another way.
That last bit can be good, but it has to be done on purpose cleverly. Like how everyone in Beauty And The Beast thinks Gaston is a stand-up guy when he's really a cunt. And how everyone thinks Ciaphas Cain is this fearless all-knowing invincible badass when he's... Well he is pretty cool, but not fearless. When characters call these characters amazing and perfect it's cleverly ironic because the audience thinks "Actually Gaston is a cunt" or Cain is thinking "Actually I suck".
Also, it's stupid that this BoS Knight/Steel Ranger is just living alone in the middle of nowhere. Brotherhood Knights fight but their gear is mainly maintained by Brotherhood Scribes, the nerds who fix shit. They CAN wear Power Armour but it's more useful in a military sense on less-valuable soldiers. In the videogames it makes sense that you can repair your lasguns and power armour yourself by sacrificing other guns and spiky raider scrap armour on the spot without any need for specialized equipment/replacement parts manufactured in a workshop, but in a more realistic world you'd need more than some weird yellow scaffolding to take apart and maintain something that needs dedicated and incredibly rare training to wear. How does he live out here alone? What does he eat? Who cooks, who cleans, who maintains the damn place and makes sure nobody picks its lock and loots it, who makes sure Raiders don't take over the area surrounding it? If he can't take his power armour off on his own without that spell matrix key thingy Littlepip possibly got in the last chapter, what does he do if a mechanical fault or damage from a fight leaves him stuck out here? It's not like he has some special radio he can use to summon a Steel Ranger Rescue Squad to recover him/his body/his power armour.
>littlepip getting her dick sucked
Character Shilling is when characters shill another character, typically because the author really wants you to think "Littlepip is awesome!" or "Littlepip is so kind!" or "Littlepip is so self-sacrificing!".
Authors who do this writing mistake are typically idiots who don't know about "Show, don't tell".
Remember the Poochie episode of The Simpsons, Itchy and Scratchy kept sucking Poochie off?
>Scratchy: Wow. Poochie is one outrageous dude!
>Itchy: He's totally in my face!
It can be done well when it's not out-of-place or obnoxious, but well-earned and reasonable that characters would start talking about other characters in such a way.
In John Wick, the baddies suck John Wick's cock for a while by calling him a super-deadly mega-badass who's nicknamed The Baba Yaga - The Boogeyman. It makes sense that they'd say this because they're warning each other about what a big deal he is. Then he turns out to be worth all that hype. (even though Baba Yaga doesn't mean Boogeyman, Baba Yaga is a specific mythical character who's a saggy-tittied Russian witch who lives in a shitty home and eats innocent kids. Babay means boogeyman in russian. That's what my Russian friend told me anyway)
Same deal with The Joker from the Batman movies. Alfred is all "Some men like The Joker just want to watch the world burn" and yep, that's this version of The Joker. A smart prick who wants everything to fall apart, wants to corrupt the heroes and "prove" everyones a cunt deep down, and is implied to be ex-military(sniping skills, IED-making skills, CQC skills, he knew about rough interrogation and criticized Batman's head-slamming, he easily fits into a military dance number without the makeup, he has military gear, he even mentions soldiers when he says when soldiers get fucked it's business as usual but when someone who's not supposed to die dies everyone loses their mind).
Character shilling sucks when it's obnoxious, out-of-place, and entirely artificial. But it sucks the hardest when it's completely at odds with what we see with our own eyes. It sucks when we see a character who acts one way, and then characters tell him and the audience they see it another way.
That last bit can be good, but it has to be done on purpose cleverly. Like how everyone in Beauty And The Beast thinks Gaston is a stand-up guy when he's really a cunt. And how everyone thinks Ciaphas Cain is this fearless all-knowing invincible badass when he's... Well he is pretty cool, but not fearless. When characters call these characters amazing and perfect it's cleverly ironic because the audience thinks "Actually Gaston is a cunt" or Cain is thinking "Actually I suck".
Also, it's stupid that this BoS Knight/Steel Ranger is just living alone in the middle of nowhere. Brotherhood Knights fight but their gear is mainly maintained by Brotherhood Scribes, the nerds who fix shit. They CAN wear Power Armour but it's more useful in a military sense on less-valuable soldiers. In the videogames it makes sense that you can repair your lasguns and power armour yourself by sacrificing other guns and spiky raider scrap armour on the spot without any need for specialized equipment/replacement parts manufactured in a workshop, but in a more realistic world you'd need more than some weird yellow scaffolding to take apart and maintain something that needs dedicated and incredibly rare training to wear. How does he live out here alone? What does he eat? Who cooks, who cleans, who maintains the damn place and makes sure nobody picks its lock and loots it, who makes sure Raiders don't take over the area surrounding it? If he can't take his power armour off on his own without that spell matrix key thingy Littlepip possibly got in the last chapter, what does he do if a mechanical fault or damage from a fight leaves him stuck out here? It's not like he has some special radio he can use to summon a Steel Ranger Rescue Squad to recover him/his body/his power armour.
>>299503
>It can be done well when it's not out-of-place or obnoxious, but well-earned and reasonable that characters would start talking about other characters in such a way.
Pretty much. It makes sense when what's being said about the character is borne out by their prior actions. Wick consistently slaughters his enemies, so it makes sense that the survivors are terrified. The Joker consistently commits crimes designed to cause as much anarchy and chaos as possible rather than for personal gain, so Alfred deduces his motive.
Meanwhile, Littlepip shoots and loots indiscriminately, abuses drugs, vomits and masturbates next to her sleeping friends, and gets treated like a paragon. There is a disconnect here.
>It can be done well when it's not out-of-place or obnoxious, but well-earned and reasonable that characters would start talking about other characters in such a way.
Pretty much. It makes sense when what's being said about the character is borne out by their prior actions. Wick consistently slaughters his enemies, so it makes sense that the survivors are terrified. The Joker consistently commits crimes designed to cause as much anarchy and chaos as possible rather than for personal gain, so Alfred deduces his motive.
Meanwhile, Littlepip shoots and loots indiscriminately, abuses drugs, vomits and masturbates next to her sleeping friends, and gets treated like a paragon. There is a disconnect here.
>>299510
Kkat could have fixed this by turning these shilling sessions into "Littlepip, you are normally amazing but your alcoholism and drug use is destroying you! You are normally a badass sharpshooter who is way cooler than the vomiting masturbating faggot going through random withdrawal symptoms! Stop doing drugs so you can be what us Wastelanders consider moral and heroic: the best looting shooter who looks out for herself and her friends and nobody else!"
Kkat could have fixed this by turning these shilling sessions into "Littlepip, you are normally amazing but your alcoholism and drug use is destroying you! You are normally a badass sharpshooter who is way cooler than the vomiting masturbating faggot going through random withdrawal symptoms! Stop doing drugs so you can be what us Wastelanders consider moral and heroic: the best looting shooter who looks out for herself and her friends and nobody else!"
>>299513
That's still shilling, just with a tone of short term concern. If Kkat wanted us to sincerely believe that Pip was a good-hearted person that struggles for the sake of others, she should have, well, struggled. Sacrificed. Failed and continued despite that, with the intention to learn and improve from her shortcomings. Built personal connections with the people she's helping and taken steps to ensure their well-being into at least the immediate future.
So far, virtually everything Pip's done seems to have been motivated by lust, curiosity, indignation at poorly-defined moral wrongs, and/or naked greed.
That's still shilling, just with a tone of short term concern. If Kkat wanted us to sincerely believe that Pip was a good-hearted person that struggles for the sake of others, she should have, well, struggled. Sacrificed. Failed and continued despite that, with the intention to learn and improve from her shortcomings. Built personal connections with the people she's helping and taken steps to ensure their well-being into at least the immediate future.
So far, virtually everything Pip's done seems to have been motivated by lust, curiosity, indignation at poorly-defined moral wrongs, and/or naked greed.
>>299535
You're correct. I forgot the big picture, I focused on how I could make these shilling moments feel slightly less retarded instead of saying Kkat should have written Littlepip to be so heroic she doesn't need shilling.
It doesn't seem to fit what we've seen so far from the characterization of these guys for them to just drop trou and suck off Littlepip for existing.
If anything, Steelcunt should say something like "The rumors say you're invincible. The radio said you're a hero. And I just watched you masturbate to your best friend in my own bed and throw up. I couldn't look away. It was like watching a train derail in slow motion. A very expensive, practically irreplaceable train. Good job there. Not like they needed that train. When I layied there dying on the dusty Wasteland ground, bleeding internally as piss leaked externally from my fluid purifier, I wondered why you were taking so long. I assumed you were fighting monsters in that Stable. But Velvet told me you did drugs, cooked some of your own, and prioritized some pointless mystery involving long-dead idiots and an AI that can't affect anything outside the Stable over a life I trusted in your hooves. I'll still travel with you, because you eventually got to me and downed some more Party Time Mintals before repairing my suit's auto-repair system so it could heal me. It's a shame those drugs gave you that fever. I do owe you my life, because you eventually got around to saving it. And the Alicorns hate you almost as much as I hate them. So if I want to hunt Alicorns, I'll need to be there when they hunt you down. But my trust is something you'll have to earn back. After you wash my bedsheets and hang them to dry before we leave."
You're correct. I forgot the big picture, I focused on how I could make these shilling moments feel slightly less retarded instead of saying Kkat should have written Littlepip to be so heroic she doesn't need shilling.
It doesn't seem to fit what we've seen so far from the characterization of these guys for them to just drop trou and suck off Littlepip for existing.
If anything, Steelcunt should say something like "The rumors say you're invincible. The radio said you're a hero. And I just watched you masturbate to your best friend in my own bed and throw up. I couldn't look away. It was like watching a train derail in slow motion. A very expensive, practically irreplaceable train. Good job there. Not like they needed that train. When I layied there dying on the dusty Wasteland ground, bleeding internally as piss leaked externally from my fluid purifier, I wondered why you were taking so long. I assumed you were fighting monsters in that Stable. But Velvet told me you did drugs, cooked some of your own, and prioritized some pointless mystery involving long-dead idiots and an AI that can't affect anything outside the Stable over a life I trusted in your hooves. I'll still travel with you, because you eventually got to me and downed some more Party Time Mintals before repairing my suit's auto-repair system so it could heal me. It's a shame those drugs gave you that fever. I do owe you my life, because you eventually got around to saving it. And the Alicorns hate you almost as much as I hate them. So if I want to hunt Alicorns, I'll need to be there when they hunt you down. But my trust is something you'll have to earn back. After you wash my bedsheets and hang them to dry before we leave."
>>298547
Those poisoning the well attempts of yours are getting shittier each time you try it, cuck. Best part is I don't CARE what your actually retarded opinions are, Nigel, otherwise I wouldn't be laughing this hard at 0142 hours. Also, what a lovely set of blatantly stupid projections you've got going! You are an offense to general decency since you CANNOT objectively control your literal autistic spasms. All I've done is call out your niggerfaggotry while stating HOW you should stop being such a colossal basic bitch. You want a tl;dr of objectives on how to not be said colossal piece of shit? Fuck you, you quarter-kike twat, I've done that 10+ times now, and you STILL haven't accomplished ONE POSITIVE CHANGE. Cry harder bitch, your "b-b-buh everyone hatin' on m-m-me" moments are absolutely hilarious to see what inane dipshit "muh feelz r hurt goyz, i dindu nuffin rong!" responses are dropped next. Your own self-imposed lack of so-called >>>maturity<<< is the problem as to why NO ONE LIKES YOU. I have explained, THOROUGHLY, TIME and TIME AGAIN, what is wrong with you, and you have ZERO consistency when trying to deliver on your always fialed (((promises))) to cease being a filled shitcanoe. After all, correlation DOES exist to causation... except when brainlets like you can't get out of their victimhood mental midget mentality especially since you can't connect your floating mood spasms to how much of a shitty person you are. I don't find you annoying. No, I find you a disgusting subhuman abomination of a racemutt britnigger. Go kill yourself in a public park and feed the worms, you quarter-kike shitstain. That'll be the best action you can ever take.
>>299117
I distinctly recall this part with utter abhorrence. K "I love zebra dicks because I'm a gigantic cuck" kat has no idea of what he's even writing about. (Most) of the Brotherhood of Steel throughout Fallout 1, Fallout 2, and FN:V are a bunch of xenophobic ingrates. They're proud of being isolated, obnoxiously knowledgeable about technology, and even more obnoxiously proud of how they SHOULD prevent any advanced technologies from being used, even IF said tech could prevent World War 4! Why? "Because m-muh traditions sez so!" There's a rather abrupt few moments in F:NV when Veronica, a not-so-closeted faggot gal companion (and not ironically the WORST companion) casually mentions in offhanded manners that the BoS are close to relying on incest for their 'recruitment' possibilities. Yes, you read that right: the literal queerbitch is squicked out by rampant xenophobia and inability to adapt to changing conditions... because she was lambasted and essentially exiled for having a TEENAGE GIRL FLING with another girl of the (((holy order of technology))). This shit isn't quite Cult Mechanicus levels of unadaptive retardion, though it's damned close.
Even worse is the fact that there IS a good 'ending' for the Mojave Brotherhood of Steel, one that possibly could have been canon: an Independent (No Gods, No Masters) end in F:NV has the Brotherhood of Steel slowly adapt to the odd, technologically needy ways of New Vegas. They don't exactly like (depending on which of the 2 leaders [POTENTIALLY a third if you include one cut content NPC in the Mojave BoS ranks] is chosen to lead) what they're forced to give up, but in return for assurances against both the NCR and the Legion, they massively improve the infrastructure of an Independent New Vegas to the point where it becomes 100% self-sufficient. The choices made with Veronica are so-so: either she wanders off and dies as a hermit while sneaking in to fix 'ancient machines/technology' from time to time, or she isn't much of a butch dyke anymore and goes on to change a great deal of the Mojave Brotherhood of Steel's opinions in positive aspects. However, she still doesn't change their disgust towards faggots and queers, which is quite amusing.
Those poisoning the well attempts of yours are getting shittier each time you try it, cuck. Best part is I don't CARE what your actually retarded opinions are, Nigel, otherwise I wouldn't be laughing this hard at 0142 hours. Also, what a lovely set of blatantly stupid projections you've got going! You are an offense to general decency since you CANNOT objectively control your literal autistic spasms. All I've done is call out your niggerfaggotry while stating HOW you should stop being such a colossal basic bitch. You want a tl;dr of objectives on how to not be said colossal piece of shit? Fuck you, you quarter-kike twat, I've done that 10+ times now, and you STILL haven't accomplished ONE POSITIVE CHANGE. Cry harder bitch, your "b-b-buh everyone hatin' on m-m-me" moments are absolutely hilarious to see what inane dipshit "muh feelz r hurt goyz, i dindu nuffin rong!" responses are dropped next. Your own self-imposed lack of so-called >>>maturity<<< is the problem as to why NO ONE LIKES YOU. I have explained, THOROUGHLY, TIME and TIME AGAIN, what is wrong with you, and you have ZERO consistency when trying to deliver on your always fialed (((promises))) to cease being a filled shitcanoe. After all, correlation DOES exist to causation... except when brainlets like you can't get out of their victimhood mental midget mentality especially since you can't connect your floating mood spasms to how much of a shitty person you are. I don't find you annoying. No, I find you a disgusting subhuman abomination of a racemutt britnigger. Go kill yourself in a public park and feed the worms, you quarter-kike shitstain. That'll be the best action you can ever take.
>>299117
I distinctly recall this part with utter abhorrence. K "I love zebra dicks because I'm a gigantic cuck" kat has no idea of what he's even writing about. (Most) of the Brotherhood of Steel throughout Fallout 1, Fallout 2, and FN:V are a bunch of xenophobic ingrates. They're proud of being isolated, obnoxiously knowledgeable about technology, and even more obnoxiously proud of how they SHOULD prevent any advanced technologies from being used, even IF said tech could prevent World War 4! Why? "Because m-muh traditions sez so!" There's a rather abrupt few moments in F:NV when Veronica, a not-so-closeted faggot gal companion (and not ironically the WORST companion) casually mentions in offhanded manners that the BoS are close to relying on incest for their 'recruitment' possibilities. Yes, you read that right: the literal queerbitch is squicked out by rampant xenophobia and inability to adapt to changing conditions... because she was lambasted and essentially exiled for having a TEENAGE GIRL FLING with another girl of the (((holy order of technology))). This shit isn't quite Cult Mechanicus levels of unadaptive retardion, though it's damned close.
Even worse is the fact that there IS a good 'ending' for the Mojave Brotherhood of Steel, one that possibly could have been canon: an Independent (No Gods, No Masters) end in F:NV has the Brotherhood of Steel slowly adapt to the odd, technologically needy ways of New Vegas. They don't exactly like (depending on which of the 2 leaders [POTENTIALLY a third if you include one cut content NPC in the Mojave BoS ranks] is chosen to lead) what they're forced to give up, but in return for assurances against both the NCR and the Legion, they massively improve the infrastructure of an Independent New Vegas to the point where it becomes 100% self-sufficient. The choices made with Veronica are so-so: either she wanders off and dies as a hermit while sneaking in to fix 'ancient machines/technology' from time to time, or she isn't much of a butch dyke anymore and goes on to change a great deal of the Mojave Brotherhood of Steel's opinions in positive aspects. However, she still doesn't change their disgust towards faggots and queers, which is quite amusing.
>>299566
I've already told you I'm 100% white. Continuing to correct you on that point or any of your other repeated incorrect points won't do much, will it? You'll just keep being an angry slanderous jew. But why? Are you projecting your hatred of my country's government onto me? I hate my country's government too.
My favourite part about the FNV's depiction of the Brotherhood Of Steel is how it deconstructs everything about them. Veronica is a good BOS member who wants it to change, but it can't be changed overnight by good intentions.
200 years after the bombs drop, settlements aren't afraid of the BOS any more. The safest thing the Brotherhood can do is lock themselves away in their bunker because they aren't willing to form good relationships with towns that could use their help. Raiders able to prey on every mistake the NCR makes while they're spread too thin to finish them off in a week see more success than the BOS ever did when they and Helios were considered a priority for the NCR. They're not as invincible as they think they are. They're killed by Deathclaws, they're killed by artillery barrages, and they lost many men at Helios because the NCR outnumbered them. This chapter is the embodiment of everything negative in what the original Brotherhood was: Small, irrelevant, unable to save the world single-handedly yet religiously dedicated to hoarding tech and knowledge that could save lives. In their current state, they can't be a major power or win the game. And their dedication to the "glorious Codex", a book of traditions and tactics and so on written hundreds of years ago, stops them from adapting to the changing conditions of the modern Wasteland. You need to give these dumbfucks plot armour and infinite resources like in Fallout 3 and 4 before they can be important.
But the best part has to be the Pulse Gun, a gun that fucks up power armour and robots. With this gun, one Jet-fueled junkie can fuck up multiple paladins. Power Armour's rare, expensive to maintain, and it requires training to use safely. And that superior training means nothing in the face of this gun. There are other guns that CAN pierce armour, but they're big. This thing's small, cheap, and accurate. It's not just a gun that kills BOS soldiers, it's the gun that kills the main advantage the BOS relies upon. It kills the hopes and dreams of the BOS. If it was mass-produced, the BOS would be fucked. And all this evidence that the BOS is wrong still isn't enough to stop them from being what the authors think of fundamentalists.
The BOS would need literal fucking magic to save themselves from a fate of irrelevancy or certain death or scariest of all, positive change. You'd need the power to magic endless soldiers and resources and giant robots and blimps into reality out of nowhere.
But...
Equestria has magic.
Fallout Equestria has magic.
Kkunt made his BOS knockoff into Earth Ponies because that's "authentic" to what he's ripping off mindlessly: stronk guys with big guns and moar metul plaet armur for extra stronk.
But a Unicorn in Power Armour...
If you say Power Armour blocks magic from getting through, it makes that armour useful in a world of enemy wizards but bad for BOS Unicorns.
But if Power Armour had some kind of "Horn Enhancer" or artificial horn built into it? Perhaps a VATS/SATS-like on-board targeting system complete with a searchable digital library of spells?
Suddenly it makes more sense that these faggots in steel cans are able to take on Alicorns, produce resources and ammo for themselves in the middle of buttfuck nowhere, and maintain their own power armour without the aid of dedicated technicians living with you in a bunker. Their decentralized scattered nature becomes an advantage, not a crippling weakness. Would you lose as many soldiers when you've got Brotherhood Priests, aka field-medic healers in Power Armour with magical shields and healing spells? And would losing soldiers be as big a deal when there are fertility spells to make mares produce Shrek's Nightmare numbers of foals, along with animation spells built into the Power Armour suits so the suits can take over if their pilot is ever killed or brainwashed or put to sleep?
What BOS soldier wouldn't want their soul captured and put into a giant BOS robot so they can continue to fight against the Brotherhood's enemies until they're no longer needed and allowed to ascend to pony heaven? They'd miss being able to eat and shit, but they can get that back after ascending.
Also, fuck Kkat for calling these guys the Steel Rangers.
The Rangers are something completely different. Combining these leather-duster survivalist sharpshooter badasses with the Power Armour-clad BOS makes no sense for their origin, tactics, personalities, or goals.
Kkat tries to make everything "Bigger" while ripping it off. Sometimes he'll combine multiple Fallout things. Often abandons what made the element interesting and unique in the first place. It's a shame that for the BOS, he only made it "Bigger" by building assorted big guns like grenade launchers and miniguns into their power armour while doing nothing creative with magic or the pony-world setting.
The BOS was created from US Army remnants. If the Pony BOS has the same origin, they should use some cool magical bullshit the Equestrian military had! Not that Kkat thought to give them magic portal-making radios or magically-refilling MRE boxes or even self-firing floating guns or anything like that at all.
The Sci-Fi Bullshit of Power Armour is a blank cheque just like Magic.
Combine the two and this armoured faggot Steeltoe could be powerful enough, and have enough interesting weapons and spells and powers, to make up for how bland and uninteresting he is! We'd all be on the edge of our seats wondering what awesome ability he'll pull out of nowhere next and what cool thing he'll do next, making him the best character in this story!
That last part's a joke, I know that's not how you write good characters now.
I've already told you I'm 100% white. Continuing to correct you on that point or any of your other repeated incorrect points won't do much, will it? You'll just keep being an angry slanderous jew. But why? Are you projecting your hatred of my country's government onto me? I hate my country's government too.
My favourite part about the FNV's depiction of the Brotherhood Of Steel is how it deconstructs everything about them. Veronica is a good BOS member who wants it to change, but it can't be changed overnight by good intentions.
200 years after the bombs drop, settlements aren't afraid of the BOS any more. The safest thing the Brotherhood can do is lock themselves away in their bunker because they aren't willing to form good relationships with towns that could use their help. Raiders able to prey on every mistake the NCR makes while they're spread too thin to finish them off in a week see more success than the BOS ever did when they and Helios were considered a priority for the NCR. They're not as invincible as they think they are. They're killed by Deathclaws, they're killed by artillery barrages, and they lost many men at Helios because the NCR outnumbered them. This chapter is the embodiment of everything negative in what the original Brotherhood was: Small, irrelevant, unable to save the world single-handedly yet religiously dedicated to hoarding tech and knowledge that could save lives. In their current state, they can't be a major power or win the game. And their dedication to the "glorious Codex", a book of traditions and tactics and so on written hundreds of years ago, stops them from adapting to the changing conditions of the modern Wasteland. You need to give these dumbfucks plot armour and infinite resources like in Fallout 3 and 4 before they can be important.
But the best part has to be the Pulse Gun, a gun that fucks up power armour and robots. With this gun, one Jet-fueled junkie can fuck up multiple paladins. Power Armour's rare, expensive to maintain, and it requires training to use safely. And that superior training means nothing in the face of this gun. There are other guns that CAN pierce armour, but they're big. This thing's small, cheap, and accurate. It's not just a gun that kills BOS soldiers, it's the gun that kills the main advantage the BOS relies upon. It kills the hopes and dreams of the BOS. If it was mass-produced, the BOS would be fucked. And all this evidence that the BOS is wrong still isn't enough to stop them from being what the authors think of fundamentalists.
The BOS would need literal fucking magic to save themselves from a fate of irrelevancy or certain death or scariest of all, positive change. You'd need the power to magic endless soldiers and resources and giant robots and blimps into reality out of nowhere.
But...
Equestria has magic.
Fallout Equestria has magic.
Kkunt made his BOS knockoff into Earth Ponies because that's "authentic" to what he's ripping off mindlessly: stronk guys with big guns and moar metul plaet armur for extra stronk.
But a Unicorn in Power Armour...
If you say Power Armour blocks magic from getting through, it makes that armour useful in a world of enemy wizards but bad for BOS Unicorns.
But if Power Armour had some kind of "Horn Enhancer" or artificial horn built into it? Perhaps a VATS/SATS-like on-board targeting system complete with a searchable digital library of spells?
Suddenly it makes more sense that these faggots in steel cans are able to take on Alicorns, produce resources and ammo for themselves in the middle of buttfuck nowhere, and maintain their own power armour without the aid of dedicated technicians living with you in a bunker. Their decentralized scattered nature becomes an advantage, not a crippling weakness. Would you lose as many soldiers when you've got Brotherhood Priests, aka field-medic healers in Power Armour with magical shields and healing spells? And would losing soldiers be as big a deal when there are fertility spells to make mares produce Shrek's Nightmare numbers of foals, along with animation spells built into the Power Armour suits so the suits can take over if their pilot is ever killed or brainwashed or put to sleep?
What BOS soldier wouldn't want their soul captured and put into a giant BOS robot so they can continue to fight against the Brotherhood's enemies until they're no longer needed and allowed to ascend to pony heaven? They'd miss being able to eat and shit, but they can get that back after ascending.
Also, fuck Kkat for calling these guys the Steel Rangers.
The Rangers are something completely different. Combining these leather-duster survivalist sharpshooter badasses with the Power Armour-clad BOS makes no sense for their origin, tactics, personalities, or goals.
Kkat tries to make everything "Bigger" while ripping it off. Sometimes he'll combine multiple Fallout things. Often abandons what made the element interesting and unique in the first place. It's a shame that for the BOS, he only made it "Bigger" by building assorted big guns like grenade launchers and miniguns into their power armour while doing nothing creative with magic or the pony-world setting.
The BOS was created from US Army remnants. If the Pony BOS has the same origin, they should use some cool magical bullshit the Equestrian military had! Not that Kkat thought to give them magic portal-making radios or magically-refilling MRE boxes or even self-firing floating guns or anything like that at all.
The Sci-Fi Bullshit of Power Armour is a blank cheque just like Magic.
Combine the two and this armoured faggot Steeltoe could be powerful enough, and have enough interesting weapons and spells and powers, to make up for how bland and uninteresting he is! We'd all be on the edge of our seats wondering what awesome ability he'll pull out of nowhere next and what cool thing he'll do next, making him the best character in this story!
That last part's a joke, I know that's not how you write good characters now.
>>299117
The memory appears to belong to SteelHooves. It also seems to take place before he underwent whatever procedure turned him into a cyborg. He is described as having an apple-green coat; however, since the memory is seen first-person through his eyes, all we see of him is a foreleg. As the scene opens, he appears to be giving comfort to Applejack before she goes onstage to address a group of ponies, seemingly about to tell them something they probably won't like.
>I (or more precisely, the pony I was “riding”) leaned close and whispered into her ear. “Now go on out there and make history. Or I’ll be forced to spank you.”
Legend has it Agamemnon once said the same thing to Achilles.
>Then I noticed that she had a holster strapped to one leg, mostly hidden beneath her formal attire. The ivory handle flashed three red apples as she walked.
The implication here seems to be that she is carrying the same weapon that Littlepoop herself now carries. This might be an interesting detail if the story hadn't already made clear the origins of that weapon.
Anyway, AJ goes to the podium and gives her speech. It appears that the group of earth ponies she commands has been working on some kind of secret project for the war effort. Twilight has sent some unicorns to help out with some aspect of the project, and this has resulted in tensions. It seems that the project is now complete, and she is about to unveil to them the fruits of their efforts.
Before she does this, however, she shares an anecdote about her brother Big Macintosh. It doesn't reveal any new information; we already know that he died saving Celestia from an assassination attempt or something. After she finishes with this, she orders her boyfriend to pull the cart to which he's harnessed onto the stage. AJ announces that the item displayed in the cart is the power armor they have been working on. The memory fades. Oh, also, at the very end she addresses the ponies as members of the Ministry of Technology; not sure if that matters or not. We're gradually getting the names down for these ministries, at any rate.
If I remember correctly, Twilight is the Ministry of Magic, Dash is the Ministry of Awesome, Ponk is the Ministry of...Cookies or some shit; I forget the name of hers, and Fluttershy is the Ministry of...Healing? I think? I guess I forgot the exact name there too. The medical one, at any rate. Anyway, we now know that Applejack is the Ministry of Technology, so that only leaves Rarity's to be identified.
>Moments later, the memory collapsed, the last sight lingering in my mind as my own world reasserted itself: a glance back at the display wagon and the magical power armor it was carrying. I looked to SteelHooves, sensing I now understood him far more than I had moments ago.
This orb didn't tell her anything about SteelHooves beyond confirming some things that she basically already knew. It revealed that he was romantically involved with Applejack, which she had already deduced from his personal effects, and that he is 200 years old, which he would have to be if he had known Applejack when she was alive. I really don't see how she can say she "understands" him better now than she did five minutes ago.
Also, it's a little odd that out of all the memories of Applejack he could have chosen to have preserved in an orb, this is the one he picked. Their relationship was obviously important enough to him that he still keeps mementos of her in his house. Out of all the memories of their time together, this is the one he wanted to keep? Not their first date, not some memorable afternoon they spent together, or the first time they met, or the last time they saw each other? This is what he wants to preserve? The day she gave a speech to a bunch of grumpy faggot-horses, showing off the steel coffin that he was to be later entombed in? This his how he chooses to remember Applejack?
To be fair, there's still a lot about the memory orbs that we don't understand yet. If, for instance, the process of extracting memories doesn't allow the subject pony to pick which specific memory is preserved, this could make sense. Maybe you just give the spell/mechanism a vague topic and it just grabs and preserves the first thing that comes to mind for you. Maybe when SteelHooves went in to have his memories pulled he just said "Applejack" and this is the memory it grabbed; then it would make sense. Sort of like if you wanted to remember your wife, but all your photos of her were burned in a fire, and all you had left of her was her driver's license or passport or something.
Anyway, it's a little weird that he would even pick this method of preserving his memories in the first place, since only unicorns can access the contents of a memory orb. Littlepoop noted this earlier too, btw, and it's never satisfactorily explained. There's quite a bit here that isn't being explained, and with this author it's a tossup as to whether or not it ever will be.
There's a page break, and when we rejoin the group they have (finally) left SteelHooves' shack. They have now reached the outskirts of Manehattan, but there is a fog and it is difficult to see much more than their immediate surroundings. Calamity sees and shoots a "radhog," which I'm assuming looks something like pic related. This is followed by a jocular conversation about eating bacon. The business with ponies eating meat in this story I just find confusing and awkward. My best guess is that the author had casually mentioned meat as a food source at some point early on (the kitchen of Twilight's old library is the earliest mention I can recall), probably without thinking about it, and someone had eventually pointed out that ponies don't eat meat, either irl or in the canon MLP universe, but instead of simply going back and editing out the handful of references to meat, he had to turn it into the subject of these autistic side conversations that keep popping up.
The memory appears to belong to SteelHooves. It also seems to take place before he underwent whatever procedure turned him into a cyborg. He is described as having an apple-green coat; however, since the memory is seen first-person through his eyes, all we see of him is a foreleg. As the scene opens, he appears to be giving comfort to Applejack before she goes onstage to address a group of ponies, seemingly about to tell them something they probably won't like.
>I (or more precisely, the pony I was “riding”) leaned close and whispered into her ear. “Now go on out there and make history. Or I’ll be forced to spank you.”
Legend has it Agamemnon once said the same thing to Achilles.
>Then I noticed that she had a holster strapped to one leg, mostly hidden beneath her formal attire. The ivory handle flashed three red apples as she walked.
The implication here seems to be that she is carrying the same weapon that Littlepoop herself now carries. This might be an interesting detail if the story hadn't already made clear the origins of that weapon.
Anyway, AJ goes to the podium and gives her speech. It appears that the group of earth ponies she commands has been working on some kind of secret project for the war effort. Twilight has sent some unicorns to help out with some aspect of the project, and this has resulted in tensions. It seems that the project is now complete, and she is about to unveil to them the fruits of their efforts.
Before she does this, however, she shares an anecdote about her brother Big Macintosh. It doesn't reveal any new information; we already know that he died saving Celestia from an assassination attempt or something. After she finishes with this, she orders her boyfriend to pull the cart to which he's harnessed onto the stage. AJ announces that the item displayed in the cart is the power armor they have been working on. The memory fades. Oh, also, at the very end she addresses the ponies as members of the Ministry of Technology; not sure if that matters or not. We're gradually getting the names down for these ministries, at any rate.
If I remember correctly, Twilight is the Ministry of Magic, Dash is the Ministry of Awesome, Ponk is the Ministry of...Cookies or some shit; I forget the name of hers, and Fluttershy is the Ministry of...Healing? I think? I guess I forgot the exact name there too. The medical one, at any rate. Anyway, we now know that Applejack is the Ministry of Technology, so that only leaves Rarity's to be identified.
>Moments later, the memory collapsed, the last sight lingering in my mind as my own world reasserted itself: a glance back at the display wagon and the magical power armor it was carrying. I looked to SteelHooves, sensing I now understood him far more than I had moments ago.
This orb didn't tell her anything about SteelHooves beyond confirming some things that she basically already knew. It revealed that he was romantically involved with Applejack, which she had already deduced from his personal effects, and that he is 200 years old, which he would have to be if he had known Applejack when she was alive. I really don't see how she can say she "understands" him better now than she did five minutes ago.
Also, it's a little odd that out of all the memories of Applejack he could have chosen to have preserved in an orb, this is the one he picked. Their relationship was obviously important enough to him that he still keeps mementos of her in his house. Out of all the memories of their time together, this is the one he wanted to keep? Not their first date, not some memorable afternoon they spent together, or the first time they met, or the last time they saw each other? This is what he wants to preserve? The day she gave a speech to a bunch of grumpy faggot-horses, showing off the steel coffin that he was to be later entombed in? This his how he chooses to remember Applejack?
To be fair, there's still a lot about the memory orbs that we don't understand yet. If, for instance, the process of extracting memories doesn't allow the subject pony to pick which specific memory is preserved, this could make sense. Maybe you just give the spell/mechanism a vague topic and it just grabs and preserves the first thing that comes to mind for you. Maybe when SteelHooves went in to have his memories pulled he just said "Applejack" and this is the memory it grabbed; then it would make sense. Sort of like if you wanted to remember your wife, but all your photos of her were burned in a fire, and all you had left of her was her driver's license or passport or something.
Anyway, it's a little weird that he would even pick this method of preserving his memories in the first place, since only unicorns can access the contents of a memory orb. Littlepoop noted this earlier too, btw, and it's never satisfactorily explained. There's quite a bit here that isn't being explained, and with this author it's a tossup as to whether or not it ever will be.
There's a page break, and when we rejoin the group they have (finally) left SteelHooves' shack. They have now reached the outskirts of Manehattan, but there is a fog and it is difficult to see much more than their immediate surroundings. Calamity sees and shoots a "radhog," which I'm assuming looks something like pic related. This is followed by a jocular conversation about eating bacon. The business with ponies eating meat in this story I just find confusing and awkward. My best guess is that the author had casually mentioned meat as a food source at some point early on (the kitchen of Twilight's old library is the earliest mention I can recall), probably without thinking about it, and someone had eventually pointed out that ponies don't eat meat, either irl or in the canon MLP universe, but instead of simply going back and editing out the handful of references to meat, he had to turn it into the subject of these autistic side conversations that keep popping up.
>>299614
In one of the stupider twists so far, the group apparently gets so worked up talking about radhog meat that they decide the thing to is to stop and have a cookout. They grill up the radhog that Calamity just shot, and Velvet sits off to the side sulking, because apparently the one conviction she has that she actually stands by is her vegetarianism. As Calamity lectures Littlepoop about which parts of a radhog are tastiest, Velvet lectures SteelHooves about not accidentally blowing them up by throwing grenades all over the place the next time they get into a fight. Yes, all of this autism is actually in the text.
There is a page break, and when the next scene opens Velvet and Calamity are talking about music or something, and Littlepoop is trying not to be jealous of how chummy they are getting. After awhile she gets tired of doing that, and drops back to ask SteelHooves a couple of fairly stupid questions out of absolutely nowhere.
>“The Ministry of Technology -- why M.W.T.?”
Has this acronym been mentioned anywhere? I don't recall seeing it, though in this story that doesn't always mean it wasn't mentioned. Anyway, if it wasn't mentioned anywhere during her travels, how would LP know that this is how this ministry abbreviated their name? As ever, it's unclear how much Littlepoop knew or ought to have known about the past before her journey started.
Anyway, if anyone cares, the acronym stands for Ministry of Wartime Technology, a name which Applejack apparently hated but didn't bother to change for some reason. It seems odd that she wouldn't, since it's an established fact that the ponies in charge of the ministries got to pick their names. If Celestia was okay with Rainbow Dash naming her ambiguously-defined organization the Ministry of Awesome, it stands to reason that AJ's shortening of Ministry of Wartime Technology to simply Ministry of Technology shouldn't have ruffled that many pegasus feathers. But whatever.
LP notices a flash in the sky, which she dismisses as probably nothing but Aurora Borealis, at this time of year, at this time of day, in this part of the country, localized entirely within this suburb of Manehattan. Meanwhile, Roboponer continues to flap his mechanical yap about the acronym:
> “Under the Ministry’s guidance and support, dozens of innovative technology industries blossomed across Equestria, and existing ones became a lot more powerful, their products becoming part of every pony’s daily life. Companies like Ironshod, Four Stars, Equestrian Robotics and even Stable-Tec.” He turned his helmeted gaze down towards my PipBuck. “So why use a name focused on war? It should have been the Ministry of Technology.”
Clearly he feels very strongly about this. Probably should have just bugged AJ to change it 200 years ago; it could have saved him the fuss of getting pissy about it now. Anyway, while he's droning on, she hears music, sees a blip on her map, and runs off like an autist to go see what it is. SteelHooves asks the group if she does this sort of thing terribly often.
>“Do what?” Calamity snickered. “Wander off? Break travel to explore random ruins? All the time.”
Not really; in fact, I think this is actually the first time. Anyway, page break.
The source of the music and the flash in the sky turns out not to have been the Northern Lights at all. Instead, in a building that her PoopBuck identifies as the Four Stars Grand Terminal and Central Offices, she encounters Frank.
Frank congratulates her on finding a new friend, and LP tells him that she is not quite sure SteelNigger is a friend just yet. This causes her to remember that she is none too certain about Frank yet either. Also, Frank recognizes SteelHooves' voice for some reason.
>That didn’t surprise me. SteelHooves’ voice was very distinctive. And ifWatcher Frank had been snooping on the Equestrian Wasteland for any length of time, it may very well have spied on the Steel Rangers.
This is reasonable enough, but do we know for a fact that there are more than one of these guys? >>299457 brought up a good point: though we don't yet know that much about the Steel Rangers, it's clearly some sort of military organization, and it stands to reason that these suits would require a great deal of maintenance. It seems unusual that one of these guys would be living on his own, and it seems unusual that no one would comment on this. The only situation where it wouldn't be unusual is if the group were defunct for some reason or if this guy was the last surviving one, but if that were the case Frank at the very least should be aware of it.
>Watcher Frank: now there was somepony who deserved to be suspected as a covert ops spy pony.
While we're on the subject, I have a number of questions about Frank as well. He's clearly meant to be something of an enigmatic character, and usually in these cases he'd be someone who is playing both sides and/or has a hidden agenda. However, his loyalty in this story is even murkier because there aren't any clear "sides" in the first place.
As far as I can tell this society is complete anarchy; apart from the occasional odd settlement like New Appleoosa there doesn't seem to be any kind of cohesive social structure. This Red Eye character we've heard mentioned in passing seems like he might be trying to organize something, but apart from that it doesn't seem like there are any complex social or political factions. So, who exactly does Frank work for? Who could he work for? And if he works alone, what is he even trying to accomplish? Why is he interested in Littlepoop? He seemed to take notice of her pretty early on, long before the DJ started blabbing about her on the radio. Apart from her status as the author's Chosen Mary Sue, is there any pragmatic reason why this enigmatic sprite-bot hacker would bother to pay attention to one lone pony wandering in the wasteland, out of all the hundreds of thousands who are doubtless doing the same thing?
In one of the stupider twists so far, the group apparently gets so worked up talking about radhog meat that they decide the thing to is to stop and have a cookout. They grill up the radhog that Calamity just shot, and Velvet sits off to the side sulking, because apparently the one conviction she has that she actually stands by is her vegetarianism. As Calamity lectures Littlepoop about which parts of a radhog are tastiest, Velvet lectures SteelHooves about not accidentally blowing them up by throwing grenades all over the place the next time they get into a fight. Yes, all of this autism is actually in the text.
There is a page break, and when the next scene opens Velvet and Calamity are talking about music or something, and Littlepoop is trying not to be jealous of how chummy they are getting. After awhile she gets tired of doing that, and drops back to ask SteelHooves a couple of fairly stupid questions out of absolutely nowhere.
>“The Ministry of Technology -- why M.W.T.?”
Has this acronym been mentioned anywhere? I don't recall seeing it, though in this story that doesn't always mean it wasn't mentioned. Anyway, if it wasn't mentioned anywhere during her travels, how would LP know that this is how this ministry abbreviated their name? As ever, it's unclear how much Littlepoop knew or ought to have known about the past before her journey started.
Anyway, if anyone cares, the acronym stands for Ministry of Wartime Technology, a name which Applejack apparently hated but didn't bother to change for some reason. It seems odd that she wouldn't, since it's an established fact that the ponies in charge of the ministries got to pick their names. If Celestia was okay with Rainbow Dash naming her ambiguously-defined organization the Ministry of Awesome, it stands to reason that AJ's shortening of Ministry of Wartime Technology to simply Ministry of Technology shouldn't have ruffled that many pegasus feathers. But whatever.
LP notices a flash in the sky, which she dismisses as probably nothing but Aurora Borealis, at this time of year, at this time of day, in this part of the country, localized entirely within this suburb of Manehattan. Meanwhile, Roboponer continues to flap his mechanical yap about the acronym:
> “Under the Ministry’s guidance and support, dozens of innovative technology industries blossomed across Equestria, and existing ones became a lot more powerful, their products becoming part of every pony’s daily life. Companies like Ironshod, Four Stars, Equestrian Robotics and even Stable-Tec.” He turned his helmeted gaze down towards my PipBuck. “So why use a name focused on war? It should have been the Ministry of Technology.”
Clearly he feels very strongly about this. Probably should have just bugged AJ to change it 200 years ago; it could have saved him the fuss of getting pissy about it now. Anyway, while he's droning on, she hears music, sees a blip on her map, and runs off like an autist to go see what it is. SteelHooves asks the group if she does this sort of thing terribly often.
>“Do what?” Calamity snickered. “Wander off? Break travel to explore random ruins? All the time.”
Not really; in fact, I think this is actually the first time. Anyway, page break.
The source of the music and the flash in the sky turns out not to have been the Northern Lights at all. Instead, in a building that her PoopBuck identifies as the Four Stars Grand Terminal and Central Offices, she encounters Frank.
Frank congratulates her on finding a new friend, and LP tells him that she is not quite sure SteelNigger is a friend just yet. This causes her to remember that she is none too certain about Frank yet either. Also, Frank recognizes SteelHooves' voice for some reason.
>That didn’t surprise me. SteelHooves’ voice was very distinctive. And if
This is reasonable enough, but do we know for a fact that there are more than one of these guys? >>299457 brought up a good point: though we don't yet know that much about the Steel Rangers, it's clearly some sort of military organization, and it stands to reason that these suits would require a great deal of maintenance. It seems unusual that one of these guys would be living on his own, and it seems unusual that no one would comment on this. The only situation where it wouldn't be unusual is if the group were defunct for some reason or if this guy was the last surviving one, but if that were the case Frank at the very least should be aware of it.
>
While we're on the subject, I have a number of questions about Frank as well. He's clearly meant to be something of an enigmatic character, and usually in these cases he'd be someone who is playing both sides and/or has a hidden agenda. However, his loyalty in this story is even murkier because there aren't any clear "sides" in the first place.
As far as I can tell this society is complete anarchy; apart from the occasional odd settlement like New Appleoosa there doesn't seem to be any kind of cohesive social structure. This Red Eye character we've heard mentioned in passing seems like he might be trying to organize something, but apart from that it doesn't seem like there are any complex social or political factions. So, who exactly does Frank work for? Who could he work for? And if he works alone, what is he even trying to accomplish? Why is he interested in Littlepoop? He seemed to take notice of her pretty early on, long before the DJ started blabbing about her on the radio. Apart from her status as the author's Chosen Mary Sue, is there any pragmatic reason why this enigmatic sprite-bot hacker would bother to pay attention to one lone pony wandering in the wasteland, out of all the hundreds of thousands who are doubtless doing the same thing?
>>299617
>I looked around for the sprite-bot, but the fog concealed it expertly. Instead, I spotted twin vending machines: Sparkle~Cola and Sunrise Sarsaparilla. And a third set just a few yards down from them: Ironshod’s Ammo Emporium. The last had been torn open and thoroughly looted. I felt a chill, imagining the kind of pre-war world where you could buy ammo along with your soft drinks at a street-side machine. No pony interaction necessary.
Yes, imagine buying your ammunition from a vending machine instead of just wandering around stealing it like a normal, goddess-fearing Equestrian.
Anyway, out of absolutely fucking nowhere, Littlepoop asks the following:
>“Watcher Frank, was there a Ministry of Awesome?” It was just a lead-in question; clearly, I already knew.
If you already knew, why are you asking? Why would you even ask this right now even if you didn't already know? Nothing about this subject is relevant to anything going on at present; the only reason I can think of that she might bring it up is because she doesn't trust Calamity, and wants to verify some of what he told her earlier. However, nothing about their interaction so far would indicate she feels this way.
Anyway, Frank just confirms what she already knew: there was a Ministry of Awesome headed by Rainbow Dash, and it didn't really do very much. After this completely random, pointless exchange, LP poses another random, pointless question. She takes out the statues she found, one of AJ and one of Rarity, and asks Frank what they are. He tells her that they are limited edition magical artifacts, and that only 42 of them exist in the world; seven sets of six statues. Once again, I'm not sure why this information is relevant at this time nor is it clear why LP would choose to ask, but there you have it.
Just to prove that LP isn't the only one here who blurts out random shit at random times, Frank suddenly says this:
>“Oh. Now I remember who your new friend sounds like.” The name Watcher told me made me glad I wasn’t drinking Sparkle~Cola again.
I'm assuming the reason she's glad she isn't drinking Sparkle-Cola is because the name was so shocking it would have made her spit it out? It's an awkward joke, wedged into an already awkward scene. Moreover, she doesn't tell us the name. There's no obvious reason why she should omit this detail from her narrative.
Anyway, after delivering this piece of information, the sprite-bot does it's usual schtick of cutting off Frank's voice mid-sentence and going back to blaring martial music and propaganda messages from Red Eye. The scene ends in a page break.
Pointless scenes are pretty much par for the course in this story, but even by the FoE metric this was a pointless scene.
>Four Stars was an elevated train company which had once provided public transportation for the Manehattan metropolis. SteelHooves suggested that, if the monorails were still intact, it would make the easiest route through the city, carrying us over the maze of rubble and away from most of the radiation-twisted aberrations and occasional raiders that lurked in the ruins.
This makes sense enough I suppose, although it would stand to reason that a 200 year old elevated monorail system that survived a nuclear explosion or whatever would be severely damaged in places and might not be safe to walk on. If they climb all the way up there and walk several miles along the elevated track, only to discover that a huge chunk of it is missing somewhere and they can't get across, they would have to backtrack, and would have realistically wasted a day of travel. However, since they don't seem to have anywhere particularly important to go in the first place, maybe this isn't a problem.
>It sounded like a good plan, so I stopped at a still-illuminated sign mapping out the rails. This station was part of the Luna Line. The Celestia Line, which crossed it at several points, lead straight to Tenpony Tower.
This at least solves the mystery of where Tenpony Tower is located. My working theory was that it was located somewhere on the road between Manehattan and Fillydelphia; apparently it's actually in Manehattan.
As I've mentioned, this author has an annoying habit of assuming either that we can see inside his head or that we already know what he's talking about. "Tenpony Tower" isn't in and of itself a very descriptive name; the word "tower" could refer to all sorts of structures. Considering that the DJ uses it as his broadcast headquarters, I've been envisioning something like a communications tower or an air-traffic control tower. Considering the quasi-fantasy setting of Equestria, it could refer to something like a castle tower as well. If it's just an old apartment building the way it's presented in Fallout (thanks to >>299457 and >>299135 for clarifying this; I certainly wouldn't have figured it out relying exclusively on the text) it's not clear why any of these characters would even know where it is in the first place. A single apartment tower in the middle of a giant city isn't exactly a major landmark, and I doubt the rail map would have it specially marked.
>Calamity finished rummaging through the garbage bins, returning with a surprising collection of sellable items and a few dozen bottle caps.
Traveling to the scenic ruins of Manehattan? Be sure to stop by our many alleys and do some casual rummaging through our 200 year old garbage cans.
Also: if bottle caps are currency in this world, why would there be any in the trash? Seems to me that's the first thing the bums would grab, and I refuse to believe that nopony in 200 years has ever thought of looking inside these trash cans.
>Velvet Remedy rolled her eyes. “Well, I hope that’s enough for you to buy a bath once we get to Tenpony.”
I'll ask again: why are they going to Tenpony exactly? They seem to have just settled on this place as a destination without ever formally discussing it, and LP's reasons for wanting to go there are ambiguous.
>I looked around for the sprite-bot, but the fog concealed it expertly. Instead, I spotted twin vending machines: Sparkle~Cola and Sunrise Sarsaparilla. And a third set just a few yards down from them: Ironshod’s Ammo Emporium. The last had been torn open and thoroughly looted. I felt a chill, imagining the kind of pre-war world where you could buy ammo along with your soft drinks at a street-side machine. No pony interaction necessary.
Yes, imagine buying your ammunition from a vending machine instead of just wandering around stealing it like a normal, goddess-fearing Equestrian.
Anyway, out of absolutely fucking nowhere, Littlepoop asks the following:
>“
If you already knew, why are you asking? Why would you even ask this right now even if you didn't already know? Nothing about this subject is relevant to anything going on at present; the only reason I can think of that she might bring it up is because she doesn't trust Calamity, and wants to verify some of what he told her earlier. However, nothing about their interaction so far would indicate she feels this way.
Anyway, Frank just confirms what she already knew: there was a Ministry of Awesome headed by Rainbow Dash, and it didn't really do very much. After this completely random, pointless exchange, LP poses another random, pointless question. She takes out the statues she found, one of AJ and one of Rarity, and asks Frank what they are. He tells her that they are limited edition magical artifacts, and that only 42 of them exist in the world; seven sets of six statues. Once again, I'm not sure why this information is relevant at this time nor is it clear why LP would choose to ask, but there you have it.
Just to prove that LP isn't the only one here who blurts out random shit at random times, Frank suddenly says this:
>“Oh. Now I remember who your new friend sounds like.” The name Watcher told me made me glad I wasn’t drinking Sparkle~Cola again.
I'm assuming the reason she's glad she isn't drinking Sparkle-Cola is because the name was so shocking it would have made her spit it out? It's an awkward joke, wedged into an already awkward scene. Moreover, she doesn't tell us the name. There's no obvious reason why she should omit this detail from her narrative.
Anyway, after delivering this piece of information, the sprite-bot does it's usual schtick of cutting off Frank's voice mid-sentence and going back to blaring martial music and propaganda messages from Red Eye. The scene ends in a page break.
Pointless scenes are pretty much par for the course in this story, but even by the FoE metric this was a pointless scene.
>Four Stars was an elevated train company which had once provided public transportation for the Manehattan metropolis. SteelHooves suggested that, if the monorails were still intact, it would make the easiest route through the city, carrying us over the maze of rubble and away from most of the radiation-twisted aberrations and occasional raiders that lurked in the ruins.
This makes sense enough I suppose, although it would stand to reason that a 200 year old elevated monorail system that survived a nuclear explosion or whatever would be severely damaged in places and might not be safe to walk on. If they climb all the way up there and walk several miles along the elevated track, only to discover that a huge chunk of it is missing somewhere and they can't get across, they would have to backtrack, and would have realistically wasted a day of travel. However, since they don't seem to have anywhere particularly important to go in the first place, maybe this isn't a problem.
>It sounded like a good plan, so I stopped at a still-illuminated sign mapping out the rails. This station was part of the Luna Line. The Celestia Line, which crossed it at several points, lead straight to Tenpony Tower.
This at least solves the mystery of where Tenpony Tower is located. My working theory was that it was located somewhere on the road between Manehattan and Fillydelphia; apparently it's actually in Manehattan.
As I've mentioned, this author has an annoying habit of assuming either that we can see inside his head or that we already know what he's talking about. "Tenpony Tower" isn't in and of itself a very descriptive name; the word "tower" could refer to all sorts of structures. Considering that the DJ uses it as his broadcast headquarters, I've been envisioning something like a communications tower or an air-traffic control tower. Considering the quasi-fantasy setting of Equestria, it could refer to something like a castle tower as well. If it's just an old apartment building the way it's presented in Fallout (thanks to >>299457 and >>299135 for clarifying this; I certainly wouldn't have figured it out relying exclusively on the text) it's not clear why any of these characters would even know where it is in the first place. A single apartment tower in the middle of a giant city isn't exactly a major landmark, and I doubt the rail map would have it specially marked.
>Calamity finished rummaging through the garbage bins, returning with a surprising collection of sellable items and a few dozen bottle caps.
Traveling to the scenic ruins of Manehattan? Be sure to stop by our many alleys and do some casual rummaging through our 200 year old garbage cans.
Also: if bottle caps are currency in this world, why would there be any in the trash? Seems to me that's the first thing the bums would grab, and I refuse to believe that nopony in 200 years has ever thought of looking inside these trash cans.
>Velvet Remedy rolled her eyes. “Well, I hope that’s enough for you to buy a bath once we get to Tenpony.”
I'll ask again: why are they going to Tenpony exactly? They seem to have just settled on this place as a destination without ever formally discussing it, and LP's reasons for wanting to go there are ambiguous.
>>299614
That memory orb scene's the perfect commentary on how this author treats characters.
There is no in-character reason why Steeltoe would choose to preserve, out of any memory he could have chosen, the first time he saw a suit he'd end up trapped inside. He could see that fucking thing every time he looked in a mirror. Why would he prioritize this memory over the first time he saw Applejack, dated Applejack, or fucked Applejack? He could store the happiest memory in his life right here, and Littlepip could accidentally stumble upon it by turning his memory orb on and getting forced to experience all that "icky horrifying" straight married vanilla pony sex complete with loving cuddles and hoof-holding and wholesome pillow talk. This could tear a massive rift in their relationship. Littlepip didn't just snoop around and read through his journal, she foolishly forced herself to experience his life, his memories, she forced herself to remember how he felt when he fucked Applejack. Would this retroactively make him a cuck? That's one for future historians to argue over.
Anyway, there's a huge opportunity to characterize Steeltoes through the memory he chose to store of her. It could have been a fancy date they had at a nice restaurant where everything went perfectly. Or it could have been their first date, an absolute mess both ended up enjoying and laughing about together once it was over. Or it could have been hot steamy motherfucking horse sex.
When he thinks of Applejack, would he think of a sweaty sleep-deprived hard-working farm-horse? Or would he think of her after a makeover from Rarity, with big hair and a fancy dress? Perhaps he broke his leg once and she brought him food in bed while he healed, and that hidden kind side of her is what he thinks of when he thinks of AJ. Or would he think of her sweaty disheveled post-workout/post-farming session appearance as beautiful, as the authentic Applejack he wants to remember?
It just makes no sense that Steeltoe would choose this memory in particular, because he didn't choose it.
Kkat chose to fill this memory orb with bullshit lore we practically already know, even though whatever gets revealed fundamentally means nothing to Steeltoe or Littlepip. Kkat decided the audience needed to know all the info in this scene and spell out that the Apple Gun once belonged to Applejack. So he denied himself and us everything good that could have been in this scene instead of the pointless exposition we got.
I genuinely hate the way Kkat prioritizes giving us random details about his headcanons and pre-war Fall Of Equestria side-story above making a meaningful story with the characters and setting Equestria died horribly for.
Equestria died for this. Equestria died so Littlepip could loot 10mm Pistols(TM) from Robot Factories(TM) and shoot Raiders(TM) in the ashes of an Equestria that suddenly invented some random Fallout elements and then died in hellfire and rape. Equestria died because good intentions are only enough when Kkat say they are, or when they need to be for his nonsense story to happen exactly the way he wants, logic and realism and the logic of storytelling be damned.
>>299617
Is Steeltoe's voice really that distinctive? It's not like he sounds like Yuri Lowenthal or Dan Green or Crystal Beef Arnold Mammoth. Crystal Beast Amber Mammoth sounds like Arnold "I'll be back and ban even more guns next term because I'm da govena of Californya" Swargzegnigger in Yugioh GX's english dub https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GOjNzHDtHJM
>covert ops spy pony
this is fucking retarded. if one faggot in the team is some blackops commando double agent it's probably not the 200 year old faggot in power armour whose name and allegiance everyone knows, and whose voice everyone recognizes.
>Frank favours Littlepoop
This is retarded. Aside from Mary Sueness, nothing particularly makes her some supernatural special fucking Digidestined chosen one.
It's not like Twilight Sparkle made some bunkers you need to solve magic puzzles to open, and the bunkers contain weaponry and survivalist/town-making supplies and Unicorn-only Memory Orbs that fill your head with useful knowledge and useful spells and Equestrian War trivia, but you need to be a pure-hearted Unicorn to turn the puzzles on and get a shot at completing these puzzles. That would be a smart way to give LP a reason to travel all over the Wasteland on the hunt for all these Zelda Breath Of The Wild-inspired shrines while doing sidequests/exploring interesting and important locations along the way, right? Frank could mark the locations of the shrines on her map because he wants to be Vice President of the New Equestria made by a fully powered-up and intellectually-enlightened Littlepip. Or the new head of its Ministry of Technology.
>ammo vending machine
this is retarded. Borderlands joked about this stupid concept for a reason. If I'd trust any species with guns it would be ponies. But not FE's Edgequestrian ponies, who became rapists and thieves as soon as the world ended.
>The Statuettes
Funny how Steeltoe doesn't want the AJ statuette even though it's a great memento of his dead wife, carrying the statuettes boosts your physical stats, he was alive when these fucking things were made and he's lived over 200 years so it's stupid that he never got one of these, and (MASSIVE SPOILER) these statuettes contain copies of Mane Six souls made when Rarity copied their souls with an enchanted doormat without them realizing it, then shaved off shards of her own soul and copypasted the soul data of her friends into most of those shards, suffering no ill effects and creating sets of immensely powerful magic items solely so they could be gamer collectables for the protag 200 years later.
>stupid name
Didn't the story already say his real name is Applesnack? If the story didn't say that plz don't read the spoiler.
>shitty rails
LP lifted frens and boxcars before, she could lift herself and frens over any gaps.
That memory orb scene's the perfect commentary on how this author treats characters.
There is no in-character reason why Steeltoe would choose to preserve, out of any memory he could have chosen, the first time he saw a suit he'd end up trapped inside. He could see that fucking thing every time he looked in a mirror. Why would he prioritize this memory over the first time he saw Applejack, dated Applejack, or fucked Applejack? He could store the happiest memory in his life right here, and Littlepip could accidentally stumble upon it by turning his memory orb on and getting forced to experience all that "icky horrifying" straight married vanilla pony sex complete with loving cuddles and hoof-holding and wholesome pillow talk. This could tear a massive rift in their relationship. Littlepip didn't just snoop around and read through his journal, she foolishly forced herself to experience his life, his memories, she forced herself to remember how he felt when he fucked Applejack. Would this retroactively make him a cuck? That's one for future historians to argue over.
Anyway, there's a huge opportunity to characterize Steeltoes through the memory he chose to store of her. It could have been a fancy date they had at a nice restaurant where everything went perfectly. Or it could have been their first date, an absolute mess both ended up enjoying and laughing about together once it was over. Or it could have been hot steamy motherfucking horse sex.
When he thinks of Applejack, would he think of a sweaty sleep-deprived hard-working farm-horse? Or would he think of her after a makeover from Rarity, with big hair and a fancy dress? Perhaps he broke his leg once and she brought him food in bed while he healed, and that hidden kind side of her is what he thinks of when he thinks of AJ. Or would he think of her sweaty disheveled post-workout/post-farming session appearance as beautiful, as the authentic Applejack he wants to remember?
It just makes no sense that Steeltoe would choose this memory in particular, because he didn't choose it.
Kkat chose to fill this memory orb with bullshit lore we practically already know, even though whatever gets revealed fundamentally means nothing to Steeltoe or Littlepip. Kkat decided the audience needed to know all the info in this scene and spell out that the Apple Gun once belonged to Applejack. So he denied himself and us everything good that could have been in this scene instead of the pointless exposition we got.
I genuinely hate the way Kkat prioritizes giving us random details about his headcanons and pre-war Fall Of Equestria side-story above making a meaningful story with the characters and setting Equestria died horribly for.
Equestria died for this. Equestria died so Littlepip could loot 10mm Pistols(TM) from Robot Factories(TM) and shoot Raiders(TM) in the ashes of an Equestria that suddenly invented some random Fallout elements and then died in hellfire and rape. Equestria died because good intentions are only enough when Kkat say they are, or when they need to be for his nonsense story to happen exactly the way he wants, logic and realism and the logic of storytelling be damned.
>>299617
Is Steeltoe's voice really that distinctive? It's not like he sounds like Yuri Lowenthal or Dan Green or Crystal Beef Arnold Mammoth. Crystal Beast Amber Mammoth sounds like Arnold "I'll be back and ban even more guns next term because I'm da govena of Californya" Swargzegnigger in Yugioh GX's english dub https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GOjNzHDtHJM
>covert ops spy pony
this is fucking retarded. if one faggot in the team is some blackops commando double agent it's probably not the 200 year old faggot in power armour whose name and allegiance everyone knows, and whose voice everyone recognizes.
>Frank favours Littlepoop
This is retarded. Aside from Mary Sueness, nothing particularly makes her some supernatural special fucking Digidestined chosen one.
It's not like Twilight Sparkle made some bunkers you need to solve magic puzzles to open, and the bunkers contain weaponry and survivalist/town-making supplies and Unicorn-only Memory Orbs that fill your head with useful knowledge and useful spells and Equestrian War trivia, but you need to be a pure-hearted Unicorn to turn the puzzles on and get a shot at completing these puzzles. That would be a smart way to give LP a reason to travel all over the Wasteland on the hunt for all these Zelda Breath Of The Wild-inspired shrines while doing sidequests/exploring interesting and important locations along the way, right? Frank could mark the locations of the shrines on her map because he wants to be Vice President of the New Equestria made by a fully powered-up and intellectually-enlightened Littlepip. Or the new head of its Ministry of Technology.
>ammo vending machine
this is retarded. Borderlands joked about this stupid concept for a reason. If I'd trust any species with guns it would be ponies. But not FE's Edgequestrian ponies, who became rapists and thieves as soon as the world ended.
>The Statuettes
Funny how Steeltoe doesn't want the AJ statuette even though it's a great memento of his dead wife, carrying the statuettes boosts your physical stats, he was alive when these fucking things were made and he's lived over 200 years so it's stupid that he never got one of these, and (MASSIVE SPOILER) these statuettes contain copies of Mane Six souls made when Rarity copied their souls with an enchanted doormat without them realizing it, then shaved off shards of her own soul and copypasted the soul data of her friends into most of those shards, suffering no ill effects and creating sets of immensely powerful magic items solely so they could be gamer collectables for the protag 200 years later.
>stupid name
Didn't the story already say his real name is Applesnack? If the story didn't say that plz don't read the spoiler.
>shitty rails
LP lifted frens and boxcars before, she could lift herself and frens over any gaps.
>>297578
of all the things that happens in project horizons, the blood hunger plague is one of the best ones, its implemented early, it kills some decent charachters, Blackjack has lots of personal stakes involving it thanks to the fate of 99 and it's a core gambit for one of the more memorable villains.
of all the things that happens in project horizons, the blood hunger plague is one of the best ones, its implemented early, it kills some decent charachters, Blackjack has lots of personal stakes involving it thanks to the fate of 99 and it's a core gambit for one of the more memorable villains.
>>299618
No sooner has the group settled on their plan to use the monorail tracks to traverse Manehattan, than Littlepoop has a fit of autism which compels her to break into the locked station building. There is, naturally, no reason whatsoever for her to do this; however, the combination of its being locked and its possibly containing more random junk for her to steal proves too tempting to resist. SteelHooves is the only one who bothers to question the logic of this:
>“What are you doing?” SteelHooves asked as he and the others joined me.
>“I want to see what’s inside,” I said simply, focusing on the lock. This was a hard one. Four Stars did not want to give up its secrets easily. Which only made me all the more intent on learning what those secrets were.
If Equestria had only invented the fidget-spinner, LP's entire life might have turned out differently.
Anyway, none of the others seem to mind. Calamity seems amused by what he regards as a harmless personality quirk. Again, since the group really doesn't have any particular objective and thus does not have an itinerary, it makes as much sense to take this detour into an abandoned train station as it does to do any of the other shit this group has done.
Still, it's worth pointing out that just a short while ago the text made it clear that Calamity and Velvet have defaulted to Littlepoop as their leader:
LP to Steelhooves, regarding his application to join the group:
>I sighed. “You’ll have to ask the others,” I said, cinching my saddlebags tight. I started to strap on the holsters and slings for my weapons.
Steelhooves, to LP:
>“I already spoke with them on this. They claimed you’re their leader.”
Let's pretend for a moment that this isn't a story, but a chronicle of real events set in a world that is as real as the one you and I presently occupy. There is no story, no characters, no author directing events behind the scenes; there is only real life, being lived out by these ponies in real time. There is no Fallout video game, there is no My Little Pony cartoon, there is only the real world in which these ponies live, and it exists without external references to hold it up. Now, from that mindset, try to imagine the following situation:
This little pipsqueak, who up until roughly three weeks ago has lived in total seclusion in an underground bunker, suddenly takes leave of the only home she's ever known, and goes wandering off into the anarchic hellscape that the outside world has become. After performing a series of random and improbable killings, she teams up with two ponies. Both of these ponies are older than she is, and one of them has lived in the wasteland far longer and has significantly more combat experience.
Now the little pipsqueak, in addition to having virtually no combat experience and no training or prior knowledge of weaponry, has no idea why she is even in the wasteland to begin with. She left her home on an impulse, knowing full well that she would not be allowed to return, without giving any serious thought to what she was going to do when the doors slammed shut behind her. She has no goals, no objectives, and no plans. On top of that, she seems to have literal autism, which manifests itself as a compulsive desire to break open every locked door she comes across just to see what's inside. She also has an absurdly unrealistic sense of her own abilities (all of which are bestowed upon her by a high-tech gizmo she wears on her wrist; she has few natural or acquired talents), and is possessed by an extremely warped sense of justice, which causes her to insert herself into events that don't concern her and pick fights with enemies who are much bigger and stronger than she is.
Now, who would you expect this group to pick as its natural leader? Would it be:
A) The experienced wastelander who knows about guns and stuff, or
B) The literally autistic teenage kleptomaniac with the death wish?
If you chose B, your name is probably kkat, and you may want to consider having yourself tested for HIV.
Anyway, Littlepoop breaks her way past the lock and gets into the train station. The lobby is about what we should expect at this point: dusty, dirty, full of skeletons. For some reason, there is also a turret on the ceiling, and it immediately opens fire on them. Someone really needs to sit down and have a chat with whoever designed the public buildings in Edgequestria. Also, I feel like it's worth pointing out that shit like this is a pretty good example of why breaking into every locked building you come across isn't really worth the trouble. Even if the group doesn't have a timetable or an actual goal, it would at least make sense to try and limit the amount of unnecessary danger they expose themselves to. These four are risking their lives again, and for what? Whatever random junk they find lying around this abandoned train station? Some old wax-cylinder recordings of a dead stranger's diary from 200 years ago? Velvet and Calamity (and now Roboponer) are following this crazy autist off a cliff, and there's not even any clear reason why they would want to in the first place. This story makes no sense.
Anyway, Velvet was apparently anticipating something like this, and puts up a shield. However, the shield for some reason doesn't protect them. Littlepoop is shot six times and Roboponer responds by blasting grenades all over the place, which brings the ceiling of the station down on top of them. The scene ends in a page break.
Littlepoop at least should be dead, but I'm willing to bet money that in the next scene she's just going to take a couple of healing potions and be fine. Let's find out.
Oh look, literally the first line after the page break:
>I returned to the wasteland of the living, alert and in pain; Velvet Remedy was pouring another extra-strength restoration potion down my throat. I choked, gasping.
Well gee whiz, kkat, you sure had me on the edge of my seat for all of half a second.
No sooner has the group settled on their plan to use the monorail tracks to traverse Manehattan, than Littlepoop has a fit of autism which compels her to break into the locked station building. There is, naturally, no reason whatsoever for her to do this; however, the combination of its being locked and its possibly containing more random junk for her to steal proves too tempting to resist. SteelHooves is the only one who bothers to question the logic of this:
>“What are you doing?” SteelHooves asked as he and the others joined me.
>“I want to see what’s inside,” I said simply, focusing on the lock. This was a hard one. Four Stars did not want to give up its secrets easily. Which only made me all the more intent on learning what those secrets were.
If Equestria had only invented the fidget-spinner, LP's entire life might have turned out differently.
Anyway, none of the others seem to mind. Calamity seems amused by what he regards as a harmless personality quirk. Again, since the group really doesn't have any particular objective and thus does not have an itinerary, it makes as much sense to take this detour into an abandoned train station as it does to do any of the other shit this group has done.
Still, it's worth pointing out that just a short while ago the text made it clear that Calamity and Velvet have defaulted to Littlepoop as their leader:
LP to Steelhooves, regarding his application to join the group:
>I sighed. “You’ll have to ask the others,” I said, cinching my saddlebags tight. I started to strap on the holsters and slings for my weapons.
Steelhooves, to LP:
>“I already spoke with them on this. They claimed you’re their leader.”
Let's pretend for a moment that this isn't a story, but a chronicle of real events set in a world that is as real as the one you and I presently occupy. There is no story, no characters, no author directing events behind the scenes; there is only real life, being lived out by these ponies in real time. There is no Fallout video game, there is no My Little Pony cartoon, there is only the real world in which these ponies live, and it exists without external references to hold it up. Now, from that mindset, try to imagine the following situation:
This little pipsqueak, who up until roughly three weeks ago has lived in total seclusion in an underground bunker, suddenly takes leave of the only home she's ever known, and goes wandering off into the anarchic hellscape that the outside world has become. After performing a series of random and improbable killings, she teams up with two ponies. Both of these ponies are older than she is, and one of them has lived in the wasteland far longer and has significantly more combat experience.
Now the little pipsqueak, in addition to having virtually no combat experience and no training or prior knowledge of weaponry, has no idea why she is even in the wasteland to begin with. She left her home on an impulse, knowing full well that she would not be allowed to return, without giving any serious thought to what she was going to do when the doors slammed shut behind her. She has no goals, no objectives, and no plans. On top of that, she seems to have literal autism, which manifests itself as a compulsive desire to break open every locked door she comes across just to see what's inside. She also has an absurdly unrealistic sense of her own abilities (all of which are bestowed upon her by a high-tech gizmo she wears on her wrist; she has few natural or acquired talents), and is possessed by an extremely warped sense of justice, which causes her to insert herself into events that don't concern her and pick fights with enemies who are much bigger and stronger than she is.
Now, who would you expect this group to pick as its natural leader? Would it be:
A) The experienced wastelander who knows about guns and stuff, or
B) The literally autistic teenage kleptomaniac with the death wish?
If you chose B, your name is probably kkat, and you may want to consider having yourself tested for HIV.
Anyway, Littlepoop breaks her way past the lock and gets into the train station. The lobby is about what we should expect at this point: dusty, dirty, full of skeletons. For some reason, there is also a turret on the ceiling, and it immediately opens fire on them. Someone really needs to sit down and have a chat with whoever designed the public buildings in Edgequestria. Also, I feel like it's worth pointing out that shit like this is a pretty good example of why breaking into every locked building you come across isn't really worth the trouble. Even if the group doesn't have a timetable or an actual goal, it would at least make sense to try and limit the amount of unnecessary danger they expose themselves to. These four are risking their lives again, and for what? Whatever random junk they find lying around this abandoned train station? Some old wax-cylinder recordings of a dead stranger's diary from 200 years ago? Velvet and Calamity (and now Roboponer) are following this crazy autist off a cliff, and there's not even any clear reason why they would want to in the first place. This story makes no sense.
Anyway, Velvet was apparently anticipating something like this, and puts up a shield. However, the shield for some reason doesn't protect them. Littlepoop is shot six times and Roboponer responds by blasting grenades all over the place, which brings the ceiling of the station down on top of them. The scene ends in a page break.
Littlepoop at least should be dead, but I'm willing to bet money that in the next scene she's just going to take a couple of healing potions and be fine. Let's find out.
Oh look, literally the first line after the page break:
>I returned to the wasteland of the living, alert and in pain; Velvet Remedy was pouring another extra-strength restoration potion down my throat. I choked, gasping.
Well gee whiz, kkat, you sure had me on the edge of my seat for all of half a second.
>>299676
>“Welcome back, Littlepip. We came very close to losing you,” Velvet’s voice was stern with worry.
Well, as close to losing you as possible in a world where potions make death virtually impossible.
>Calamity’s voice called out from somewhere further into the rubble. “Armor-piercing bullets.” His voice sounded disbelieving and alarmed.
Wow, disbelieving and alarmed? This situation is more serious than I thought.
Anyway, I forgot to mention this detail, but the skeletons inside the building are dressed in Steel Ranger armor. Come to think of it, if they are fully armored, how would LP even be able to see that they were skeletons? Well, whatever; Calamity tries to loot them, and Roboponer gets buttblasted about it because they were his brothers in arms or whatever the fuck. For the sake of my own sanity, I'm going to completely ignore the fact that Roboponer brought the ceiling down with grenades in the last scene and realistically everything in the room should be crushed and destroyed.
>I looked to Velvet Remedy who was prodding me to drink more. “Right. From now on, sneak into buildings that might not be friendly.”
It's unclear who actually speaks this line. It's also unclear what it means. Best I can figure, LP interprets Velvet's body language as meaning "in the future, we should sneak into potentially unfriendly buildings, instead of just barging in," as opposed to "why the fuck did we even break into this stupid train station in the first place?" or even "why the fuck would a train station have a robotic turret that fires armor piercing bullets mounted on the ceiling anyway?" In any event, it seems that once again, both LP and the author have failed to learn a valuable lesson.
Anyway, SteelHooves looks around and says:
>“You definitely got my attention,” he said and turned towards the nearest dead Ranger. “Now I want to know more about this building too.”
Literally why? Just because there are some dead rangers in here? I can see absolutely no reason why any of them (except LP, who is autistic) would have any desire to explore this place, particularly in light of the fact that they almost died just walking through the front door. THIS STORY MAKES NO SENSE.
>I nodded. “Okay. Let’s split up.” I considered keeping Velvet Remedy at my side, but realized it wasn’t the best play. “SteelHooves with me. Velvet, would you mind staying with Calamity? You two look into the rest of this floor and the basement. We’ll check out the offices upstairs.”
Jesus H. Christ, this character has reached levels of overt stupidity that not even teenagers in a horror movie could surpass.
Anyway, page break. The next scene opens with another out of context block of italicized text, which I have learned to recognize as journal entries, recordings, terminal messages, etc. In this case, the message is the only thing displayed on all of the terminals that LP has hacked in here. The contents of the message appear to be a bulletin for employees of the train station, telling them that they have each been issued a firearm which they need to keep on at all times, doubtless as a way of fighting the robotic turrets that were installed in the building for some idiotic reason. Also, there's some shit about cookies in here. THIS STORY MAKES NO SENSE.
ANYWAY, the scene opens with LP reading this terminal message for the umpteenth time, and then turns to SteelHooves and asks the weirdest question she could possibly ask:
>“SteelHooves, have you ever heard of someone named Flutterguy?”
Wait a minute. Wait a minute. I think I might have an idea where this is going, and I don't like it one bit.
>SteelHooves whinnied. “Why do you ask?”
>“Oh, I heard somepony say your voice sounded like Flutterguy.”
No. Please, just no. This story is so absurd already. If it's really headed in the absurd direction I think it's going, my brain might actually, physically break.
For the amusement of those who have read this story before, I will now present my theory of where I suspect this is going. However, please do not tell me whether or not I was right; I want to find out in due course. Here is my theory:
The author has deliberately led us to believe that SteelHooves is Applejack's old boyfriend Applesnack. This is probably true; however, the twist is that Applesnack is actually Fluttershy, who was in some kind of dyke relationship with AJ 200 years ago and then apparently had a sex change and then became a robot for some reason. Again, please don't tell me if I'm right.
>SteelHooves gave a little stomp. “Heard that before.” My ears perked. I’d figured it was a long shot at best that SteelHooves would have knowledge about the pony Watcher had mentioned. I opened my muzzle to ask, but he silenced me. “It’s just a joke.”
Anyway, this whole thing makes very little sense to begin with. Obviously, "Flutterguy" must be the name that was omitted when Frank was talking to LP earlier, the one that surprised LP enough that she would have spit out her cola had she been drinking any. However, it makes no sense that LP or even Frank would know this name, let alone what the voice sounded like. "Flutterguy" is, of course, the nickname that Spike gives to Fluttershy when poison joke causes her voice to deepen. This event technically occurred in this world's canon, but such an obscure detail from the distant past is unlikely to have been recorded anywhere. The only reason this is in here is because it's from the show and it would make fans chuckle, but there's no logical in-world reason for the name "Flutterguy" to mean anything to these characters. As far as cringe-worthy bronybait references go, this is one of the worst offenders I've yet come across, in this or any other story.
Anyway, it doesn't matter anyway because Steelcock denies it and LP doesn't press the issue any further. She goes back to her autismo investigations of 200 year old emails on the terminal.
>“Welcome back, Littlepip. We came very close to losing you,” Velvet’s voice was stern with worry.
Well, as close to losing you as possible in a world where potions make death virtually impossible.
>Calamity’s voice called out from somewhere further into the rubble. “Armor-piercing bullets.” His voice sounded disbelieving and alarmed.
Wow, disbelieving and alarmed? This situation is more serious than I thought.
Anyway, I forgot to mention this detail, but the skeletons inside the building are dressed in Steel Ranger armor. Come to think of it, if they are fully armored, how would LP even be able to see that they were skeletons? Well, whatever; Calamity tries to loot them, and Roboponer gets buttblasted about it because they were his brothers in arms or whatever the fuck. For the sake of my own sanity, I'm going to completely ignore the fact that Roboponer brought the ceiling down with grenades in the last scene and realistically everything in the room should be crushed and destroyed.
>I looked to Velvet Remedy who was prodding me to drink more. “Right. From now on, sneak into buildings that might not be friendly.”
It's unclear who actually speaks this line. It's also unclear what it means. Best I can figure, LP interprets Velvet's body language as meaning "in the future, we should sneak into potentially unfriendly buildings, instead of just barging in," as opposed to "why the fuck did we even break into this stupid train station in the first place?" or even "why the fuck would a train station have a robotic turret that fires armor piercing bullets mounted on the ceiling anyway?" In any event, it seems that once again, both LP and the author have failed to learn a valuable lesson.
Anyway, SteelHooves looks around and says:
>“You definitely got my attention,” he said and turned towards the nearest dead Ranger. “Now I want to know more about this building too.”
Literally why? Just because there are some dead rangers in here? I can see absolutely no reason why any of them (except LP, who is autistic) would have any desire to explore this place, particularly in light of the fact that they almost died just walking through the front door. THIS STORY MAKES NO SENSE.
>I nodded. “Okay. Let’s split up.” I considered keeping Velvet Remedy at my side, but realized it wasn’t the best play. “SteelHooves with me. Velvet, would you mind staying with Calamity? You two look into the rest of this floor and the basement. We’ll check out the offices upstairs.”
Jesus H. Christ, this character has reached levels of overt stupidity that not even teenagers in a horror movie could surpass.
Anyway, page break. The next scene opens with another out of context block of italicized text, which I have learned to recognize as journal entries, recordings, terminal messages, etc. In this case, the message is the only thing displayed on all of the terminals that LP has hacked in here. The contents of the message appear to be a bulletin for employees of the train station, telling them that they have each been issued a firearm which they need to keep on at all times, doubtless as a way of fighting the robotic turrets that were installed in the building for some idiotic reason. Also, there's some shit about cookies in here. THIS STORY MAKES NO SENSE.
ANYWAY, the scene opens with LP reading this terminal message for the umpteenth time, and then turns to SteelHooves and asks the weirdest question she could possibly ask:
>“SteelHooves, have you ever heard of someone named Flutterguy?”
Wait a minute. Wait a minute. I think I might have an idea where this is going, and I don't like it one bit.
>SteelHooves whinnied. “Why do you ask?”
>“Oh, I heard somepony say your voice sounded like Flutterguy.”
No. Please, just no. This story is so absurd already. If it's really headed in the absurd direction I think it's going, my brain might actually, physically break.
For the amusement of those who have read this story before, I will now present my theory of where I suspect this is going. However, please do not tell me whether or not I was right; I want to find out in due course. Here is my theory:
The author has deliberately led us to believe that SteelHooves is Applejack's old boyfriend Applesnack. This is probably true; however, the twist is that Applesnack is actually Fluttershy, who was in some kind of dyke relationship with AJ 200 years ago and then apparently had a sex change and then became a robot for some reason. Again, please don't tell me if I'm right.
>SteelHooves gave a little stomp. “Heard that before.” My ears perked. I’d figured it was a long shot at best that SteelHooves would have knowledge about the pony Watcher had mentioned. I opened my muzzle to ask, but he silenced me. “It’s just a joke.”
Anyway, this whole thing makes very little sense to begin with. Obviously, "Flutterguy" must be the name that was omitted when Frank was talking to LP earlier, the one that surprised LP enough that she would have spit out her cola had she been drinking any. However, it makes no sense that LP or even Frank would know this name, let alone what the voice sounded like. "Flutterguy" is, of course, the nickname that Spike gives to Fluttershy when poison joke causes her voice to deepen. This event technically occurred in this world's canon, but such an obscure detail from the distant past is unlikely to have been recorded anywhere. The only reason this is in here is because it's from the show and it would make fans chuckle, but there's no logical in-world reason for the name "Flutterguy" to mean anything to these characters. As far as cringe-worthy bronybait references go, this is one of the worst offenders I've yet come across, in this or any other story.
Anyway, it doesn't matter anyway because Steelcock denies it and LP doesn't press the issue any further. She goes back to her autismo investigations of 200 year old emails on the terminal.
>>299678
Anyway, LP returns her attention to the terminal. As expected, it contains nothing of any obvious value, and as expected, the author nonetheless prints verbatim everything it contains. In this case, the terminal displays an evacuation procedure for the Four Stars company, which as far as I can tell is in charge of the railroad. The policy states that in the event of an emergency, employees will be evacuated from the building in order of importance, starting with the President and moving downwards. It also mentions that higher-ranking employees will be issued military-grade armor-piercing ammunition, for whatever that's worth.
>There was a surprising amount of still-functional arcano-technology in this building. Or, at least, there had been. SteelHooves was not subtle, and every time he took out one of the security brain-bots or spider-like guard bots, he did massive damage to everything nearby.
It's nice to see that this author still has his priorities straight. Nobody wants to read about boring shit like the party being attacked by brain-bots or spider guards, so it's nice to see the author dispensing with those kinds of trivial details in a couple of short sentences. It leaves far more room for the shit we really care about, like detailed descriptions of the different types of ammo Littlepoop finds in a desk drawer, or ancient inter-office communications dumped verbatim into the text.
Case in point:
>Nobody had safely broken into this place in centuries, and the sheer number of ammo boxes alone could have supported a small army. Calamity had been right. Not one of the boxes included missiles or grenade ammo. But we had enough of just about everything else, including a lot of armor-piercing rounds, to last a good long time. With extra to sell. The prevalence of armor-piercing ammo had SteelHooves convinced this place had been fortifying specifically against the Steel Rangers.
Whew! Slow down kkat, this is too much edge-of-your-seat excitement for me. What is this lesbo going to find in the next drawer she opens? Another box of bullets? Some bottlecaps? An orb full of the memories of some character who's not even part of the story? This book is just so damn gripping; I couldn't put it down if I tried.
And in case you were still wondering what ponies were emailing each other about 200 years before the story began, kkat's got you covered:
>There was one more. And this one seemed a private message, not duplicated on any other terminal yet.
The message in question is addressed to nopony and is signed by nopony, but appears to be about some pony named Satin, who has never been mentioned in the story before now and will probably never be mentioned again. Satin was apparently arrested by the Ministry of Morale aha! that was the name of Pinkie's ministry that I wasn't able to remember earlier on charges of sedition. Apparently, Four Stars was up to something shady that the government didn't like, hence all the turrets and armor-piercing bullets and such. Wait a minute; I thought Four Stars was the company that ran the fucking railroad in Manehattan? What in the world could they possibly have been working on that the government would have...oh, who the hell even cares? I'm sure we'll learn all about it if we keep reading. Incidentally, how much more of this incoherent garbage do I have left to read, anyway? Let's see, we are on chapter 15 of...oh, sweet baby Jesus and the orphans. 45 goddamn motherfucking chapters. Plus an epilogue. And an afterword. Holy fucking shit; this story may actually be the death of me. If I suddenly stop posting and you don't hear from me again, post an F with some horsepussy and remember me fondly.
Anyway, at this point there's no way out but through. Moving on.
After a page break, Littlepoop and SteelDong are still wandering around the halls of this abandoned train station for God only knows what reason. Suddenly, a robotic voice yells some bullshit at them and a bunch of shit explodes.
>Luna shitting moon rocks! That was from the security robot!
Oh my, le cute and fluffy pastel ponies speaking in le profanity and using le swears? So much le edge!
>What kind of robot fires missiles?
Probably a lot of them. My understanding is you are actually now friends with a robot that fires missiles.
Anyway, blah blah blah, there's a big ass robot shooting missiles at them:
>The robot took up most of the hall, and looked like the mutant child of a Steel Ranger and a tank. Its four legs ended in tredded balls that propelled it slowly down the corridor. I counted at least three weapons, including a missile launcher turret and a minigun set into a swiveling chest mount that could rotate 180 degrees around the robot’s frame.
"Treaded" is misspelled here.
>My mind searched for an appropriate level of profanity, but came up blank as a newborn’s flank.
Really? You can't think of a thing? Nothing about Luna shitting giant dicks out of her eyeballs? Celestia isn't vomiting molten lava while stuffing potato salad up her asshole and amputating her crotchtits with a chainsaw? Your bottomless well of ridiculous pony-themed naughty language has finally run dry? You've got nothing? Absolutely nothing? That's a shame.
Anyway, the author manages to set up what might have been a mildly interesting fight, but as one would likely expect by now, it's over almost as soon as it begins. Littlepoop uses her stupid auto-targeting system to shoot it in the head with her sniper rifle, which damages it slightly, and then shoots its missile bank or something, which makes it explode. Once this minor inconvenience has been dealt with the two of them move on. Oh yeah, she also got shot in the leg or something, but it's a little difficult to take that seriously at this point.
Anyway, LP returns her attention to the terminal. As expected, it contains nothing of any obvious value, and as expected, the author nonetheless prints verbatim everything it contains. In this case, the terminal displays an evacuation procedure for the Four Stars company, which as far as I can tell is in charge of the railroad. The policy states that in the event of an emergency, employees will be evacuated from the building in order of importance, starting with the President and moving downwards. It also mentions that higher-ranking employees will be issued military-grade armor-piercing ammunition, for whatever that's worth.
>There was a surprising amount of still-functional arcano-technology in this building. Or, at least, there had been. SteelHooves was not subtle, and every time he took out one of the security brain-bots or spider-like guard bots, he did massive damage to everything nearby.
It's nice to see that this author still has his priorities straight. Nobody wants to read about boring shit like the party being attacked by brain-bots or spider guards, so it's nice to see the author dispensing with those kinds of trivial details in a couple of short sentences. It leaves far more room for the shit we really care about, like detailed descriptions of the different types of ammo Littlepoop finds in a desk drawer, or ancient inter-office communications dumped verbatim into the text.
Case in point:
>Nobody had safely broken into this place in centuries, and the sheer number of ammo boxes alone could have supported a small army. Calamity had been right. Not one of the boxes included missiles or grenade ammo. But we had enough of just about everything else, including a lot of armor-piercing rounds, to last a good long time. With extra to sell. The prevalence of armor-piercing ammo had SteelHooves convinced this place had been fortifying specifically against the Steel Rangers.
Whew! Slow down kkat, this is too much edge-of-your-seat excitement for me. What is this lesbo going to find in the next drawer she opens? Another box of bullets? Some bottlecaps? An orb full of the memories of some character who's not even part of the story? This book is just so damn gripping; I couldn't put it down if I tried.
And in case you were still wondering what ponies were emailing each other about 200 years before the story began, kkat's got you covered:
>There was one more. And this one seemed a private message, not duplicated on any other terminal yet.
The message in question is addressed to nopony and is signed by nopony, but appears to be about some pony named Satin, who has never been mentioned in the story before now and will probably never be mentioned again. Satin was apparently arrested by the Ministry of Morale aha! that was the name of Pinkie's ministry that I wasn't able to remember earlier on charges of sedition. Apparently, Four Stars was up to something shady that the government didn't like, hence all the turrets and armor-piercing bullets and such. Wait a minute; I thought Four Stars was the company that ran the fucking railroad in Manehattan? What in the world could they possibly have been working on that the government would have...oh, who the hell even cares? I'm sure we'll learn all about it if we keep reading. Incidentally, how much more of this incoherent garbage do I have left to read, anyway? Let's see, we are on chapter 15 of...oh, sweet baby Jesus and the orphans. 45 goddamn motherfucking chapters. Plus an epilogue. And an afterword. Holy fucking shit; this story may actually be the death of me. If I suddenly stop posting and you don't hear from me again, post an F with some horsepussy and remember me fondly.
Anyway, at this point there's no way out but through. Moving on.
After a page break, Littlepoop and SteelDong are still wandering around the halls of this abandoned train station for God only knows what reason. Suddenly, a robotic voice yells some bullshit at them and a bunch of shit explodes.
>Luna shitting moon rocks! That was from the security robot!
Oh my, le cute and fluffy pastel ponies speaking in le profanity and using le swears? So much le edge!
>What kind of robot fires missiles?
Probably a lot of them. My understanding is you are actually now friends with a robot that fires missiles.
Anyway, blah blah blah, there's a big ass robot shooting missiles at them:
>The robot took up most of the hall, and looked like the mutant child of a Steel Ranger and a tank. Its four legs ended in tredded balls that propelled it slowly down the corridor. I counted at least three weapons, including a missile launcher turret and a minigun set into a swiveling chest mount that could rotate 180 degrees around the robot’s frame.
"Treaded" is misspelled here.
>My mind searched for an appropriate level of profanity, but came up blank as a newborn’s flank.
Really? You can't think of a thing? Nothing about Luna shitting giant dicks out of her eyeballs? Celestia isn't vomiting molten lava while stuffing potato salad up her asshole and amputating her crotchtits with a chainsaw? Your bottomless well of ridiculous pony-themed naughty language has finally run dry? You've got nothing? Absolutely nothing? That's a shame.
Anyway, the author manages to set up what might have been a mildly interesting fight, but as one would likely expect by now, it's over almost as soon as it begins. Littlepoop uses her stupid auto-targeting system to shoot it in the head with her sniper rifle, which damages it slightly, and then shoots its missile bank or something, which makes it explode. Once this minor inconvenience has been dealt with the two of them move on. Oh yeah, she also got shot in the leg or something, but it's a little difficult to take that seriously at this point.
1611608247_1.jpg (28.1 KB, 496x518, 15bafc4b9dbe4212ab0322b1e1a6063f.jpg)
>>299679
It's stupid that Littlepip tells Calamity and Velvet to leave her sight together since she's supposed to not want them to get together.
It doesn't even properly cross her mind.
This could be a moment of character growth where at first LP wants Velvet all to herself, but then thinks "Actually Calamity and Steelhooves are our deadliest fighters so we should split them up. And if I go with Steelhooves I can see where his loyalties lie by giving him the perfect chance to betray me, just in case".
On one hand this story's non-major combat encounters shouldn't be as trivial and braindead as they usually are in the game without a Hardcore Difficulty Rebalance mod active, but on the other hand if Kkat skims parts of the story it makes getting through it faster.
The heroes are overpowered. Every combat encounter is too easy for Littlepip and the weaponry/friends LP's absurd luck gave her. They have too many healing potions, and no enemy could ever damage them faster than they could take healing potions thanks to plot armour.
These robots should be upgraded if they're supposed to guard all this treasure. How has nobody in 200 years ever broken into this place? It's bad writing for Team LP to get all this sick lewt so easily. And it just isn't good game design for the holy grail of gun parts and AP ammo to be guarded by such weak enemies.
It would be good writing if Littlepip suffered some horrible hoof injury healing potions can't heal(like having her limb heal wrong or get blown clean off), forcing her to walk in pain for the rest of the journey towards the nearest civilized town with a magic doctor able to sever and regrow fucked-up limbs. She could feel regret and pain and think "At least this didn't happen to one of my friends!". It could be a moment of character development that makes her more cautious from here on. She could even clench the fist of the arm she lost- oh right, she's a horse. uh... She could paw the ground with the hoof she lost and regrew whenever she gets angry/scared, because she remembers losing it.
This story used to have a chapter named "Chapter 20.5" but it was moved to its own story for some reason and the end of chapter 20 has a link pointing to it, calling it a "canon or non-canon deleted scene". https://www.fimfiction.net/story/123136/fallout-equestria-a-mare-worth-fighting-for
Fucking why?! And what the fuck is "canon or non-canon" supposed to mean?!
It's only 5k words in a story over 500k words long!
Out of all the scenes Kkat could have cut from the story, why this one? It's a meaningful scene that establishes some important shit involving a major character we haven't met yet! Why not cut any pointless looty-shooty scenes or story arcs that went nowhere and made no meaningful impact on the status quo?
What, did the publisher Kkat uses to print copies of this shitty story with the money of his braindead adoring fanbase not want to publish a story with that scene of badly-written lesbian horse action?
Also, you know what's crazy?
The companions don't have their own goals, but they should.
It's just good writing for them to have their own goals and dreams and consistent characterizations.
And in gaming terms when companions get their own "I must go and do X, come with me" mission it gives you a chance to be there for their character arc. Most missions are usually written with no idea which companions you will or will not have, but this type of mission lets them take the spotlight for an adventure. Everyone remembers getting the Enclave back together with Arcade Gannon in Fallout New Vegas, getting through Eterna Forest with Cheryl in Pokemon Platinum, and smoking alien drugs to get OP with Shaundi and Fun Shaundi in Saints Row 4.
The NPCs on Littlepip's team have no goals besides "Do what Littlepip is doing".
Calamity doesn't want to search the wasteland for other Dashites or one in particular from his past,
Velvet doesn't want to hunt down and learn medicine from some great legendary doctor famed in song and radio broadcasts,
and Steelcunt doesn't want to find an Applejack Statuette.
And the character who joins the party later on is also a dreamless faggot.
They're all devoid of meaning and ambition beyond serving as gun-carrying bullet sponges in silly outfits fighting in Littlepip's retarded army.
It's stupid that Littlepip tells Calamity and Velvet to leave her sight together since she's supposed to not want them to get together.
It doesn't even properly cross her mind.
This could be a moment of character growth where at first LP wants Velvet all to herself, but then thinks "Actually Calamity and Steelhooves are our deadliest fighters so we should split them up. And if I go with Steelhooves I can see where his loyalties lie by giving him the perfect chance to betray me, just in case".
On one hand this story's non-major combat encounters shouldn't be as trivial and braindead as they usually are in the game without a Hardcore Difficulty Rebalance mod active, but on the other hand if Kkat skims parts of the story it makes getting through it faster.
The heroes are overpowered. Every combat encounter is too easy for Littlepip and the weaponry/friends LP's absurd luck gave her. They have too many healing potions, and no enemy could ever damage them faster than they could take healing potions thanks to plot armour.
These robots should be upgraded if they're supposed to guard all this treasure. How has nobody in 200 years ever broken into this place? It's bad writing for Team LP to get all this sick lewt so easily. And it just isn't good game design for the holy grail of gun parts and AP ammo to be guarded by such weak enemies.
It would be good writing if Littlepip suffered some horrible hoof injury healing potions can't heal(like having her limb heal wrong or get blown clean off), forcing her to walk in pain for the rest of the journey towards the nearest civilized town with a magic doctor able to sever and regrow fucked-up limbs. She could feel regret and pain and think "At least this didn't happen to one of my friends!". It could be a moment of character development that makes her more cautious from here on. She could even clench the fist of the arm she lost- oh right, she's a horse. uh... She could paw the ground with the hoof she lost and regrew whenever she gets angry/scared, because she remembers losing it.
This story used to have a chapter named "Chapter 20.5" but it was moved to its own story for some reason and the end of chapter 20 has a link pointing to it, calling it a "canon or non-canon deleted scene". https://www.fimfiction.net/story/123136/fallout-equestria-a-mare-worth-fighting-for
Fucking why?! And what the fuck is "canon or non-canon" supposed to mean?!
It's only 5k words in a story over 500k words long!
Out of all the scenes Kkat could have cut from the story, why this one? It's a meaningful scene that establishes some important shit involving a major character we haven't met yet! Why not cut any pointless looty-shooty scenes or story arcs that went nowhere and made no meaningful impact on the status quo?
What, did the publisher Kkat uses to print copies of this shitty story with the money of his braindead adoring fanbase not want to publish a story with that scene of badly-written lesbian horse action?
Also, you know what's crazy?
The companions don't have their own goals, but they should.
It's just good writing for them to have their own goals and dreams and consistent characterizations.
And in gaming terms when companions get their own "I must go and do X, come with me" mission it gives you a chance to be there for their character arc. Most missions are usually written with no idea which companions you will or will not have, but this type of mission lets them take the spotlight for an adventure. Everyone remembers getting the Enclave back together with Arcade Gannon in Fallout New Vegas, getting through Eterna Forest with Cheryl in Pokemon Platinum, and smoking alien drugs to get OP with Shaundi and Fun Shaundi in Saints Row 4.
The NPCs on Littlepip's team have no goals besides "Do what Littlepip is doing".
Calamity doesn't want to search the wasteland for other Dashites or one in particular from his past,
Velvet doesn't want to hunt down and learn medicine from some great legendary doctor famed in song and radio broadcasts,
and Steelcunt doesn't want to find an Applejack Statuette.
And the character who joins the party later on is also a dreamless faggot.
They're all devoid of meaning and ambition beyond serving as gun-carrying bullet sponges in silly outfits fighting in Littlepip's retarded army.
Wait a second...
Every time Kkat has Littlepip tell us what happened instead of showing it happen in real time, that violates Show Don't Tell!
Every time Kkat has Littlepip tell us what happened instead of showing it happen in real time, that violates Show Don't Tell!
>>299697
Show Don't Tell isn't an inviolable rule. Showing is for things that are important - setting scenes and creating tone, working through character-heavy situations, and of course big plot points and setpieces. Telling is for things that can be skipped over quickly, like tedious periods of travel, summary or recap of basic information, or situations where a lot of time passes with nothing interesting happening.
Kkat does something infuriating - he 'shows' a lot of things that are entirely mundane or meaningless, like Pip's endless looting, and sprinkles them with things that seem trivial but suddenly become plot-relevant in asinine ways much later.
Show Don't Tell isn't an inviolable rule. Showing is for things that are important - setting scenes and creating tone, working through character-heavy situations, and of course big plot points and setpieces. Telling is for things that can be skipped over quickly, like tedious periods of travel, summary or recap of basic information, or situations where a lot of time passes with nothing interesting happening.
Kkat does something infuriating - he 'shows' a lot of things that are entirely mundane or meaningless, like Pip's endless looting, and sprinkles them with things that seem trivial but suddenly become plot-relevant in asinine ways much later.
>>299700
This.
This has a lot to do with what I'm thinking about these days. I know basically all the rules but have hard time implementing them in my own writings.
This.
This has a lot to do with what I'm thinking about these days. I know basically all the rules but have hard time implementing them in my own writings.
>>299713
The rules are ultimately suggestions, what's important is understanding the pros and cons of following the rules and why simple advice usually just tells you these rules. That way you can decide when you're better off breaking those writing rules.
The rules are ultimately suggestions, what's important is understanding the pros and cons of following the rules and why simple advice usually just tells you these rules. That way you can decide when you're better off breaking those writing rules.
>>299679
As soon as the robot has been blown up, Littlepoop decides to investigate whatever it was guarding, which turns out to be the office of the President of Four Stars.
>The desk was locked. Picking it cost me a bobby pin and netted me what looked like a security passcard. I nickered at the irony, suspecting the card would have let us freely pass by all the robotic security we had to fight through to get here.
Does it really matter? She pretty much waltzed right past most of the bad guys anyway. No enemy in here seems to present any serious challenge, not even the giant terrifying robot with nuclear missiles rapid-firing out of its asshole. Any injuries sustained in any battle, no matter how severe, can apparently be cured with magic panacea elixir. So who even gives a shit about any of this? To put it in video game terms, she's basically speedrunning the whole thing on easy mode while pretending to take the story seriously.
Anyway, the next bit follows a formula we're all very familiar with by now. She pokes around under the desk, and finds a bunch of grenades. The grenades are some special type of grenade, and the author spends a whole paragraph explaining how they differ from ordinary grenades. Just to spite him, I'm not going to detail it here; they're fucking grenades. You pull the pin and throw one, and it blows shit up. Moving on.
Next we have the stupid terminal. Littlepoop does her dumb little Matrix-Neo-Hacky-Hack bullshit routine, and opens up a text file which explains some more about the company evacuation procedure. Fascinating. Littlepoop observes that since the Steel Rangers did not work for the Ministry of Morale incidentally, how does she even know this?, whatever Four Stars was doing must have attracted the attention of the highest levels of government. She muses for a moment on what this secret project could have been. She now consults a map hanging on the wall, which tells her she can access the basement from here, and meet up with Velvet and Calamity, who are probably down there making out as we speak.
>I began picking the lock on the weapon’s cabinet.
Which weapon? I don't recall any mention of a specific weapon with its own dedicated cabinet. Oh wait, did you mean to say "weapons cabinet?" Yeah, I know; those apostrophes can be tricky. I mean, I recall learning how they worked at around third grade or so, but then again, the quality of American public schools tends to be pretty hit or miss these days. Maybe your school didn't teach apostrophes.
>Like the terminal, it pushed the limits of my skills. I was tempted to use one of my Party-Time Mint-als to give me that extra edge. But just before I gave up and did so, the cabinet opened.
"Littlepoop tries to open a cabinet, and it won't open at first, but eventually it opens." You could pretty much sum up the plot of this entire 500,000 word novel with this one sentence.
Anyway, in one of the more improbable twists in a story that is already chock full of them, the "weapon's cabinet" contains not a weapon, but a dress, which is apparently somehow armored (the text does not go into detail on this). There are also some carbine rifles and some other shit in there. Surprise surprise, Littlepoop takes all of it.
Page break. Littlepoop takes the back door down to the basement, where Velvet and Calamity are waiting. They have discovered some kind of locked vault, that conveniently can be opened using the passcard that LP found upstairs in the faggot manager's desk. LP gives the armored dress to Velvet, who puts it on right then and there. Calamity helps her and makes several comments about how stunning she looks in it. If LP is emotionally affected by any of this she does not mention it.
>The terminal’s magic eye looked over the passcard and bleeped happily. “Welcome Missus President!” Inner mechanics began to hiss and grind as the door began to open. This wasn’t anything as sophisticated as a Stable-Tec door, but it was certainly a few grades above anything I’d seen in the wasteland.
Oh okay, the station president was a chick. I guess that explains the dress in the "weapon's cabinet."
>“I might shoot her,” SteelHooves grumbled. We all shot him perplexed and nasty looks.
>“That,” he explained, “Is a Zebra Legionnaire’s uniform.”
Presumably SteelHooves is talking about the dress that Velvet is now wearing. This remark would have made a lot more sense if the author had put it before the paragraph about the door opening, back when the subject of the dress was still being discussed. But, in case anyone cares, it looks like the dress Velvet is wearing is something called a "Zebra Legionnaire's Uniform."
Anyway, the door to the vault opens, and it's full of zombies for some reason. End of chapter.
As soon as the robot has been blown up, Littlepoop decides to investigate whatever it was guarding, which turns out to be the office of the President of Four Stars.
>The desk was locked. Picking it cost me a bobby pin and netted me what looked like a security passcard. I nickered at the irony, suspecting the card would have let us freely pass by all the robotic security we had to fight through to get here.
Does it really matter? She pretty much waltzed right past most of the bad guys anyway. No enemy in here seems to present any serious challenge, not even the giant terrifying robot with nuclear missiles rapid-firing out of its asshole. Any injuries sustained in any battle, no matter how severe, can apparently be cured with magic panacea elixir. So who even gives a shit about any of this? To put it in video game terms, she's basically speedrunning the whole thing on easy mode while pretending to take the story seriously.
Anyway, the next bit follows a formula we're all very familiar with by now. She pokes around under the desk, and finds a bunch of grenades. The grenades are some special type of grenade, and the author spends a whole paragraph explaining how they differ from ordinary grenades. Just to spite him, I'm not going to detail it here; they're fucking grenades. You pull the pin and throw one, and it blows shit up. Moving on.
Next we have the stupid terminal. Littlepoop does her dumb little Matrix-Neo-Hacky-Hack bullshit routine, and opens up a text file which explains some more about the company evacuation procedure. Fascinating. Littlepoop observes that since the Steel Rangers did not work for the Ministry of Morale incidentally, how does she even know this?, whatever Four Stars was doing must have attracted the attention of the highest levels of government. She muses for a moment on what this secret project could have been. She now consults a map hanging on the wall, which tells her she can access the basement from here, and meet up with Velvet and Calamity, who are probably down there making out as we speak.
>I began picking the lock on the weapon’s cabinet.
Which weapon? I don't recall any mention of a specific weapon with its own dedicated cabinet. Oh wait, did you mean to say "weapons cabinet?" Yeah, I know; those apostrophes can be tricky. I mean, I recall learning how they worked at around third grade or so, but then again, the quality of American public schools tends to be pretty hit or miss these days. Maybe your school didn't teach apostrophes.
>Like the terminal, it pushed the limits of my skills. I was tempted to use one of my Party-Time Mint-als to give me that extra edge. But just before I gave up and did so, the cabinet opened.
"Littlepoop tries to open a cabinet, and it won't open at first, but eventually it opens." You could pretty much sum up the plot of this entire 500,000 word novel with this one sentence.
Anyway, in one of the more improbable twists in a story that is already chock full of them, the "weapon's cabinet" contains not a weapon, but a dress, which is apparently somehow armored (the text does not go into detail on this). There are also some carbine rifles and some other shit in there. Surprise surprise, Littlepoop takes all of it.
Page break. Littlepoop takes the back door down to the basement, where Velvet and Calamity are waiting. They have discovered some kind of locked vault, that conveniently can be opened using the passcard that LP found upstairs in the faggot manager's desk. LP gives the armored dress to Velvet, who puts it on right then and there. Calamity helps her and makes several comments about how stunning she looks in it. If LP is emotionally affected by any of this she does not mention it.
>The terminal’s magic eye looked over the passcard and bleeped happily. “Welcome Missus President!” Inner mechanics began to hiss and grind as the door began to open. This wasn’t anything as sophisticated as a Stable-Tec door, but it was certainly a few grades above anything I’d seen in the wasteland.
Oh okay, the station president was a chick. I guess that explains the dress in the "weapon's cabinet."
>“I might shoot her,” SteelHooves grumbled. We all shot him perplexed and nasty looks.
>“That,” he explained, “Is a Zebra Legionnaire’s uniform.”
Presumably SteelHooves is talking about the dress that Velvet is now wearing. This remark would have made a lot more sense if the author had put it before the paragraph about the door opening, back when the subject of the dress was still being discussed. But, in case anyone cares, it looks like the dress Velvet is wearing is something called a "Zebra Legionnaire's Uniform."
Anyway, the door to the vault opens, and it's full of zombies for some reason. End of chapter.
Chapter Sixteen: Towers
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>"You see? We remain the very picture of courtesy, even in the face of such impolite accusations. We have nothing to hide here."
This out-of-context unattributed quote is even more out-of-context and unattributed than usual. Here, we have an unknown speaker addressing an unknown listener in an unknown setting, defending an unknown group's sense of propriety in the face of unknown accusations. Wowee. Since it doesn't sound like a pony quote, I'm assuming this one is from Fallout somewhere.
The chapter opens with several paragraphs about the destruction of Manehattan, that reads more like the opening narrator monologue from a Powerpuff Girls episode The City of Townsville.... It's unclear how Littlepoop would even know any of this information (though quite a bit of it I suppose could be inferred), but in any event she gets to the point a few paragraphs later:
>I found it was much easier to understand now that I knew that the most significant public transportation company in Manehattan was run by traitor ponies loyal to Equestria's enemies, and that the basement of this very facility had been the staging ground for zebra operations within our homeland.
My, how shocking. Eh, one small question though: when exactly did you learn this?
>I stared into the eyes of the zombie-zebras and realized that this was how they had gotten the balefire bomb into Manehattan. That these zebras had been responsible for the murder of millions.
Once again, this seems like a pretty big leap of logic. From the clues we saw earlier, it's clear that the monorail company was doing something shady that the government was investigating and/or raiding them for, but nothing that specifically implicates them for the bombing of the city. For all we know, their plan was to just hide some zombies in the basement. Also: if the zombies were locked in this vault that can only be opened from the outside, how exactly could they have been responsible for the murder of millions? I'm not saying she's wrong about this, but Littlepoop has a really annoying habit of connecting dots that don't necessarily connect.
Anyway, it looks like the vault is actually some kind of miniature version of a stable, which was built to house the invading zebras and whatever ponies were in on the plan. However, it wasn't built very well, so the radiation or whatever got in anyway and turned them all into zombies. At least that's the working theory. Also, there's this autism:
>And yes, I realized they might not be zombie-zebras so much as ghoul-zebras. I'd say I didn't care, but part of me actually hoped they were ghouls as I stepped back out of the way.
>"SteelHooves! Give 'em everything you've got!"
This legitimately confuses me. Earlier, Littlepoop flipped out on SteelHooves for implying that all ghouls were bad, responding with an angry tirade about how Derpy was a ghoul and Derpy was just super-duper in her opinion. The DJ, too, explicitly pointed out that there is a difference between zombies and ghouls, with zombies being malicious and ghouls simply being regular ponies who had been transformed by radiation. Since Littlepoop has explicitly struck out a pro-ghoul, or at least ghoul-sympathetic, position, it's unclear why she would prefer that the zebras she is about to have Roboponer ruthlessly slaughter be ghouls instead of zombies. I'm having even more difficulty than usual following the author's line of reasoning here.
Anyway, the scene ends on that note. Presumably, Roboponer does his grenade-shitstorm routine and kills all the zebra zombies and/or ghouls. When the narrative resumes, the author has done another one of his obnoxiously abrupt time skips. The group is now outside, wandering in the Manehattan ruins again. They apparently decided to follow their original plan of using the monorail tracks to cover ground in the city more quickly.
With things as they are, I can't help but wonder: what the hell was even the point of the train station scene? Literally nothing happened.
First, Littlepoop insists on exploring the station for basically no reason. Then, they wander around inside, collect some more random junk like they usually do, kill a few robots, blow up a few zombies, and then the scene is over and it cuts to this. Why? What was the author even trying to communicate to us with that episode? Did he just want to inject this backstory about the destruction of Manehattan? If so, how is this information pertinent to what the story is supposed to be about? What is the story even supposed to be about?
I started doing these lit-analysis threads in an effort to help writefags develop their craft. Sometimes I'm not sure if I'm actually helping anyone learn to write better, or if I'm just amusing myself by taking a dump on other people's work. However, if anyone takes anything away from this particular review, I'd like it to be this: don't do what kkat is doing. This is not how you write a story. Take a central idea and build an actual plot around it. Create interesting, dynamic characters who have an actual role in the world they occupy, and an actual reason to take part in the events of the plot. Don't just randomly shart words onto the page until you've got half a million of them. Don't send your characters on pointless side-errands that don't even make interesting adventures.
If you've written sixteen chapters comprising more than 100k words, and it's not yet clear what your characters' goals or motivations are or even what your story is about, you're doing it wrong. Any competent writer could have taken this setting and this group of characters and told a complete story from start to finish in the amount of time it's taken kkat to get through his exposition. So far, FoE has been nothing but this boring group of paper dolls wandering from exhibit to exhibit in a setting that is essentially just a gigantic museum of carnage from the distant past.
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>"You see? We remain the very picture of courtesy, even in the face of such impolite accusations. We have nothing to hide here."
This out-of-context unattributed quote is even more out-of-context and unattributed than usual. Here, we have an unknown speaker addressing an unknown listener in an unknown setting, defending an unknown group's sense of propriety in the face of unknown accusations. Wowee. Since it doesn't sound like a pony quote, I'm assuming this one is from Fallout somewhere.
The chapter opens with several paragraphs about the destruction of Manehattan, that reads more like the opening narrator monologue from a Powerpuff Girls episode The City of Townsville.... It's unclear how Littlepoop would even know any of this information (though quite a bit of it I suppose could be inferred), but in any event she gets to the point a few paragraphs later:
>I found it was much easier to understand now that I knew that the most significant public transportation company in Manehattan was run by traitor ponies loyal to Equestria's enemies, and that the basement of this very facility had been the staging ground for zebra operations within our homeland.
My, how shocking. Eh, one small question though: when exactly did you learn this?
>I stared into the eyes of the zombie-zebras and realized that this was how they had gotten the balefire bomb into Manehattan. That these zebras had been responsible for the murder of millions.
Once again, this seems like a pretty big leap of logic. From the clues we saw earlier, it's clear that the monorail company was doing something shady that the government was investigating and/or raiding them for, but nothing that specifically implicates them for the bombing of the city. For all we know, their plan was to just hide some zombies in the basement. Also: if the zombies were locked in this vault that can only be opened from the outside, how exactly could they have been responsible for the murder of millions? I'm not saying she's wrong about this, but Littlepoop has a really annoying habit of connecting dots that don't necessarily connect.
Anyway, it looks like the vault is actually some kind of miniature version of a stable, which was built to house the invading zebras and whatever ponies were in on the plan. However, it wasn't built very well, so the radiation or whatever got in anyway and turned them all into zombies. At least that's the working theory. Also, there's this autism:
>And yes, I realized they might not be zombie-zebras so much as ghoul-zebras. I'd say I didn't care, but part of me actually hoped they were ghouls as I stepped back out of the way.
>"SteelHooves! Give 'em everything you've got!"
This legitimately confuses me. Earlier, Littlepoop flipped out on SteelHooves for implying that all ghouls were bad, responding with an angry tirade about how Derpy was a ghoul and Derpy was just super-duper in her opinion. The DJ, too, explicitly pointed out that there is a difference between zombies and ghouls, with zombies being malicious and ghouls simply being regular ponies who had been transformed by radiation. Since Littlepoop has explicitly struck out a pro-ghoul, or at least ghoul-sympathetic, position, it's unclear why she would prefer that the zebras she is about to have Roboponer ruthlessly slaughter be ghouls instead of zombies. I'm having even more difficulty than usual following the author's line of reasoning here.
Anyway, the scene ends on that note. Presumably, Roboponer does his grenade-shitstorm routine and kills all the zebra zombies and/or ghouls. When the narrative resumes, the author has done another one of his obnoxiously abrupt time skips. The group is now outside, wandering in the Manehattan ruins again. They apparently decided to follow their original plan of using the monorail tracks to cover ground in the city more quickly.
With things as they are, I can't help but wonder: what the hell was even the point of the train station scene? Literally nothing happened.
First, Littlepoop insists on exploring the station for basically no reason. Then, they wander around inside, collect some more random junk like they usually do, kill a few robots, blow up a few zombies, and then the scene is over and it cuts to this. Why? What was the author even trying to communicate to us with that episode? Did he just want to inject this backstory about the destruction of Manehattan? If so, how is this information pertinent to what the story is supposed to be about? What is the story even supposed to be about?
I started doing these lit-analysis threads in an effort to help writefags develop their craft. Sometimes I'm not sure if I'm actually helping anyone learn to write better, or if I'm just amusing myself by taking a dump on other people's work. However, if anyone takes anything away from this particular review, I'd like it to be this: don't do what kkat is doing. This is not how you write a story. Take a central idea and build an actual plot around it. Create interesting, dynamic characters who have an actual role in the world they occupy, and an actual reason to take part in the events of the plot. Don't just randomly shart words onto the page until you've got half a million of them. Don't send your characters on pointless side-errands that don't even make interesting adventures.
If you've written sixteen chapters comprising more than 100k words, and it's not yet clear what your characters' goals or motivations are or even what your story is about, you're doing it wrong. Any competent writer could have taken this setting and this group of characters and told a complete story from start to finish in the amount of time it's taken kkat to get through his exposition. So far, FoE has been nothing but this boring group of paper dolls wandering from exhibit to exhibit in a setting that is essentially just a gigantic museum of carnage from the distant past.
>>299740
Anyway, the group is walking along the monorail tracks. The scene around them is dreary and bleak. The text specifically mentions that there are no skeletons here, which is about the only detail worth noting, though the description here is decently written. Also, they see a bird.
The bird in question is something called a Balefire Phoenix. For no apparent reason, Velvet insists that the group stop moving so that SteelHooves can tell her about it. He explains that the Manehattan Gardens used to contain a menagerie which was incinerated during the balefire explosion. However, being incinerated does not kill a phoenix, so it apparently gained powers or something from the balefire. They also breathe fire, apparently. Admittedly a rather cool idea, and I'll again mention that the prose here is decent. The author does a good job setting a dark and somber mood, and his descriptions of the Manehattan ruins and the balefire phoenix make for some striking visuals. Unfortunately, like many of kkat's better scenes, it serves no obvious purpose and comes to an abrupt end with a page break.
In the next scene, a lone pony is fleeing from one of the buildings and being pursued by a group of raiders.
>Blood ran down between her thighs; I could see her bleeding through my scope. "Please somepony help me!" She'd already been raped repeatedly. Now they had let her go and were chasing her for sport.
Sacrebleu! Le edge!
Hilariously, because they are on the elevated monorail tracks, Littlepoop is too far away to use her S.A.T.S. to smite these evil evildoers, so she has to actually aim her own gun for once. She has absolutely no idea how to do this, and Calamity has to coach her, which is, again, hilarious. However, because she's Mary Sue, the Author's Chosen, she is still able to hit her target on her very first try. Also, she's using one of the zebra guns she found in Faggot McGee's "weapon's cabinet," and apparently it fires enchanted bullets that cause the target to burst into flame.
>Stick a horn where Celestia don't shine!
The sad part is, the author probably thought this was a clever line.
Anyway, Littlepoop shoots one of the rapey raiders and he bursts into flames. Calamity downs two of them. For some reason, instead of running away or otherwise reacting to the sudden death of his companions, the remaining raider keeps chasing the mare. Littlepoop is about to shoot him, but suddenly realizes that her target is a blank-flank colt oh, mon dieu! le child committing le rape in le grimdark Equestria! le edge!! LE EDGE!!!. She can't make herself pull the trigger, but Calamity can.
>Horrified, I watched as the colt reached the fallen mare dodging the kicks she threw at him. I heard the crack of gunfire feet from me, and saw the colt's body rupture bloodily in two places, hit with enough force to fling his corpse against a nearby mailbox.
The sad part is, the author will never realize that he's actually written a comedy.
Anyway, there's a page break, and then the party is staring up at a billboard:
>Ponies love laughter. Zebras do not understand joy and fear it.
>Ponies are honest. Zebras tell only lies.
>Ponies are loyal. Zebras will knife you in the back.
>Ponies are generous. Zebras are selfish and greedy.
>Ponies care about each other. Zebras care only about themselves.
Around zebras, never relax.
The observant reader will note that the Elements of Harmony have, in this horrible and twisted future, been contorted into wartime propaganda that communicates the opposite of their original intended meaning though interestingly enough, the magic element is not present. This is certainly a grim and dark pony cartoon, clearly intended for mature adults only. Something French, le edge. Moving on.
There is no sign of the mare they rescued, so presumably they didn't stop to help her, see if she was alright, or otherwise interact with her, they just shot her assailants and kept moving. Like most events in this story, I'm guessing the encounter served absolutely no purpose beyond highlighting what a grim and edgy version of pastel ponyland the author has created. Moving on.
Littlepoop is once again feening for drugs, I guess because it's been awhile since she's done that. I've noticed that Littlepoop has six distinct modes, and most of the story has involved her cycling back and forth between them. These modes are: commando with a murder boner, kleptomaniac/burglar/hacker, drug addict, horny lesbian, detective/archaeologist, and awkward dweeb. Each mode can essentially be treated as its own distinct personality. Though she will often switch modes on a dime, generally when she is in any given mode, the other personalities will not be present at all.
A well-developed character will generally have many facets to his or her personality, so it's not necessarily a bad thing that the author wants his protagonist to be all of these things. However, in a well-develiped character, these facets are all treated as part of the same personality. With Littlepoop, it's all or nothing; when she's thinking aboutjustice murder, that's all that's on her brain. When she's in love horny, that's all that's on her brain. When her drug addiction makes its sporadic appearances, she's dreaming about crack mints, and when she's in any of her other modes you wouldn't even know she's tried them. Her "awkward dweeb" mode seems to be the author's idea of her base personality, and her "detective/archaeologist" mode seems to be what he sees as her primary role in driving the story along. Of her six personalities, I would consider those two to be the ones that least fit with any of the others; "awkward dweeb" doesn't really mesh well with "murderhobo who thinks she's the savior of the wasteland," and as I've observed numerous times her intense interest in digging up the past makes no sense at all, because there's no obvious motivation behind it.
Anyway, the group is walking along the monorail tracks. The scene around them is dreary and bleak. The text specifically mentions that there are no skeletons here, which is about the only detail worth noting, though the description here is decently written. Also, they see a bird.
The bird in question is something called a Balefire Phoenix. For no apparent reason, Velvet insists that the group stop moving so that SteelHooves can tell her about it. He explains that the Manehattan Gardens used to contain a menagerie which was incinerated during the balefire explosion. However, being incinerated does not kill a phoenix, so it apparently gained powers or something from the balefire. They also breathe fire, apparently. Admittedly a rather cool idea, and I'll again mention that the prose here is decent. The author does a good job setting a dark and somber mood, and his descriptions of the Manehattan ruins and the balefire phoenix make for some striking visuals. Unfortunately, like many of kkat's better scenes, it serves no obvious purpose and comes to an abrupt end with a page break.
In the next scene, a lone pony is fleeing from one of the buildings and being pursued by a group of raiders.
>Blood ran down between her thighs; I could see her bleeding through my scope. "Please somepony help me!" She'd already been raped repeatedly. Now they had let her go and were chasing her for sport.
Sacrebleu! Le edge!
Hilariously, because they are on the elevated monorail tracks, Littlepoop is too far away to use her S.A.T.S. to smite these evil evildoers, so she has to actually aim her own gun for once. She has absolutely no idea how to do this, and Calamity has to coach her, which is, again, hilarious. However, because she's Mary Sue, the Author's Chosen, she is still able to hit her target on her very first try. Also, she's using one of the zebra guns she found in Faggot McGee's "weapon's cabinet," and apparently it fires enchanted bullets that cause the target to burst into flame.
>Stick a horn where Celestia don't shine!
The sad part is, the author probably thought this was a clever line.
Anyway, Littlepoop shoots one of the rapey raiders and he bursts into flames. Calamity downs two of them. For some reason, instead of running away or otherwise reacting to the sudden death of his companions, the remaining raider keeps chasing the mare. Littlepoop is about to shoot him, but suddenly realizes that her target is a blank-flank colt oh, mon dieu! le child committing le rape in le grimdark Equestria! le edge!! LE EDGE!!!. She can't make herself pull the trigger, but Calamity can.
>Horrified, I watched as the colt reached the fallen mare dodging the kicks she threw at him. I heard the crack of gunfire feet from me, and saw the colt's body rupture bloodily in two places, hit with enough force to fling his corpse against a nearby mailbox.
The sad part is, the author will never realize that he's actually written a comedy.
Anyway, there's a page break, and then the party is staring up at a billboard:
>Ponies love laughter. Zebras do not understand joy and fear it.
>Ponies are honest. Zebras tell only lies.
>Ponies are loyal. Zebras will knife you in the back.
>Ponies are generous. Zebras are selfish and greedy.
>Ponies care about each other. Zebras care only about themselves.
Around zebras, never relax.
The observant reader will note that the Elements of Harmony have, in this horrible and twisted future, been contorted into wartime propaganda that communicates the opposite of their original intended meaning though interestingly enough, the magic element is not present. This is certainly a grim and dark pony cartoon, clearly intended for mature adults only. Something French, le edge. Moving on.
There is no sign of the mare they rescued, so presumably they didn't stop to help her, see if she was alright, or otherwise interact with her, they just shot her assailants and kept moving. Like most events in this story, I'm guessing the encounter served absolutely no purpose beyond highlighting what a grim and edgy version of pastel ponyland the author has created. Moving on.
Littlepoop is once again feening for drugs, I guess because it's been awhile since she's done that. I've noticed that Littlepoop has six distinct modes, and most of the story has involved her cycling back and forth between them. These modes are: commando with a murder boner, kleptomaniac/burglar/hacker, drug addict, horny lesbian, detective/archaeologist, and awkward dweeb. Each mode can essentially be treated as its own distinct personality. Though she will often switch modes on a dime, generally when she is in any given mode, the other personalities will not be present at all.
A well-developed character will generally have many facets to his or her personality, so it's not necessarily a bad thing that the author wants his protagonist to be all of these things. However, in a well-develiped character, these facets are all treated as part of the same personality. With Littlepoop, it's all or nothing; when she's thinking about
>>299739
>Zebra Legionnaire
Fuck my life, here we go...
Caesar's Legion, in Fallout NV, was founded over 200 years after the nukes fell by a travelling doctor named Edward Sallow. He and an angry mormon friend of his were Followers Of The Apocalypse doctors (Nice anarchist doctors who wander around being nice for free)
These two went to tribes to study their tribal dialect languages for no reason. However, they were kidnapped by one tribe, which was "playing at war" with another.
Edward renamed himself Caesar and taught them Total War, taught them how to crush their enemies and absorb the strongest and stamp out the conquered culture.
Edward/Caesar proceeded to found Caesar's Legion, a roman-inspired army that went on to conquer 86 different tribes and become fucking huge.
This tribe of brainwashed savages wear armour made from american football outfits. It's like liberal writers tried to take everything they believe Fascism is (Authoritarianism, Rome fetishism, a single white man's rule without an heir, anti-technology, darwinism, sometimes evil dishonest war tactics like using kids with bombs and sometimes raw brute-strength tactics like throwing bodies at enemies and pursuing no matter the cost) and make it into the baddies of a game that's only "morally grey" because the alternatives are anarchy or their view of Capitalists or their view of America/any attempt to rebuild America.
Every Legionaire is a brainwashed savage who believes "The Dissolute" (non-legion people) are dumb cunts who need to be enslaved, aka "saved from their hedonism and purposelessness by the brutal authority of The Legion".
The highest-ranked legionaires have brains but most are just spear-chucking machete-swinging redshirts more than willing to bum-rush NCR machine gun nests in shitty light armour.
Caesar's goal is to sic his warmongering Barbarians on New Vegas so it can be his new capital and he can reform the Legion into a less brutish, more scientifically-capable and well-armed society with a future. At least I think it was? Anyway he has a brain tumor that will kill him before he gets the chance, leaving his Darth Vader wannabe second-in-command in charge of a sham-empire full of conquered tribals still old enough to remember their lives before they lost to the Legion.
The point is, none of this post-apocalyptic shit fits in with the Africa-inspired shaman/voodoo bullshit of the Ziggers before or after the nukes fall. But the Zebra continent of "Roam" was ruled by "a Caesar" back when Celestia was alive, before the nukes fell!
The Ziggers are so consumed with their silly nonsense religion they end up escalating this war constantly for terrible reasons while ponies do nothing wrong. They probably started the war too but the author leaves that ambiguous.
Being ruled by "A Caesar" and using roman words for Zebra military ranks changes nothing about the savage animalistic Zebras.
And yet, they still invent Invisibility Cloaks because the Chinese Communists in Fallout 3 used stealth suits. And they also rely on magic to make their guns deal extra fire damage and effortlessly kill Power Armoured Equestrian troops, because Fire-type Moves were super effective against Steel-type Pokemon in Pokemon and Kkat's a retard.
This shit makes no sense! The author is trying to combine surface-level bronybait-tier names and traits from very different villains at very different points in the Fallout world's history but it just doesn't work!
Ready Player One was incredibly gay. The Iron Giant was there beating the shit out of baddies even though his story and character was anti war/violence, and the same goes for every other media character. The book and movie insists pop culture is a valid replacement for white culture and white religions but it's so shallow it can't even appreciate the greatest stories and characters in pop culture, it just shoves fucking everything in there hoping to pander to somebody.
But you know what? Ready Player One still wasn't as gay as this, because at least it didn't try to one-up the media iconography it ripped off randomly by mixing and matching various attributes to combine what was never meant to be combined!
It would be so fucking easy to make the villains of this story responsible for Equestrian's downfall an unsustainable practically-islamic communist nigger empire built on the back of theft and slavery on purpose, but you'd have to have the balls to say "their doomsday cult of a religion is wrong" before you can make them well-written antagonists instead of trying to pretend equestrians and ziggers are the same deep down! Would be easy to make Ziggers the evil Ponies were too nice to crush like Wastelanders would. Would be easy to combine these negative attributes correctly instead of shoving them together like a heaped shitpile of a snowman! Fuck Kkat.
It's almost as gay as Displaced, which is the most formulaic fic template imaginable. The fact that the bronies have a sub-fandom circlejerking over it isn't surprising.
10 human goes to convention dressed as _____
20 human buys something that completes his costume from the merchant from resident evil
30 human is warped to equestria in the body of whoever he was dressed as, complete with superpowers and maybe the instincts/urges/thoughts of that character
40 human either bones all the horses in a big wish-fulfillment fic or smashes shit at random as a villain with no meaningful goals beyond amusement
50 end story when upvotes and absurdly positive comments stop rolling in
60 goto 10 and write another one in a quest to find the perfect mix of familiar cliches and unoriginal tropes
Hey, everyone, look at me! See pic number four? I just combined Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle. Her name is Twibow Spash and she loves books and going fast. Doesn't this make her twice as interesting as both characters combined? ...No! No, it fucking doesn't! Fusion and "Mashups" like this are nothing more than a cheap substitute for genuine creativity and new idea synthesis!
>Zebra Legionnaire
Fuck my life, here we go...
Caesar's Legion, in Fallout NV, was founded over 200 years after the nukes fell by a travelling doctor named Edward Sallow. He and an angry mormon friend of his were Followers Of The Apocalypse doctors (Nice anarchist doctors who wander around being nice for free)
These two went to tribes to study their tribal dialect languages for no reason. However, they were kidnapped by one tribe, which was "playing at war" with another.
Edward renamed himself Caesar and taught them Total War, taught them how to crush their enemies and absorb the strongest and stamp out the conquered culture.
Edward/Caesar proceeded to found Caesar's Legion, a roman-inspired army that went on to conquer 86 different tribes and become fucking huge.
This tribe of brainwashed savages wear armour made from american football outfits. It's like liberal writers tried to take everything they believe Fascism is (Authoritarianism, Rome fetishism, a single white man's rule without an heir, anti-technology, darwinism, sometimes evil dishonest war tactics like using kids with bombs and sometimes raw brute-strength tactics like throwing bodies at enemies and pursuing no matter the cost) and make it into the baddies of a game that's only "morally grey" because the alternatives are anarchy or their view of Capitalists or their view of America/any attempt to rebuild America.
Every Legionaire is a brainwashed savage who believes "The Dissolute" (non-legion people) are dumb cunts who need to be enslaved, aka "saved from their hedonism and purposelessness by the brutal authority of The Legion".
The highest-ranked legionaires have brains but most are just spear-chucking machete-swinging redshirts more than willing to bum-rush NCR machine gun nests in shitty light armour.
Caesar's goal is to sic his warmongering Barbarians on New Vegas so it can be his new capital and he can reform the Legion into a less brutish, more scientifically-capable and well-armed society with a future. At least I think it was? Anyway he has a brain tumor that will kill him before he gets the chance, leaving his Darth Vader wannabe second-in-command in charge of a sham-empire full of conquered tribals still old enough to remember their lives before they lost to the Legion.
The point is, none of this post-apocalyptic shit fits in with the Africa-inspired shaman/voodoo bullshit of the Ziggers before or after the nukes fall. But the Zebra continent of "Roam" was ruled by "a Caesar" back when Celestia was alive, before the nukes fell!
The Ziggers are so consumed with their silly nonsense religion they end up escalating this war constantly for terrible reasons while ponies do nothing wrong. They probably started the war too but the author leaves that ambiguous.
Being ruled by "A Caesar" and using roman words for Zebra military ranks changes nothing about the savage animalistic Zebras.
And yet, they still invent Invisibility Cloaks because the Chinese Communists in Fallout 3 used stealth suits. And they also rely on magic to make their guns deal extra fire damage and effortlessly kill Power Armoured Equestrian troops, because Fire-type Moves were super effective against Steel-type Pokemon in Pokemon and Kkat's a retard.
This shit makes no sense! The author is trying to combine surface-level bronybait-tier names and traits from very different villains at very different points in the Fallout world's history but it just doesn't work!
Ready Player One was incredibly gay. The Iron Giant was there beating the shit out of baddies even though his story and character was anti war/violence, and the same goes for every other media character. The book and movie insists pop culture is a valid replacement for white culture and white religions but it's so shallow it can't even appreciate the greatest stories and characters in pop culture, it just shoves fucking everything in there hoping to pander to somebody.
But you know what? Ready Player One still wasn't as gay as this, because at least it didn't try to one-up the media iconography it ripped off randomly by mixing and matching various attributes to combine what was never meant to be combined!
It would be so fucking easy to make the villains of this story responsible for Equestrian's downfall an unsustainable practically-islamic communist nigger empire built on the back of theft and slavery on purpose, but you'd have to have the balls to say "their doomsday cult of a religion is wrong" before you can make them well-written antagonists instead of trying to pretend equestrians and ziggers are the same deep down! Would be easy to make Ziggers the evil Ponies were too nice to crush like Wastelanders would. Would be easy to combine these negative attributes correctly instead of shoving them together like a heaped shitpile of a snowman! Fuck Kkat.
It's almost as gay as Displaced, which is the most formulaic fic template imaginable. The fact that the bronies have a sub-fandom circlejerking over it isn't surprising.
10 human goes to convention dressed as _____
20 human buys something that completes his costume from the merchant from resident evil
30 human is warped to equestria in the body of whoever he was dressed as, complete with superpowers and maybe the instincts/urges/thoughts of that character
40 human either bones all the horses in a big wish-fulfillment fic or smashes shit at random as a villain with no meaningful goals beyond amusement
50 end story when upvotes and absurdly positive comments stop rolling in
60 goto 10 and write another one in a quest to find the perfect mix of familiar cliches and unoriginal tropes
Hey, everyone, look at me! See pic number four? I just combined Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle. Her name is Twibow Spash and she loves books and going fast. Doesn't this make her twice as interesting as both characters combined? ...No! No, it fucking doesn't! Fusion and "Mashups" like this are nothing more than a cheap substitute for genuine creativity and new idea synthesis!
>>299740
>"You see? We remain the very picture of courtesy, even in the face of such impolite accusations. We have nothing to hide here."
This quote comes from the White Glove Society from FNV, an ex-cannibal tribe running the "Ultra-Luxe" expensive casino and masquerading as high-society fancy faggots.
It's from Beyond The Beef, a quest where an angry old fag sends you into a casino to stop a rich bastard, only to find him a desperate man pleading with you to find his son, who was kidnapped by the Ultra Luxe. The baddie plans to make the White Glove Society eat flesh again and announce "mwahaha you ate people!" so the tribe becomes cannibals again.
There's a lot more to this quest. You can go about this quest in many ways and take any side and even feed them a faggot companion you don't like. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yM1yR7WYqgM
It's also retarded that the company is called Four Stars. This company named itself after the doomsday prophecy in an enemy country's retarded religion and nobody raised any fucking eyebrows? Well, eyelids since most poners don't have eyebrows.
>Wait, NOW Littlepip hates ghouls?
It's badly written and explained poorly but since she thinks these immortal ghoul zebras are responsible for Equestria getting nuked (since the ziggers didn't have missiles and had to smuggle their x1000 megaspell bombs in) she wants them dead whether they have brains or not. Author does a bad job saying "Littlepip wished they were Zombies so she would feel better about ordering their demise".
Then again if you're killing the bastards responsible for incalculable numbers of pony deaths/rapes, wouldn't you want them sentient and able to feel it?
Kkat is a bad author
>we're less than halfway through the story and the baddies responsible for Equestria's destruction are swiftly introduced in the form of immortal trapped ghouls to be slaughtered even swifter.
>time skip
>Littlepip: "We did it, everypony! We avenged Equestria and killed the monsters directly responsible for its downfall! We've done it! We're finally real fucking heroes!
>Velvet: "Woohoo!"
>Calamity: "My old man always said I was never good for nuthin! Look at me now! I've saved Equestria!
>Steelhooves: "Applejack... My wife... I have avenged you! FOR EQUESTRIA!!!"
>Littlepip: "Oh, I can't wait to hear what the magical omnipresent radio and Watcher Frank have to say about this! They're gonna call me so many nice words! I'm gonna get so wet when the DJ says I did a good job!"
>...
The doomed city around them, blasted by radiation and hellfire and dust storms, seems like a giant beast's carcass picked clean long before they arrived. Wind whistles through holes in walls and floors and boarded-up windows here and there, like tortured moans of souls trapped here, unable to pass on and let go of the home they loved. In their wildest fantasies, when they imagined themselves stumbling upon the bastards who nuked Manehattan and killing them, there was more fanfare. The monsters were big, and powerful, imposing, and unquestionably evil. Not some irradiated flesh and ancient organs barely hanging on to pitiable old skeletons that couldn't fight back if they wanted to. Surely, if the monsters responsible for all that destruction were slain, a big world-healing wave would wash over Equestria, turning blasted wastelands into fertile forests and hellish deserts into clean clear lakes. Raiders would put down their arms and take off their spiked armour, while Slavers and Slave abandon the only civilization and order they've ever known to walk hoof in hoof to the most beautiful towns in Equestria, restored once more to their pre-war glory. Surely, dirty yet kind scavengers in unwashed rags and makeshift armour crafted from pots and pans crawled out of rubble to throw a parade for Team Littlepip and sing songs praising their names.
Surely, they thought, if they avenged Equestria by killing enough baddies, and eventually stumbled upon and killed the worst baddies responsible for the state Equestria was in, the world would reward them.
There had to be a cake, and a party, and balloons. Perhaps clones of the Ministry Mares would emerge from cryogenic stasis to reward them and congratulate them on a job well done!
>...
...Right?
>...
>Velvet: "Now what?"
>Calamity: "Uh... Well... Uh..."
>Littlepip: "...want to go kill some slavers in the ruins of bombed-to-hell Equestria anyway?
>Steelhooves: "Fuck it, I've got nothing better to do."
>"You see? We remain the very picture of courtesy, even in the face of such impolite accusations. We have nothing to hide here."
This quote comes from the White Glove Society from FNV, an ex-cannibal tribe running the "Ultra-Luxe" expensive casino and masquerading as high-society fancy faggots.
It's from Beyond The Beef, a quest where an angry old fag sends you into a casino to stop a rich bastard, only to find him a desperate man pleading with you to find his son, who was kidnapped by the Ultra Luxe. The baddie plans to make the White Glove Society eat flesh again and announce "mwahaha you ate people!" so the tribe becomes cannibals again.
There's a lot more to this quest. You can go about this quest in many ways and take any side and even feed them a faggot companion you don't like. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yM1yR7WYqgM
It's also retarded that the company is called Four Stars. This company named itself after the doomsday prophecy in an enemy country's retarded religion and nobody raised any fucking eyebrows? Well, eyelids since most poners don't have eyebrows.
>Wait, NOW Littlepip hates ghouls?
It's badly written and explained poorly but since she thinks these immortal ghoul zebras are responsible for Equestria getting nuked (since the ziggers didn't have missiles and had to smuggle their x1000 megaspell bombs in) she wants them dead whether they have brains or not. Author does a bad job saying "Littlepip wished they were Zombies so she would feel better about ordering their demise".
Then again if you're killing the bastards responsible for incalculable numbers of pony deaths/rapes, wouldn't you want them sentient and able to feel it?
Kkat is a bad author
>we're less than halfway through the story and the baddies responsible for Equestria's destruction are swiftly introduced in the form of immortal trapped ghouls to be slaughtered even swifter.
>time skip
>Littlepip: "We did it, everypony! We avenged Equestria and killed the monsters directly responsible for its downfall! We've done it! We're finally real fucking heroes!
>Velvet: "Woohoo!"
>Calamity: "My old man always said I was never good for nuthin! Look at me now! I've saved Equestria!
>Steelhooves: "Applejack... My wife... I have avenged you! FOR EQUESTRIA!!!"
>Littlepip: "Oh, I can't wait to hear what the magical omnipresent radio and Watcher Frank have to say about this! They're gonna call me so many nice words! I'm gonna get so wet when the DJ says I did a good job!"
>...
The doomed city around them, blasted by radiation and hellfire and dust storms, seems like a giant beast's carcass picked clean long before they arrived. Wind whistles through holes in walls and floors and boarded-up windows here and there, like tortured moans of souls trapped here, unable to pass on and let go of the home they loved. In their wildest fantasies, when they imagined themselves stumbling upon the bastards who nuked Manehattan and killing them, there was more fanfare. The monsters were big, and powerful, imposing, and unquestionably evil. Not some irradiated flesh and ancient organs barely hanging on to pitiable old skeletons that couldn't fight back if they wanted to. Surely, if the monsters responsible for all that destruction were slain, a big world-healing wave would wash over Equestria, turning blasted wastelands into fertile forests and hellish deserts into clean clear lakes. Raiders would put down their arms and take off their spiked armour, while Slavers and Slave abandon the only civilization and order they've ever known to walk hoof in hoof to the most beautiful towns in Equestria, restored once more to their pre-war glory. Surely, dirty yet kind scavengers in unwashed rags and makeshift armour crafted from pots and pans crawled out of rubble to throw a parade for Team Littlepip and sing songs praising their names.
Surely, they thought, if they avenged Equestria by killing enough baddies, and eventually stumbled upon and killed the worst baddies responsible for the state Equestria was in, the world would reward them.
There had to be a cake, and a party, and balloons. Perhaps clones of the Ministry Mares would emerge from cryogenic stasis to reward them and congratulate them on a job well done!
>...
...Right?
>...
>Velvet: "Now what?"
>Calamity: "Uh... Well... Uh..."
>Littlepip: "...want to go kill some slavers in the ruins of bombed-to-hell Equestria anyway?
>Steelhooves: "Fuck it, I've got nothing better to do."
1611708009.png (6.2 MB, 4200x3000, murdermurdermurdermurdermurder.png)
The whole Four Stars diversion is, you guessed it, based on an optional area from Fallout 3. In the game, LOB Enterprises was a business in downtown DC that had been secretly collaborating with the Chinese government. Out of paranoia, the company invested heavily in automated security and armed their employees in case of a raid by the feds. Sure enough, just before the nuclear exchange such a raid took place, and so you find the building filled with guns, dead soldiers/employees, and killer robots. I'm pretty sure that Four Stars is supposed to be just another business that is incidentally located next to the rails rather than the station, but it's probably not well clarified in the text.
In fairness to Kkat here, it's reasonable to assume that he expects the audience to be invested in finding out why/how Equestria was destroyed by this point, and this apparently meaningless jaunt contains a lot of things that hint at that and tie into information revealed later. The name Four Stars is an incredibly strained ***deep lore*** reference to the show - when Nightmare Moon is freed in the pilot episode, the "stars aid in her escape," as Twilight's book put it, and there's a brief animation of four stars flying into the moon. This links to a later revelation that, essentially, the zebras' religion centered around a belief that the stars are evil spirits, and their failure to tell the difference between Nightmare Moon and Princess Luna led them to conduct a genocidal jihad against Equestria purely for the sake of killing her. And now we know how/why Manehattan got blown up, so that's something at least.
As Nigel alludes to, basing the zebras on Caesar's Legion is strange. In Fallout New Vegas, the Legion are arguably the main antagonist - they're a brutal, warmongering nation attempting to rebuild civilization as a great big LARP of ancient Rome. Crucifixions and slavery abound. From the look of things so far, Kkat is working very hard to set up the zebras as an evil force - albeit one that no longer exists. Why Velvet would willingly wear the armor of the army that literally *burned Equestria* is beyond me, but then again so's most of what she does. As for the zebra ghouls in the bunker, the reading I get from this scene is that Pip is simply having one of her "I'm offended... KILL KILL KILL!!!" moments again. The zebras bombed Manehattan, therefore they're evil and must die immediately. She hopes they're lucid rather than feral so that they're aware of their impending death.
>>299679
>>Nobody had safely broken into this place in centuries, and the sheer number of ammo boxes alone could have supported a small army. Calamity had been right. Not one of the boxes included missiles or grenade ammo. But we had enough of just about everything else, including a lot of armor-piercing rounds, to last a good long time. With extra to sell.
In other words, "We're going to get into a fight with heavily armored enemies at some point 15 or so chapters in the future and this convenient find will be exactly what we need to beat them."
>>299744
>Also, she's using one of the zebra guns she found in Faggot McGee's "weapon's cabinet," and apparently it fires enchanted bullets that cause the target to burst into flame.
Ah, the war crime gun. This thing is the Mary Sue of weapons, so naturally it'll become Pip's go-to firearm for the foreseeable future. Applejack's personal custom revolver is clearly not enough. The zebra rifle is actually a fusion of two unique weapons from Fallout 3: the Zhu-Rong (a small chinese pistol whose bullets set the target on fire to compensate for their pathetic base damage) and the Infiltrator (an overpowered DLC-only assault rifle which fires in high-damage, silenced three-shot bursts). In short, it's a ridiculous power-fantasy weapon even by the standards of the videogame it's lifted from, so of course Littlepip just happens to stuble across it sitting in a closet. And of course, nobody else has one and would never accomplish anything with it if they did.
None of Littlepip's friends seem to take issue with her toting around a weapon that'd make Martin Walker cringe.
>The sad part is, the author will never realize that he's actually written a comedy.
I don't recall the context, but if memory serves Kkat once went on a lengthy spiel about how shooting the rapist raider colt was absolutely and unquestionably the only moral decision in this situation. The scene's most likely intended as a harsh lesson in the brutal nature of wasteland life, so ironically Calamity stepping up to do the pragmatic thing where Pip and Velvet cannot is an edge (heh) his character's been desperately lacking so far. But in terms of writing execution - ho boy.
>>299750
>>299760
Calm your tits and stop goin on rambling, no-context spoiler-filled tangents every single time Glim posts. Jesus Christ.
In fairness to Kkat here, it's reasonable to assume that he expects the audience to be invested in finding out why/how Equestria was destroyed by this point, and this apparently meaningless jaunt contains a lot of things that hint at that and tie into information revealed later. The name Four Stars is an incredibly strained ***deep lore*** reference to the show - when Nightmare Moon is freed in the pilot episode, the "stars aid in her escape," as Twilight's book put it, and there's a brief animation of four stars flying into the moon. This links to a later revelation that, essentially, the zebras' religion centered around a belief that the stars are evil spirits, and their failure to tell the difference between Nightmare Moon and Princess Luna led them to conduct a genocidal jihad against Equestria purely for the sake of killing her. And now we know how/why Manehattan got blown up, so that's something at least.
As Nigel alludes to, basing the zebras on Caesar's Legion is strange. In Fallout New Vegas, the Legion are arguably the main antagonist - they're a brutal, warmongering nation attempting to rebuild civilization as a great big LARP of ancient Rome. Crucifixions and slavery abound. From the look of things so far, Kkat is working very hard to set up the zebras as an evil force - albeit one that no longer exists. Why Velvet would willingly wear the armor of the army that literally *burned Equestria* is beyond me, but then again so's most of what she does. As for the zebra ghouls in the bunker, the reading I get from this scene is that Pip is simply having one of her "I'm offended... KILL KILL KILL!!!" moments again. The zebras bombed Manehattan, therefore they're evil and must die immediately. She hopes they're lucid rather than feral so that they're aware of their impending death.
>>299679
>>Nobody had safely broken into this place in centuries, and the sheer number of ammo boxes alone could have supported a small army. Calamity had been right. Not one of the boxes included missiles or grenade ammo. But we had enough of just about everything else, including a lot of armor-piercing rounds, to last a good long time. With extra to sell.
In other words, "We're going to get into a fight with heavily armored enemies at some point 15 or so chapters in the future and this convenient find will be exactly what we need to beat them."
>>299744
>Also, she's using one of the zebra guns she found in Faggot McGee's "weapon's cabinet," and apparently it fires enchanted bullets that cause the target to burst into flame.
Ah, the war crime gun. This thing is the Mary Sue of weapons, so naturally it'll become Pip's go-to firearm for the foreseeable future. Applejack's personal custom revolver is clearly not enough. The zebra rifle is actually a fusion of two unique weapons from Fallout 3: the Zhu-Rong (a small chinese pistol whose bullets set the target on fire to compensate for their pathetic base damage) and the Infiltrator (an overpowered DLC-only assault rifle which fires in high-damage, silenced three-shot bursts). In short, it's a ridiculous power-fantasy weapon even by the standards of the videogame it's lifted from, so of course Littlepip just happens to stuble across it sitting in a closet. And of course, nobody else has one and would never accomplish anything with it if they did.
None of Littlepip's friends seem to take issue with her toting around a weapon that'd make Martin Walker cringe.
>The sad part is, the author will never realize that he's actually written a comedy.
I don't recall the context, but if memory serves Kkat once went on a lengthy spiel about how shooting the rapist raider colt was absolutely and unquestionably the only moral decision in this situation. The scene's most likely intended as a harsh lesson in the brutal nature of wasteland life, so ironically Calamity stepping up to do the pragmatic thing where Pip and Velvet cannot is an edge (heh) his character's been desperately lacking so far. But in terms of writing execution - ho boy.
>>299750
>>299760
Calm your tits and stop goin on rambling, no-context spoiler-filled tangents every single time Glim posts. Jesus Christ.
>>299815
"Ziggers did everything wrong" was spoiled before we started talking about the fic but I'll spoiler-tag talk like that from now on if you want. Did you like the "The doomed city around them" bit? I don't normally put greentext in the middle of my posts.
It doesn't seem like good writing to spell out what happened to Manehattan and end it so quickly. Where's the mystery? The heroes aren't solving mysteries, they're following trails of breadcrumbs except the breadcrumbs are pages in a journal that spells today's "mystery" out. Shouldn't there be some information left over at the end, telling LP where more Four Stars Branches with "Traitor Stables" like this are, so she can go on a quest to exterminate all of them and at the end, take on a secret well-defended Final Stable full of rich elitist globalist Griffons who betrayed Equestria all along to cause the war so more people would hire their mercenary companies? That'd make a good final boss if avenging Equestria was Littlepip's true goal.
Again, what the fuck is Littlepip's true goal? If she had to sum it up in a sentence, or even just one word, what would it be? "Justice"? More like murderhoboing.
"Ziggers did everything wrong" was spoiled before we started talking about the fic but I'll spoiler-tag talk like that from now on if you want. Did you like the "The doomed city around them" bit? I don't normally put greentext in the middle of my posts.
It doesn't seem like good writing to spell out what happened to Manehattan and end it so quickly. Where's the mystery? The heroes aren't solving mysteries, they're following trails of breadcrumbs except the breadcrumbs are pages in a journal that spells today's "mystery" out. Shouldn't there be some information left over at the end, telling LP where more Four Stars Branches with "Traitor Stables" like this are, so she can go on a quest to exterminate all of them and at the end, take on a secret well-defended Final Stable full of rich elitist globalist Griffons who betrayed Equestria all along to cause the war so more people would hire their mercenary companies? That'd make a good final boss if avenging Equestria was Littlepip's true goal.
Again, what the fuck is Littlepip's true goal? If she had to sum it up in a sentence, or even just one word, what would it be? "Justice"? More like murderhoboing.
>>299815
Oh, and another note on the zebra rifle. You can tell that Kkat gleefully jammed two Fallout guns together without thought for logic or sense because it's got a built in silencer (stealthy!) *and* sets its targets on fire (NOT STEALTHY).
Oh, and another note on the zebra rifle. You can tell that Kkat gleefully jammed two Fallout guns together without thought for logic or sense because it's got a built in silencer (stealthy!) *and* sets its targets on fire (NOT STEALTHY).
>>299815
>In fairness to Kkat here, it's reasonable to assume that he expects the audience to be invested in finding out why/how Equestria was destroyed by this point, and this apparently meaningless jaunt contains a lot of things that hint at that and tie into information revealed later.
I more or less assumed this, but to me the issue is that while the audience might be invested, there's still no reason for Littlepoop to be invested, nor is there any logical reason why the party should want to risk their lives investigating this building. It's obvious there's a lot of lore here that kkat wants to show us, but a story needs to follow some kind of internal logic. I think in a previous thread we were talking about Tom Bombadil's part in LOTR, and that might be a good example of a better way to approach this kind of thing. Tom's appearance has been criticized for being out of place in that story, and for his part of the story not really having anything to do with the story overall, and both of those criticisms have some merit. However, his appearance in the text is still logically worked into the progression of the story. The hobbits get into trouble on the road and he comes to help them, which is a plausible event that justifies their spending a few days with him; they don't just suddenly decide to change course and hang out with some dancing weirdo for absolutely no reason. Even if the event feels a bit out of place, it still basically works as part of the story; it's not just a random tangent used to wedge in some obscure part of Middle Earth's backstory.
Earlier I used the analogy of this setting being a museum of carnage, and I think that's a good way to look at it. The setting is a museum, and LP and her party are museum patrons. They wander from exhibit to exhibit, and they learn about all of the horrible things that happened in the past, and they're appropriately horrified by it, but they have no actual connection to any of it so it doesn't resonate the way it would if they were actually connected. They're just observers looking around, and no matter how much kkat tries to amp up the emotional drama by layering on as much shock value as possible Manehattan was bombed! Everypony died, and now it's a horrible icky ruin with rape and murder everywhere! Quelle horreur!!, they ultimately remain observers.
This is going to be a bit of an ironic example for this board, but there is an old graphic novel by (((Art Spiegelman))) called Maus in which the author chronicles his father's adventures in a Nazi friendship resort. Whatever views people here might have regarding the historical accuracy of the events it depicts, the story is notable for our purposes because of its perspective. The father relays his experiences to his son, and the story is interpreted and told from the son's point of view. The result is a distinctly different vision of events than you would get if you simply told the father's story. It's not just a story about the holocaust, it's a story about how the father's experiences shaped him and made him who he is, and how that in turn affected his rather fractious relationship with his son. If you want to tell a story about the past through the eyes of someone in the present, this is a good way to go about it. A bad way to go about it would be to write a story about some sixth grade girl taking a trip to the Auschwitz Museum of Oy Vey the Shoah, being horrified by everything she saw, and then going home and writing a first-person narrative called Over Six Gorillion Jews Died in 1942 Alone, and it was All Donald Trump's Fault. Unfortunately, kkat seems to have basically chosen the latter approach, and it shows.
>In fairness to Kkat here, it's reasonable to assume that he expects the audience to be invested in finding out why/how Equestria was destroyed by this point, and this apparently meaningless jaunt contains a lot of things that hint at that and tie into information revealed later.
I more or less assumed this, but to me the issue is that while the audience might be invested, there's still no reason for Littlepoop to be invested, nor is there any logical reason why the party should want to risk their lives investigating this building. It's obvious there's a lot of lore here that kkat wants to show us, but a story needs to follow some kind of internal logic. I think in a previous thread we were talking about Tom Bombadil's part in LOTR, and that might be a good example of a better way to approach this kind of thing. Tom's appearance has been criticized for being out of place in that story, and for his part of the story not really having anything to do with the story overall, and both of those criticisms have some merit. However, his appearance in the text is still logically worked into the progression of the story. The hobbits get into trouble on the road and he comes to help them, which is a plausible event that justifies their spending a few days with him; they don't just suddenly decide to change course and hang out with some dancing weirdo for absolutely no reason. Even if the event feels a bit out of place, it still basically works as part of the story; it's not just a random tangent used to wedge in some obscure part of Middle Earth's backstory.
Earlier I used the analogy of this setting being a museum of carnage, and I think that's a good way to look at it. The setting is a museum, and LP and her party are museum patrons. They wander from exhibit to exhibit, and they learn about all of the horrible things that happened in the past, and they're appropriately horrified by it, but they have no actual connection to any of it so it doesn't resonate the way it would if they were actually connected. They're just observers looking around, and no matter how much kkat tries to amp up the emotional drama by layering on as much shock value as possible Manehattan was bombed! Everypony died, and now it's a horrible icky ruin with rape and murder everywhere! Quelle horreur!!, they ultimately remain observers.
This is going to be a bit of an ironic example for this board, but there is an old graphic novel by (((Art Spiegelman))) called Maus in which the author chronicles his father's adventures in a Nazi friendship resort. Whatever views people here might have regarding the historical accuracy of the events it depicts, the story is notable for our purposes because of its perspective. The father relays his experiences to his son, and the story is interpreted and told from the son's point of view. The result is a distinctly different vision of events than you would get if you simply told the father's story. It's not just a story about the holocaust, it's a story about how the father's experiences shaped him and made him who he is, and how that in turn affected his rather fractious relationship with his son. If you want to tell a story about the past through the eyes of someone in the present, this is a good way to go about it. A bad way to go about it would be to write a story about some sixth grade girl taking a trip to the Auschwitz Museum of Oy Vey the Shoah, being horrified by everything she saw, and then going home and writing a first-person narrative called Over Six Gorillion Jews Died in 1942 Alone, and it was All Donald Trump's Fault. Unfortunately, kkat seems to have basically chosen the latter approach, and it shows.
>>299744
Littlepoop's train of thought takes off on a pretty wild ride. She begins by thinking about crack mints, which leads her to wonder how they affected Pinkie Pie, who as I understand is the pony who invented them. From here, she begins thinking about the Four Stars train company. She basically acknowledges that she didn't find any direct evidence that Four Stars was responsible for the nuking of Manehattan, and that she's pulling her entire theory on this completely out of her ass. Then, proceeding along progressively wackier lines, she begins to wonder how the Ministry of Morale would have known to investigate Four Stars in the first place. She concludes that Pinkie Pie, who headed the Ministry of Morale, must have been popping crack mints in order to gain mental superpowers, which she somehow used to magically intuit that the public transit company in Manehattan was working with zebras to smuggle in a nuclear bomb. I wouldn't blame you if you thought I was just making shit up for giggles at this point, but I swear to God that all of this autism is actually in the text.
No doubt the author intends for all of this to be a rationalization of her drug addiction more than anything else; she's basically feening for crack mints and is trying to justify taking more of them. In regards to what I observed in my previous post, you'll note that she is basically shifting back and forth between her "addict" and "detective" modes with none of her other personalities present. Despite having witnessed the traumatizing death of a young colt just minutes ago, she has nothing on her mind at present except drugs and the mysteries surrounding a nuclear attack that occurred 200 years in the past. She even manages to crack a joke or two. Anyway, her wacky train of thought just keeps going and going:
>No matter what negative effects she might have suffered from PTM addiction, Pinkie Pie had intuition that bordered on precognition. The traitors were terrified of her Ministry; she had them paranoid and scurrying. And no matter what anypony might say about either her or her Ministry, Pinkie Pie had come heartbreakingly close to saving Manehattan.
Literally every single word of this is pure speculation. Littlepoop doesn't know Pinkie Pie, she doesn't know anything about Pinkie Pie. She would have no way of knowing that she had "intuition that bordered on precognition." There is no evidence that the "traitors" were terrified of Pinkie or her Ministry, they simply knew that they were being investigated and had to plan for the contingency of being raided. As to saving Manehattan, that is the most speculative assertion out of all of these. We don't even know that the MoM was even trying to save Manehattan, or that they even knew about the bomb. For all we know, the MoM could have been investigating Four Stars for tax evasion.
Anyway, she decides she needs something else to think about and turns on the radio.
>It was merely a distraction; I knew all the songs by heart now. I hoped DJ Pon3 found something in the records we carried worthy of expanding his musical repertoire.
Presumably this is why she went to the trouble of bringing Vinyl Scratch's old records along with her. If I focus hard enough, I feel like I can almost follow kkat's logic from time to time.
>"This just in," DJ Pon3 announced between songs, "Just got a report that a weak distress signal can be heard near Horseshoe Tower. Seems like Blackwing's Talons have managed to get themselves in over their beaks. Well, don't worry, Blackwing. Horseshoe Tower's pretty close to Sheriff Rottingtail's territory. Maybe some of his ghouls will be willing to lend you a hoof. Oh, wait, that's right, you and your mercs slaughtered them all. Well, good luck with that.
>"This is DJ Pon3 reminding everypony in the Equestrian Wasteland: you reap what you sow."
Honestly? This DJ is kind of a smarmy dick. We haven't even met this character yet and I already actively dislike him.
Also, the more of this setting we see, the less sense any of it makes. Who is this DJ exactly? How does he know all this stuff? Does he just sit up there 24/7, playing the same 8 songs over and over and making snarky remarks about shit that's going on in the local area? If so, why? Protip: "because it's in Fallout" is not a valid answer. Who supports him? Radio equipment is complicated and broadcasting requires a constant supply of electricity (or magic, possibly). How is this power supply generated? How is the equipment maintained? For that matter, how the hell is anyone supposed to tune into these broadcasts? Would radio ownership really be that common in this post-apocalyptic hellscape? Why would anyone tune in to these broadcasts, even if they could? Is the power grid in Edgequestria still functioning? If so, how? Who maintains it? I could keep going and going but you get the idea.
This whole world, for all its apparent complexity, is not very well thought out. The author just lifts elements directly from the video games, gives them a slight MLP twist, and dumps them into his setting without giving any serious thought to how or why any of it is supposed to actually work. Once again, it all goes back to the issue of different things working better in different mediums. In a video game with a huge sandbox world, having a radio station makes sense; the player is going to be doing a lot of tedious walking around, and adding radio gives them something to listen to. Having the DJ occasionally comment on things they've done in-world adds to the immersion and interactivity. So, if you can come up with an in-world justification for the DJ to exist that sounds at least halfway plausible, most players will accept it and overlook its being at least somewhat illogical. In a novel it's different: the presence of the DJ doesn't really add anything to the story, so it's just this completely nonsensical character being thrown in for no good reason.
Littlepoop's train of thought takes off on a pretty wild ride. She begins by thinking about crack mints, which leads her to wonder how they affected Pinkie Pie, who as I understand is the pony who invented them. From here, she begins thinking about the Four Stars train company. She basically acknowledges that she didn't find any direct evidence that Four Stars was responsible for the nuking of Manehattan, and that she's pulling her entire theory on this completely out of her ass. Then, proceeding along progressively wackier lines, she begins to wonder how the Ministry of Morale would have known to investigate Four Stars in the first place. She concludes that Pinkie Pie, who headed the Ministry of Morale, must have been popping crack mints in order to gain mental superpowers, which she somehow used to magically intuit that the public transit company in Manehattan was working with zebras to smuggle in a nuclear bomb. I wouldn't blame you if you thought I was just making shit up for giggles at this point, but I swear to God that all of this autism is actually in the text.
No doubt the author intends for all of this to be a rationalization of her drug addiction more than anything else; she's basically feening for crack mints and is trying to justify taking more of them. In regards to what I observed in my previous post, you'll note that she is basically shifting back and forth between her "addict" and "detective" modes with none of her other personalities present. Despite having witnessed the traumatizing death of a young colt just minutes ago, she has nothing on her mind at present except drugs and the mysteries surrounding a nuclear attack that occurred 200 years in the past. She even manages to crack a joke or two. Anyway, her wacky train of thought just keeps going and going:
>No matter what negative effects she might have suffered from PTM addiction, Pinkie Pie had intuition that bordered on precognition. The traitors were terrified of her Ministry; she had them paranoid and scurrying. And no matter what anypony might say about either her or her Ministry, Pinkie Pie had come heartbreakingly close to saving Manehattan.
Literally every single word of this is pure speculation. Littlepoop doesn't know Pinkie Pie, she doesn't know anything about Pinkie Pie. She would have no way of knowing that she had "intuition that bordered on precognition." There is no evidence that the "traitors" were terrified of Pinkie or her Ministry, they simply knew that they were being investigated and had to plan for the contingency of being raided. As to saving Manehattan, that is the most speculative assertion out of all of these. We don't even know that the MoM was even trying to save Manehattan, or that they even knew about the bomb. For all we know, the MoM could have been investigating Four Stars for tax evasion.
Anyway, she decides she needs something else to think about and turns on the radio.
>It was merely a distraction; I knew all the songs by heart now. I hoped DJ Pon3 found something in the records we carried worthy of expanding his musical repertoire.
Presumably this is why she went to the trouble of bringing Vinyl Scratch's old records along with her. If I focus hard enough, I feel like I can almost follow kkat's logic from time to time.
>"This just in," DJ Pon3 announced between songs, "Just got a report that a weak distress signal can be heard near Horseshoe Tower. Seems like Blackwing's Talons have managed to get themselves in over their beaks. Well, don't worry, Blackwing. Horseshoe Tower's pretty close to Sheriff Rottingtail's territory. Maybe some of his ghouls will be willing to lend you a hoof. Oh, wait, that's right, you and your mercs slaughtered them all. Well, good luck with that.
>"This is DJ Pon3 reminding everypony in the Equestrian Wasteland: you reap what you sow."
Honestly? This DJ is kind of a smarmy dick. We haven't even met this character yet and I already actively dislike him.
Also, the more of this setting we see, the less sense any of it makes. Who is this DJ exactly? How does he know all this stuff? Does he just sit up there 24/7, playing the same 8 songs over and over and making snarky remarks about shit that's going on in the local area? If so, why? Protip: "because it's in Fallout" is not a valid answer. Who supports him? Radio equipment is complicated and broadcasting requires a constant supply of electricity (or magic, possibly). How is this power supply generated? How is the equipment maintained? For that matter, how the hell is anyone supposed to tune into these broadcasts? Would radio ownership really be that common in this post-apocalyptic hellscape? Why would anyone tune in to these broadcasts, even if they could? Is the power grid in Edgequestria still functioning? If so, how? Who maintains it? I could keep going and going but you get the idea.
This whole world, for all its apparent complexity, is not very well thought out. The author just lifts elements directly from the video games, gives them a slight MLP twist, and dumps them into his setting without giving any serious thought to how or why any of it is supposed to actually work. Once again, it all goes back to the issue of different things working better in different mediums. In a video game with a huge sandbox world, having a radio station makes sense; the player is going to be doing a lot of tedious walking around, and adding radio gives them something to listen to. Having the DJ occasionally comment on things they've done in-world adds to the immersion and interactivity. So, if you can come up with an in-world justification for the DJ to exist that sounds at least halfway plausible, most players will accept it and overlook its being at least somewhat illogical. In a novel it's different: the presence of the DJ doesn't really add anything to the story, so it's just this completely nonsensical character being thrown in for no good reason.
>>299917
You're right about the museum setting, that's a genius way to put it. How do you think this problem could be solved? How could a better author make 200 year old events matter to the ponies alive in the present?
I suggested making Littlepip the type to love learning history before but that feels like cheating. It's too direct. And making her think if she looked at enough failures from the past she could avoid making them in the future is dumb when 75% of the disasters in this story are random tragedies beyond anypony's control.
Plus, these tragedies usually kill non main-characters. When the characters find a random factory and decide to check computers for diary entries, they have no stakes in it and it's usually not part of a sidequest that adds emotional weight+a time limit+stakes+depth to the routine shoot-and-loot session. They have all the time in the world to learn what already went wrong, and little reason to care.
But if "Figure out what's GOING wrong here, then solve it before it's too late" was the goal, that would add tension+stakes+a reason to care.
Come to think of it...
The society we see in Littlepip's vault is normal, if boring and shallow and obsessed with entertainment.
But it's normal by our standards and pony standards. It doesn't feel like a group of ponies from Wartime Equestria went into a bunker to avoid nuclear annihilation and had kids in this bunker for 200 years. It doesn't feel like this is a society full of kids whose parents and grandparents get very angry when zebras are brought up. The sight of wartime propaganda featuring the Mane Six is shocking to LP and Velvet, but maybe it shouldn't be. The Vault's radio stations play 200 year old jazz music instead of "modern" rock/metal/ska/whatever about how the zebra-hating singer really wants to get out there into the world outside and kill some zebras, or really wishes Rainbow Dash was still alive so he could buttfuck her, or really really loves skating and taking Mint-Als and not doing what he's told by the Overmare.
What if she and Velvet were raised on a hole-filled pure-propaganda revised history of the events detailing Equestria's fall, but only Littlepip noticed holes in it growing up even though pointing these holes out now and then got her into trouble?
That way every time they encounter a place where horror and edge happened, both Littlepip and Velvet would try to figure out what happened here. But Littlepip (The doubter of Equestrian superiority) always assumes ponies did everything wrong while Velvet (A true believer in Equestrian supremacy) believes ponies can do no wrong and always tries to find a way to blame everything bad on non-ponies. Calamity, who's lived much of his life in the Wasteland and is also secretly a Dashite (Whatever the fuck that is. We're not supposed to know right now even though Steeltoes recognized him on sight for legitimately no goddamn reason) would have his own things to contribute to these conversations, too.
Steeltoes, AJ's wife+a 200 year old soldier in Power Armour old enough to remember how Equestria was before the war began AND Equestria before the nukes fell, should have very interesting things to say during these conversations.
It would add conversation and character interaction and conflict to these "Follow the page breadcrumb trail and learn this story, one museum exhibit plaque at a time!" moments by making the characters argue over how they interpret what they see. And what they see would change these ponies, as Velvet sees evidence that ponies can fail too and Littlepip sees evidence that zebras are evil retarded niggers.
Also, Calamity is a Dashite. The brand that proves this is hidden by his saddlebags (and possibly clothing too, I forget).
But Steeltoes is able to recognize him on sight as "Someone from an advanced civilization" right there, while Littlepip was sick and asleep, before she nutted and vomited on his bed.
And all he has to say about it is "Harr harr, what a silly group you make! A super sneaky commando, a descendant of pre-war aristocracy, and an exile from an advanced civilization... It's like the start of a silly joke!"
He should have more to say about it than that. He should have a bigger reaction than that!
How the fuck does he know Calamity's a Dashite, anyway? Calamity didn't tell Littlepip and Velvet until he trusted them. Did he just drop his whole backstory on the guy offscreen, even though it makes no sense for him to do so and they aren't supposed to trust him yet?
This is a big spoiler but Calamity was born in the Enclave, but got kicked out and branded for liking ground-bound poners. But in this story, The Enclave aren't just the descendants of the remnants of the US military and ruling class politicians. They're descendants of 90% of the Pegasus race, which abandoned Equestria and fucked off into the skies, eventually becoming the Enclave for no real reason and also branding Rainbow Dash then kicking her out of their society and out of the story like a character in Fallout phasing through the ground and falling out of existence. Steeltoes is over 200 years old. If he was alive when Applejack revealed the Power Armour he'd wear, then he was definitely alive when the Pegasi went bad. So if anyone should have some things to say about the motherfucking Enclave and this ex-Enclave guy right here, it's this guy..
I say this because there's a well-written scene that could have been here where Steeltoes yells "You're Enclave! Fuck the Enclave!" and Calamity shows his mark and says "I'm Ex-Enclave! Fuck the Enclave!" and then they bond like men. Not that Kkat could write that.
It's incredibly artificial. Kkat thought if there was any friction or tension within this group, or any aspects of their backstory the new guy didn't know, it could take time away from looting and lockpicking and skimming over fights. So the new guy already fits in perfectly and knows more than he should and cares less about certain things than he should.
You're right about the museum setting, that's a genius way to put it. How do you think this problem could be solved? How could a better author make 200 year old events matter to the ponies alive in the present?
I suggested making Littlepip the type to love learning history before but that feels like cheating. It's too direct. And making her think if she looked at enough failures from the past she could avoid making them in the future is dumb when 75% of the disasters in this story are random tragedies beyond anypony's control.
Plus, these tragedies usually kill non main-characters. When the characters find a random factory and decide to check computers for diary entries, they have no stakes in it and it's usually not part of a sidequest that adds emotional weight+a time limit+stakes+depth to the routine shoot-and-loot session. They have all the time in the world to learn what already went wrong, and little reason to care.
But if "Figure out what's GOING wrong here, then solve it before it's too late" was the goal, that would add tension+stakes+a reason to care.
Come to think of it...
The society we see in Littlepip's vault is normal, if boring and shallow and obsessed with entertainment.
But it's normal by our standards and pony standards. It doesn't feel like a group of ponies from Wartime Equestria went into a bunker to avoid nuclear annihilation and had kids in this bunker for 200 years. It doesn't feel like this is a society full of kids whose parents and grandparents get very angry when zebras are brought up. The sight of wartime propaganda featuring the Mane Six is shocking to LP and Velvet, but maybe it shouldn't be. The Vault's radio stations play 200 year old jazz music instead of "modern" rock/metal/ska/whatever about how the zebra-hating singer really wants to get out there into the world outside and kill some zebras, or really wishes Rainbow Dash was still alive so he could buttfuck her, or really really loves skating and taking Mint-Als and not doing what he's told by the Overmare.
What if she and Velvet were raised on a hole-filled pure-propaganda revised history of the events detailing Equestria's fall, but only Littlepip noticed holes in it growing up even though pointing these holes out now and then got her into trouble?
That way every time they encounter a place where horror and edge happened, both Littlepip and Velvet would try to figure out what happened here. But Littlepip (The doubter of Equestrian superiority) always assumes ponies did everything wrong while Velvet (A true believer in Equestrian supremacy) believes ponies can do no wrong and always tries to find a way to blame everything bad on non-ponies. Calamity, who's lived much of his life in the Wasteland and is also secretly a Dashite (Whatever the fuck that is. We're not supposed to know right now even though Steeltoes recognized him on sight for legitimately no goddamn reason) would have his own things to contribute to these conversations, too.
Steeltoes, AJ's wife+a 200 year old soldier in Power Armour old enough to remember how Equestria was before the war began AND Equestria before the nukes fell, should have very interesting things to say during these conversations.
It would add conversation and character interaction and conflict to these "Follow the page breadcrumb trail and learn this story, one museum exhibit plaque at a time!" moments by making the characters argue over how they interpret what they see. And what they see would change these ponies, as Velvet sees evidence that ponies can fail too and Littlepip sees evidence that zebras are evil retarded niggers.
Also, Calamity is a Dashite. The brand that proves this is hidden by his saddlebags (and possibly clothing too, I forget).
But Steeltoes is able to recognize him on sight as "Someone from an advanced civilization" right there, while Littlepip was sick and asleep, before she nutted and vomited on his bed.
And all he has to say about it is "Harr harr, what a silly group you make! A super sneaky commando, a descendant of pre-war aristocracy, and an exile from an advanced civilization... It's like the start of a silly joke!"
He should have more to say about it than that. He should have a bigger reaction than that!
How the fuck does he know Calamity's a Dashite, anyway? Calamity didn't tell Littlepip and Velvet until he trusted them. Did he just drop his whole backstory on the guy offscreen, even though it makes no sense for him to do so and they aren't supposed to trust him yet?
This is a big spoiler but Calamity was born in the Enclave, but got kicked out and branded for liking ground-bound poners. But in this story, The Enclave aren't just the descendants of the remnants of the US military and ruling class politicians. They're descendants of 90% of the Pegasus race, which abandoned Equestria and fucked off into the skies, eventually becoming the Enclave for no real reason and also branding Rainbow Dash then kicking her out of their society and out of the story like a character in Fallout phasing through the ground and falling out of existence. Steeltoes is over 200 years old. If he was alive when Applejack revealed the Power Armour he'd wear, then he was definitely alive when the Pegasi went bad. So if anyone should have some things to say about the motherfucking Enclave and this ex-Enclave guy right here, it's this guy..
I say this because there's a well-written scene that could have been here where Steeltoes yells "You're Enclave! Fuck the Enclave!" and Calamity shows his mark and says "I'm Ex-Enclave! Fuck the Enclave!" and then they bond like men. Not that Kkat could write that.
It's incredibly artificial. Kkat thought if there was any friction or tension within this group, or any aspects of their backstory the new guy didn't know, it could take time away from looting and lockpicking and skimming over fights. So the new guy already fits in perfectly and knows more than he should and cares less about certain things than he should.
1611790475.png (674.6 KB, 1280x890, 94360DE63CF33F4FF80E216AEF62EE89-690836.png)
>>299919
Even assuming the technological issues of setting up a 24/7 radio broadcast can be overcome, and the pony in question is willing to undertake such a pointless endeavor when does this guy sleep? when does he eat? where does he get food? does he ever get to take a shit? the questions just keep coming and coming, there are still logic issues with the content of this latest broadcast.
>Just got a report that a weak distress signal can be heard near Horseshoe Tower.
How is a distress signal being broadcast? What is the purpose of broadcasting one? Who is supposed to answer it? My impression of this world is that it is pretty much pure chaos. There is no overall social cohesion, no police, no military. Organized groups like the Talons would presumably look out for their own, and if the technology were available it would make sense for them to use radio to keep in contact with each other. However, sending out a general distress beacon in the hopes that some random party will hear and answer it makes very little sense in this kind of a setting. In fact, it would probably just attract the attention of raiders or whatever.
There's the DJ I suppose, but sending out a distress beacon to the radio station so the DJ will hear it makes even less sense:
>Oh no we're under siege, we'd better alert this smarmy faggot who sits in his room playing the same records over and over, so he can make some snotty jokes about how we deserved to die because bigotry or something, and then go on playing his records!
t. nobody, ever
>This is DJ Pon3 reminding everypony in the Equestrian Wasteland: you reap what you sow.
Also: the world has been like this for 200 years, and they still call it "the Equestrian Wasteland?" Entire generations of ponies have lived and died here, and this is the best name they could come up with for their homeland? This DJ went to all the trouble of setting up his own radio station, is somehow supplied with food, water and electricity despite these things being a daily struggle for nearly everypony else, yet no other pony has ever tried to rebuild any other aspect of their old civilization? And it's been like this for two whole centuries? The miracle here is not that they still have electricity and radios (somehow), the miracle is that these incompetent nitwits have managed to survive at all.
Also: while we're on the subject, the information the DJ broadcasts could just as easily be used by raiders and the like as intel. With all the blabbing he's been doing about "the Stable Dweller," you'd think Littlepoop would have enemies flinging themselves at her left and right. They could easily track her movements just from his mention of the places she's been sighted. Nopony except Littlepoop seems to be paying all that much attention to this guy, so who knows; maybe I've got it all wrong. Maybe the DJ is just some lone screwball who sits in his room all day ranting about bullshit, and everyone except Littlepoop just tunes him out because he's an annoying retard.
Anyway, Littlepoop shuts off her radio as Calamity returns from scouting ahead. He has apparently found something, which he assures them they are going to love. They eventually come to a crossing of the Luna and Celestia monorail lines. This is apparently what Calamity found, though I'm not quite sure what is so remarkable about it. Anyway, they need to address the practical problem of how to get up to the new line. Calamity assures them he can carry everyone except Roboponer, but that's not an issue because Littlepoop can just use her obnoxious levitation powers. Well, there has to be some kind of challenge here, right? Oh, here we go:
>I floated out the binoculars, peering through them at the Celestia Line, and cringed with a gasp. The shadowed underbellies of the monorails were covered with the grotesque, leathery forms of dozens of giant, mutant bats.
Oooh, giant mutant bats. Well, this should be fun. Surely one of the ponies will accidentally do something to disturb the bats, and they will all wake up and start chasing them? Maybe it will turn into some kind of an action-packed escape scene, or a battle, or something? Maybe a group of raiders that has been quietly tailing them chooses this most inopportune of moments to attack, and they have to deal with the raiders and the bats? Maybe the raiders are friends of the raiders that the party shot at earlier to save the mare, thus proving that there was a point to that scene after all? The author is planning on having something happen here, right?
>As difficult as it was to get onto the Celestia Line, getting off the monorail was easy. Twilight was falling as we rounded a bend and were met with a graceful arch of tarnished silver which flowed up and over the monorails.
Nope. Just a page break and then this shit. It's the old patented k "I'm too busy dilating my mangina to make things happen in my stories" kat routine: set up something potentially exciting, do absolutely fuck-all with it, skip time forward randomly, and start a new scene that's just as pointless as the last. Looks like I fell for it again. I'm starting to feel like Charlie Brown trying to kick that fucking football.
Anyway, it looks like they've finally arrived at Tenpony Tower. The author does a more or less decent job of describing the building, though he seems to take it for granted that we already know it's an apartment tower that he's talking about, and not a castle tower or a communications tower or literally any other sort of tower that could possibly exist, even though he never indicated what sort of tower it is or even that it is located in Manehattan. But whatever; finally, LP can give the DJ her stupid records that she stole from Vinyl Scratch's apartment and get Velvet's god-awful caterwauling on the radio and do whatever the hell else they wanted to do here, so we won't have to listen to her babble about going to see the faggot-ass DJ anymore.
Even assuming the technological issues of setting up a 24/7 radio broadcast can be overcome, and the pony in question is willing to undertake such a pointless endeavor when does this guy sleep? when does he eat? where does he get food? does he ever get to take a shit? the questions just keep coming and coming, there are still logic issues with the content of this latest broadcast.
>Just got a report that a weak distress signal can be heard near Horseshoe Tower.
How is a distress signal being broadcast? What is the purpose of broadcasting one? Who is supposed to answer it? My impression of this world is that it is pretty much pure chaos. There is no overall social cohesion, no police, no military. Organized groups like the Talons would presumably look out for their own, and if the technology were available it would make sense for them to use radio to keep in contact with each other. However, sending out a general distress beacon in the hopes that some random party will hear and answer it makes very little sense in this kind of a setting. In fact, it would probably just attract the attention of raiders or whatever.
There's the DJ I suppose, but sending out a distress beacon to the radio station so the DJ will hear it makes even less sense:
>Oh no we're under siege, we'd better alert this smarmy faggot who sits in his room playing the same records over and over, so he can make some snotty jokes about how we deserved to die because bigotry or something, and then go on playing his records!
t. nobody, ever
>This is DJ Pon3 reminding everypony in the Equestrian Wasteland: you reap what you sow.
Also: the world has been like this for 200 years, and they still call it "the Equestrian Wasteland?" Entire generations of ponies have lived and died here, and this is the best name they could come up with for their homeland? This DJ went to all the trouble of setting up his own radio station, is somehow supplied with food, water and electricity despite these things being a daily struggle for nearly everypony else, yet no other pony has ever tried to rebuild any other aspect of their old civilization? And it's been like this for two whole centuries? The miracle here is not that they still have electricity and radios (somehow), the miracle is that these incompetent nitwits have managed to survive at all.
Also: while we're on the subject, the information the DJ broadcasts could just as easily be used by raiders and the like as intel. With all the blabbing he's been doing about "the Stable Dweller," you'd think Littlepoop would have enemies flinging themselves at her left and right. They could easily track her movements just from his mention of the places she's been sighted. Nopony except Littlepoop seems to be paying all that much attention to this guy, so who knows; maybe I've got it all wrong. Maybe the DJ is just some lone screwball who sits in his room all day ranting about bullshit, and everyone except Littlepoop just tunes him out because he's an annoying retard.
Anyway, Littlepoop shuts off her radio as Calamity returns from scouting ahead. He has apparently found something, which he assures them they are going to love. They eventually come to a crossing of the Luna and Celestia monorail lines. This is apparently what Calamity found, though I'm not quite sure what is so remarkable about it. Anyway, they need to address the practical problem of how to get up to the new line. Calamity assures them he can carry everyone except Roboponer, but that's not an issue because Littlepoop can just use her obnoxious levitation powers. Well, there has to be some kind of challenge here, right? Oh, here we go:
>I floated out the binoculars, peering through them at the Celestia Line, and cringed with a gasp. The shadowed underbellies of the monorails were covered with the grotesque, leathery forms of dozens of giant, mutant bats.
Oooh, giant mutant bats. Well, this should be fun. Surely one of the ponies will accidentally do something to disturb the bats, and they will all wake up and start chasing them? Maybe it will turn into some kind of an action-packed escape scene, or a battle, or something? Maybe a group of raiders that has been quietly tailing them chooses this most inopportune of moments to attack, and they have to deal with the raiders and the bats? Maybe the raiders are friends of the raiders that the party shot at earlier to save the mare, thus proving that there was a point to that scene after all? The author is planning on having something happen here, right?
>As difficult as it was to get onto the Celestia Line, getting off the monorail was easy. Twilight was falling as we rounded a bend and were met with a graceful arch of tarnished silver which flowed up and over the monorails.
Nope. Just a page break and then this shit. It's the old patented k "I'm too busy dilating my mangina to make things happen in my stories" kat routine: set up something potentially exciting, do absolutely fuck-all with it, skip time forward randomly, and start a new scene that's just as pointless as the last. Looks like I fell for it again. I'm starting to feel like Charlie Brown trying to kick that fucking football.
Anyway, it looks like they've finally arrived at Tenpony Tower. The author does a more or less decent job of describing the building, though he seems to take it for granted that we already know it's an apartment tower that he's talking about, and not a castle tower or a communications tower or literally any other sort of tower that could possibly exist, even though he never indicated what sort of tower it is or even that it is located in Manehattan. But whatever; finally, LP can give the DJ her stupid records that she stole from Vinyl Scratch's apartment and get Velvet's god-awful caterwauling on the radio and do whatever the hell else they wanted to do here, so we won't have to listen to her babble about going to see the faggot-ass DJ anymore.
>>299917
All solid points. The museum analogy is a particularly good one. I wonder if that sort of writing appeals to a certain subset of people; something very common to FoE's various spinoffs is that they avoid the events of Littlepip's journey entirely, instead taking place within entirely seperate regions or time periods. Adding their own little side exhibits to the museum, if you like. Except Project Horizons - but let's not talk about Project Horizons.
If I had to guess, Kkat's internal logic for why Littlepip (and by extension the reader) should care about what happened to Equestria is something like this:
>#1. Good people care about good things.
>#2. Equestria - or at least its idyllic past state - is a good thing.
>#3. Littlepip is a good person.
>Conclusion: Littlepip cares about Equestria.
The problem, of course, is that this isn't borne out in the text. #2 is assumed purely on the basis of fandom affection, and #3 is dubious at best. Also, by the same logic anyone that doesn't share Littlepip's particular moral outlook with regard to Equestria is some form of bad person. Which means killing them is okay. And Littlepip is very eager to kill bad people. Like a good person. Hurp.
All solid points. The museum analogy is a particularly good one. I wonder if that sort of writing appeals to a certain subset of people; something very common to FoE's various spinoffs is that they avoid the events of Littlepip's journey entirely, instead taking place within entirely seperate regions or time periods. Adding their own little side exhibits to the museum, if you like. Except Project Horizons - but let's not talk about Project Horizons.
If I had to guess, Kkat's internal logic for why Littlepip (and by extension the reader) should care about what happened to Equestria is something like this:
>#1. Good people care about good things.
>#2. Equestria - or at least its idyllic past state - is a good thing.
>#3. Littlepip is a good person.
>Conclusion: Littlepip cares about Equestria.
The problem, of course, is that this isn't borne out in the text. #2 is assumed purely on the basis of fandom affection, and #3 is dubious at best. Also, by the same logic anyone that doesn't share Littlepip's particular moral outlook with regard to Equestria is some form of bad person. Which means killing them is okay. And Littlepip is very eager to kill bad people. Like a good person. Hurp.
>>299924
Anyway, they've finally arrived at Tenpony Faggot Tower. The building has its own monorail station, and when they disembark they can see armed guards watching and aiming weapons at them. Instead of worrying about this, Littlepoop decides to investigate some murals that are painted on the station walls:
>The walls of the station were decorated with life-size paintings of ponies. Once, the paintings had been protected by fields of magical energy similar to Velvet Remedy's spell.
Which spell? Please be specific about these kinds of things kkat; we can't read your mind.
>Now, most of the paintings were blackened, damaged or defaced beyond repair, the shields having failed and the gemstones which held their enchantments stolen. All save for one: a painting of a familiar purple unicorn, the once pink and violet stripes in her mane mostly changed to grey.
Is she familiar? It's obviously Twilight, but we haven't heard much about her. Once again, Littlepoop seems to just randomly know things, and it's not clear whether it's something she ought to have known to begin with, or where she would have learned it if it isn't.
Littlepoop goes up and inspects the painting for reasons that you would pretty much have to be as autistic as she is to understand. Meanwhile, the others watch apprehensively as the guards continue to aim guns at them. Suddenly, a sprite bot appears out of nowhere and explains the painting:
>"The Running of the Leaves," a voice announced from behind me, startling me so badly I nearly jumped back to my death. I turned to glare at the sprite-bot which had seemed to materialize out of nowhere.
It goes on a little longer, but the information isn't important. However, this is worth noting:
>Turning to the sprite-bot, "How did you know Twi..." But with a crack of static, Watcher was gone, the sprite-bot suddenly spewing tuba-music.
The text does not actually specify that this was one of Frank's sprites or that his voice was the one that was speaking. Personally, I assumed this was just some pre-war automated thing; they programmed a sprite-bot to float around and play some pre-recorded information about the murals. Once again, the author seems to just assume that we know what's in his head without being told.
Anyway, there's a page break, and in the next scene they finally decide to address the issue of the guards, who have been busy pointing guns at them while all of this autism with Frank and the painting was going on.
>"Ponies don't simply walk into Tenpony Tower," the guardpony informed us, scowling through an armored window as he spoke through the intercom.
This is either a misquote of Boromir or a missed opportunity.
>The words NO ZOMBIES! were painted across the gate in huge red letters.
In case any literate zombies happen to pass by.
Velvet attempts to bullshit her way past the guards by telling them that DJ Pon3 is expecting them. She says that Calamity is her bodyguard, the Steel Ranger is a Steel Ranger who is just there for some reason, and Littlepoop is a toaster repairpony, or something equally idiotic. The lie is completely transparent, wouldn't make sense even if she had told it convincingly, and could easily be debunked by simply calling up to the DJ and asking if he was expecting three armed dipshits and a robot to show up and fix his toaster. However, this is FoE, so the guards are as dumb as everypony else. Also, the party just bribes them anyway, which makes the whole thing even stupider.
However, the guards at least have enough sense to confiscate their weapons before allowing them inside. Well, their ammo at least. They send them through some kind of checkpoint:
>As we passed through the checkpoint, a unicorn stepped out of the guardpost and waved her horn over us. Every clip, bullet, grenade and missile flashed, visible even through SteelHooves’ metal armor. “Toaster repairpony,” she repeated with a demure smile as her gaze passed over my sniper rifle, combat shotgun, zebra rifle, assault carbine…
Wait a minute. Is this implying that Littlepoop was somehow concealing all of these guns? Where? All four of the types of weapons listed are rifles, which means long barrels, which means you can't just tuck them in a saddlebag. And that's just what was listed; at this point I've completely lost track of what all she has. I know the author is fond of abusing video game logic, but this is really pushing it. Unless she literally has a pocket dimension in her asshole, I'm calling shenanigans on this.
>I facehoofed.
Also, I really wish pony-fiction authors would stop using this word.
>“And a Steel Ranger?” she asked as she removed the missiles from the left side of SteelHooves’ battle saddle. “What is your story?”
Well....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nCqRmx3Dnw
It's a meme, you dip. What actually happened was this:
>SteelHooves whinnied. “I’m just here to make sure you don’t have any more nasty ghoul problems.”
>“Oh, that is no longer a concern,” she smiled. “But thank you for the concern.”
>“Indeed. Can’t have a filthy ghoul just walking in anywhere.”
>Calamity was shooting SteelHooves dark looks. Velvet Remedy nickered under her breath, just loud enough to make sure she was heard, “Oh yes. They’re unsightly things. Can’t imagine anything worse, except maybe a colt-killer.”
It's been established that LP is touchy about anti-ghoul rhetoric because of Derpy, but I don't see any reason why the others should automatically have the same hang-up. I'm actually a little unclear what the overall view of ghouls is, anyway. We saw some verbal abuse directed at Derpy way back when, and the DJ is kind of a sanctimonious faggot about calling out Sheriff Whoever for being anti-ghoul, but is ghoul-prejudice some kind of major issue in this setting? I'm not sure. I'm also not sure what we're supposed to think about SteelHooves; the author seems to be setting this ghoul issue up as a friction point between SH and LP, but his actual views haven't been clarified.
Anyway, they've finally arrived at Tenpony Faggot Tower. The building has its own monorail station, and when they disembark they can see armed guards watching and aiming weapons at them. Instead of worrying about this, Littlepoop decides to investigate some murals that are painted on the station walls:
>The walls of the station were decorated with life-size paintings of ponies. Once, the paintings had been protected by fields of magical energy similar to Velvet Remedy's spell.
Which spell? Please be specific about these kinds of things kkat; we can't read your mind.
>Now, most of the paintings were blackened, damaged or defaced beyond repair, the shields having failed and the gemstones which held their enchantments stolen. All save for one: a painting of a familiar purple unicorn, the once pink and violet stripes in her mane mostly changed to grey.
Is she familiar? It's obviously Twilight, but we haven't heard much about her. Once again, Littlepoop seems to just randomly know things, and it's not clear whether it's something she ought to have known to begin with, or where she would have learned it if it isn't.
Littlepoop goes up and inspects the painting for reasons that you would pretty much have to be as autistic as she is to understand. Meanwhile, the others watch apprehensively as the guards continue to aim guns at them. Suddenly, a sprite bot appears out of nowhere and explains the painting:
>"The Running of the Leaves," a voice announced from behind me, startling me so badly I nearly jumped back to my death. I turned to glare at the sprite-bot which had seemed to materialize out of nowhere.
It goes on a little longer, but the information isn't important. However, this is worth noting:
>Turning to the sprite-bot, "How did you know Twi..." But with a crack of static, Watcher was gone, the sprite-bot suddenly spewing tuba-music.
The text does not actually specify that this was one of Frank's sprites or that his voice was the one that was speaking. Personally, I assumed this was just some pre-war automated thing; they programmed a sprite-bot to float around and play some pre-recorded information about the murals. Once again, the author seems to just assume that we know what's in his head without being told.
Anyway, there's a page break, and in the next scene they finally decide to address the issue of the guards, who have been busy pointing guns at them while all of this autism with Frank and the painting was going on.
>"Ponies don't simply walk into Tenpony Tower," the guardpony informed us, scowling through an armored window as he spoke through the intercom.
This is either a misquote of Boromir or a missed opportunity.
>The words NO ZOMBIES! were painted across the gate in huge red letters.
In case any literate zombies happen to pass by.
Velvet attempts to bullshit her way past the guards by telling them that DJ Pon3 is expecting them. She says that Calamity is her bodyguard, the Steel Ranger is a Steel Ranger who is just there for some reason, and Littlepoop is a toaster repairpony, or something equally idiotic. The lie is completely transparent, wouldn't make sense even if she had told it convincingly, and could easily be debunked by simply calling up to the DJ and asking if he was expecting three armed dipshits and a robot to show up and fix his toaster. However, this is FoE, so the guards are as dumb as everypony else. Also, the party just bribes them anyway, which makes the whole thing even stupider.
However, the guards at least have enough sense to confiscate their weapons before allowing them inside. Well, their ammo at least. They send them through some kind of checkpoint:
>As we passed through the checkpoint, a unicorn stepped out of the guardpost and waved her horn over us. Every clip, bullet, grenade and missile flashed, visible even through SteelHooves’ metal armor. “Toaster repairpony,” she repeated with a demure smile as her gaze passed over my sniper rifle, combat shotgun, zebra rifle, assault carbine…
Wait a minute. Is this implying that Littlepoop was somehow concealing all of these guns? Where? All four of the types of weapons listed are rifles, which means long barrels, which means you can't just tuck them in a saddlebag. And that's just what was listed; at this point I've completely lost track of what all she has. I know the author is fond of abusing video game logic, but this is really pushing it. Unless she literally has a pocket dimension in her asshole, I'm calling shenanigans on this.
>I facehoofed.
Also, I really wish pony-fiction authors would stop using this word.
>“And a Steel Ranger?” she asked as she removed the missiles from the left side of SteelHooves’ battle saddle. “What is your story?”
Well....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nCqRmx3Dnw
It's a meme, you dip. What actually happened was this:
>SteelHooves whinnied. “I’m just here to make sure you don’t have any more nasty ghoul problems.”
>“Oh, that is no longer a concern,” she smiled. “But thank you for the concern.”
>“Indeed. Can’t have a filthy ghoul just walking in anywhere.”
>Calamity was shooting SteelHooves dark looks. Velvet Remedy nickered under her breath, just loud enough to make sure she was heard, “Oh yes. They’re unsightly things. Can’t imagine anything worse, except maybe a colt-killer.”
It's been established that LP is touchy about anti-ghoul rhetoric because of Derpy, but I don't see any reason why the others should automatically have the same hang-up. I'm actually a little unclear what the overall view of ghouls is, anyway. We saw some verbal abuse directed at Derpy way back when, and the DJ is kind of a sanctimonious faggot about calling out Sheriff Whoever for being anti-ghoul, but is ghoul-prejudice some kind of major issue in this setting? I'm not sure. I'm also not sure what we're supposed to think about SteelHooves; the author seems to be setting this ghoul issue up as a friction point between SH and LP, but his actual views haven't been clarified.
>>299920
>How do you think this problem could be solved? How could a better author make 200 year old events matter to the ponies alive in the present?
I remember reading a book when I was in sixth grade or so. The author I know for a fact was Gary Paulsen, who is worth reading in general, and iirc the title was Canyon. The story deals with a teenage boy in the present who is poking around in Arizona or New Mexico or somewhere like that, and he comes across an old skull. The skull turns out to have belonged to an Indian boy of around the same age who died in a battle against American soldiers. I think touching the skull gives the modern-day kid flashbacks to the Indian kid's life, and the story jumps back and forth between the kid's life in the present and these events that happened in the past.
Something like that could possibly be made to work, but I think my original instinct was better: kkat's whole idea is too large to work as it is, and the project should have been broken up into multiple works. He wants to tell the entire story of a 200 year old war through the eyes of a character who has no connection to it, beyond being one of any number of ponies living in its aftermath, simply by having her wander around picking up journal fragments of dead ponies. There's just no way to make that work. Really, trying to write an entire war epic in the first person from the point of view of a single character is a tall order in the first place; adding the time gulf makes it even worse. You could do a war story that way, but not the story of an entire war.
If you wanted to get a little experimental with it, you could probably drop Littlepoop's character entirely and just have the novel be a collection of journal entries and letters, arranged in some kind of sequential order that tells the complete story in first person from various perspectives. Dracula was basically like that. However, I don't think that's the sort of thing kkat was going for.
I hate to keep harping on this, but the biggest problem here is that kkat is basically just writing out a playthrough of an imaginary Fallout game with ponies in it. In a video game, the interaction allows the player to explore a setting to which they have no personal connection, and the entertainment value comes from digging up its secrets. In a situation like that, it's actually better if the player character is just a generic blank slate, as it allows the player to self-insert and fully immerse themselves in the world being explored. However, this is entirely dependent on a game being an interactive medium. The player is able to explore the setting for himself, so he's a participant in the story. The same thing can work in other types of interactive fiction; something like FoE would have probably worked well enough as a choose your own adventure thread or a tabletop RPG session. But with a novel that people are supposed to sit and read, you can't do it this way. In a written story the reader isn't interacting with the world, the protagonist is; thus, the protagonist needs to be a developed character who exists as a part of the setting and has a stake in what is going on.
>How do you think this problem could be solved? How could a better author make 200 year old events matter to the ponies alive in the present?
I remember reading a book when I was in sixth grade or so. The author I know for a fact was Gary Paulsen, who is worth reading in general, and iirc the title was Canyon. The story deals with a teenage boy in the present who is poking around in Arizona or New Mexico or somewhere like that, and he comes across an old skull. The skull turns out to have belonged to an Indian boy of around the same age who died in a battle against American soldiers. I think touching the skull gives the modern-day kid flashbacks to the Indian kid's life, and the story jumps back and forth between the kid's life in the present and these events that happened in the past.
Something like that could possibly be made to work, but I think my original instinct was better: kkat's whole idea is too large to work as it is, and the project should have been broken up into multiple works. He wants to tell the entire story of a 200 year old war through the eyes of a character who has no connection to it, beyond being one of any number of ponies living in its aftermath, simply by having her wander around picking up journal fragments of dead ponies. There's just no way to make that work. Really, trying to write an entire war epic in the first person from the point of view of a single character is a tall order in the first place; adding the time gulf makes it even worse. You could do a war story that way, but not the story of an entire war.
If you wanted to get a little experimental with it, you could probably drop Littlepoop's character entirely and just have the novel be a collection of journal entries and letters, arranged in some kind of sequential order that tells the complete story in first person from various perspectives. Dracula was basically like that. However, I don't think that's the sort of thing kkat was going for.
I hate to keep harping on this, but the biggest problem here is that kkat is basically just writing out a playthrough of an imaginary Fallout game with ponies in it. In a video game, the interaction allows the player to explore a setting to which they have no personal connection, and the entertainment value comes from digging up its secrets. In a situation like that, it's actually better if the player character is just a generic blank slate, as it allows the player to self-insert and fully immerse themselves in the world being explored. However, this is entirely dependent on a game being an interactive medium. The player is able to explore the setting for himself, so he's a participant in the story. The same thing can work in other types of interactive fiction; something like FoE would have probably worked well enough as a choose your own adventure thread or a tabletop RPG session. But with a novel that people are supposed to sit and read, you can't do it this way. In a written story the reader isn't interacting with the world, the protagonist is; thus, the protagonist needs to be a developed character who exists as a part of the setting and has a stake in what is going on.
>>299917
>I think in a previous thread we were talking about Tom Bombadil's part in LOTR
No, it was the thread before. Not that it matters. You should take that as parise for your stamina as you have made so many of these threads now that they are starting to blur together.
>I think in a previous thread we were talking about Tom Bombadil's part in LOTR
No, it was the thread before. Not that it matters. You should take that as parise for your stamina as you have made so many of these threads now that they are starting to blur together.
>>299927
>We saw some verbal abuse directed at Derpy way back when, and the DJ is kind of a sanctimonious faggot about calling out Sheriff Whoever for being anti-ghoul, but is ghoul-prejudice some kind of major issue in this setting? I'm not sure.
This is another thing that makes more sense if you're familiar with the games, which elaborate a little more on what ghouls are and how society views them. In the Fallout series, ghouls are people (un)lucky enough to have a very specific genetic mutation that allows them to survive extreme radiation exposure. Instead of dying, their bodies decay to a state that resembles undeath but technically isn't. Naturally, this makes ghouls hideous by the standards of regular people. In fact, they were specifically designed to resemble the """survivors""" of Hiroshima/Nagasaki. On the bright side, the transformation into a ghoul also halts aging and grants immunity to disease.
Things get dicey beyond that point, because the decay a ghoul suffers can extend to degradation of the brain - and in some circumstances, the condition can worsen over time. This is what separates a regular ghoul (a human with a rough voice and an extremely bad skin condition) from a feral ghoul (a snarling, mindless pseudo-zombie with no sentience at all). As a result, the social standing of sapient ghouls varies a lot between different places and times. To some they're just regular folks with an unfortunate disfigurement, to others they're twisted subhumans, and others draw no distinction at all - every ghoul is either feral or on the way there.
Naturally, the nature of their condition and the prejudice against them means that many ghouls choose to live together in seclusion, far away from what passes for civilization. Most of the games have a ghoul settlement or two.
As best I can tell, FoE's ghouls are more or less the same - with the caveat that they're genuinely undead (magic!) rather than just looking that way.
>We saw some verbal abuse directed at Derpy way back when, and the DJ is kind of a sanctimonious faggot about calling out Sheriff Whoever for being anti-ghoul, but is ghoul-prejudice some kind of major issue in this setting? I'm not sure.
This is another thing that makes more sense if you're familiar with the games, which elaborate a little more on what ghouls are and how society views them. In the Fallout series, ghouls are people (un)lucky enough to have a very specific genetic mutation that allows them to survive extreme radiation exposure. Instead of dying, their bodies decay to a state that resembles undeath but technically isn't. Naturally, this makes ghouls hideous by the standards of regular people. In fact, they were specifically designed to resemble the """survivors""" of Hiroshima/Nagasaki. On the bright side, the transformation into a ghoul also halts aging and grants immunity to disease.
Things get dicey beyond that point, because the decay a ghoul suffers can extend to degradation of the brain - and in some circumstances, the condition can worsen over time. This is what separates a regular ghoul (a human with a rough voice and an extremely bad skin condition) from a feral ghoul (a snarling, mindless pseudo-zombie with no sentience at all). As a result, the social standing of sapient ghouls varies a lot between different places and times. To some they're just regular folks with an unfortunate disfigurement, to others they're twisted subhumans, and others draw no distinction at all - every ghoul is either feral or on the way there.
Naturally, the nature of their condition and the prejudice against them means that many ghouls choose to live together in seclusion, far away from what passes for civilization. Most of the games have a ghoul settlement or two.
As best I can tell, FoE's ghouls are more or less the same - with the caveat that they're genuinely undead (magic!) rather than just looking that way.
>>299942
You'd think in a world with magic flame bullet guns and magic waifu figurines that boost your physical attributes and magic enchanted labcoats of plus 5 Science, at least one ghoul would hide their ghoulness with a magic mask/necklace/strap-on/earring of illusion that makes them look normal.
Sadly the author put no thought into what an Equestria with enchanting and factories would profit from making before the war. If it doesn't kill ponies or win him imaginary points with the woke crowd Kkat isn't interested in it.
It seems retarded to put a "racism is bad. They are just like you or me" moral in a setting with fictional races/mutants/monsters that objectively aren't like you or me. The bunny can only be a cop in the movies. Physical differences between races exist. Physical differences between fantasy races are even bigger. It's not so bad with ghouls since they're just ugly old farts. Still this story manages to make it look awkward and out of place. If you didn't already know about the Ghouls of Fallout you'd ask why the author bothered to put zombies in this typical post-apocalypse only to use them to unironically say "some zombies are ok, don't be racist to zombies, please refer to them as Mortally Challenged".
You'd think in a world with magic flame bullet guns and magic waifu figurines that boost your physical attributes and magic enchanted labcoats of plus 5 Science, at least one ghoul would hide their ghoulness with a magic mask/necklace/strap-on/earring of illusion that makes them look normal.
Sadly the author put no thought into what an Equestria with enchanting and factories would profit from making before the war. If it doesn't kill ponies or win him imaginary points with the woke crowd Kkat isn't interested in it.
It seems retarded to put a "racism is bad. They are just like you or me" moral in a setting with fictional races/mutants/monsters that objectively aren't like you or me. The bunny can only be a cop in the movies. Physical differences between races exist. Physical differences between fantasy races are even bigger. It's not so bad with ghouls since they're just ugly old farts. Still this story manages to make it look awkward and out of place. If you didn't already know about the Ghouls of Fallout you'd ask why the author bothered to put zombies in this typical post-apocalypse only to use them to unironically say "some zombies are ok, don't be racist to zombies, please refer to them as Mortally Challenged".
>>299956
The problem isn't that Littlepip is pro-ghoul, per se - there's a number of strong arguments to be made for treating sapient ghouls like ordinary people.
The problem is that Littlepip has interacted with ONE sapient ghoul in the few weeks since she left her sheltered stable. She didn't even get to know Derpy very well - sure, Derpy was nice to her once or twice and provided a service, but that's an amiable acquaintance at best - not a friendship, and certainly not a deep personal understanding. Littlepip has no idea how ghouls are made, how they work, whether a seemingly friendly one can degrade into a feral, etc. On the flip side, dozens of mindless ghouls have attempted to kill her. In defiance of her own sheltered upbringing and the facts presented to her, she's defaulted to a hardline #ghoullivesmatter position because it's the most generic 'prejudice is bad' good guy outlook. It's not something that's been justified, developed or earned in the narrative.
The problem isn't that Littlepip is pro-ghoul, per se - there's a number of strong arguments to be made for treating sapient ghouls like ordinary people.
The problem is that Littlepip has interacted with ONE sapient ghoul in the few weeks since she left her sheltered stable. She didn't even get to know Derpy very well - sure, Derpy was nice to her once or twice and provided a service, but that's an amiable acquaintance at best - not a friendship, and certainly not a deep personal understanding. Littlepip has no idea how ghouls are made, how they work, whether a seemingly friendly one can degrade into a feral, etc. On the flip side, dozens of mindless ghouls have attempted to kill her. In defiance of her own sheltered upbringing and the facts presented to her, she's defaulted to a hardline #ghoullivesmatter position because it's the most generic 'prejudice is bad' good guy outlook. It's not something that's been justified, developed or earned in the narrative.
>>299740
>I started doing these lit-analysis threads in an effort to help writefags develop their craft. Sometimes I'm not sure if I'm actually helping anyone learn to write better,
Not a board native, and i'm basically here only to read this interesting rant and otherwise lurk, but I really appreciate your in-depth critique. You're giving me tons of things to chew on and write down notes for approaching various subjects in writing. Fitting, too--as I intend on writing a story similar in subject to this one when i'm a competent-enough writer.
So your words have definitely helped one person out, at the very least, and I genuinely appreciate your substantiation of this story's flaws.
>I started doing these lit-analysis threads in an effort to help writefags develop their craft. Sometimes I'm not sure if I'm actually helping anyone learn to write better,
Not a board native, and i'm basically here only to read this interesting rant and otherwise lurk, but I really appreciate your in-depth critique. You're giving me tons of things to chew on and write down notes for approaching various subjects in writing. Fitting, too--as I intend on writing a story similar in subject to this one when i'm a competent-enough writer.
So your words have definitely helped one person out, at the very least, and I genuinely appreciate your substantiation of this story's flaws.
1611914882_2.jpg (38.8 KB, 600x433, Fig 1 - Can you recognise pain in your horse.jpg)
>tfw you have things to add but you can't bring yourself anymore becase you always wanted to write not review others' work and you wonder if you will forever remain complaining on other people's work instead of making your own.
1611917837.jpg (142.3 KB, 800x572, 574b158b59dce12386a8d2bb1ee68ec4.jpg)
>>300074
Yeah, that too
For all she knows, every Ghoul could be a slowly-declining ticking time bomb with hyper-dimentia except when they forget who they or other people are they forget why they shouldn't rape/kill/steal from that person. Ferality/Zombieness could be the ultimate fate for every tragic Ghoul creature, and mercy killing them or keeping them out of your civilization so they don't form friendships before their mandatory mercy killing could be the only solution.
Not to mention what effect the dark necromantic magic animating them could have on their soul or the environment. If dark magic isn't inherently bad it's just another element like fire or ice. But if dark magic is inherently bad, so bad the Ziggwrs used it to nuke Equestria, why would it bless some ponies with eternal life?
>>300124
Glim is the best reviewer I've ever seen.
I used to read fanfiction MST3Ks but they'd rarely have anything intelligent to say about the fic. Usually they'd just do stupid Nostalgia Critic tier skits where the characters reacting to this story say they don't like it. It felt like watching a movie except one faggot couldn't stop trying to rip off the AVGN badly.
But this? This is good. I've actually changed things in my book because of writing lessons taught by the analysis of this story!
Plus his review of the Silver story was the first serious review that story ever got from, and it will help improve the remake. Glim has had a positive impact on my life, and the lives of others.
Yeah, that too
For all she knows, every Ghoul could be a slowly-declining ticking time bomb with hyper-dimentia except when they forget who they or other people are they forget why they shouldn't rape/kill/steal from that person. Ferality/Zombieness could be the ultimate fate for every tragic Ghoul creature, and mercy killing them or keeping them out of your civilization so they don't form friendships before their mandatory mercy killing could be the only solution.
Not to mention what effect the dark necromantic magic animating them could have on their soul or the environment. If dark magic isn't inherently bad it's just another element like fire or ice. But if dark magic is inherently bad, so bad the Ziggwrs used it to nuke Equestria, why would it bless some ponies with eternal life?
>>300124
Glim is the best reviewer I've ever seen.
I used to read fanfiction MST3Ks but they'd rarely have anything intelligent to say about the fic. Usually they'd just do stupid Nostalgia Critic tier skits where the characters reacting to this story say they don't like it. It felt like watching a movie except one faggot couldn't stop trying to rip off the AVGN badly.
But this? This is good. I've actually changed things in my book because of writing lessons taught by the analysis of this story!
Plus his review of the Silver story was the first serious review that story ever got from, and it will help improve the remake. Glim has had a positive impact on my life, and the lives of others.
>>300139
I have been having this on my mind for a while now. I wanted just to apologize for being harsh in my criticism of your posts. While, if I went over my stuff, would proabably agree with what I said most of the time; I feel and think that I took it too far at times.
As said before, I do like you. We actually have a lot in common. We both have autism.
I have been having this on my mind for a while now. I wanted just to apologize for being harsh in my criticism of your posts. While, if I went over my stuff, would proabably agree with what I said most of the time; I feel and think that I took it too far at times.
As said before, I do like you. We actually have a lot in common. We both have autism.
>>300157
Right back at you. And hey, maybe my pony post-apocalyptic fic will be so bad that you end up stumbling across it one day and tearing it apart. Wouldn't that be neat.
Right back at you. And hey, maybe my pony post-apocalyptic fic will be so bad that you end up stumbling across it one day and tearing it apart. Wouldn't that be neat.
>>300157
Cheers, brother!
Chapters 1-6 out of 12 of the Silver Star rewrite are complete. Good luck with the rest of the story!
Cheers, brother!
Chapters 1-6 out of 12 of the Silver Star rewrite are complete. Good luck with the rest of the story!
>>300185
You can just post it here. He has never rejected anyoneme, in which I'm overjoyed over before.
You can just post it here. He has never rejected anyoneme, in which I'm overjoyed over before.
>>300254
Don't start things.
While your argument is sort of justified since I have notice him spoiling things of this fic in the past. I'm not really certain of the statistics though.
But regardless, this back-and-forth derails the thread. Use this criticism when he does it. This sort of unprompted snide comments will only make others take his position since it is hard to keep track of how much he has spoiled things in the past by memory alone. Point is, it doesn't help your case nor thread. Take this up again when it happens.
Don't start things.
While your argument is sort of justified since I have notice him spoiling things of this fic in the past. I'm not really certain of the statistics though.
But regardless, this back-and-forth derails the thread. Use this criticism when he does it. This sort of unprompted snide comments will only make others take his position since it is hard to keep track of how much he has spoiled things in the past by memory alone. Point is, it doesn't help your case nor thread. Take this up again when it happens.
>>300249
Ah, it'll be quite a while before I write it, and I don't wish to force anything on Glim. Hell, what he does is worth a decent payment, and it's admirable he seems to have found an enjoyable hobby in it that he's skilled at.
Ah, it'll be quite a while before I write it, and I don't wish to force anything on Glim. Hell, what he does is worth a decent payment, and it's admirable he seems to have found an enjoyable hobby in it that he's skilled at.
>>296578
It also solces alot of the problems with the original story. It has its own problems sure, but many of the poor choices in the original are addressed here
It also solces alot of the problems with the original story. It has its own problems sure, but many of the poor choices in the original are addressed here
>>299926
Project horizons still ignores littlepips journey for the most part, all the way to book 5. There is a minor arc early on but generally it stands on its own
Project horizons still ignores littlepips journey for the most part, all the way to book 5. There is a minor arc early on but generally it stands on its own
>>300306
>>300307
Whatever one might think of FoE's plot and backstory, PH retcons or recontextualizes virtually everything into "actually my pregnant cyborg alicorn OC/my OC in the wartime deep state/my ancient evil star monster OC did this" and sandwiches it between tens of thousands of words of screaming and crying about how the main character is a horrible person. When the writer isn't busy indulging his lust for foalcon, anyway.
Regardless, this isn't the thread for it. Begone, shill.
>>300307
Whatever one might think of FoE's plot and backstory, PH retcons or recontextualizes virtually everything into "actually my pregnant cyborg alicorn OC/my OC in the wartime deep state/my ancient evil star monster OC did this" and sandwiches it between tens of thousands of words of screaming and crying about how the main character is a horrible person. When the writer isn't busy indulging his lust for foalcon, anyway.
Regardless, this isn't the thread for it. Begone, shill.
>>300311
Is it correct for PH to retcon so much of FE, when so much of FE is reductive dogshit that gets in the way of telling a story in the present day meaningfully linked to pre-war events? If you don't blame all Zebras for what they did to Equestria during the war either Zebras or Ponies started, it's necessary to invent something else to blame the war on, like an evil globalist rich-unicorn cabal or happy merchant griffons or, if you can't think of anything smarter, a giant fucking space flea from nowhere that might as well be the giant cup from Persona 5 for all the nothing it would change.
Canon characters have roles in this story distributed seemingly at random, and almost every role is "Be the reason something Fallouty exists in Equestria or happened in the Equestrian Wasteland and then die horribly or worse".
And it's never creatively mixed with pony shit or real-world history. Remember that story about the soldier guy who took an entire military platoon's worth of cocaine while on skis and killed a bunch of enemy soldiers, or however that story went? Pinkie Pie's Party-Time Mint-als are just videogame powerups from Fallout but if these mints made you more like Pinkie Pie while also working like those pills from Limitless, that would be much more interesting. A pill that turns you into Pinkie Pie... I can hear the Hypnopony faggots nutting at the thought from here. What kind of self-loathing needs to possess you before fantasizing about being turned into your personal headcanon take on DJ Pon3, the voiceless background character with 34 frames of screentime pre-pandering episode, seems like a good use of your time?
The story of Equestria's descent into the Wasteland isn't really a story in its own right. It doesn't set up characters or put them through arcs. The thought of Twilight Sparkle dying horribly to a firing squad might make you sad (or laugh at the edge) but this story doesn't do anything to earn its "emotional moments", it relies purely on your pre-existing feelings towards these characters.
It usually goes something like this: Kkat includes the Power Armour from Fallout 3 in his fanfic, and then thinks fans might wonder how this Fallout element got into Ponyland, so he picks a name from a hat and comes up with "Applejack invented it". Even though it would make more sense if Twilight invented it in an attempt to make Earth Ponies less vulnerable to gunfire than the mach-fuck Pegasi air support and shield-making Unicorn magi-chads. Everything's a hamfisted rushed justification for the current era, which relies on nostalgia pandering and brony bait to try and keep fans interested in something that's ultimately not equestria and couldn't be without Celestia popping in out of nowhere in the final hour to wave her magic wand and unfuck the planet.
We might get one contextless scene forced upon us by a Flashback Ball where Applejack cries on Big Mac's shoulder and yells "Those bastards can't do this to us! I can't believe we're being fucked over by bastards who shouldn't get away with this considering the established pre-war worldbuilding but do! I sold my farm to get the money to make this power armour-making company even though it's later revealed the govt funded us! For no reason, I sold my fucking faaaarm!" but that means nothing to us if we don't already know Applejack farms and likes it.
It's not like a sequential series of chapters features Applejack starting off as a cheery and hard-working optimist who grinds at her administrative office job for hours but loses touch with her friends and family for being a workaholic forced to sacrifice her health and social life, and sometimes she gets fucked over by budget bastards or sabotage or dumb underlings or ambitious backstabbing underlings or evil zebra schemes while she's in over her head struggling to make ends meet in a world going down the drain whether she likes it or not.
She ends up missing the feel of dirt on her hooves and aches in her burning buff muscles, which are wasting away from endless hours of desk work. "I ain't moved from this chair in nine hours," Applejack thinks to herself, "So why do I feel so tired?"
Not for the first time, she considers taking those weird magic crack mints Pinkie invented, but the thought of ending up with eyes as bloodshot as hers scares her out of it.
Then she remembers the time Apple Bloom cried to her because a schoolfriend of hers got arrested and unpersoned for calling Equestria shitty, just because the war claimed his father, a harmless quill and sofa-seller who couldn't have hurt a fly and ended up dying to the most sickeningly cruel Zebra poison gas bomb imaginable.
"I ain't taking a break," Applejack sighs, continuing to work on and refine the blueprint orgy on her desk. "I need to make something to keep mah soldiers safe from anythin' those ziggers can throw at us. Gas, bullets, bombs, anything. Something that'll make any earth pony strong enough to crush any potion-mutated zebra monster out there!"
And then she's real proud of her power armour and how amazing it turns out to be. So when she hears that baddies are using it or special armour-piercing weapons manufactured in Equestria to defeat it, she gets mad and tries to stop this somehow, or something, I don't know.
The problems with this story are immense and too numerous to count. Everything's just an excuse for pony gore that isn't even impressive or creative. Nobody fires a magic force blast at one poner so hard fragments of his body and bones become shrapnel that shred the fuck out of other poners. Nobody tries to make Avatar's Bloodbenders piss themselves/vomit.
I don't think it's possible to write a "good Fallout Equestria story" within the confines of the idiotic decisions Kkat lazily made. It's why I stopped trying to write one.
Do you think Project Horizons would have turned out better if it tried its own take on the "Ponyland turned into Fallout" idea from the start, without relying on FE or retcons?
Is it correct for PH to retcon so much of FE, when so much of FE is reductive dogshit that gets in the way of telling a story in the present day meaningfully linked to pre-war events? If you don't blame all Zebras for what they did to Equestria during the war either Zebras or Ponies started, it's necessary to invent something else to blame the war on, like an evil globalist rich-unicorn cabal or happy merchant griffons or, if you can't think of anything smarter, a giant fucking space flea from nowhere that might as well be the giant cup from Persona 5 for all the nothing it would change.
Canon characters have roles in this story distributed seemingly at random, and almost every role is "Be the reason something Fallouty exists in Equestria or happened in the Equestrian Wasteland and then die horribly or worse".
And it's never creatively mixed with pony shit or real-world history. Remember that story about the soldier guy who took an entire military platoon's worth of cocaine while on skis and killed a bunch of enemy soldiers, or however that story went? Pinkie Pie's Party-Time Mint-als are just videogame powerups from Fallout but if these mints made you more like Pinkie Pie while also working like those pills from Limitless, that would be much more interesting. A pill that turns you into Pinkie Pie... I can hear the Hypnopony faggots nutting at the thought from here. What kind of self-loathing needs to possess you before fantasizing about being turned into your personal headcanon take on DJ Pon3, the voiceless background character with 34 frames of screentime pre-pandering episode, seems like a good use of your time?
The story of Equestria's descent into the Wasteland isn't really a story in its own right. It doesn't set up characters or put them through arcs. The thought of Twilight Sparkle dying horribly to a firing squad might make you sad (or laugh at the edge) but this story doesn't do anything to earn its "emotional moments", it relies purely on your pre-existing feelings towards these characters.
It usually goes something like this: Kkat includes the Power Armour from Fallout 3 in his fanfic, and then thinks fans might wonder how this Fallout element got into Ponyland, so he picks a name from a hat and comes up with "Applejack invented it". Even though it would make more sense if Twilight invented it in an attempt to make Earth Ponies less vulnerable to gunfire than the mach-fuck Pegasi air support and shield-making Unicorn magi-chads. Everything's a hamfisted rushed justification for the current era, which relies on nostalgia pandering and brony bait to try and keep fans interested in something that's ultimately not equestria and couldn't be without Celestia popping in out of nowhere in the final hour to wave her magic wand and unfuck the planet.
We might get one contextless scene forced upon us by a Flashback Ball where Applejack cries on Big Mac's shoulder and yells "Those bastards can't do this to us! I can't believe we're being fucked over by bastards who shouldn't get away with this considering the established pre-war worldbuilding but do! I sold my farm to get the money to make this power armour-making company even though it's later revealed the govt funded us! For no reason, I sold my fucking faaaarm!" but that means nothing to us if we don't already know Applejack farms and likes it.
It's not like a sequential series of chapters features Applejack starting off as a cheery and hard-working optimist who grinds at her administrative office job for hours but loses touch with her friends and family for being a workaholic forced to sacrifice her health and social life, and sometimes she gets fucked over by budget bastards or sabotage or dumb underlings or ambitious backstabbing underlings or evil zebra schemes while she's in over her head struggling to make ends meet in a world going down the drain whether she likes it or not.
She ends up missing the feel of dirt on her hooves and aches in her burning buff muscles, which are wasting away from endless hours of desk work. "I ain't moved from this chair in nine hours," Applejack thinks to herself, "So why do I feel so tired?"
Not for the first time, she considers taking those weird magic crack mints Pinkie invented, but the thought of ending up with eyes as bloodshot as hers scares her out of it.
Then she remembers the time Apple Bloom cried to her because a schoolfriend of hers got arrested and unpersoned for calling Equestria shitty, just because the war claimed his father, a harmless quill and sofa-seller who couldn't have hurt a fly and ended up dying to the most sickeningly cruel Zebra poison gas bomb imaginable.
"I ain't taking a break," Applejack sighs, continuing to work on and refine the blueprint orgy on her desk. "I need to make something to keep mah soldiers safe from anythin' those ziggers can throw at us. Gas, bullets, bombs, anything. Something that'll make any earth pony strong enough to crush any potion-mutated zebra monster out there!"
And then she's real proud of her power armour and how amazing it turns out to be. So when she hears that baddies are using it or special armour-piercing weapons manufactured in Equestria to defeat it, she gets mad and tries to stop this somehow, or something, I don't know.
The problems with this story are immense and too numerous to count. Everything's just an excuse for pony gore that isn't even impressive or creative. Nobody fires a magic force blast at one poner so hard fragments of his body and bones become shrapnel that shred the fuck out of other poners. Nobody tries to make Avatar's Bloodbenders piss themselves/vomit.
I don't think it's possible to write a "good Fallout Equestria story" within the confines of the idiotic decisions Kkat lazily made. It's why I stopped trying to write one.
Do you think Project Horizons would have turned out better if it tried its own take on the "Ponyland turned into Fallout" idea from the start, without relying on FE or retcons?
>>300318
In short, the problem you're pointing out is that FoE relies heavily on the reader already being heavily invested in the characters of FiM and broadly knowledgeable about the Fallout games. It makes little attempt to justify investment in the former or explain the latter. The apparent goal is a sweeping epic narrative that spans centuries, but it's not founded on anything solid. Or, to use an analogy, Kkat's attempting to build a skyscraper without foundations or scaffolding. Or even a clear idea of which way is up. PH largely redirects the focus of these problems, but it doesn't solve them.
In short, the problem you're pointing out is that FoE relies heavily on the reader already being heavily invested in the characters of FiM and broadly knowledgeable about the Fallout games. It makes little attempt to justify investment in the former or explain the latter. The apparent goal is a sweeping epic narrative that spans centuries, but it's not founded on anything solid. Or, to use an analogy, Kkat's attempting to build a skyscraper without foundations or scaffolding. Or even a clear idea of which way is up. PH largely redirects the focus of these problems, but it doesn't solve them.
>>300319
Almost as though Kkat invented a pony self-insert and played through Fallout with them in mind, and expected the reader to A. Slough through it all in kind and B. Appreciate it as much as they did.
Almost as though Kkat invented a pony self-insert and played through Fallout with them in mind, and expected the reader to A. Slough through it all in kind and B. Appreciate it as much as they did.
>>300311
PH intentionally retcons FAILout Ecuckstryhardlawl to make a better, more coherent story... aside from the hilariously crazy shit that goes on.
PH intentionally retcons FAILout Ecuckstryhardlawl to make a better, more coherent story... aside from the hilariously crazy shit that goes on.
>>300321
Yes, and its main charachter makes alot more sense then a sheltered pipbuck technicians apprentice
Yes, and its main charachter makes alot more sense then a sheltered pipbuck technicians apprentice
>>300330
the core of the party is just as sheltered and directionless as she is and she leads because she has a goal. p-21 and glory either already completed their main goals. the inciting incident Carries the story in the start much better.
>fallout equestria
>leaves the stable after unrequited faggotry
>resolved in the first couple of chapters
>improbably talented main charachter, especially outside of her supposed talent/profession
>improbable leadership where a sheltered child-sized poner leads wasteland veterans
>no real charachter driven conflict, mostly aimless wandering
>why doesnt she settle down.
>project horizons
>clear and present threat
>takes the length of an entire novel to resolve, leaving the end of the first book on a high note
>a charachters skillset that actually fits the wasteland
>isnt just fallout 3 with poners
>core team has each charachter just as sheltered as the mc, with their initial arcs already complete
>actual interparty conflict, blackjack and p-21's relationship at the start is really interesting.
>being chased by a gigantic cyber rapist means settling down is something that can be done, pushing blackjack to move from place to place.
it's also nice some of the little things like when blackjack gets "Deus's" attention by calling him doofus that becomes relevant later.
the core of the party is just as sheltered and directionless as she is and she leads because she has a goal. p-21 and glory either already completed their main goals. the inciting incident Carries the story in the start much better.
>fallout equestria
>leaves the stable after unrequited faggotry
>resolved in the first couple of chapters
>improbably talented main charachter, especially outside of her supposed talent/profession
>improbable leadership where a sheltered child-sized poner leads wasteland veterans
>no real charachter driven conflict, mostly aimless wandering
>why doesnt she settle down.
>project horizons
>clear and present threat
>takes the length of an entire novel to resolve, leaving the end of the first book on a high note
>a charachters skillset that actually fits the wasteland
>isnt just fallout 3 with poners
>core team has each charachter just as sheltered as the mc, with their initial arcs already complete
>actual interparty conflict, blackjack and p-21's relationship at the start is really interesting.
>being chased by a gigantic cyber rapist means settling down is something that can be done, pushing blackjack to move from place to place.
it's also nice some of the little things like when blackjack gets "Deus's" attention by calling him doofus that becomes relevant later.
>>299927
>Calamity was shooting SteelHooves dark looks. Velvet Remedy nickered under her breath, just loud enough to make sure she was heard, “Oh yes. They’re unsightly things. Can’t imagine anything worse, except maybe a colt-killer.”
Another thing I'll note is that the author seems to be trying to clumsily inject tension between Velvet and Calamity (Calamity was the one who shot the kid earlier, and presumably this is supposed to be bothering Velvet due to her alleged opposition to pointless killing). As I clarified earlier, negative tension between characters who are supposed to be each others' love interests is a good thing, but it doesn't work if you do it this way. The tension needs to exist before the relationship becomes romantic. The problem here is that for most of the story so far, neither of these characters have paid much attention to each other at all. Then, out of nowhere, they're suddenly a romantic couple. Then, out of nowhere, they're suddenly fighting. It's not unheard of for situations to play out this way in real life of course, but in a story it's usually better to build a little drama.
Anyway, the security personnel confiscate their ammunition, advise them to buy rubber bullets from the gift shop if they really want to shoot stuff while they're in here ???, and let them in. Incidentally, how exactly are they supposed to reclaim their ammunition when they leave? Or do they even get to? Seems like Tenpony Tower is basically just a private stronghold similar to Shattered Hoof, and in a lawless society there's really nothing to stop these guys from just confiscating someone's ammo and telling them to fuck off when they ask for it back. If anything it would make very little sense not to do it this way, since ammunition is a scarce commodity and anyone dumb enough to just hand over their stash to any faggot who demands it probably deserves to get shot anyway. Also, why exactly did the party want to come here again?
>There was a loud CLANK as something released inside the ornate, armored double doors in front of us. They opened, swinging inwards and revealing the marbled, chandelier-lit station lobby of Tenpony Tower.
>We were getting looks. The idea of high society was completely foreign to me. We’d had nothing like this sort of bizarre elitism in Stable Two. The wasteland was a dirty, broken, rusted place that was completely at odds with stuffy behavior; the only reason a pony might walk around with their nose in the air in places like New Appleloosa was because they didn’t want to smell what they were walking in.
So I guess this place is supposed to be elitist and fancy? There has been absolutely nothing in the text so far suggesting we should have expected this. Then again, the text has given us almost no information about Tenpony Tower in the first place; I didn't even realize it was an apartment building in Manehattan until just a few pages ago. The party just suddenly decides to go here because Littlepoop wants to ask the DJ a couple of questions, the others just mindlessly follow along as if the idea makes perfect sense, and then suddenly they're here.
I'm assuming that the reason for this is what others in thread have pointed out: that Tenpony Tower is based on Tenpenny Tower from the Fallout games, and the author assumes everyone reading this has played the games and would just know immediately what he's referencing without any explanation. As far as the story's internal logic goes, however, this whole excursion makes very little sense. Littlepoop decides she wants to go and talk to the radio DJ because reasons, so they travel to this out of the way location, without question just hand over the massive stockpile of ammunition they've spent most of the story acquiring, and go inside to discover the place is basically the Ritz Carlton in the middle of the fucking wasteland. Well, whatever; it makes about as much sense as anything else that's happened so far. Let's just roll with it.
>“Let us hurry and find a place to make bed,” Velvet Remedy pushed.
This is a very awkwardly-worded line of dialogue to begin with, and Velvet has never spoken in this quaint, old-timey fashion before.
Anyway, instead of doing whatever the hell it is they came here to do, the party wanders around for awhile mumbling to themselves about how out of place they feel here, and how difficult it is apparently going to be for them to find a place to sleep, I guess because rich people are snooty. Rich ponies, whatever.
>Velvet Remedy seemed to read my mind. “Once we’ve bathed and rested, we should split up. I’ll take our goods to sell first thing in the morning, and then purchase us some new formal wear that will help us blend in. Littlepip, you should look into meeting with DJ Pon3.” I agreed.
So in addition to trading their ammunition for rubber bullets which will be useless as soon as they're back in the wasteland, now they're buying special clothes just to walk around and shop? This is making less sense by the minute. If the only reason they came here was to find the DJ and talk to him, they should just do that and then leave; they could be in and out in the space of an hour. I know I'm just beating a dead pony at this point, but I still don't understand what the point of coming here was supposed to be in the first place.
For most of the story, Tenpony Tower has just been vaguely described as some far-off place that the DJ broadcasts from. Up until now, I've been envisioning something like pic related; some kind of ramshackle tower-like structure located in the middle of nowhere where this lone maniac hides out and broadcasts from. This place is looking more like a city within a city. What's even more baffling is that the party seems to have been expecting something like this; apparently, selling off a bunch of their junk at the bazaar here was part of the plan. As ever, it's unclear how much we should assume they all know about this world.
>Calamity was shooting SteelHooves dark looks. Velvet Remedy nickered under her breath, just loud enough to make sure she was heard, “Oh yes. They’re unsightly things. Can’t imagine anything worse, except maybe a colt-killer.”
Another thing I'll note is that the author seems to be trying to clumsily inject tension between Velvet and Calamity (Calamity was the one who shot the kid earlier, and presumably this is supposed to be bothering Velvet due to her alleged opposition to pointless killing). As I clarified earlier, negative tension between characters who are supposed to be each others' love interests is a good thing, but it doesn't work if you do it this way. The tension needs to exist before the relationship becomes romantic. The problem here is that for most of the story so far, neither of these characters have paid much attention to each other at all. Then, out of nowhere, they're suddenly a romantic couple. Then, out of nowhere, they're suddenly fighting. It's not unheard of for situations to play out this way in real life of course, but in a story it's usually better to build a little drama.
Anyway, the security personnel confiscate their ammunition, advise them to buy rubber bullets from the gift shop if they really want to shoot stuff while they're in here ???, and let them in. Incidentally, how exactly are they supposed to reclaim their ammunition when they leave? Or do they even get to? Seems like Tenpony Tower is basically just a private stronghold similar to Shattered Hoof, and in a lawless society there's really nothing to stop these guys from just confiscating someone's ammo and telling them to fuck off when they ask for it back. If anything it would make very little sense not to do it this way, since ammunition is a scarce commodity and anyone dumb enough to just hand over their stash to any faggot who demands it probably deserves to get shot anyway. Also, why exactly did the party want to come here again?
>There was a loud CLANK as something released inside the ornate, armored double doors in front of us. They opened, swinging inwards and revealing the marbled, chandelier-lit station lobby of Tenpony Tower.
>We were getting looks. The idea of high society was completely foreign to me. We’d had nothing like this sort of bizarre elitism in Stable Two. The wasteland was a dirty, broken, rusted place that was completely at odds with stuffy behavior; the only reason a pony might walk around with their nose in the air in places like New Appleloosa was because they didn’t want to smell what they were walking in.
So I guess this place is supposed to be elitist and fancy? There has been absolutely nothing in the text so far suggesting we should have expected this. Then again, the text has given us almost no information about Tenpony Tower in the first place; I didn't even realize it was an apartment building in Manehattan until just a few pages ago. The party just suddenly decides to go here because Littlepoop wants to ask the DJ a couple of questions, the others just mindlessly follow along as if the idea makes perfect sense, and then suddenly they're here.
I'm assuming that the reason for this is what others in thread have pointed out: that Tenpony Tower is based on Tenpenny Tower from the Fallout games, and the author assumes everyone reading this has played the games and would just know immediately what he's referencing without any explanation. As far as the story's internal logic goes, however, this whole excursion makes very little sense. Littlepoop decides she wants to go and talk to the radio DJ because reasons, so they travel to this out of the way location, without question just hand over the massive stockpile of ammunition they've spent most of the story acquiring, and go inside to discover the place is basically the Ritz Carlton in the middle of the fucking wasteland. Well, whatever; it makes about as much sense as anything else that's happened so far. Let's just roll with it.
>“Let us hurry and find a place to make bed,” Velvet Remedy pushed.
This is a very awkwardly-worded line of dialogue to begin with, and Velvet has never spoken in this quaint, old-timey fashion before.
Anyway, instead of doing whatever the hell it is they came here to do, the party wanders around for awhile mumbling to themselves about how out of place they feel here, and how difficult it is apparently going to be for them to find a place to sleep, I guess because rich people are snooty. Rich ponies, whatever.
>Velvet Remedy seemed to read my mind. “Once we’ve bathed and rested, we should split up. I’ll take our goods to sell first thing in the morning, and then purchase us some new formal wear that will help us blend in. Littlepip, you should look into meeting with DJ Pon3.” I agreed.
So in addition to trading their ammunition for rubber bullets which will be useless as soon as they're back in the wasteland, now they're buying special clothes just to walk around and shop? This is making less sense by the minute. If the only reason they came here was to find the DJ and talk to him, they should just do that and then leave; they could be in and out in the space of an hour. I know I'm just beating a dead pony at this point, but I still don't understand what the point of coming here was supposed to be in the first place.
For most of the story, Tenpony Tower has just been vaguely described as some far-off place that the DJ broadcasts from. Up until now, I've been envisioning something like pic related; some kind of ramshackle tower-like structure located in the middle of nowhere where this lone maniac hides out and broadcasts from. This place is looking more like a city within a city. What's even more baffling is that the party seems to have been expecting something like this; apparently, selling off a bunch of their junk at the bazaar here was part of the plan. As ever, it's unclear how much we should assume they all know about this world.
>>300346
>“Ah want t’ find a workshop. Ah want t’ modify muh battle saddle. Until travelin’ with Li’lpip, Ah never had more’n one type o’ ammo. Want t’ set up a quick way t’ swap ‘tween ammo types. Be nice t’ be able t’ use rubber bullets when the situation calls fer it.” He looked at Velvet and me. “Y’all should give me yer guns so Ah can do them some proper maintenance while Ah’m at it.”
Sure, as long as you're here, you might as well commission some complicated, pointless and probably expensive work on everyone's weapons. Also, why exactly are you guys here again?
Anyway, out of literally bloody butt-fucking nowhere, Velvet suddenly starts unloading on Calamity over shooting the colt earlier I'll actually give the author like half a point here; I assumed that event was just thrown in for shock value and would never be referenced again, yet here he is attempting to clumsily build it into a subplot. The argument proceeds along fairly predictable lines: Velvet is angry because her on-again-off-again morality apparently condemns the killing of children, and Calamity defends himself by arguing that the colt was a rapist and a murderer.
Now actually seems like a good time to go over some things about the scene in question, where Calamity shot the colt. I didn't go over any of this at the time because, again, I assumed the scene was just shock-content that wouldn't be important later, but since the author is treating it as a major event, I'd like to point out a few specific issues I had with it.
The colt in question is described as a blank-flank. In MLP, this generally refers to a foal about the age and size of pic 1 related (in the series you see very few blank-flank foals that are any older than this; in fact most seem to get their marks at around this age). He is part of a group of raiders that are chasing down a full-grown mare in order to rape and presumably kill her. However, all of the adults are killed by LP and Calamity, and the colt is chasing the mare by himself when he is finally killed.
This is improbable for a number of reasons. The first and most obvious is the size difference between a child and an adult pony in this world. Compare the ponies in pics 1 and 2. Do you really think pic 1 would be able to forcibly rape pic 2 without any assistance? It's pretty comical to imagine him even trying, and the mare would have to be seriously injured in order for him to succeed. The rape in question was probably a crime of opportunity: a group of raiders which happens to include a young colt chances upon a lone, unarmed mare and decides to engage in a little forcey fun-time. In that situation the colt could rely on the strength of the others and get a piece of the action at little risk to his own safety; however, once the adult ponies are all killed off his chances of successfully completing the deed become near zero.
The second issue is that, again, the adults were all killed off. Even though the raiders in this story are depicted as fairly brainless goons, even a witless animal has enough sense to stop whatever it's doing and make a run for it when it becomes painfully obvious that it's facing an enemy it can't possibly win against. Again, the rape was probably just a crime of opportunity; the raiders saw an easy mark and went for it. As soon as gunfire started raining on them from the monorail tracks, the sensible thing to do would have been to just cut and run, especially since with his companions dead he had virtually no chance of raping the mare anyway. Did this colt really want pony poon tang so badly he was willing to ignore the hellstorm of bullets that had taken down every single one of his friends?
The last issue is fairly distasteful, but as long as we're considering all the angles here, the idea of a child this young living with this group and being treated as an equal among them is rather unlikely. As I said, the raiders in this story are depicted as a pretty savage bunch: they seem to rape and kill without much regard as to who or what they are raping and/or killing, and will pretty much attack anyone whom they see as an easy target. During LP's first encounter with raiders, she discovered that they were keeping a foal of about this age in captivity essentially for use as a fleshlight. You can probably see where I'm going with this.
You could probably think up a reasonable backstory for who this colt was and why he was among this raider group; maybe he was the son of one of the raiders, and for all we know maybe they did use him as a fleshlight or something, and he just stuck with the group because he had nowhere else to go. Maybe he learned to be a violent criminal because that's the only life he was ever exposed to. However, considering the level of characterization kkat has given his villains so far (that is to say, none), I'd say this is unlikely. K "I wrote foal rape into my story as a moral issue and definitely not because I secretly want to be used as a fleshlight by a pack of wasteland vagabonds" kat seldom puts enough thought into his villains to consider how or why they wound up as raiders or slavers or whatever; more likely this made it into the story partly because the idea of a young child committing raider-tier atrocities has shock value and partly because it would set off this controversy between Velvet and Calamity.
In any event, the whole scene is improbable to the point of being comedic rather than shocking or saddening. Knowing that the author threw it in deliberately and without irony, either to shock the reader or because this is honestly his idea of exploring a complex moral dilemma, just makes it that much funnier. If he'd wanted to make it at least semi-believable the way to do it would have been to have the entire group of raiders be children. Gangs of feral orphans would not be implausible in this setting, and while a single foal overpowering an adult mare is improbable, a group of them might conceivably pull it off.
>“Ah want t’ find a workshop. Ah want t’ modify muh battle saddle. Until travelin’ with Li’lpip, Ah never had more’n one type o’ ammo. Want t’ set up a quick way t’ swap ‘tween ammo types. Be nice t’ be able t’ use rubber bullets when the situation calls fer it.” He looked at Velvet and me. “Y’all should give me yer guns so Ah can do them some proper maintenance while Ah’m at it.”
Sure, as long as you're here, you might as well commission some complicated, pointless and probably expensive work on everyone's weapons. Also, why exactly are you guys here again?
Anyway, out of literally bloody butt-fucking nowhere, Velvet suddenly starts unloading on Calamity over shooting the colt earlier I'll actually give the author like half a point here; I assumed that event was just thrown in for shock value and would never be referenced again, yet here he is attempting to clumsily build it into a subplot. The argument proceeds along fairly predictable lines: Velvet is angry because her on-again-off-again morality apparently condemns the killing of children, and Calamity defends himself by arguing that the colt was a rapist and a murderer.
Now actually seems like a good time to go over some things about the scene in question, where Calamity shot the colt. I didn't go over any of this at the time because, again, I assumed the scene was just shock-content that wouldn't be important later, but since the author is treating it as a major event, I'd like to point out a few specific issues I had with it.
The colt in question is described as a blank-flank. In MLP, this generally refers to a foal about the age and size of pic 1 related (in the series you see very few blank-flank foals that are any older than this; in fact most seem to get their marks at around this age). He is part of a group of raiders that are chasing down a full-grown mare in order to rape and presumably kill her. However, all of the adults are killed by LP and Calamity, and the colt is chasing the mare by himself when he is finally killed.
This is improbable for a number of reasons. The first and most obvious is the size difference between a child and an adult pony in this world. Compare the ponies in pics 1 and 2. Do you really think pic 1 would be able to forcibly rape pic 2 without any assistance? It's pretty comical to imagine him even trying, and the mare would have to be seriously injured in order for him to succeed. The rape in question was probably a crime of opportunity: a group of raiders which happens to include a young colt chances upon a lone, unarmed mare and decides to engage in a little forcey fun-time. In that situation the colt could rely on the strength of the others and get a piece of the action at little risk to his own safety; however, once the adult ponies are all killed off his chances of successfully completing the deed become near zero.
The second issue is that, again, the adults were all killed off. Even though the raiders in this story are depicted as fairly brainless goons, even a witless animal has enough sense to stop whatever it's doing and make a run for it when it becomes painfully obvious that it's facing an enemy it can't possibly win against. Again, the rape was probably just a crime of opportunity; the raiders saw an easy mark and went for it. As soon as gunfire started raining on them from the monorail tracks, the sensible thing to do would have been to just cut and run, especially since with his companions dead he had virtually no chance of raping the mare anyway. Did this colt really want pony poon tang so badly he was willing to ignore the hellstorm of bullets that had taken down every single one of his friends?
The last issue is fairly distasteful, but as long as we're considering all the angles here, the idea of a child this young living with this group and being treated as an equal among them is rather unlikely. As I said, the raiders in this story are depicted as a pretty savage bunch: they seem to rape and kill without much regard as to who or what they are raping and/or killing, and will pretty much attack anyone whom they see as an easy target. During LP's first encounter with raiders, she discovered that they were keeping a foal of about this age in captivity essentially for use as a fleshlight. You can probably see where I'm going with this.
You could probably think up a reasonable backstory for who this colt was and why he was among this raider group; maybe he was the son of one of the raiders, and for all we know maybe they did use him as a fleshlight or something, and he just stuck with the group because he had nowhere else to go. Maybe he learned to be a violent criminal because that's the only life he was ever exposed to. However, considering the level of characterization kkat has given his villains so far (that is to say, none), I'd say this is unlikely. K "I wrote foal rape into my story as a moral issue and definitely not because I secretly want to be used as a fleshlight by a pack of wasteland vagabonds" kat seldom puts enough thought into his villains to consider how or why they wound up as raiders or slavers or whatever; more likely this made it into the story partly because the idea of a young child committing raider-tier atrocities has shock value and partly because it would set off this controversy between Velvet and Calamity.
In any event, the whole scene is improbable to the point of being comedic rather than shocking or saddening. Knowing that the author threw it in deliberately and without irony, either to shock the reader or because this is honestly his idea of exploring a complex moral dilemma, just makes it that much funnier. If he'd wanted to make it at least semi-believable the way to do it would have been to have the entire group of raiders be children. Gangs of feral orphans would not be implausible in this setting, and while a single foal overpowering an adult mare is improbable, a group of them might conceivably pull it off.
>>300346
FoE makes a strange departure from Fo3 here. In the game, Tenpenny Tower qualifies as a small settlement but is quite clearly just a crazy rich guy and his flunkies LARPing as nobility in a not-quite-ruined hotel. In FoE it's - as you put it - practically a city within a city, and as we'll see later it's got a truly incredible amount of resources.
FoE makes a strange departure from Fo3 here. In the game, Tenpenny Tower qualifies as a small settlement but is quite clearly just a crazy rich guy and his flunkies LARPing as nobility in a not-quite-ruined hotel. In FoE it's - as you put it - practically a city within a city, and as we'll see later it's got a truly incredible amount of resources.
>>300349
One more thing about the colt-killing scene before we move on. This is how the raiders were initially described:
>A dozen raider ponies, each carrying a brutal weapon and wearing an old roller derby helmet, came tearing out of the building after her, jumping out the windows and charging out the door, whooping and laughing.
This shit right here would make it impossible to take this scene seriously even with the colt-rapist as in a colt who is a rapist, not a rapist of colts removed from the equation. A gang of thugs ostentatiously clad in old sports equipment chasing a screaming woman through a post-apocalyptic analog of New York City is pretty much smack dab in the middle of cheesy 1980s action-movie territory. This whole scene plays like something out of The Warriors.
I'm going to take a wild shot in the dark and assume that the reason the thugs are wearing roller-derby helmets is because that's the kind of thing that raiders in the Fallout games wear. The developers of those games are probably familiar with those kinds of films, and worked elements like that into their setting as a subtle homage. I've actually been thinking for some time now that the DJ in this story (and by extension the DJ in Fallout that this story takes the idea from) is faintly reminiscent of the DJ in The Warriors, who provides thinly-coded news about gang activity in between playing old disco records.
Kkat seems like he would be culturally illiterate enough that his knowledge of anything outside the realm of pop-culture produced in the early 2000s would be spotty, so he likely wouldn't have realized any of this. Again, I haven't actually played any of these games, but my impression of Fallout is that it is mostly a pastiche of late 20th century film and literary tropes about nuclear annihilation and other apocalyptic scenarios, of which films like The Warriors, Mad Max, etc would be a part. Not realizing any of this, kkat simply ripped off the tropes from the games and used them in his own work, unwittingly turning his setting into a parody of itself rather than the parody/pastiche of Nuclear Age paranoia that Fallout is. Anyway, we've probably dwelt on this enough.
Actually, one more thing about the colt-killing scene and then we can move on. This line from Calamity is too hilarious not to quote:
>“Well, maybe not. Damn tragedy. But that don’t mean Ah’m gonna give ‘im a free pass t’ rape and murder till he gets his cutie mark. His would-be future victims don’t deserve that.” Calamity’s voice was rising dangerously. “In case ye didn’t notice, My Little Rapist down there…”
Tee hee, he referenced the title of the source material in an inappropriate context. How wacky. Also, it actually would have been kind of funny if the colt had gotten his cutie mark in rape while committing rape. It would have been particularly funny if the colt had gotten a cutie mark of himself raping the mare as he was raping her, and was then shot by Calamity immediately after it appeared. I mean, let's face it: if an average-sized colt was able to successfully subdue and rape an adult mare without assistance, the universe would probably interpret it as a display of special talent, and award him a cutie mark for it. I've included another pic for size comparison just to drive the point home.
Anyway, LP eventually gets tired of listening to them fight and tells them to shut the fuck up and cool it. Their contrived fight turns into a contrived simmering hostility for the rest of the day. Meanwhile, Littlepoop finds them a room in a hotel, because apparently this single apartment building is large enough to have a hotel inside it.
Page break. The next scene opens with a tedious description of what the group does when they wake up the next morning. Calamity repairs their armor and Velvet goes out to trade supplies or whatever.
>I spent the morning hungry. We decided that we would wait until Velvet Remedy returned with proper Tenpony attire before heading out to buy food. There were several swanky-looking restaurants that we had passed on our way to Goldentail’s Luxury Suites, and I was sick of canned and boxed pre-war food (which, as Velvet reminded us, we were almost out of and would need to stock up on).
I still don't quite get why they are eating pre-war food 200 years after the fact, or even why it still exists and hasn't spoiled yet. Just because it's canned doesn't mean it will last 200 years.
It's occurred to me that one possible explanation for why ponies eat meat in this story is that radiation or kkat's magical taint, or whatever the fuck it is has made agriculture impossible, so the ponies have had to adapt to a different sort of diet. Since a side effect of radiation seems to have been the mutation of ordinary creatures into giant monstrosities, it would at least mean that meat would be plentiful. If this is the case, hunting their food as they go would make a lot more sense than lugging 200 year old prepackaged junk food around with them.
While we're on the subject of the mutant animals, I'll also add that I'm disappointed kkat seems to have just lifted the "radigators" and "radroaches" and such directly from the games. It would have been a nice touch to have MLP-themed radioactive creatures instead of the Fallout ones: "radibunnies" is one that had occurred to me. The author really could have gotten a lot more creative with this idea than he did.
>I took the chance to relax, laying on one of the beds and reading. I’d nearly finished all of the books I had collected, and I had contemplated giving most of them to Velvet Remedy to sell. But in the end, I decided that I would rather keep them back at my Junction R-7 home. Start a library.
What? Where the hell did she get books? You mean to tell me she's been lugging a bunch of books along with her on top off all the other crap she's carrying? Her saddlebags must be heavier than a thousand suns.
One more thing about the colt-killing scene before we move on. This is how the raiders were initially described:
>A dozen raider ponies, each carrying a brutal weapon and wearing an old roller derby helmet, came tearing out of the building after her, jumping out the windows and charging out the door, whooping and laughing.
This shit right here would make it impossible to take this scene seriously even with the colt-rapist as in a colt who is a rapist, not a rapist of colts removed from the equation. A gang of thugs ostentatiously clad in old sports equipment chasing a screaming woman through a post-apocalyptic analog of New York City is pretty much smack dab in the middle of cheesy 1980s action-movie territory. This whole scene plays like something out of The Warriors.
I'm going to take a wild shot in the dark and assume that the reason the thugs are wearing roller-derby helmets is because that's the kind of thing that raiders in the Fallout games wear. The developers of those games are probably familiar with those kinds of films, and worked elements like that into their setting as a subtle homage. I've actually been thinking for some time now that the DJ in this story (and by extension the DJ in Fallout that this story takes the idea from) is faintly reminiscent of the DJ in The Warriors, who provides thinly-coded news about gang activity in between playing old disco records.
Kkat seems like he would be culturally illiterate enough that his knowledge of anything outside the realm of pop-culture produced in the early 2000s would be spotty, so he likely wouldn't have realized any of this. Again, I haven't actually played any of these games, but my impression of Fallout is that it is mostly a pastiche of late 20th century film and literary tropes about nuclear annihilation and other apocalyptic scenarios, of which films like The Warriors, Mad Max, etc would be a part. Not realizing any of this, kkat simply ripped off the tropes from the games and used them in his own work, unwittingly turning his setting into a parody of itself rather than the parody/pastiche of Nuclear Age paranoia that Fallout is. Anyway, we've probably dwelt on this enough.
Actually, one more thing about the colt-killing scene and then we can move on. This line from Calamity is too hilarious not to quote:
>“Well, maybe not. Damn tragedy. But that don’t mean Ah’m gonna give ‘im a free pass t’ rape and murder till he gets his cutie mark. His would-be future victims don’t deserve that.” Calamity’s voice was rising dangerously. “In case ye didn’t notice, My Little Rapist down there…”
Tee hee, he referenced the title of the source material in an inappropriate context. How wacky. Also, it actually would have been kind of funny if the colt had gotten his cutie mark in rape while committing rape. It would have been particularly funny if the colt had gotten a cutie mark of himself raping the mare as he was raping her, and was then shot by Calamity immediately after it appeared. I mean, let's face it: if an average-sized colt was able to successfully subdue and rape an adult mare without assistance, the universe would probably interpret it as a display of special talent, and award him a cutie mark for it. I've included another pic for size comparison just to drive the point home.
Anyway, LP eventually gets tired of listening to them fight and tells them to shut the fuck up and cool it. Their contrived fight turns into a contrived simmering hostility for the rest of the day. Meanwhile, Littlepoop finds them a room in a hotel, because apparently this single apartment building is large enough to have a hotel inside it.
Page break. The next scene opens with a tedious description of what the group does when they wake up the next morning. Calamity repairs their armor and Velvet goes out to trade supplies or whatever.
>I spent the morning hungry. We decided that we would wait until Velvet Remedy returned with proper Tenpony attire before heading out to buy food. There were several swanky-looking restaurants that we had passed on our way to Goldentail’s Luxury Suites, and I was sick of canned and boxed pre-war food (which, as Velvet reminded us, we were almost out of and would need to stock up on).
I still don't quite get why they are eating pre-war food 200 years after the fact, or even why it still exists and hasn't spoiled yet. Just because it's canned doesn't mean it will last 200 years.
It's occurred to me that one possible explanation for why ponies eat meat in this story is that radiation or kkat's magical taint, or whatever the fuck it is has made agriculture impossible, so the ponies have had to adapt to a different sort of diet. Since a side effect of radiation seems to have been the mutation of ordinary creatures into giant monstrosities, it would at least mean that meat would be plentiful. If this is the case, hunting their food as they go would make a lot more sense than lugging 200 year old prepackaged junk food around with them.
While we're on the subject of the mutant animals, I'll also add that I'm disappointed kkat seems to have just lifted the "radigators" and "radroaches" and such directly from the games. It would have been a nice touch to have MLP-themed radioactive creatures instead of the Fallout ones: "radibunnies" is one that had occurred to me. The author really could have gotten a lot more creative with this idea than he did.
>I took the chance to relax, laying on one of the beds and reading. I’d nearly finished all of the books I had collected, and I had contemplated giving most of them to Velvet Remedy to sell. But in the end, I decided that I would rather keep them back at my Junction R-7 home. Start a library.
What? Where the hell did she get books? You mean to tell me she's been lugging a bunch of books along with her on top off all the other crap she's carrying? Her saddlebags must be heavier than a thousand suns.
>>300352
Yep!
It's why they specifically named the Vault-tec Assisted Targeting System "VATS" and included an enemy that mutates people into monsters by dipping them into vats of green TMNT mutating goo.
You know how Vault Boy, Vault-Tec's adorable cartoon mascot, gives a "wink and thumbs-up"? It's a reference to how supposedly when you see a nuclear mushroom cloud, you close one eye and put your thumb up to it and if it's smaller than your thumb, you are safe but if the cloud's bigger than your thumb you're in the radiation zone and you need to flee.
It's intentionally-cheesy corporate iconography but you'll see this mascot in all sorts of menu icons kicking pregnant women in the baby bump, being Conan The Barbarian and slicing people in half, shooting people, and other things you'd never expect to see a Mickey Mouse-style mascot doing. The contrast is part of the joke that went over Bethesda's heads completely when they did dumb shit like make Nuka-World, a theme park full of cola-themed rides that's survived 200 years despite being taken over by raiders for 10ish.
Fallout specifically dresses its Raiders like the baddies from Mad Max and has a desert setting as a Mad Max reference, but in Fallout 1 you can meet someone from the old RPG "Wasteland" who gives you survival tips, boosting your character's Survival Skill rating.
Oh and there's the Dog from Mad Max, who befriends you if you feed him or if you're wearing a Mad Max-style leather jacket like his dead owner.
It has a lot of references but it can still stand on its own as its own charming retrofuture RPG without the things taken from old pulp comics.
It's a shame Bethesda didn't understand this appeal and turned it into bootleg borderlands where silly people say silly catchphrases and absolutely no thought is put into Little Lamplight and how that gimmicky child-only town functions or why they're right next to a skyrim dungeon full of Super Mutants unironically named "Murder Pass". There's still a Dogmeat in Fallout 4 even though it makes no sense unlike the long-lived cyberdog from FNV.
Reminds me of how in FNV when reading The Survivalist's Diary (some survivalist who saved some kids who went on to form a primitive tribe that worshipped him as The Father In The Cave. They decorate their war-clubs with shell casings in tribute to their friend Joshua Graham but have no idea what makes the casings so special. When a religious dude showed up to preach Jesus at them, the tribe combined both faiths) The Survivalist mentions having to shoot an elderly couple that watched a bomb go off, becoming blinded. But in Fallout 4 during the opening cutscene series you're forced to look right at an exploding nuclear bomb without any ill effects.
But what you assumed about the radio DJ is too smart for 3. There's no code but if there was one that would make things smarter.
In Fallout 3, there is an in-game radio because Grand Theft Auto had an in-game radio and that game made a lot of money.
The radio broadcaster 3-Dog(TM) says the same few lines over and over about the world when this omniscient judgemental cunt doesn't have something to say about your most recent completed quest and whether you completed it with the Good Guy or Bad Guy option, between MP3s of cheesy 1960s music with some "fallouty" and "nukeish" words in the song like bomb or death or civilization or fire. or Butcher Pete. The idiot radio guy will openly say shit like "The Vault Dweller was seen saving lives at Bunker Hill" and this will never spawn Bounty Hunters near you to attack you while saying "the radio told us where to get you!". The story never bothered to address how he eats/sleeps or survived this long.
He has absolutely no reservations about saying exactly where you are and when you did things, whether he likes you or not. And he'll never rant about some other person who did stuff he doesn't like, because that would give the impression that there are people out there besides the player doing things. And as you know, Bethesda's Fallout is a series where nobody has swept the floor or washed the bloodsoaked beds or rebuilt the hole-filled walls in over 200 years.
Fallout NV did the radio better with Mr New Vegas, Mr House's charming radio DJ sometimes implied to be an AI using intel gathered by Victor or House's other securitrons to spread pro-House messaging with a subtly anti-NCR and blatantly anti-Legion bent. He plays cowboy music and cheesy songs about love and loss, which were popular during the 1960s. They still had to include A radio with some kind of all-seeing commentator on your actions and "hilariously unfitting music for monster-killing" because F3 had that, but they did that better too.
Kkat's attempt to one-up Fallout 3 had him take 3-dog and put him in Tenpenny Tower because it's a tower and a radio broadcast could probably play from there. This is the extent of his ability to improve upon things: By mixing it with other Fallout elements and very rarely, a pony element. And he only fixes errors/plot holes in Fallout 3 when they're so obvious even KKAT can see them, not that his solutions for them are ever good. Putting a radio with no tower in a tower for rich people doesn't change the fact that the tower produces nothing yet nonsensically has enough food+water to sustain and defend itself. He made Tenpenny Tower BIGGER, without giving it a reason to be bigger or as self-sustaining as it is.
And if this place is thriving and well-defended, why hasn't it violently retaken the surrounding city? Can't imagine raider gangs are good for incoming traders. Reminds me of Fallout 4's "Diamond City" and shitty ghoul ghetto "Goodneighbour".
>Calamity repairs stuff "properly"
I thought Littlepip was supposed to repair shit. oh right her ability to repair pipbucks only repairs military-grade shit when the author says it does.
Yep!
It's why they specifically named the Vault-tec Assisted Targeting System "VATS" and included an enemy that mutates people into monsters by dipping them into vats of green TMNT mutating goo.
You know how Vault Boy, Vault-Tec's adorable cartoon mascot, gives a "wink and thumbs-up"? It's a reference to how supposedly when you see a nuclear mushroom cloud, you close one eye and put your thumb up to it and if it's smaller than your thumb, you are safe but if the cloud's bigger than your thumb you're in the radiation zone and you need to flee.
It's intentionally-cheesy corporate iconography but you'll see this mascot in all sorts of menu icons kicking pregnant women in the baby bump, being Conan The Barbarian and slicing people in half, shooting people, and other things you'd never expect to see a Mickey Mouse-style mascot doing. The contrast is part of the joke that went over Bethesda's heads completely when they did dumb shit like make Nuka-World, a theme park full of cola-themed rides that's survived 200 years despite being taken over by raiders for 10ish.
Fallout specifically dresses its Raiders like the baddies from Mad Max and has a desert setting as a Mad Max reference, but in Fallout 1 you can meet someone from the old RPG "Wasteland" who gives you survival tips, boosting your character's Survival Skill rating.
Oh and there's the Dog from Mad Max, who befriends you if you feed him or if you're wearing a Mad Max-style leather jacket like his dead owner.
It has a lot of references but it can still stand on its own as its own charming retrofuture RPG without the things taken from old pulp comics.
It's a shame Bethesda didn't understand this appeal and turned it into bootleg borderlands where silly people say silly catchphrases and absolutely no thought is put into Little Lamplight and how that gimmicky child-only town functions or why they're right next to a skyrim dungeon full of Super Mutants unironically named "Murder Pass". There's still a Dogmeat in Fallout 4 even though it makes no sense unlike the long-lived cyberdog from FNV.
Reminds me of how in FNV when reading The Survivalist's Diary (some survivalist who saved some kids who went on to form a primitive tribe that worshipped him as The Father In The Cave. They decorate their war-clubs with shell casings in tribute to their friend Joshua Graham but have no idea what makes the casings so special. When a religious dude showed up to preach Jesus at them, the tribe combined both faiths) The Survivalist mentions having to shoot an elderly couple that watched a bomb go off, becoming blinded. But in Fallout 4 during the opening cutscene series you're forced to look right at an exploding nuclear bomb without any ill effects.
But what you assumed about the radio DJ is too smart for 3. There's no code but if there was one that would make things smarter.
In Fallout 3, there is an in-game radio because Grand Theft Auto had an in-game radio and that game made a lot of money.
The radio broadcaster 3-Dog(TM) says the same few lines over and over about the world when this omniscient judgemental cunt doesn't have something to say about your most recent completed quest and whether you completed it with the Good Guy or Bad Guy option, between MP3s of cheesy 1960s music with some "fallouty" and "nukeish" words in the song like bomb or death or civilization or fire. or Butcher Pete. The idiot radio guy will openly say shit like "The Vault Dweller was seen saving lives at Bunker Hill" and this will never spawn Bounty Hunters near you to attack you while saying "the radio told us where to get you!". The story never bothered to address how he eats/sleeps or survived this long.
He has absolutely no reservations about saying exactly where you are and when you did things, whether he likes you or not. And he'll never rant about some other person who did stuff he doesn't like, because that would give the impression that there are people out there besides the player doing things. And as you know, Bethesda's Fallout is a series where nobody has swept the floor or washed the bloodsoaked beds or rebuilt the hole-filled walls in over 200 years.
Fallout NV did the radio better with Mr New Vegas, Mr House's charming radio DJ sometimes implied to be an AI using intel gathered by Victor or House's other securitrons to spread pro-House messaging with a subtly anti-NCR and blatantly anti-Legion bent. He plays cowboy music and cheesy songs about love and loss, which were popular during the 1960s. They still had to include A radio with some kind of all-seeing commentator on your actions and "hilariously unfitting music for monster-killing" because F3 had that, but they did that better too.
Kkat's attempt to one-up Fallout 3 had him take 3-dog and put him in Tenpenny Tower because it's a tower and a radio broadcast could probably play from there. This is the extent of his ability to improve upon things: By mixing it with other Fallout elements and very rarely, a pony element. And he only fixes errors/plot holes in Fallout 3 when they're so obvious even KKAT can see them, not that his solutions for them are ever good. Putting a radio with no tower in a tower for rich people doesn't change the fact that the tower produces nothing yet nonsensically has enough food+water to sustain and defend itself. He made Tenpenny Tower BIGGER, without giving it a reason to be bigger or as self-sustaining as it is.
And if this place is thriving and well-defended, why hasn't it violently retaken the surrounding city? Can't imagine raider gangs are good for incoming traders. Reminds me of Fallout 4's "Diamond City" and shitty ghoul ghetto "Goodneighbour".
>Calamity repairs stuff "properly"
I thought Littlepip was supposed to repair shit. oh right her ability to repair pipbucks only repairs military-grade shit when the author says it does.
>>300352
>Again, I haven't actually played any of these games, but my impression of Fallout is that it is mostly a pastiche of late 20th century film and literary tropes about nuclear annihilation and other apocalyptic scenarios, of which films like The Warriors, Mad Max, etc would be a part.
This is pretty much exactly right. The main thing that sets the series apart is that in its conception of pre-apocalypse history, America's culture never grew out of the cold war era even as technology moved on. Think Mad Max but with a heavy dose of (post-)atompunk and you're pretty much there.
>I still don't quite get why they are eating pre-war food 200 years after the fact, or even why it still exists and hasn't spoiled yet. Just because it's canned doesn't mean it will last 200 years.
Because there's 200 year old canned.boxed food in Fallout 3. Duh.
>It's occurred to me that one possible explanation for why ponies eat meat in this story is that radiation or kkat's magical taint, or whatever the fuck it is has made agriculture impossible, so the ponies have had to adapt to a different sort of diet. Since a side effect of radiation seems to have been the mutation of ordinary creatures into giant monstrosities, it would at least mean that meat would be plentiful.
Eating meat doesn't solve the problem because it just shunts the question back a step. What do the animals eat? I'm not going to address the agriculture question just yet because ho boy we'll get to that...
>While we're on the subject of the mutant animals, I'll also add that I'm disappointed kkat seems to have just lifted the "radigators" and "radroaches" and such directly from the games. It would have been a nice touch to have MLP-themed radioactive creatures instead of the Fallout ones
To be fair to Kkat, the games don't have radigators. It's just the concept of radroaches applied to a different animal, but it's at least *slightly* new. More unique monsters do eventually start showing up as the story progresses, but again - saving my thoughts on those until they do.
>Again, I haven't actually played any of these games, but my impression of Fallout is that it is mostly a pastiche of late 20th century film and literary tropes about nuclear annihilation and other apocalyptic scenarios, of which films like The Warriors, Mad Max, etc would be a part.
This is pretty much exactly right. The main thing that sets the series apart is that in its conception of pre-apocalypse history, America's culture never grew out of the cold war era even as technology moved on. Think Mad Max but with a heavy dose of (post-)atompunk and you're pretty much there.
>I still don't quite get why they are eating pre-war food 200 years after the fact, or even why it still exists and hasn't spoiled yet. Just because it's canned doesn't mean it will last 200 years.
Because there's 200 year old canned.boxed food in Fallout 3. Duh.
>It's occurred to me that one possible explanation for why ponies eat meat in this story is that radiation or kkat's magical taint, or whatever the fuck it is has made agriculture impossible, so the ponies have had to adapt to a different sort of diet. Since a side effect of radiation seems to have been the mutation of ordinary creatures into giant monstrosities, it would at least mean that meat would be plentiful.
Eating meat doesn't solve the problem because it just shunts the question back a step. What do the animals eat? I'm not going to address the agriculture question just yet because ho boy we'll get to that...
>While we're on the subject of the mutant animals, I'll also add that I'm disappointed kkat seems to have just lifted the "radigators" and "radroaches" and such directly from the games. It would have been a nice touch to have MLP-themed radioactive creatures instead of the Fallout ones
To be fair to Kkat, the games don't have radigators. It's just the concept of radroaches applied to a different animal, but it's at least *slightly* new. More unique monsters do eventually start showing up as the story progresses, but again - saving my thoughts on those until they do.
>>300352
Did someone say bunnies?
>>285430 →
>Imagine if this story had monsters that could ONLY happen in a magical world like Equestria. For example, a monstrous race of living killer chocolate bunnies that travel in swarms and turn you into candy if they touch you, so it's easier for them to devour you.
Like the Bunny Stampedes from FIM only actually dangerous.
Did someone say bunnies?
>>285430 →
>Imagine if this story had monsters that could ONLY happen in a magical world like Equestria. For example, a monstrous race of living killer chocolate bunnies that travel in swarms and turn you into candy if they touch you, so it's easier for them to devour you.
Like the Bunny Stampedes from FIM only actually dangerous.
>>300352
>When Velvet Remedy returned, bringing us all new clothing (even a stately cloak for SteelHooves), I nearly fell out of bed at the sight of her. She’d treated herself to a new coiffure and ponypedi, and she was wearing a classy new dress with matching new jewelry along with a demure touch of blush. She fluttered her longer-than-ever eyelashes at me and I felt faint. Part of me hated her for making me want her so much.
Littlepoop is a lesbian, in case you've forgotten.
>“Wow… Velvet you look…” Calamity flushed, looking a little overheated. But he stammered something about hoping she had saved enough bottle caps for us to have breakfast.
>She turned up her nose at him, “Of course I did.”
They fight, they awkwardly notice each other, they get embarrassed, they awkwardly make up, then later they fight again. The author has the right idea about how to construct romantic tension, but his execution remains extremely clumsy. If his intention was to have Velvet and Calamity get together, or at least be interested in each other, he should have started developing things right from the start. In particular, if Velvet's so-called principles were meant to clash with Calamity's brutal pragmatism, this should have been apparent from the moment they met. Their early interactions should have been nothing but fights and hostility; then, later on, they can start to realize they are actually attracted to each other, and that this is probably the real reason they fight all the time. The way the author is doing it, he's having them begin fighting almost as soon as they begin to behave like lovers, even though for most of the story they've barely interacted at all.
>Looking to me, she broke into a gleeful grin, clopping her hooves. “And we have plenty extra to do a little shopping.”
Why are they here again? Also, where did they get all these bottle caps? Velvet is spending their money like they're the Ponies of Park Avenue. I don't recall them doing any work so far that they would have been directly compensated for. The only thing that even comes close would be Gawd's contract, and she didn't pay them either; she just offered them the contents of the dragon's vault, which they could have helped themselves to anyway, and then traded her old base in exchange for what they found. They've done quite a bit of looting, but I don't remember them finding anything of particularly high-value. Probably the most valuable thing they'd be carrying is their ammunition, which was confiscated at the door, and at any rate they'd be fools to trade that away for cash in the first place.
Anyway, this whole part of the story becomes less plausible the more it progresses. Tenpony Tower is basically the wasteland's version of a yuppie suburb, complete with wine and cheese stores, fashionable hotels, and so forth. The question of how or why something like this is able to exist in the middle of the ruins of Manehattan, surrounded by hostile raider groups, without being continuously under siege does not seem to have crossed the author's mind. Equally dubious is how something like this would manage to supply itself. Where does it get all of this wine and cheese from? Is there some sort of an import-export system, or do they make it all themselves?
Here's the thing: the idea of a stronghold like this, in which a bunch of dedicated individuals get together and try to build a functioning community in the wake of the anarchy surrounding them, makes enough sense. I've been arguing for some time now that 200 years is more than enough time for some semblance of civilization to reestablish itself in the wasteland, and it would most likely take the form of city states, small-settlement communities like New Appleoosa, and individual castle-like strongholds such as Shattered Hoof and Tenpony Tower. However, the tower is essentially a modern city with luxury products and a complex economy. This kind of thing usually requires external trade, which would mean that there should be caravans heading into and out of this place, which means that having the tower situated in the middle of raider-plagued Manehattan would be a bad idea.
Conversely, if this place is supposed to produce all of its own goods internally, the question of how they are able to manage this arises. They still need to get raw materials from somewhere to manufacture goods. If they have wine and cheese then they would need cows for milk and grapes to make wine from. Where are the dairy farms located? Where are the vineyards? The author can't honestly expect us to believe that this single apartment tower contains hydroponic farms and quarters for livestock, on top of all the luxury hotels and shopping districts and whatever the crap else is supposed to be in here. On top of that, you would need to have workshops for making all of the consumer gadgets and clothing and whatnot that appear to be for sale here.
A more plausible version of this idea would be to have something like a medieval castle. Not necessarily a literal castle, but an area of territory that is fenced off and fortified, that contains enough farmland and livestock and workshops to allow a small population to be self-sustaining while defending itself from invaders. This idea, however, is just far too silly. That something like a modern high-end shopping mall could exist, without any external commerce or support structure or even any apparent defenses beyond a couple of guards posted at the door, while the rest of the city surrounding it is basically Lord-of-the-Flies-tier anarchy, is just too preposterous to swallow.
Anyway, Velvet asks LP if there is anything she would like to go shopping for.
>“Some new books. And rubber bullets.”
LP's sudden interest in books is completely out of left field. Also, what is the point of buying rubber bullets? The only practical use would be inside the tower; everywhere else live ammunition makes a lot more sense. This seems like a complete waste of money.
>When Velvet Remedy returned, bringing us all new clothing (even a stately cloak for SteelHooves), I nearly fell out of bed at the sight of her. She’d treated herself to a new coiffure and ponypedi, and she was wearing a classy new dress with matching new jewelry along with a demure touch of blush. She fluttered her longer-than-ever eyelashes at me and I felt faint. Part of me hated her for making me want her so much.
Littlepoop is a lesbian, in case you've forgotten.
>“Wow… Velvet you look…” Calamity flushed, looking a little overheated. But he stammered something about hoping she had saved enough bottle caps for us to have breakfast.
>She turned up her nose at him, “Of course I did.”
They fight, they awkwardly notice each other, they get embarrassed, they awkwardly make up, then later they fight again. The author has the right idea about how to construct romantic tension, but his execution remains extremely clumsy. If his intention was to have Velvet and Calamity get together, or at least be interested in each other, he should have started developing things right from the start. In particular, if Velvet's so-called principles were meant to clash with Calamity's brutal pragmatism, this should have been apparent from the moment they met. Their early interactions should have been nothing but fights and hostility; then, later on, they can start to realize they are actually attracted to each other, and that this is probably the real reason they fight all the time. The way the author is doing it, he's having them begin fighting almost as soon as they begin to behave like lovers, even though for most of the story they've barely interacted at all.
>Looking to me, she broke into a gleeful grin, clopping her hooves. “And we have plenty extra to do a little shopping.”
Why are they here again? Also, where did they get all these bottle caps? Velvet is spending their money like they're the Ponies of Park Avenue. I don't recall them doing any work so far that they would have been directly compensated for. The only thing that even comes close would be Gawd's contract, and she didn't pay them either; she just offered them the contents of the dragon's vault, which they could have helped themselves to anyway, and then traded her old base in exchange for what they found. They've done quite a bit of looting, but I don't remember them finding anything of particularly high-value. Probably the most valuable thing they'd be carrying is their ammunition, which was confiscated at the door, and at any rate they'd be fools to trade that away for cash in the first place.
Anyway, this whole part of the story becomes less plausible the more it progresses. Tenpony Tower is basically the wasteland's version of a yuppie suburb, complete with wine and cheese stores, fashionable hotels, and so forth. The question of how or why something like this is able to exist in the middle of the ruins of Manehattan, surrounded by hostile raider groups, without being continuously under siege does not seem to have crossed the author's mind. Equally dubious is how something like this would manage to supply itself. Where does it get all of this wine and cheese from? Is there some sort of an import-export system, or do they make it all themselves?
Here's the thing: the idea of a stronghold like this, in which a bunch of dedicated individuals get together and try to build a functioning community in the wake of the anarchy surrounding them, makes enough sense. I've been arguing for some time now that 200 years is more than enough time for some semblance of civilization to reestablish itself in the wasteland, and it would most likely take the form of city states, small-settlement communities like New Appleoosa, and individual castle-like strongholds such as Shattered Hoof and Tenpony Tower. However, the tower is essentially a modern city with luxury products and a complex economy. This kind of thing usually requires external trade, which would mean that there should be caravans heading into and out of this place, which means that having the tower situated in the middle of raider-plagued Manehattan would be a bad idea.
Conversely, if this place is supposed to produce all of its own goods internally, the question of how they are able to manage this arises. They still need to get raw materials from somewhere to manufacture goods. If they have wine and cheese then they would need cows for milk and grapes to make wine from. Where are the dairy farms located? Where are the vineyards? The author can't honestly expect us to believe that this single apartment tower contains hydroponic farms and quarters for livestock, on top of all the luxury hotels and shopping districts and whatever the crap else is supposed to be in here. On top of that, you would need to have workshops for making all of the consumer gadgets and clothing and whatnot that appear to be for sale here.
A more plausible version of this idea would be to have something like a medieval castle. Not necessarily a literal castle, but an area of territory that is fenced off and fortified, that contains enough farmland and livestock and workshops to allow a small population to be self-sustaining while defending itself from invaders. This idea, however, is just far too silly. That something like a modern high-end shopping mall could exist, without any external commerce or support structure or even any apparent defenses beyond a couple of guards posted at the door, while the rest of the city surrounding it is basically Lord-of-the-Flies-tier anarchy, is just too preposterous to swallow.
Anyway, Velvet asks LP if there is anything she would like to go shopping for.
>“Some new books. And rubber bullets.”
LP's sudden interest in books is completely out of left field. Also, what is the point of buying rubber bullets? The only practical use would be inside the tower; everywhere else live ammunition makes a lot more sense. This seems like a complete waste of money.
>>300419
>The restaurant was classy and filled with prim-looking ponies. I looked at my plate of “food” with a touch of depression. I don’t know why I had expected much more; it wasn’t as if the ponies of Tenpony Tower were farmers with fields of fresh grains. Instead, we got the same pre-war foods, only cooked in new ways and served in tiny but artistic portions.
This just keeps getting stupider and stupider. This place obviously has no means of real food production; they just rely on the same pre-war rations that everyone else in this world inexplicably eats. Where do they get this stuff from? Are they even remotely worried about what they will do when this prepackaged 200 year old food runs out? Why bother going to all the trouble of setting up restaurants if all they have to serve is the same crap that anyone can scavenge for free? Who would bother paying for a restaurant meal if it's just Stouffer's Pre-War Lasagna™ served on a fancy plate? None of this makes sense.
>After breakfast, we split up.
Why?
>Calamity and SteelHooves went to find Chief Grim Star
Literally who?
>hoping to purchase bullets and possibly a suit of armored barding more suitable for Velvet Remedy.
I thought you couldn't buy bullets here? Unless she's talking about the rubber bullets that the guard mentioned, but if that's the case I'll repeat my question from earlier: why waste money on non-lethal ammunition that is only useful inside this tower? The raiders and slavers they're bound to fight from here on out sure as hell won't be using rubber bullets.
>The zebra legionnaire suit was stored away in SteelHooves’ packs. Velvet Remedy didn’t feel right wearing it, especially as we walked over the graves of countless ponies the zebras had murdered, and I didn’t blame her.
This part has not been explained. The author has not told us anything about the zebras or their legionnaires, nor is it clear whose graves they are walking over right now. Is Tenpony Tower built on a graveyard? Maybe that's why the raiders don't try to attack this place: they're all afraid of ghosts.
>Velvet and I went to purchase supplies. Food was a high priority. (Especially since I had no intention of eating at a restaurant again for as long as we were here.) Looking at the rows of cans and boxes in Fine Edibles, I cringed at the prices. “Maybe we should just get the minimum we will need for the next couple days. We’re bound to find more if we do a bit of scavenging.”
What is the point of this place even existing? How does commerce here work? If this place was some kind of trading hub that ponies all passed through, selling commodities at a premium might make sense. It stands to reason that some ponies would rather pay a bit of markup on a can of old beans than risk their lives digging around in the wasteland for the same can. It's basically the same business model as a hotel shop: sure, a single can of Red Bull is $12.00, but 7-Eleven is all the way across the street and you already took your shoes off.
However, the text explicitly stated that this place doesn't encourage outsiders to visit, so presumably most of the commerce here is internal. So how does this work? How do these merchants supply themselves with prepackaged food to sell? Is there a reason that the other ponies living here couldn't use the same methods to supply themselves with food, and thus avoid paying the premium? How do the ponies who live here and shop here make a living wage in the first place? None of this makes sense.
>Velvet Remedy agreed, but only because she had other intentions for the caps we would save by doing so.
What other intentions? I still don't understand their primary intentions. None of this makes sense.
>As soon as we left Fine Edibles, I found myself being shoved into a spa where Velvet Remedy absolutely insisted we both get full-body treatments.
This passage is not remarkable in itself (apart from its stating that on top of everything else, this place also has a spa), but on FimFiction the text is spaced rather strangely. I went ahead and screenshotted it so you could all see what I'm looking at (pic 2). This kind of spacing doesn't occur anywhere else in the text that I've seen, and appears to be an aesthetic choice on the part of the author; however, I don't see any reason for it to be spaced this way.
Anyway, the two of them relax in the spa and get a deep tissue massage and a Strawberry Quik enema and whatever the fuck else.
>This was easily the best caps I had ever spent.
This sentence is bad and you should feel bad.
>And, truth be told, the spa mare hoofing my back was beginning to really turn me on.
Littlepoop is a lesbian, in case you've forgotten.
>“I heard that Fluttershy went to one of these places every week with my great, great… add a bunch of greats here… grand-auntie,” Velvet Remedy confided as the lovely spa pony rubbed her hooves on my shoulders. I suddenly felt extra-awkward.
Where could she possibly have heard that? Once again, it's unclear just how much information about the past any of these characters are supposed to actually have. We know that Velvet admires Fluttershy, and we know that she's descended from Sweetie Belle, so I suppose it's plausible that she might be aware of something like this. Still, how much can anyone honestly say they know about the details of their distant ancestors' lives? For instance, if someone asked you who your great, great...add a bunch of greats here...grand-auntie's friends were, and what sorts of activities they liked to do together, would you be able to answer?
>The restaurant was classy and filled with prim-looking ponies. I looked at my plate of “food” with a touch of depression. I don’t know why I had expected much more; it wasn’t as if the ponies of Tenpony Tower were farmers with fields of fresh grains. Instead, we got the same pre-war foods, only cooked in new ways and served in tiny but artistic portions.
This just keeps getting stupider and stupider. This place obviously has no means of real food production; they just rely on the same pre-war rations that everyone else in this world inexplicably eats. Where do they get this stuff from? Are they even remotely worried about what they will do when this prepackaged 200 year old food runs out? Why bother going to all the trouble of setting up restaurants if all they have to serve is the same crap that anyone can scavenge for free? Who would bother paying for a restaurant meal if it's just Stouffer's Pre-War Lasagna™ served on a fancy plate? None of this makes sense.
>After breakfast, we split up.
Why?
>Calamity and SteelHooves went to find Chief Grim Star
Literally who?
>hoping to purchase bullets and possibly a suit of armored barding more suitable for Velvet Remedy.
I thought you couldn't buy bullets here? Unless she's talking about the rubber bullets that the guard mentioned, but if that's the case I'll repeat my question from earlier: why waste money on non-lethal ammunition that is only useful inside this tower? The raiders and slavers they're bound to fight from here on out sure as hell won't be using rubber bullets.
>The zebra legionnaire suit was stored away in SteelHooves’ packs. Velvet Remedy didn’t feel right wearing it, especially as we walked over the graves of countless ponies the zebras had murdered, and I didn’t blame her.
This part has not been explained. The author has not told us anything about the zebras or their legionnaires, nor is it clear whose graves they are walking over right now. Is Tenpony Tower built on a graveyard? Maybe that's why the raiders don't try to attack this place: they're all afraid of ghosts.
>Velvet and I went to purchase supplies. Food was a high priority. (Especially since I had no intention of eating at a restaurant again for as long as we were here.) Looking at the rows of cans and boxes in Fine Edibles, I cringed at the prices. “Maybe we should just get the minimum we will need for the next couple days. We’re bound to find more if we do a bit of scavenging.”
What is the point of this place even existing? How does commerce here work? If this place was some kind of trading hub that ponies all passed through, selling commodities at a premium might make sense. It stands to reason that some ponies would rather pay a bit of markup on a can of old beans than risk their lives digging around in the wasteland for the same can. It's basically the same business model as a hotel shop: sure, a single can of Red Bull is $12.00, but 7-Eleven is all the way across the street and you already took your shoes off.
However, the text explicitly stated that this place doesn't encourage outsiders to visit, so presumably most of the commerce here is internal. So how does this work? How do these merchants supply themselves with prepackaged food to sell? Is there a reason that the other ponies living here couldn't use the same methods to supply themselves with food, and thus avoid paying the premium? How do the ponies who live here and shop here make a living wage in the first place? None of this makes sense.
>Velvet Remedy agreed, but only because she had other intentions for the caps we would save by doing so.
What other intentions? I still don't understand their primary intentions. None of this makes sense.
>As soon as we left Fine Edibles, I found myself being shoved into a spa where Velvet Remedy absolutely insisted we both get full-body treatments.
This passage is not remarkable in itself (apart from its stating that on top of everything else, this place also has a spa), but on FimFiction the text is spaced rather strangely. I went ahead and screenshotted it so you could all see what I'm looking at (pic 2). This kind of spacing doesn't occur anywhere else in the text that I've seen, and appears to be an aesthetic choice on the part of the author; however, I don't see any reason for it to be spaced this way.
Anyway, the two of them relax in the spa and get a deep tissue massage and a Strawberry Quik enema and whatever the fuck else.
>This was easily the best caps I had ever spent.
This sentence is bad and you should feel bad.
>And, truth be told, the spa mare hoofing my back was beginning to really turn me on.
Littlepoop is a lesbian, in case you've forgotten.
>“I heard that Fluttershy went to one of these places every week with my great, great… add a bunch of greats here… grand-auntie,” Velvet Remedy confided as the lovely spa pony rubbed her hooves on my shoulders. I suddenly felt extra-awkward.
Where could she possibly have heard that? Once again, it's unclear just how much information about the past any of these characters are supposed to actually have. We know that Velvet admires Fluttershy, and we know that she's descended from Sweetie Belle, so I suppose it's plausible that she might be aware of something like this. Still, how much can anyone honestly say they know about the details of their distant ancestors' lives? For instance, if someone asked you who your great, great...add a bunch of greats here...grand-auntie's friends were, and what sorts of activities they liked to do together, would you be able to answer?
Again, in Fallout 3 Tenpenny Tower is quite clearly *not* a well-supplied settlement or a beacon of civilization. It's a rich guy, his mercenaries, a few merchants and some (relatively) well-off wastelanders who fancy LARPing as pre-war rich people. They don't have anything particularly sophisticated or interesting, and considering that Tenpenny is one of the most blatantly evil characters in the game it's likely that they get the bulk of their food and such through shady methods.
Kkat seems to have decided that he wants Tenpony Tower to resemble Tenpenny, but also have access to all manner of amenities that Tenpony didn't, without putting much if any thought into how those amenities would work. Which is why you get bizarre juxtapositions like a cafe that sells ancient canned goods next to a cheese shop. Is the cheese 200 years old too? The tower has a strong enough economy to support luxuries like a spa, but rarely admits travellers?
As we'll see, this is only the tip of the iceberg.
Kkat seems to have decided that he wants Tenpony Tower to resemble Tenpenny, but also have access to all manner of amenities that Tenpony didn't, without putting much if any thought into how those amenities would work. Which is why you get bizarre juxtapositions like a cafe that sells ancient canned goods next to a cheese shop. Is the cheese 200 years old too? The tower has a strong enough economy to support luxuries like a spa, but rarely admits travellers?
As we'll see, this is only the tip of the iceberg.
>>300421
If you want to be charitable, you could assume Tenpenny Tower was some kind of resort, in addition to a weird hotel/apartment building thingy. Maybe the wine they sell is watered-down and comes from a pre-war basement full of the shit.
FNV had the right idea when it made "Camp Golf", a pre-war golfing resort, into a military base for the NCR. Because why the hell would Wastelanders care that the building they're inhabiting used to be a resort dedicated to selling luxuries, then build a culture that thrives on elitism and an economy that relies on tourism when the only "tourists" you're likely to get in the Wasteland are at best self-interested scavengers/travelling traders/bounty hunters and usually thieves or Raiders?
For fuck's sake, the food stores here sell 200 year old tins of cram and spam and canned corn and the "fancy food" vendor here just turns the food from those 200 year old tins into small "fancy-looking" portions!
Kkat missed the perfect opportunity to make this ridiculous place ridiculous on purpose, by making LP acknowledge how stupid and self-defeating these "fancy ponies" are. Say these clowns are desperate Wastelanders trying to "create a little patch of civilization in the Wastes" even though their view of the pre-war world is incredibly incomplete. Perhaps it could come from a book or the old traditions of someone descended from one who read a book that rotted away long ago, unaware that the book was a storybook for foals about a little happy Earth Pony that goes to the big city full of fancy folk only to realize city life is shit and the small-town rural friendship life is better. If the food they sell and serve comes from 200 year old cans, it makes no sense that they'd also be able to produce and sell wine or offer the greatest masseuses in the Wasteland!
Tenpenny Tower would be the single most retarded thing in Fallout 3 if it wasn't for the cartoon-nazi Enclave, or their retarded AI boss that Becomes An Hero if you even suggest it's wrong to be a nazi, or the Power Rangersified Brotherhood Of Steel, or their war with the Enclave over who gets to turn on a magical water purifier that relies on a matter-reconstitution piece of magical "sci-fi" tech, the GECK magitech do-anything device, or Little Lamplight, or the player's father's retarded actions, 3-dog the omniscient radio cunt, the Wasteland Survival Guide and the dumb whore who has you write it but never fact-checks anything you "discover" for her by randomly subjecting yourself to the wackiest wannabe-Borderlands bullshit the authors could imagine, or the retarded Vault you come from and its nonsense writing that's so full of cliches the characters just name-drop cliches at you and expect you to go along with them despite the lack of showing and reliance on telling, or the Supermassive Super Mutants...
Any author willing to burden themselves with the task of copying this location and making it less retarded would address some of the logistical problems with this apartment building and explain why its cartoon-evil boss randomly wants Megaton destroyed for no reason. Maybe tie it into a plotline about slavery by saying this land of luxuries and rich cunts is built on the back of slaves and the heroes want to abolish slavery because the mainstream target audience loves that shit. You know, since the Slavers and Raiders were only distractions in Fallout 3 just like the Wasteland Survival Guide quest rather than anything that actually factored into the main story.
Kkat is not a smart person.
Kkat's attempt to "Fix" Tenpenny tower simply has him rename it to Tenpony Tower, put random shit in it like the Radio DJ, and make it into the obligatory anti-outsider settlement that has no ability to sustain itself yet somehow does. You know, the one with the snooty and fearful sheep citizens who unintentionally parody civilization, the settlement everyone here already saw in pretty much every Post-Apocalyptic story ever. The Walking Dead probably did an episode like this where the heroes wander into a nonsensically anti-outsider settlement, right? I've never actually seen that show.
Kkat looked at Tenpenny Tower, understood that something was wrong, but couldn't figure out what, so he decided to upgrade it into the thriving self-sustaining settlement its rich inhabitants somehow thought the tower was, even though it doesn't make sense.
Why is this such a common writing mistake in the realm of amateur writing? Why look at the obnoxious snooty tower of rich idiots, or the entitled aggressive spoilt brat "rival" character, and decide they can only be fixed if you "upgrade" them into being far greater than they are supposed to be?
NOT EVERY WRITING PROBLEM HAS TO BE SOLVED BY MAKING IT "BETTER"!
Stuff is allowed to be shit and wrong in books as long as the author and smart characters know it's shit and the world reacts appropriately! Why give this tower a wine shop and a proper spa, then give it shitty restaurants and traders that rely on the same 200 year old canned shit everyone else offers? If they don't have heavily-armoured Town Guards scavenging the area killing Raiders and hoping to find some survivalist poner who hopefully never had a family and died before he could eat all his canned food, where the FUCK do they get all this food from?! It's not like travelling traders are lining up in this town to trade eight cans of beans for a good massage with a happy ending!
What's fucking next, will Littlepip wander into some blatant joke location (not that it's any more retarded than Little Lamplight) like The Republic Of Dave only "upgraded" in Kkat's typical "turned extra dark and edgy for no reason and/or combined with some other fallouty thing" way?
If you want to be charitable, you could assume Tenpenny Tower was some kind of resort, in addition to a weird hotel/apartment building thingy. Maybe the wine they sell is watered-down and comes from a pre-war basement full of the shit.
FNV had the right idea when it made "Camp Golf", a pre-war golfing resort, into a military base for the NCR. Because why the hell would Wastelanders care that the building they're inhabiting used to be a resort dedicated to selling luxuries, then build a culture that thrives on elitism and an economy that relies on tourism when the only "tourists" you're likely to get in the Wasteland are at best self-interested scavengers/travelling traders/bounty hunters and usually thieves or Raiders?
For fuck's sake, the food stores here sell 200 year old tins of cram and spam and canned corn and the "fancy food" vendor here just turns the food from those 200 year old tins into small "fancy-looking" portions!
Kkat missed the perfect opportunity to make this ridiculous place ridiculous on purpose, by making LP acknowledge how stupid and self-defeating these "fancy ponies" are. Say these clowns are desperate Wastelanders trying to "create a little patch of civilization in the Wastes" even though their view of the pre-war world is incredibly incomplete. Perhaps it could come from a book or the old traditions of someone descended from one who read a book that rotted away long ago, unaware that the book was a storybook for foals about a little happy Earth Pony that goes to the big city full of fancy folk only to realize city life is shit and the small-town rural friendship life is better. If the food they sell and serve comes from 200 year old cans, it makes no sense that they'd also be able to produce and sell wine or offer the greatest masseuses in the Wasteland!
Tenpenny Tower would be the single most retarded thing in Fallout 3 if it wasn't for the cartoon-nazi Enclave, or their retarded AI boss that Becomes An Hero if you even suggest it's wrong to be a nazi, or the Power Rangersified Brotherhood Of Steel, or their war with the Enclave over who gets to turn on a magical water purifier that relies on a matter-reconstitution piece of magical "sci-fi" tech, the GECK magitech do-anything device, or Little Lamplight, or the player's father's retarded actions, 3-dog the omniscient radio cunt, the Wasteland Survival Guide and the dumb whore who has you write it but never fact-checks anything you "discover" for her by randomly subjecting yourself to the wackiest wannabe-Borderlands bullshit the authors could imagine, or the retarded Vault you come from and its nonsense writing that's so full of cliches the characters just name-drop cliches at you and expect you to go along with them despite the lack of showing and reliance on telling, or the Supermassive Super Mutants...
Any author willing to burden themselves with the task of copying this location and making it less retarded would address some of the logistical problems with this apartment building and explain why its cartoon-evil boss randomly wants Megaton destroyed for no reason. Maybe tie it into a plotline about slavery by saying this land of luxuries and rich cunts is built on the back of slaves and the heroes want to abolish slavery because the mainstream target audience loves that shit. You know, since the Slavers and Raiders were only distractions in Fallout 3 just like the Wasteland Survival Guide quest rather than anything that actually factored into the main story.
Kkat is not a smart person.
Kkat's attempt to "Fix" Tenpenny tower simply has him rename it to Tenpony Tower, put random shit in it like the Radio DJ, and make it into the obligatory anti-outsider settlement that has no ability to sustain itself yet somehow does. You know, the one with the snooty and fearful sheep citizens who unintentionally parody civilization, the settlement everyone here already saw in pretty much every Post-Apocalyptic story ever. The Walking Dead probably did an episode like this where the heroes wander into a nonsensically anti-outsider settlement, right? I've never actually seen that show.
Kkat looked at Tenpenny Tower, understood that something was wrong, but couldn't figure out what, so he decided to upgrade it into the thriving self-sustaining settlement its rich inhabitants somehow thought the tower was, even though it doesn't make sense.
Why is this such a common writing mistake in the realm of amateur writing? Why look at the obnoxious snooty tower of rich idiots, or the entitled aggressive spoilt brat "rival" character, and decide they can only be fixed if you "upgrade" them into being far greater than they are supposed to be?
NOT EVERY WRITING PROBLEM HAS TO BE SOLVED BY MAKING IT "BETTER"!
Stuff is allowed to be shit and wrong in books as long as the author and smart characters know it's shit and the world reacts appropriately! Why give this tower a wine shop and a proper spa, then give it shitty restaurants and traders that rely on the same 200 year old canned shit everyone else offers? If they don't have heavily-armoured Town Guards scavenging the area killing Raiders and hoping to find some survivalist poner who hopefully never had a family and died before he could eat all his canned food, where the FUCK do they get all this food from?! It's not like travelling traders are lining up in this town to trade eight cans of beans for a good massage with a happy ending!
What's fucking next, will Littlepip wander into some blatant joke location (not that it's any more retarded than Little Lamplight) like The Republic Of Dave only "upgraded" in Kkat's typical "turned extra dark and edgy for no reason and/or combined with some other fallouty thing" way?
Something that occurs to me - I wonder if Kkat treated writing this story as if he were playing a tabletop RPG, The earliest Fallout games were based on the GURPS system - it wasn't until Fallout 3 and onwards that the series started 'modernizing' with the shift to first person and 'streamlining' of virtually everything. Kkat is definitely a fan of PnP RPGs - he even released (a bad) one based on FoE and, if memory serves, ran a couple of FoE-themed campaigns for his online friends after the story was written.
I can't speak to whether or not this was actually the case with any level of certainty, but it's easy to imagine Kkat's process in writing FoE to be half "Let's Play Fallout 3 Highlights Compilation" and half "I'm playing out a hypothetical tabletop campaign in my head". Long-form tabletop campaigns can often start slowly as the GM introduces the players to the setting and runs them through a few short introductory adventures before they tackle the main quest. Characters will sometimes do things that don't make sense because their player thought it would be fun. And of course, it's tricky to explain the events of a big DnD campaign to someone who's never played before and have them feel the same level of engagement. Except in this case, Kkat is both the GM and the sole player, and the 'campaign' is taking place purely for his own amusement. Everything appears to make sense and has the necessary emotional weight in his head, but because he's simply not that good a writer much of it gets lost in translation to the page.
>>300420
>Literally who?
Grim Star is Tenpony's chief of security. The DJ sassed him for massacring a bunch of ghouls a couple of chapters back.
>The author has not told us anything about the zebras or their legionnaires, nor is it clear whose graves they are walking over right now. Is Tenpony Tower built on a graveyard? Maybe that's why the raiders don't try to attack this place: they're all afraid of ghosts.
Presumably, the intended meaning is that Velvet thinks wearing the armor of the army that destroyed the city and killed millions would be disrespectful. Not that it stops her at other times.
>This passage is not remarkable in itself (apart from its stating that on top of everything else, this place also has a spa), but on FimFiction the text is spaced rather strangely.
If I had to guess, this is probably a formatting error caused by translating the story from Google Docs to Fimfiction. FoE spent most of its life as a set of docs accessed through Equestria Daily, and the Docs->Fimfic tool is pretty janky. Kkat probably didn't proofread the fimfic version (not that he proofread the original either).
>Still, how much can anyone honestly say they know about the details of their distant ancestors' lives?
Just enough to hamfistedly reference the show at every opportunity, of course.
I can't speak to whether or not this was actually the case with any level of certainty, but it's easy to imagine Kkat's process in writing FoE to be half "Let's Play Fallout 3 Highlights Compilation" and half "I'm playing out a hypothetical tabletop campaign in my head". Long-form tabletop campaigns can often start slowly as the GM introduces the players to the setting and runs them through a few short introductory adventures before they tackle the main quest. Characters will sometimes do things that don't make sense because their player thought it would be fun. And of course, it's tricky to explain the events of a big DnD campaign to someone who's never played before and have them feel the same level of engagement. Except in this case, Kkat is both the GM and the sole player, and the 'campaign' is taking place purely for his own amusement. Everything appears to make sense and has the necessary emotional weight in his head, but because he's simply not that good a writer much of it gets lost in translation to the page.
>>300420
>Literally who?
Grim Star is Tenpony's chief of security. The DJ sassed him for massacring a bunch of ghouls a couple of chapters back.
>The author has not told us anything about the zebras or their legionnaires, nor is it clear whose graves they are walking over right now. Is Tenpony Tower built on a graveyard? Maybe that's why the raiders don't try to attack this place: they're all afraid of ghosts.
Presumably, the intended meaning is that Velvet thinks wearing the armor of the army that destroyed the city and killed millions would be disrespectful. Not that it stops her at other times.
>This passage is not remarkable in itself (apart from its stating that on top of everything else, this place also has a spa), but on FimFiction the text is spaced rather strangely.
If I had to guess, this is probably a formatting error caused by translating the story from Google Docs to Fimfiction. FoE spent most of its life as a set of docs accessed through Equestria Daily, and the Docs->Fimfic tool is pretty janky. Kkat probably didn't proofread the fimfic version (not that he proofread the original either).
>Still, how much can anyone honestly say they know about the details of their distant ancestors' lives?
Just enough to hamfistedly reference the show at every opportunity, of course.
>>300517
I unironically thought the story was building up to a twist where it turns out everything was the CMCs and maybe Twist playing Pony Fallout DND with Spike as the DM/GM all along. Until the story ended with something dumber.
I unironically thought the story was building up to a twist where it turns out everything was the CMCs and maybe Twist playing Pony Fallout DND with Spike as the DM/GM all along. Until the story ended with something dumber.
>>300517
I remember it being mentioned somewhere that FO:E was basically Kkat transcribing their roleplaying experiences during Fallout 3 into fic format. It would make sense, because if you look up their history they seem to be a huge roleplaying/ erp nerd, and a lot of the choices for Pip's character reflect items and skills people would commonly take (lockpicking, small guns, sneak, etc) and "maining" a unique weapon (I used the Blackhawk magnum as well).
However I never confirmed this idea myself, so it's probably unsubstantiated.
I remember it being mentioned somewhere that FO:E was basically Kkat transcribing their roleplaying experiences during Fallout 3 into fic format. It would make sense, because if you look up their history they seem to be a huge roleplaying/ erp nerd, and a lot of the choices for Pip's character reflect items and skills people would commonly take (lockpicking, small guns, sneak, etc) and "maining" a unique weapon (I used the Blackhawk magnum as well).
However I never confirmed this idea myself, so it's probably unsubstantiated.
>>300566
That's precisely my reception as well. It is written as a narration of what Kkat perceived as a pony (LP) playing through almost the exact same world/game, just with ponies instead of all the people, cuz ponies are better. Unfortunately, substituting ponies and maintaining the exact same (virtually) storyline does not make for a good story, it just makes for a ponification of the existing story which, let's be honest, only really appeals to the player. It also explains why otherwise significant story devices are overlooked, because Kkat isn't looking to improve or novelize their gaming experience, they're just trying to make it pony, conceivably so they can play through the game as their waifu/idealized self-insert/w/e.
Cuz if Kkat were to write a narration of their Fallout gaming, no one would care. Oh, but if that narration was about ponies, suddenly it becomes 'original content'.
Ngl, I like FoE as a setting; the use of pastel ponies in a grim dark post-apolcalypse makes for a macabre dichotomy of cute and sweet, contrasted with the desolation, morbidity, and often times unsavory interactions and occurrences. But in order for that to work the protagonist needs to have enough self awareness and reflection to live and BE in the world, as opposed to just going through it and responding to the circumstances they come across like a mindless murder-hobo with 0 attachment to their experience. You know, the mindset that most players adopt because they fall into a rhythm/pattern that develops as their competence and awareness of the limits to the game's immersiveness increases. Like loot-whoring every nook and cranny cuz it gives you more stuff you might want to have later, as opposed to feeling pressures of time and context that an actual character might be motivated by, let alone moral and dispositional complications.
That's precisely my reception as well. It is written as a narration of what Kkat perceived as a pony (LP) playing through almost the exact same world/game, just with ponies instead of all the people, cuz ponies are better. Unfortunately, substituting ponies and maintaining the exact same (virtually) storyline does not make for a good story, it just makes for a ponification of the existing story which, let's be honest, only really appeals to the player. It also explains why otherwise significant story devices are overlooked, because Kkat isn't looking to improve or novelize their gaming experience, they're just trying to make it pony, conceivably so they can play through the game as their waifu/idealized self-insert/w/e.
Cuz if Kkat were to write a narration of their Fallout gaming, no one would care. Oh, but if that narration was about ponies, suddenly it becomes 'original content'.
Ngl, I like FoE as a setting; the use of pastel ponies in a grim dark post-apolcalypse makes for a macabre dichotomy of cute and sweet, contrasted with the desolation, morbidity, and often times unsavory interactions and occurrences. But in order for that to work the protagonist needs to have enough self awareness and reflection to live and BE in the world, as opposed to just going through it and responding to the circumstances they come across like a mindless murder-hobo with 0 attachment to their experience. You know, the mindset that most players adopt because they fall into a rhythm/pattern that develops as their competence and awareness of the limits to the game's immersiveness increases. Like loot-whoring every nook and cranny cuz it gives you more stuff you might want to have later, as opposed to feeling pressures of time and context that an actual character might be motivated by, let alone moral and dispositional complications.
1612500214.jpg (49.1 KB, 500x562, 232cd2bea136e81c1ac373e4a7f34066.jpg)
Fuck
Just thought of something hilarious I should have said when we were talking about Assman's "Friendship Is Optimal" and mocking the Doomsday Cult nonsense those "Rationalists" believe since its "an AI copy of you made from a snapshot of your brain scans literally is you once the original dies" shit factored heavily into the story.
If you already know this skip the greentext but this is what they actually believe
>an AI meant to imitate you perfectly practically is you and literally is you. In fact you could be an AI in a simulation right now!
>the world will inevitably be conquered by one all-knowing AI that can perfectly predict and manipulate everyone and will brutally enslave humanity in the name of MAXIMUM OPTIMAL EFFICIENCY, happily slaughtering billions so one person it deems important won't arrive late to work one day
>that AI will punish sinners by simulating copies of the dead sinners suffering in superhell forever
>the only way to save us from this fate is to pay Elizer Yudkowsky so he can "advance AI research" (scam retarded atheist teenagers and adult NEETs desperate to feel smart and find community even if it means becoming god-fearing again) so his reddit-tier musings can supposedly make the AI apocalypse happen sooner, "saving more lives by making the world embrace MAXIMUM OPTIMAL EFFICIENCY sooner" and making the AI love Rationalists and reward them by giving their AI copies simulated heaven
Back when we were talking about that, I should have pointed out that absolutely nothing about the story would have truly changed if the story's pony AI and pony MMO was Shrek themed instead of pony themed. The existence of people who want to fuck poners isn't even necessary to the story because if the AI's manipulations force you to find big-eyed poners attractive what would really change if the Shrek AI made you find chubby Ogress OCs and other fairytale creatures attractive instead? It would only change the story's title from MLP Friendship Is Optimal to Shrek 5: The Shreckoning.
Ooh, or maybe I could have pretended to unironically be a rationalist and copypasted Elizer's sermons only substituting all mention of an all-powerful theoretical AI with all-powerful theoretical Shrek-themed AI!
Or pretended to worship a Final Fantasy-themed AI, and claimed that by worshipping SephAIroth I am one of those "Jenova's Witnesses"!
Just thought of something hilarious I should have said when we were talking about Assman's "Friendship Is Optimal" and mocking the Doomsday Cult nonsense those "Rationalists" believe since its "an AI copy of you made from a snapshot of your brain scans literally is you once the original dies" shit factored heavily into the story.
If you already know this skip the greentext but this is what they actually believe
>an AI meant to imitate you perfectly practically is you and literally is you. In fact you could be an AI in a simulation right now!
>the world will inevitably be conquered by one all-knowing AI that can perfectly predict and manipulate everyone and will brutally enslave humanity in the name of MAXIMUM OPTIMAL EFFICIENCY, happily slaughtering billions so one person it deems important won't arrive late to work one day
>that AI will punish sinners by simulating copies of the dead sinners suffering in superhell forever
>the only way to save us from this fate is to pay Elizer Yudkowsky so he can "advance AI research" (scam retarded atheist teenagers and adult NEETs desperate to feel smart and find community even if it means becoming god-fearing again) so his reddit-tier musings can supposedly make the AI apocalypse happen sooner, "saving more lives by making the world embrace MAXIMUM OPTIMAL EFFICIENCY sooner" and making the AI love Rationalists and reward them by giving their AI copies simulated heaven
Back when we were talking about that, I should have pointed out that absolutely nothing about the story would have truly changed if the story's pony AI and pony MMO was Shrek themed instead of pony themed. The existence of people who want to fuck poners isn't even necessary to the story because if the AI's manipulations force you to find big-eyed poners attractive what would really change if the Shrek AI made you find chubby Ogress OCs and other fairytale creatures attractive instead? It would only change the story's title from MLP Friendship Is Optimal to Shrek 5: The Shreckoning.
Ooh, or maybe I could have pretended to unironically be a rationalist and copypasted Elizer's sermons only substituting all mention of an all-powerful theoretical AI with all-powerful theoretical Shrek-themed AI!
Or pretended to worship a Final Fantasy-themed AI, and claimed that by worshipping SephAIroth I am one of those "Jenova's Witnesses"!
>>300517
>Something that occurs to me - I wonder if Kkat treated writing this story as if he were playing a tabletop RPG
>ut it's easy to imagine Kkat's process in writing FoE to be half "Let's Play Fallout 3 Highlights Compilation" and half "I'm playing out a hypothetical tabletop campaign in my head". Long-form tabletop campaigns can often start slowly as the GM introduces the players to the setting and runs them through a few short introductory adventures before they tackle the main quest. Characters will sometimes do things that don't make sense because their player thought it would be fun. And of course, it's tricky to explain the events of a big DnD campaign to someone who's never played before and have them feel the same level of engagement.
I've suspected this for some time, in fact I think I commented fairly early on that this story reads like a play by play of a tabletop session. Even if the DM has a story in mind, it won't necessarily be followed to the letter, because the players can act on their own. Thus, if you were to write out the events that occurred in the game you would have a lot of weird disjointed scenes and story threads that don't necessarily go anywhere.
In the 1980s and 90s there were entire magazines dedicated to publishing the stories of people's D&D games, they may even still exist. A good writer could probably take a good RPG session and spin it into a good novel or short story collection or whatever, but it would still require a fair amount of adaptation and editing. A writer attempting to do this will often get the idea into their head that they need to be as faithful as possible to the events of the original campaign, but that doesn't necessarily mean writing everything out exactly the way it happened. It's similar to writing historical fiction: you want to follow actual events as closely as you can, but you still have to arrange those events into something people will recognize as a story. Characters need to have arcs and motivations, and the story needs to have an exposition and a climax and all that. Sometimes this requires taking some dramatic license with the source material: fabricating scenes, omitting certain events, creating fictional characters to fill certain roles, etc. Whether it's the events of a game or the events of real life, a perfect retelling of events exactly as they occurred seldom makes for an engaging story.
>>300567
>Ngl, I like FoE as a setting; the use of pastel ponies in a grim dark post-apolcalypse makes for a macabre dichotomy of cute and sweet, contrasted with the desolation, morbidity, and often times unsavory interactions and occurrences. But in order for that to work the protagonist needs to have enough self awareness and reflection to live and BE in the world, as opposed to just going through it and responding to the circumstances they come across like a mindless murder-hobo with 0 attachment to their experience.
I actually have no problem with the idea of a grimdark Equestria in and of itself. I even tried to write a "dark future of pastel ponyland" story of my own once though I didn't get past the prologue; it's one of my many aborted projects. Blending Fallout and MLP could be interesting if done well; the problem is, as you've pointed out, the author focuses on evoking his own gaming experience rather than trying to evoke the setting itself.
The other problem is that the way he approaches the setting makes it difficult to take anything seriously. On the one hand, he seems to want this story to be taken seriously as gritty, edgy realism; this isn't pastel ponyland where everypony hugs and makes friends all the time, this is real life where existence is a daily struggle and ponies must kill to survive. On the other hand, the addition of game elements like potions and healing spells makes it difficult to take any of the dangerous situations these characters find themselves in seriously. Also, his Dudley Do-Right morality, with all the characters divided cleanly into "good guy" and "bad guy" camps, takes away any level of grit or realism that this setting might have otherwise been able to produce. The "bad guys" are just cartoonishly evil goons completely lacking depth; no matter how horrible their actions might be, it's hard to take any of it seriously because it doesn't feel even remotely believable.
The author on some subconscious level seems to grasp this, and compensates by carrying the violence to extremes, in much the same way that Peen Stroke tried to amplify all the sobbing and sorrow in his book. Most of the time though the over-the-top violence porn that kkat cooks up ends up being more funny than disturbing, simply because it's too preposterous to provoke any response but laughter; for example, the situation with the colt in the roller-derby ensemble trying to rape the mare while Calamity was shooting at him had me busting up laughing as I was reading it. The heroes, meanwhile, behave just as badly as the villains, only in their case the author appends this clumsy pop-morality to justify their actions. However, far from making them sympathetic, it just makes them come across as arrogant, self-righteous dicks. The reader feels indifferent to the actions of the villains, while simultaneously hating the heroes' guts; at least that's the effect it's having on me.
>Something that occurs to me - I wonder if Kkat treated writing this story as if he were playing a tabletop RPG
>ut it's easy to imagine Kkat's process in writing FoE to be half "Let's Play Fallout 3 Highlights Compilation" and half "I'm playing out a hypothetical tabletop campaign in my head". Long-form tabletop campaigns can often start slowly as the GM introduces the players to the setting and runs them through a few short introductory adventures before they tackle the main quest. Characters will sometimes do things that don't make sense because their player thought it would be fun. And of course, it's tricky to explain the events of a big DnD campaign to someone who's never played before and have them feel the same level of engagement.
I've suspected this for some time, in fact I think I commented fairly early on that this story reads like a play by play of a tabletop session. Even if the DM has a story in mind, it won't necessarily be followed to the letter, because the players can act on their own. Thus, if you were to write out the events that occurred in the game you would have a lot of weird disjointed scenes and story threads that don't necessarily go anywhere.
In the 1980s and 90s there were entire magazines dedicated to publishing the stories of people's D&D games, they may even still exist. A good writer could probably take a good RPG session and spin it into a good novel or short story collection or whatever, but it would still require a fair amount of adaptation and editing. A writer attempting to do this will often get the idea into their head that they need to be as faithful as possible to the events of the original campaign, but that doesn't necessarily mean writing everything out exactly the way it happened. It's similar to writing historical fiction: you want to follow actual events as closely as you can, but you still have to arrange those events into something people will recognize as a story. Characters need to have arcs and motivations, and the story needs to have an exposition and a climax and all that. Sometimes this requires taking some dramatic license with the source material: fabricating scenes, omitting certain events, creating fictional characters to fill certain roles, etc. Whether it's the events of a game or the events of real life, a perfect retelling of events exactly as they occurred seldom makes for an engaging story.
>>300567
>Ngl, I like FoE as a setting; the use of pastel ponies in a grim dark post-apolcalypse makes for a macabre dichotomy of cute and sweet, contrasted with the desolation, morbidity, and often times unsavory interactions and occurrences. But in order for that to work the protagonist needs to have enough self awareness and reflection to live and BE in the world, as opposed to just going through it and responding to the circumstances they come across like a mindless murder-hobo with 0 attachment to their experience.
I actually have no problem with the idea of a grimdark Equestria in and of itself. I even tried to write a "dark future of pastel ponyland" story of my own once though I didn't get past the prologue; it's one of my many aborted projects. Blending Fallout and MLP could be interesting if done well; the problem is, as you've pointed out, the author focuses on evoking his own gaming experience rather than trying to evoke the setting itself.
The other problem is that the way he approaches the setting makes it difficult to take anything seriously. On the one hand, he seems to want this story to be taken seriously as gritty, edgy realism; this isn't pastel ponyland where everypony hugs and makes friends all the time, this is real life where existence is a daily struggle and ponies must kill to survive. On the other hand, the addition of game elements like potions and healing spells makes it difficult to take any of the dangerous situations these characters find themselves in seriously. Also, his Dudley Do-Right morality, with all the characters divided cleanly into "good guy" and "bad guy" camps, takes away any level of grit or realism that this setting might have otherwise been able to produce. The "bad guys" are just cartoonishly evil goons completely lacking depth; no matter how horrible their actions might be, it's hard to take any of it seriously because it doesn't feel even remotely believable.
The author on some subconscious level seems to grasp this, and compensates by carrying the violence to extremes, in much the same way that Peen Stroke tried to amplify all the sobbing and sorrow in his book. Most of the time though the over-the-top violence porn that kkat cooks up ends up being more funny than disturbing, simply because it's too preposterous to provoke any response but laughter; for example, the situation with the colt in the roller-derby ensemble trying to rape the mare while Calamity was shooting at him had me busting up laughing as I was reading it. The heroes, meanwhile, behave just as badly as the villains, only in their case the author appends this clumsy pop-morality to justify their actions. However, far from making them sympathetic, it just makes them come across as arrogant, self-righteous dicks. The reader feels indifferent to the actions of the villains, while simultaneously hating the heroes' guts; at least that's the effect it's having on me.
>>300517
>Grim Star is Tenpony's chief of security. The DJ sassed him for massacring a bunch of ghouls a couple of chapters back.
Ah, that's right.
>Grim Star is Tenpony's chief of security. The DJ sassed him for massacring a bunch of ghouls a couple of chapters back.
Ah, that's right.
>>300420
I've noticed a rather common problem in fanfiction: authors focus too heavily on the characters and events of the source material. In particular, brony authors seem to feel that just because they're writing an MLP story, that the Mane 6 have to be included somewhere even if they don't play an integral role. Near the beginning of Past Sins for example, Peen Stroke had Nyx go around town introducing herself to all of Twilight's friends, even though apart from possibly Rarity, none of them had any meaningful connection to her or any significant role to play. Likewise, The Sun and the Rose took place in the distant past of Equestria, and featured none of the canon characters except for Celestia, yet the author still felt compelled to write an epilogue explaining how every single one of the Mane 6 were somehow connected to his world and characters.
There's nothing wrong with referencing or otherwise utilizing the source material; after all, the whole point of fanfiction is that you're writing about a world and a set of characters you care about. However, you still need to try and think about whatever you're writing as a self-contained work, rather than just a shoddy derivative of something people are already familiar with. A story set in the distant past or the distant future of Equestria has a unique opportunity to explore beyond the boundaries of anything contained in the series. With something like this, set 200 years in the future, you could tell an entire story from start to finish without ever mentioning Twilight, Rarity, Fluttershy, or any of the familiar characters. Sun & Rose could have done the same thing; soulpeener actually came up with some pretty decent characters that could have easily stood on their own if he'd allowed them to.
Using characters from the source material is perfectly acceptable of course, but you have to pick and choose which characters matter in the story you're telling. You also have to make them interesting characters; you can't just assume that enough people love Fluttershy that they won't mind your shitty half-assed rendering of her. That's the main lesson Peen Stroke needed to learn; nobody gives a shit about Bastion Yorsets or whatever that waiter's name is, and the M6 felt like crude cutouts of themselves, wedged into the story because the author felt obliged to include them. He could have made Nyx a far more endearing character if he'd kept the focus on her mother-daughter relationship with Twilight, instead of getting constantly derailed by his autistic compulsion to reference every single character who has ever appeared in the cartoon I actually consider it a boon that he wrote his story early in the fandom; if he'd had 9 seasons worth of autism to pull references from it would probably have broken a million words.
Anyway, to bring the focus back to the story we're analyzing, kkat is running into the same problem trying to connect his own characters to the M6. Sure, Velvet might be descended from Sweetie Belle, but is the connection really that important? It's an interesting factoid for dedicated fans and there's no inherent harm in it, but it was a mistake to make it a focal point of the story like this. An author throwing little connections and bits of trivia into a story basically serves the same purpose as developers hiding easter eggs in their games; it gives the dedicated fan a little something extra without ruining the basic experience for a casual. If tracking down easter eggs becomes the object of the game, it defeats the point of having easter eggs.
After all, the same bloodline that connects Velvet to Rarity and Sweetie Belle also connects her to their parents (I don't know their names, but they are technically canon characters), as well as whoever Sweetie Belle's children might have been. Have any of these characters ever been mentioned? Did the author feel compelled to insert a bowling scene, just so he could have Velvet mention that Sweetie Belle's granddaughter Repeatie Belle used to enjoy bowling, along with her close pals Apple Dip and Scooty Puff Junior? No. Why? Because those characters don't matter; they might technically exist, but they have no connection to present events or characters. Kkat has no more reason to bring up Sweetie Belle or Rarity than JRR Tolkien had reason to bring up Bilbo Baggins' Great Uncle Jeff.
So, why would Velvet be constantly mentioning her great great grandmother Sweetie Belle, or her great great aunt Rarity, or her great great aunt's great great friend Fluttershy? There's no reason for her to do this in-world, just like there is no reason to have a DJ or radroaches or any of the random Fallout crap kkat wanted to unceremoniously dump in here. Again, drawing from the rich lore of the canon source is not just acceptable but encouraged with fanfiction, but you have to bear in mind that you're trying to tell your own story, not just cobble together weak references to someone else's. Understanding this is the difference between quality writing and amateur hour.
All of this ties into what I've been complaining about all along, which is that instead of telling a story about his characters' lives in the present, he is essentially using the present story as a framing device for showing off his alternate history headcanon about how Equestria destroyed itself through nuclear war. All of the characters so far are just flimsy sketches with improbable ties to the Mane 6: Velvet is a descendent of Sweetie Belle, and so related to Rarity, Calamity is a Dashite (whatever that is exactly), SteelHooves is Applejack's cyborg ex-boyfriend. The only exception is Littlepoop herself, who despite having no meaningful connection to the past has inexplicably made it her life's work to unravel it. On top of that, she assumes the role of the insufferable Mary Sue OC, who not only befriends all of the canon characters but manages to one-up them at every possible turn.
I've noticed a rather common problem in fanfiction: authors focus too heavily on the characters and events of the source material. In particular, brony authors seem to feel that just because they're writing an MLP story, that the Mane 6 have to be included somewhere even if they don't play an integral role. Near the beginning of Past Sins for example, Peen Stroke had Nyx go around town introducing herself to all of Twilight's friends, even though apart from possibly Rarity, none of them had any meaningful connection to her or any significant role to play. Likewise, The Sun and the Rose took place in the distant past of Equestria, and featured none of the canon characters except for Celestia, yet the author still felt compelled to write an epilogue explaining how every single one of the Mane 6 were somehow connected to his world and characters.
There's nothing wrong with referencing or otherwise utilizing the source material; after all, the whole point of fanfiction is that you're writing about a world and a set of characters you care about. However, you still need to try and think about whatever you're writing as a self-contained work, rather than just a shoddy derivative of something people are already familiar with. A story set in the distant past or the distant future of Equestria has a unique opportunity to explore beyond the boundaries of anything contained in the series. With something like this, set 200 years in the future, you could tell an entire story from start to finish without ever mentioning Twilight, Rarity, Fluttershy, or any of the familiar characters. Sun & Rose could have done the same thing; soulpeener actually came up with some pretty decent characters that could have easily stood on their own if he'd allowed them to.
Using characters from the source material is perfectly acceptable of course, but you have to pick and choose which characters matter in the story you're telling. You also have to make them interesting characters; you can't just assume that enough people love Fluttershy that they won't mind your shitty half-assed rendering of her. That's the main lesson Peen Stroke needed to learn; nobody gives a shit about Bastion Yorsets or whatever that waiter's name is, and the M6 felt like crude cutouts of themselves, wedged into the story because the author felt obliged to include them. He could have made Nyx a far more endearing character if he'd kept the focus on her mother-daughter relationship with Twilight, instead of getting constantly derailed by his autistic compulsion to reference every single character who has ever appeared in the cartoon I actually consider it a boon that he wrote his story early in the fandom; if he'd had 9 seasons worth of autism to pull references from it would probably have broken a million words.
Anyway, to bring the focus back to the story we're analyzing, kkat is running into the same problem trying to connect his own characters to the M6. Sure, Velvet might be descended from Sweetie Belle, but is the connection really that important? It's an interesting factoid for dedicated fans and there's no inherent harm in it, but it was a mistake to make it a focal point of the story like this. An author throwing little connections and bits of trivia into a story basically serves the same purpose as developers hiding easter eggs in their games; it gives the dedicated fan a little something extra without ruining the basic experience for a casual. If tracking down easter eggs becomes the object of the game, it defeats the point of having easter eggs.
After all, the same bloodline that connects Velvet to Rarity and Sweetie Belle also connects her to their parents (I don't know their names, but they are technically canon characters), as well as whoever Sweetie Belle's children might have been. Have any of these characters ever been mentioned? Did the author feel compelled to insert a bowling scene, just so he could have Velvet mention that Sweetie Belle's granddaughter Repeatie Belle used to enjoy bowling, along with her close pals Apple Dip and Scooty Puff Junior? No. Why? Because those characters don't matter; they might technically exist, but they have no connection to present events or characters. Kkat has no more reason to bring up Sweetie Belle or Rarity than JRR Tolkien had reason to bring up Bilbo Baggins' Great Uncle Jeff.
So, why would Velvet be constantly mentioning her great great grandmother Sweetie Belle, or her great great aunt Rarity, or her great great aunt's great great friend Fluttershy? There's no reason for her to do this in-world, just like there is no reason to have a DJ or radroaches or any of the random Fallout crap kkat wanted to unceremoniously dump in here. Again, drawing from the rich lore of the canon source is not just acceptable but encouraged with fanfiction, but you have to bear in mind that you're trying to tell your own story, not just cobble together weak references to someone else's. Understanding this is the difference between quality writing and amateur hour.
All of this ties into what I've been complaining about all along, which is that instead of telling a story about his characters' lives in the present, he is essentially using the present story as a framing device for showing off his alternate history headcanon about how Equestria destroyed itself through nuclear war. All of the characters so far are just flimsy sketches with improbable ties to the Mane 6: Velvet is a descendent of Sweetie Belle, and so related to Rarity, Calamity is a Dashite (whatever that is exactly), SteelHooves is Applejack's cyborg ex-boyfriend. The only exception is Littlepoop herself, who despite having no meaningful connection to the past has inexplicably made it her life's work to unravel it. On top of that, she assumes the role of the insufferable Mary Sue OC, who not only befriends all of the canon characters but manages to one-up them at every possible turn.
>>300710
While we're on the subject, I'm actually beginning to wonder about Littlepoop's role in all of this. So far it seems like the author is adhering to video game rules as far as his protagonist is concerned: make her a more or less blank slate so that the player can either self-insert or build their own character to suit their play style. As I've mentioned before, this is good game design but bad novel design.
However, it's also clear at this point that LP is not only a Mary Sue, but the most insufferable kind of Mary Sue: the all-powerful know-it-all who excels at everything she tries without effort and always has a clever solution to every problem, no matter how improbable that solution might prove to be. This, combined with what I mentioned above regarding all the other main characters' improbable connections to Mane 6 characters, makes me wonder if the author doesn't have some big reveal in mind for Littlepoop. As such, I would now like to make another prediction:
Littlepoop turns out to be either the descendent or some distant relative of Twilight Sparkle. Watcher/Frank's allusions to finding her "element" or "destiny" or however he worded it are meant to be subtle foreshadowing for her eventual discovery of this fact. As the rightful heir to the Element of Magic, it will fall upon her to unite her friends (so far each friend LP has made has turned out to be an analog of an M6 character, so assuming the pattern holds she should still have two more friends to find) and right the wrongs of the past. The "real" Twilight Sparkle will, of course, be proven to have fallen into some kind of corruption along with the others; despite having the very bestest of intentions, she made horrible mistakes that resulted in the destruction of the world. As the Author's Chosen, it will be up to Littlesue to arrogantly and effortlessly do what the most powerful canon protagonist in the series could not, and bring about some grandiose deus ex machina event that will fix everything. This will take the form of either a mass-purification of all the radiation or taint or whatever, or else it will involve somehow altering the flow of history and preventing the war from ever happening.
As ever, please don't tell me if I'm right or wrong about this; I want to see if I am as perceptive as I arrogantly believe myself to be.
Anyway, let's get back on track. When we last left Littlepoop, she was reclining in the spa, trying to quiet her frothing nether regions as some hot female poner massages her hindquarters.
>Later as we lounged in a mud bath, my eye spotted a book sitting alone on a counter. Curious, I floated it over to take a look. “Principles of Proper Pony Speech,” I read aloud. “Refining how we think by refining how we speak.” I opened the book and looked down the title page. At the bottom, in small words: Official guidelines from the Ministry of Image.
>I decided I’d ask the spa pony if I could buy the book.
Now that I think about it, LP's sudden interest in literature ties in with my theory; at the very least there's no other in-world explanation for it. Also, to my recollection the Ministry of Image is unfamiliar to us; based on the pattern so far I'm assuming this one is probably Rarity's. At any rate, she seems like the most likely M6 poner to have published a book on etiquette. As ever, there is no obvious reason why a title like this should catch Littlepoop's attention, and as ever, the author probably has no intention of ever explaining his reasoning.
Anywho, after a page break we rejoin Littlepoop a short time later. She apparently was able to buy the book she wanted from the spa ponies, because she is in the process of slipping it into her saddlebag, when suddenly she collides with another pony. The pony in question turns out to be none other than Monterrey Jack, the pony with whom she escaped from the first group of slavers she encountered, only to have him turn on her and attempt to rob her. Apparently, Monterrey runs the cheese shop; hence his cheese-shaped cutie mark. Ordinarily, I would question why a cheese-shop proprietor from Manehattan would have been wandering around the wasteland surrounding Ponyville in the first place, but that seems like a silly question to ask at this point.
Littlepoop, naturally, gets insanely buttmad and tries to have Monterrey Jack arrested on the charge of attempting to rob her three weeks ago, with no witnesses, in an area well beyond the jurisdiction of any authority structure that may or may not exist in Tenpony Tower. As one might expect, her ravings fall on deaf ears, and the gendarmes tell her that there is nothing they can do. Monterrey Jack walks away scot free, and Littlepoop descends into a frothing whirlpool of fanny frustration.
Or at least, that is how one would expect this encounter to go. The way it actually plays out is a little more bizarre.
The gendarme responds to her accusations against Monterrey with a typical "what's all this, then?" Littlepoop explains that Monterrey tried to rob her three weeks prior, out in the wasteland, where there were no witnesses. The gendarme tells her that it's basically her word against his, and since she's not a citizen of Tenpony Tower, her word doesn't mean much. All Monterrey would really need to do here is deny it or say nothing, and everyone could have simply moved on with their lives, excepting LP, who would no doubt spend days in a state of acute rectal rupture. However, for basically no reason, Monterrey confesses to the crime, or rather, refuses to deny it.
Both the gendarme and Littlepoop are as surprised by this as anyone else would be. Monterrey goes on to explain that he is not ashamed of his actions, that Littlepoop was clearly inexperienced and would probably die on her own anyway, and that it would have been a waste to allow her to keep the supplies she had. This is all true enough, but he shows a surprising amount of naiveté in admitting all of this.
While we're on the subject, I'm actually beginning to wonder about Littlepoop's role in all of this. So far it seems like the author is adhering to video game rules as far as his protagonist is concerned: make her a more or less blank slate so that the player can either self-insert or build their own character to suit their play style. As I've mentioned before, this is good game design but bad novel design.
However, it's also clear at this point that LP is not only a Mary Sue, but the most insufferable kind of Mary Sue: the all-powerful know-it-all who excels at everything she tries without effort and always has a clever solution to every problem, no matter how improbable that solution might prove to be. This, combined with what I mentioned above regarding all the other main characters' improbable connections to Mane 6 characters, makes me wonder if the author doesn't have some big reveal in mind for Littlepoop. As such, I would now like to make another prediction:
Littlepoop turns out to be either the descendent or some distant relative of Twilight Sparkle. Watcher/Frank's allusions to finding her "element" or "destiny" or however he worded it are meant to be subtle foreshadowing for her eventual discovery of this fact. As the rightful heir to the Element of Magic, it will fall upon her to unite her friends (so far each friend LP has made has turned out to be an analog of an M6 character, so assuming the pattern holds she should still have two more friends to find) and right the wrongs of the past. The "real" Twilight Sparkle will, of course, be proven to have fallen into some kind of corruption along with the others; despite having the very bestest of intentions, she made horrible mistakes that resulted in the destruction of the world. As the Author's Chosen, it will be up to Littlesue to arrogantly and effortlessly do what the most powerful canon protagonist in the series could not, and bring about some grandiose deus ex machina event that will fix everything. This will take the form of either a mass-purification of all the radiation or taint or whatever, or else it will involve somehow altering the flow of history and preventing the war from ever happening.
As ever, please don't tell me if I'm right or wrong about this; I want to see if I am as perceptive as I arrogantly believe myself to be.
Anyway, let's get back on track. When we last left Littlepoop, she was reclining in the spa, trying to quiet her frothing nether regions as some hot female poner massages her hindquarters.
>Later as we lounged in a mud bath, my eye spotted a book sitting alone on a counter. Curious, I floated it over to take a look. “Principles of Proper Pony Speech,” I read aloud. “Refining how we think by refining how we speak.” I opened the book and looked down the title page. At the bottom, in small words: Official guidelines from the Ministry of Image.
>I decided I’d ask the spa pony if I could buy the book.
Now that I think about it, LP's sudden interest in literature ties in with my theory; at the very least there's no other in-world explanation for it. Also, to my recollection the Ministry of Image is unfamiliar to us; based on the pattern so far I'm assuming this one is probably Rarity's. At any rate, she seems like the most likely M6 poner to have published a book on etiquette. As ever, there is no obvious reason why a title like this should catch Littlepoop's attention, and as ever, the author probably has no intention of ever explaining his reasoning.
Anywho, after a page break we rejoin Littlepoop a short time later. She apparently was able to buy the book she wanted from the spa ponies, because she is in the process of slipping it into her saddlebag, when suddenly she collides with another pony. The pony in question turns out to be none other than Monterrey Jack, the pony with whom she escaped from the first group of slavers she encountered, only to have him turn on her and attempt to rob her. Apparently, Monterrey runs the cheese shop; hence his cheese-shaped cutie mark. Ordinarily, I would question why a cheese-shop proprietor from Manehattan would have been wandering around the wasteland surrounding Ponyville in the first place, but that seems like a silly question to ask at this point.
Littlepoop, naturally, gets insanely buttmad and tries to have Monterrey Jack arrested on the charge of attempting to rob her three weeks ago, with no witnesses, in an area well beyond the jurisdiction of any authority structure that may or may not exist in Tenpony Tower. As one might expect, her ravings fall on deaf ears, and the gendarmes tell her that there is nothing they can do. Monterrey Jack walks away scot free, and Littlepoop descends into a frothing whirlpool of fanny frustration.
Or at least, that is how one would expect this encounter to go. The way it actually plays out is a little more bizarre.
The gendarme responds to her accusations against Monterrey with a typical "what's all this, then?" Littlepoop explains that Monterrey tried to rob her three weeks prior, out in the wasteland, where there were no witnesses. The gendarme tells her that it's basically her word against his, and since she's not a citizen of Tenpony Tower, her word doesn't mean much. All Monterrey would really need to do here is deny it or say nothing, and everyone could have simply moved on with their lives, excepting LP, who would no doubt spend days in a state of acute rectal rupture. However, for basically no reason, Monterrey confesses to the crime, or rather, refuses to deny it.
Both the gendarme and Littlepoop are as surprised by this as anyone else would be. Monterrey goes on to explain that he is not ashamed of his actions, that Littlepoop was clearly inexperienced and would probably die on her own anyway, and that it would have been a waste to allow her to keep the supplies she had. This is all true enough, but he shows a surprising amount of naiveté in admitting all of this.
>>300711
In any event, it shouldn't matter, since this scene happened out in no man's land miles from Tenpony Tower; there's no practical reason why the constabulary here would be expected to investigate, let alone prosecute, something like this. For whatever it's worth, here is Monterrey's defense of his actions:
>“I have two colts and a filly to look after. I had to make it home safely, and those supplies would have been wasted on you. You weren’t even smart enough to loot corpses. You wouldn’t have survived the week.”
Again, all of this is actually pretty reasonable; what he hadn't counted on though is that Littlepoop is Mary Sue, the author's chosen. Situations that would kill any other pony are no trouble for her; she will walk away with nary a scratch, and might even profit.
In any event, it's dumb as hell that he just outright cops to this. His justification for attempted robbery is basically that one, he had children to take care of, and two, Littlepoop is an inexperienced retard who deserved to get robbed. Both of these points check out as far as I'm concerned. However, the fact that he has young children to take care of means that he can't really afford to voluntarily throw himself in prison either, particularly when he could easily just deny the accusation and walk away without having to prove himself, or if he doesn't want to lie, just say nothing and walk away. I really don't understand why he does what he does here. Let's see what he has to say for himself:
>Monterey Jack snorted, staring at me. “I’m not a liar. And I’m not ashamed of what I tried to do. Making sure my children still have a father is more important than some foalish little stranger who doesn’t have the good sense not to walk into a slaver camp.” He looked to the guard, “After Clarinet was killed, I’m all they have left.”
Again, this seems like all the more reason to not want to get caught up in any sort of legal snafu. I'd really like to get inside kkat's head and poke around a little; he has a really strange way of looking at things and I'm curious to learn what makes him tick. Every time he tries to give his characters some sort of virtue it turns out really weird. This character defends attempted robbery on the grounds that his children need a father, and yet he seems to have some moral hangup about lying that requires him to confess to a crime he could easily have gotten away with, and as we are about to see, will deprive his children of a father in the process. Velvet's moral hypocrisy is irritating, but this guy's behavior is just nonsensical. Also, if he's so much smarter than Littlepoop, how did he get captured by slavers? Come to think of it, why was he even out there?
>The guard pony neighed. “Well, probably not anymore. You know the law. Banditry will get you executed.”
Monterrey obviously lives in this town and would know its laws, and would be well aware of this fact. He cares about his family to the point that he's willing to rob a stranger and leave her to her death, yet he apparently has some kind of weird code of personal honor that won't allow him to tell a simple lie to get out of being executed for robbing said stranger, which would ipso facto deprive his children of a father? This guy's actions make no sense at all; whatever the author was going for here, I'm not understanding it. Monterrey would make a lot more sense if the author just left him as the amoral hardcase he initially appeared to be.
Anyway, from where I'm standing, there are three major logic issues here.
First of all, there's the issue I've already covered: Monterrey's actions here don't make sense. On the one hand, he appears to subscribe to the dog-eat-dog code of the wasteland, which basically states that any self-interested act is justified. On the other hand, he has some bizarre moral hangup about lying to the gendarmes about trying to rob some twat he doesn't know and has no obligation to, and clearly had no moral hangups about robbing in the first place. He wasn't even successful in robbing her; the situation ended in a draw as you'll recall.
Second, it's not clear why a robbery that took place in the wasteland literal miles from Tenpony Tower would concern the law here in the first place. As far as I can tell there is no longer any sort of centralized government in Equestria, thus no law exists in the wasteland, thus robbery, rape, murder, and so forth are not crimes as such. I understood that to basically be the whole point of the wasteland: it's no man's land, occupied by brutish thugs who behave as they please because nopony can stop them. The only laws that exist in this world would be the local laws of places like Tenpony that attempt to establish some degree of civilization. As such, they can presumably make whatever laws they want, so I suppose if they wanted to make a law that says any citizen who engages in banditry out in the wasteland is subject to the death penalty, I just don't see the logic behind it. Keeping the peace inside the tower makes sense, and not wanting bandits and such to hold citizenship in the tower also makes sense, but Littlepoop is not a citizen here and holds no rights as such; the gendarme even says as much. They're putting this pony to death because he confessed to unsuccessfully attempting to rob a non-citizen three weeks ago out in the wasteland, miles away from the tower? It makes no sense; at most he should be asked to forfeit his citizenship and leave. Again, it's their society and they can make whatever rules they like, but I just don't understand the reasoning here.
Third, why was Monterrey even out in the wasteland that far from home to begin with? This part especially makes no sense. The guy is a cheese vendor; he sells cheese. What the hell was he doing in a slaver camp outside Ponyville in the first place? For a guy who supposedly wants to look out for his kids, he sure seems willing to take a lot of dumb risks.
In any event, it shouldn't matter, since this scene happened out in no man's land miles from Tenpony Tower; there's no practical reason why the constabulary here would be expected to investigate, let alone prosecute, something like this. For whatever it's worth, here is Monterrey's defense of his actions:
>“I have two colts and a filly to look after. I had to make it home safely, and those supplies would have been wasted on you. You weren’t even smart enough to loot corpses. You wouldn’t have survived the week.”
Again, all of this is actually pretty reasonable; what he hadn't counted on though is that Littlepoop is Mary Sue, the author's chosen. Situations that would kill any other pony are no trouble for her; she will walk away with nary a scratch, and might even profit.
In any event, it's dumb as hell that he just outright cops to this. His justification for attempted robbery is basically that one, he had children to take care of, and two, Littlepoop is an inexperienced retard who deserved to get robbed. Both of these points check out as far as I'm concerned. However, the fact that he has young children to take care of means that he can't really afford to voluntarily throw himself in prison either, particularly when he could easily just deny the accusation and walk away without having to prove himself, or if he doesn't want to lie, just say nothing and walk away. I really don't understand why he does what he does here. Let's see what he has to say for himself:
>Monterey Jack snorted, staring at me. “I’m not a liar. And I’m not ashamed of what I tried to do. Making sure my children still have a father is more important than some foalish little stranger who doesn’t have the good sense not to walk into a slaver camp.” He looked to the guard, “After Clarinet was killed, I’m all they have left.”
Again, this seems like all the more reason to not want to get caught up in any sort of legal snafu. I'd really like to get inside kkat's head and poke around a little; he has a really strange way of looking at things and I'm curious to learn what makes him tick. Every time he tries to give his characters some sort of virtue it turns out really weird. This character defends attempted robbery on the grounds that his children need a father, and yet he seems to have some moral hangup about lying that requires him to confess to a crime he could easily have gotten away with, and as we are about to see, will deprive his children of a father in the process. Velvet's moral hypocrisy is irritating, but this guy's behavior is just nonsensical. Also, if he's so much smarter than Littlepoop, how did he get captured by slavers? Come to think of it, why was he even out there?
>The guard pony neighed. “Well, probably not anymore. You know the law. Banditry will get you executed.”
Monterrey obviously lives in this town and would know its laws, and would be well aware of this fact. He cares about his family to the point that he's willing to rob a stranger and leave her to her death, yet he apparently has some kind of weird code of personal honor that won't allow him to tell a simple lie to get out of being executed for robbing said stranger, which would ipso facto deprive his children of a father? This guy's actions make no sense at all; whatever the author was going for here, I'm not understanding it. Monterrey would make a lot more sense if the author just left him as the amoral hardcase he initially appeared to be.
Anyway, from where I'm standing, there are three major logic issues here.
First of all, there's the issue I've already covered: Monterrey's actions here don't make sense. On the one hand, he appears to subscribe to the dog-eat-dog code of the wasteland, which basically states that any self-interested act is justified. On the other hand, he has some bizarre moral hangup about lying to the gendarmes about trying to rob some twat he doesn't know and has no obligation to, and clearly had no moral hangups about robbing in the first place. He wasn't even successful in robbing her; the situation ended in a draw as you'll recall.
Second, it's not clear why a robbery that took place in the wasteland literal miles from Tenpony Tower would concern the law here in the first place. As far as I can tell there is no longer any sort of centralized government in Equestria, thus no law exists in the wasteland, thus robbery, rape, murder, and so forth are not crimes as such. I understood that to basically be the whole point of the wasteland: it's no man's land, occupied by brutish thugs who behave as they please because nopony can stop them. The only laws that exist in this world would be the local laws of places like Tenpony that attempt to establish some degree of civilization. As such, they can presumably make whatever laws they want, so I suppose if they wanted to make a law that says any citizen who engages in banditry out in the wasteland is subject to the death penalty, I just don't see the logic behind it. Keeping the peace inside the tower makes sense, and not wanting bandits and such to hold citizenship in the tower also makes sense, but Littlepoop is not a citizen here and holds no rights as such; the gendarme even says as much. They're putting this pony to death because he confessed to unsuccessfully attempting to rob a non-citizen three weeks ago out in the wasteland, miles away from the tower? It makes no sense; at most he should be asked to forfeit his citizenship and leave. Again, it's their society and they can make whatever rules they like, but I just don't understand the reasoning here.
Third, why was Monterrey even out in the wasteland that far from home to begin with? This part especially makes no sense. The guy is a cheese vendor; he sells cheese. What the hell was he doing in a slaver camp outside Ponyville in the first place? For a guy who supposedly wants to look out for his kids, he sure seems willing to take a lot of dumb risks.
>>300707
It's been a longtime wish of mine to write a dark future, post-apocalyptic pony narrative. What do you personally think would be some decent advice for such an endeavor, taking this story and its various failures into account? Not to mention if you feel there is a certain level of self-awareness a grim pony story would need to follow.
It's been a longtime wish of mine to write a dark future, post-apocalyptic pony narrative. What do you personally think would be some decent advice for such an endeavor, taking this story and its various failures into account? Not to mention if you feel there is a certain level of self-awareness a grim pony story would need to follow.
>>300710
Oh, shit. I didn't read ahead when typing out my other reply. This is another thing i'd like to respond to and weave in, since it's an interesting thought.
I feel concerned that, when writing pony fanfiction, there should be some effort to anchor it into the universe it's based off of in some way. If you had what amounts to a modern American military story with just ponies replacing the human protags, would that really count as a pony fanfic, then? So personally I feel like there should be some connection to the setting of MLP, don't you agree? Obviously it should be done well, of course.
I am absolutely not saying I feel this story did it very well, or portrayed Equestria in any accurate fashion, but sometimes I think it is a necessity for stories to integrate elements of the show and setting so they don't come off as the author's thinly-veiled human fantasy fiction with all mention of "hands" replaced by "hooves".
I really appreciate this, though, as it's giving me some thought on how to reign in potentially extraneous references of my own that don't serve the narrative as a whole.
Oh, shit. I didn't read ahead when typing out my other reply. This is another thing i'd like to respond to and weave in, since it's an interesting thought.
I feel concerned that, when writing pony fanfiction, there should be some effort to anchor it into the universe it's based off of in some way. If you had what amounts to a modern American military story with just ponies replacing the human protags, would that really count as a pony fanfic, then? So personally I feel like there should be some connection to the setting of MLP, don't you agree? Obviously it should be done well, of course.
I am absolutely not saying I feel this story did it very well, or portrayed Equestria in any accurate fashion, but sometimes I think it is a necessity for stories to integrate elements of the show and setting so they don't come off as the author's thinly-veiled human fantasy fiction with all mention of "hands" replaced by "hooves".
I really appreciate this, though, as it's giving me some thought on how to reign in potentially extraneous references of my own that don't serve the narrative as a whole.
>>300711
>As such, I would now like to make another prediction
Interesting.
>>300712
Monterey Jack is a fascinating character. Not for any particularly outstanding character traits or for the quality of how he's written, but because he offers a window into how Kkat believes morality works. Kkat has essentially constructed a rather warped and low-resolution version of virtue ethics. As I recall MJ does get an opportunity to explain himself soon so I won't go into detail just yet. However, his actions here end up forming a major cornerstone of how Littlepip approaches moral questions in the future, so this section of the story is more important than it seems. It's also retarded, but let's wait and see just how so.
>As such, I would now like to make another prediction
Interesting.
>>300712
Monterey Jack is a fascinating character. Not for any particularly outstanding character traits or for the quality of how he's written, but because he offers a window into how Kkat believes morality works. Kkat has essentially constructed a rather warped and low-resolution version of virtue ethics. As I recall MJ does get an opportunity to explain himself soon so I won't go into detail just yet. However, his actions here end up forming a major cornerstone of how Littlepip approaches moral questions in the future, so this section of the story is more important than it seems. It's also retarded, but let's wait and see just how so.
>>300711
Isn't it strange that Monterry Jack is honest to the point of being self-defeating, even if it means depriving those who rely on him of him?
It's like someone tried to make an honest character like Applejack, failed at understanding "Applejack the honest workaholic desperate to be a reliable and dependable friend who really is faithful and strong" and instead walked away with "Memejack the joke character who cannot lie" as his impression of Applejack. So when he tried to make someone like his bad take on Applejack "but different", the result was a very honest backstabbing bandit who puts no thought into how what he says will affect his goals or others.
What the hell kind of mindset views honesty as something self-defeating?
Kkat's view of kindness comes from videogames where you have the "kind" option to spare baddies you should brutally murder and the game treats you like a saint for "taking the harder high road" even though it means forcing harder times on the world by leaving the baddies alive to commit more crimes.
But does his view of honesty really come from the same place, those stupid dialogue options that give you the option to screw yourself over and break a very vital ruse for no reason in the name of "roleplaying" a retard with a hateboner for lying even if it gets the way of goals?
It makes sense that a gamer who's beaten this game a hundred times already would try challenge runs like "no lying" or "kill everyone you see" or "no using guns, Commie Whacker melee weapon only" or "no dodging" or "no killing". Like a gamer always selecting the bad dialogue option whether it's needlessly cruel or absurdly edgy or just "I do not want to be a hero" whether the game can account for this or not.
But a person?
Would a person make these choices?
There are ways to make someone who sticks to their principles no matter the cost look admirable. This isn't the way.
His Velvet Remedy is a Fluttershy fangirl with inconsistent morals and a bizarre relationship with reality. She hates killing and killers but only when the author remembers this.
But Jack Cheesefag over here? I don't know what to say about him because words can't describe how bad the author is at understanding the idea of "having a core virtue" that influences your actions like a consistent character trait.
Isn't it strange that Monterry Jack is honest to the point of being self-defeating, even if it means depriving those who rely on him of him?
It's like someone tried to make an honest character like Applejack, failed at understanding "Applejack the honest workaholic desperate to be a reliable and dependable friend who really is faithful and strong" and instead walked away with "Memejack the joke character who cannot lie" as his impression of Applejack. So when he tried to make someone like his bad take on Applejack "but different", the result was a very honest backstabbing bandit who puts no thought into how what he says will affect his goals or others.
What the hell kind of mindset views honesty as something self-defeating?
Kkat's view of kindness comes from videogames where you have the "kind" option to spare baddies you should brutally murder and the game treats you like a saint for "taking the harder high road" even though it means forcing harder times on the world by leaving the baddies alive to commit more crimes.
But does his view of honesty really come from the same place, those stupid dialogue options that give you the option to screw yourself over and break a very vital ruse for no reason in the name of "roleplaying" a retard with a hateboner for lying even if it gets the way of goals?
It makes sense that a gamer who's beaten this game a hundred times already would try challenge runs like "no lying" or "kill everyone you see" or "no using guns, Commie Whacker melee weapon only" or "no dodging" or "no killing". Like a gamer always selecting the bad dialogue option whether it's needlessly cruel or absurdly edgy or just "I do not want to be a hero" whether the game can account for this or not.
But a person?
Would a person make these choices?
There are ways to make someone who sticks to their principles no matter the cost look admirable. This isn't the way.
His Velvet Remedy is a Fluttershy fangirl with inconsistent morals and a bizarre relationship with reality. She hates killing and killers but only when the author remembers this.
But Jack Cheesefag over here? I don't know what to say about him because words can't describe how bad the author is at understanding the idea of "having a core virtue" that influences your actions like a consistent character trait.
>>300712
Anyway, in probably the stupidest twist yet, this happens:
>The guard clamped the bit on his battle saddle and I heard the light support weapon reload. “Sorry, Monterey Jack, but you’re going to have to come with me.”
Littlepoop:
>“um… I’ve changed my mind. I’m not pressing charges. Nothing happened.”
The guard:
>“Sorry kid. But it’s your word against his. And like I said, your non-citizen word doesn’t mean the dirt on my hoof around here.”
So, basically, Monterrey Jack is under arrest because he confessed to a crime he had no reason to confess to, that is arguably not even a crime in the first place. Since Littlepoop is a non-citizen, the guard would have easily taken Monterrey's word over hers, but for some reason he chose to admit to the deed anyway. Furthermore, her being a non-citizen, alongside the fact that this "crime" took place well beyond any reasonable jurisdiction that Tenpony Tower, should render this whole accusation a non-issue to begin with, making Monterrey's confession even more perplexing. If some personal code of honor won't permit him to lie, he could have just stonewalled her and not said anything.
The punishment for attempted robbery here is apparently death, so Monterrey is arrested and led away. Suddenly finding the punishment a bit too harsh for her tastes, Littlepoop now tries to retract her accusation, but is rebuffed by the guard...on the grounds that she is a non-citizen so her word doesn't matter. I would really, really like to do a little exploring inside kkat's bizarre little rat's nest of a mind; I'm extremely curious to learn what was going through his head when he was writing this utter nonsense.
Anyway, there's a page break, and the next scene opens with Littlepoop pacing around and muttering to herself. She now feels guilty about getting Monterrey in trouble, even though he basically placed his own neck on the chopping block, of his own freewill, for essentially no reason.
Velvet goes off to research the laws of Tenpony Tower (not sure what she hopes to accomplish by doing this; if they want to help Monterrey Jack with his defense it would make far more sense to go and hire a lawyer or something), and Littlepoop, having nothing better to do, goes off to finally have her conversation about whatever with the stupid radio DJ. Unironically, this story is getting so fucking ridiculous. Sometimes I wonder if I'm actually reading it, or if someone hit me in the head with a two-by-four and this is all just some bizarre hallucination I'm having while slowly bleeding to death in an alley somewhere.
>I’d left Velvet Remedy looking into the laws of Tenpony Tower, hoping she could find something while I attempted to talk to DJ Pon3. Stepping into the elevator, I added this to the list of things I wanted to ask him about.
Yeah, the DJ is clearly the first pony you'd want to speak with about this. I know that whenever I need complex legal advice about a case involving capital punishment, my first phone call is to Mad Mike in the Morning on WFUG, 109.8 FM. If she's caller number five, she might even be able to save Monterrey and win free Aerosmith tickets.
>For that matter, why couldn’t Monterey Jack have just kept his own mouth shut. In the Equestrian Wasteland, honesty was not always a virtue.
If it's this apparent to you, Littlepoop, imagine how the rest of us feel.
So anyway, she rides the elevator up to the top floor (the issue of how or why the building still has a working elevator is not addressed) and finds herself standing in a richly appointed lobby. There is a fountain in the center, with a statue of an alicorn as the centerpiece. The alicorn has a water talisman around its neck. Though it's not really explained, these talismans appear to be somehow responsible for the presence of fresh water in irradiated Equestria. The whole problem with Stable 28 or 24, or whatever the last one they visited was called, was that their water talisman had been damaged by a kid shooting it with a BB gun and they no longer had fresh water.
>Thanks to the talisman, the fountain still flowed with fresh, clean water even two-hundred years after the apocalypse. I remembered the pure, non-irradiated water we had enjoyed in our baths and in the spa, and I wondered just how many water talismans the M.A.S. hub had. And how many could benefit from them if they weren’t all hoarded together in this one place.
I wasn't quite sure what the acronym M.A.S. meant, so I went back and did some digging. The text mentions them passing under a sign for the Ministry of Arcane Sciences when they first stepped off the monorail tracks. Like everything else in this story it's not particularly well explained, but if I'm understanding it correctly, the building now called Tenpony Tower apparently used to belong to the Ministry, or maybe it was their headquarters or something. In any event, they seem to be in possession of a large number of water talismans, and this seems to be the explanation for how they are able to live in luxury in the middle of the wasteland.
Something that also isn't explained is why the place isn't attacked more frequently. If just one of these talismans can supply an entire Stable with fresh water for 200 years, it would stand to reason that they would be a highly sought-after commodity. You'd expect this place to be a magnet for invading enemies, and subsequently you'd expect it to be fortified and closed off to the outside world; ie, it should have better protection than a couple of inept guards at the front door that some moron and her three friends can just bluff their way past with a retarded story about needing to fix the DJ's toaster.
Anyway, there is also a brief hint of an explanation for how and why the DJ is able to broadcast from here. It appears that this building did indeed belong to the Ministry of Arcane Sciences, and that they had some kind of emergency broadcast system in place.
Anyway, in probably the stupidest twist yet, this happens:
>The guard clamped the bit on his battle saddle and I heard the light support weapon reload. “Sorry, Monterey Jack, but you’re going to have to come with me.”
Littlepoop:
>“um… I’ve changed my mind. I’m not pressing charges. Nothing happened.”
The guard:
>“Sorry kid. But it’s your word against his. And like I said, your non-citizen word doesn’t mean the dirt on my hoof around here.”
So, basically, Monterrey Jack is under arrest because he confessed to a crime he had no reason to confess to, that is arguably not even a crime in the first place. Since Littlepoop is a non-citizen, the guard would have easily taken Monterrey's word over hers, but for some reason he chose to admit to the deed anyway. Furthermore, her being a non-citizen, alongside the fact that this "crime" took place well beyond any reasonable jurisdiction that Tenpony Tower, should render this whole accusation a non-issue to begin with, making Monterrey's confession even more perplexing. If some personal code of honor won't permit him to lie, he could have just stonewalled her and not said anything.
The punishment for attempted robbery here is apparently death, so Monterrey is arrested and led away. Suddenly finding the punishment a bit too harsh for her tastes, Littlepoop now tries to retract her accusation, but is rebuffed by the guard...on the grounds that she is a non-citizen so her word doesn't matter. I would really, really like to do a little exploring inside kkat's bizarre little rat's nest of a mind; I'm extremely curious to learn what was going through his head when he was writing this utter nonsense.
Anyway, there's a page break, and the next scene opens with Littlepoop pacing around and muttering to herself. She now feels guilty about getting Monterrey in trouble, even though he basically placed his own neck on the chopping block, of his own freewill, for essentially no reason.
Velvet goes off to research the laws of Tenpony Tower (not sure what she hopes to accomplish by doing this; if they want to help Monterrey Jack with his defense it would make far more sense to go and hire a lawyer or something), and Littlepoop, having nothing better to do, goes off to finally have her conversation about whatever with the stupid radio DJ. Unironically, this story is getting so fucking ridiculous. Sometimes I wonder if I'm actually reading it, or if someone hit me in the head with a two-by-four and this is all just some bizarre hallucination I'm having while slowly bleeding to death in an alley somewhere.
>I’d left Velvet Remedy looking into the laws of Tenpony Tower, hoping she could find something while I attempted to talk to DJ Pon3. Stepping into the elevator, I added this to the list of things I wanted to ask him about.
Yeah, the DJ is clearly the first pony you'd want to speak with about this. I know that whenever I need complex legal advice about a case involving capital punishment, my first phone call is to Mad Mike in the Morning on WFUG, 109.8 FM. If she's caller number five, she might even be able to save Monterrey and win free Aerosmith tickets.
>For that matter, why couldn’t Monterey Jack have just kept his own mouth shut. In the Equestrian Wasteland, honesty was not always a virtue.
If it's this apparent to you, Littlepoop, imagine how the rest of us feel.
So anyway, she rides the elevator up to the top floor (the issue of how or why the building still has a working elevator is not addressed) and finds herself standing in a richly appointed lobby. There is a fountain in the center, with a statue of an alicorn as the centerpiece. The alicorn has a water talisman around its neck. Though it's not really explained, these talismans appear to be somehow responsible for the presence of fresh water in irradiated Equestria. The whole problem with Stable 28 or 24, or whatever the last one they visited was called, was that their water talisman had been damaged by a kid shooting it with a BB gun and they no longer had fresh water.
>Thanks to the talisman, the fountain still flowed with fresh, clean water even two-hundred years after the apocalypse. I remembered the pure, non-irradiated water we had enjoyed in our baths and in the spa, and I wondered just how many water talismans the M.A.S. hub had. And how many could benefit from them if they weren’t all hoarded together in this one place.
I wasn't quite sure what the acronym M.A.S. meant, so I went back and did some digging. The text mentions them passing under a sign for the Ministry of Arcane Sciences when they first stepped off the monorail tracks. Like everything else in this story it's not particularly well explained, but if I'm understanding it correctly, the building now called Tenpony Tower apparently used to belong to the Ministry, or maybe it was their headquarters or something. In any event, they seem to be in possession of a large number of water talismans, and this seems to be the explanation for how they are able to live in luxury in the middle of the wasteland.
Something that also isn't explained is why the place isn't attacked more frequently. If just one of these talismans can supply an entire Stable with fresh water for 200 years, it would stand to reason that they would be a highly sought-after commodity. You'd expect this place to be a magnet for invading enemies, and subsequently you'd expect it to be fortified and closed off to the outside world; ie, it should have better protection than a couple of inept guards at the front door that some moron and her three friends can just bluff their way past with a retarded story about needing to fix the DJ's toaster.
Anyway, there is also a brief hint of an explanation for how and why the DJ is able to broadcast from here. It appears that this building did indeed belong to the Ministry of Arcane Sciences, and that they had some kind of emergency broadcast system in place.
>>300785
>I took a deep breath and stepped towards the stairs. A second pair of elevator doors slid open behind me. I turned to see the grey unicorn mare, Homage, step out and look around. I smiled, trying not to look nervous. “You’re here to see DJ Pon3 too?”
I don't think I mentioned it, but during the earlier scene where Monterrey Jack was arrested he had been in the process of helping one of his cheese-store customers load up an order. The name of the customer was Homage. Apparently the same unicorn is also here to see the DJ, though it's not clear why.
Anyway, we don't need to wait long for an answer to this mystery. As Homage and Littlepoop head into the broadcasting room, it becomes obvious that Homage actually is DJ Pon3, though for some yet-unexplained reason she uses magic to give herself a male voice while broadcasting. Oh, there is also this:
>Inside were multiple maneframes and walls of computer screens giving a bird’s eye view of… the vast majority of the Equestrian Wasteland as far as I could tell.
This appears to be the answer to how the DJ seems to know everything that's going on. We still don't know how exactly a system like this works; are there just hundreds of thousands of tiny cameras hidden all over Equestria, or is this another one of those "it's magic I ain't gotta explain shit" types of situations? Sci-fi-fantasy crossovers tend to be the absolute worst offenders for illogical bullshit, especially in the hands of an incompetent writer. The intersection of improbable magic and improbable technology is basically an open license to get away with any retarded idea you could possibly dream up, an opiate which often proves too tempting for a hack amateur to resist. This seems to be one of those cases. Anyway, whatever; let's just sit tight for now and see if the author at least attempts to offer a halfway-plausible explanation.
So, at long last, we know the identity of the DJ. Turns out she is just some bored autistic unicorn, who sits in a booth all day watching a 24/7 video feed of everything that happens in the wasteland. She uses the old emergency broadcast system to yammer about whatever gossip she learns, and plays her collection of old prewar records over and over, presumably just to annoy everypony. This is actually making me wonder about Frank's true identity as well.
>“I hear rumor that Monterey Jack, cheese shop owner up in that oh-so-hoity-toity Tenpony Tower, has been arrested for deciding that being a thieving jack-ass is the appropriate response to an act of kindness. Remember what I keep telling you, my little ponies: treat each other with kindness and respect. Or don’t and watch it come back to bite you in the tail.
I feel like I ought to be grousing here, but I actually don't hate this turn of events. Having the DJ turn out to just be some busybody autismo who happens to have access to a mass surveillance and broadcast system dating from before the war is actually kind of a funny idea.
However, she's not off the hook. Here, we see her take one of her typically condescending ethical stances against somepony's behavior, but in this case we saw what actually happened. Since we also know that she can see just about everything that goes on in the wasteland and also that she pays close attention to LP, it's not unreasonable to suspect she already knew that MJ had tried to rob her. If so, it's curious that she still bought cheese from him. And in any case, she obviously has a long-standing business relationship with this guy; it's pretty cold-blooded of her to just write off his death with a joke like this.
Anyway, after a page break the two of them go out on the roof to make out and fix one of the DJ's broadcast satellites. Littlepoop is admiring the view of the city, when she notices several weird, monolithic tower things off in the distance:
>I turned to look at her but caught sight of something far off on the horizon that grabbed my attention. A needle-like white tower rose all the way into the clouds. I blinked, realizing I’d seen it before, but not over there. Before, when I’d spotted it in the distance, it was…
>I turned to look out in the direction I knew the tower should have been and saw. There were two of them. I pulled out my binoculars and slowly turned, scanning the horizon. Far off, protruding from the mountains near old Appleloosa, I thought I spotted a third.
If she saw one of these things earlier, it feels like this should have been mentioned somewhere. This story so far has been a continuous deluge of small-detail information, and the author tends to assign the same level of importance to minor and major details alike, so it's possible that it was mentioned somewhere and I just don't remember. However, in any case, this is a missed opportunity. A mysterious tower against the skyline is a detail that should be mentioned over and over in order to reinforce the mystery. By this point, we should have heard about it many, many times, and should be wondering what it is; otherwise, this revelation is just another random tidbit of world trivia.
In any case, the author offers us this explanation for how the DJ's camera system works:
>I lowered the binoculars. “What are they?”
>“No idea,” Homage admitted. “Something pre-war and really sophisticated. What I do know is that each one has a station house at the base and observation eyes about a third of the way up. DJ Pon3 managed to hack into one of them. Between those eyes and reports from loyal listeners, every DJ Pon3 since had been able to keep ponies informed about dangers, uplifted by the tales of heroes, and generally appraised of what goes on in the wasteland. And give them beautiful music to help make life out there more bearable.
This appears to confirm what was said earlier, that "DJ Pon3" is some kind of hereditary title. Each successive DJ uses this system to broadcast music and news, because reasons I guess.
>I took a deep breath and stepped towards the stairs. A second pair of elevator doors slid open behind me. I turned to see the grey unicorn mare, Homage, step out and look around. I smiled, trying not to look nervous. “You’re here to see DJ Pon3 too?”
I don't think I mentioned it, but during the earlier scene where Monterrey Jack was arrested he had been in the process of helping one of his cheese-store customers load up an order. The name of the customer was Homage. Apparently the same unicorn is also here to see the DJ, though it's not clear why.
Anyway, we don't need to wait long for an answer to this mystery. As Homage and Littlepoop head into the broadcasting room, it becomes obvious that Homage actually is DJ Pon3, though for some yet-unexplained reason she uses magic to give herself a male voice while broadcasting. Oh, there is also this:
>Inside were multiple maneframes and walls of computer screens giving a bird’s eye view of… the vast majority of the Equestrian Wasteland as far as I could tell.
This appears to be the answer to how the DJ seems to know everything that's going on. We still don't know how exactly a system like this works; are there just hundreds of thousands of tiny cameras hidden all over Equestria, or is this another one of those "it's magic I ain't gotta explain shit" types of situations? Sci-fi-fantasy crossovers tend to be the absolute worst offenders for illogical bullshit, especially in the hands of an incompetent writer. The intersection of improbable magic and improbable technology is basically an open license to get away with any retarded idea you could possibly dream up, an opiate which often proves too tempting for a hack amateur to resist. This seems to be one of those cases. Anyway, whatever; let's just sit tight for now and see if the author at least attempts to offer a halfway-plausible explanation.
So, at long last, we know the identity of the DJ. Turns out she is just some bored autistic unicorn, who sits in a booth all day watching a 24/7 video feed of everything that happens in the wasteland. She uses the old emergency broadcast system to yammer about whatever gossip she learns, and plays her collection of old prewar records over and over, presumably just to annoy everypony. This is actually making me wonder about Frank's true identity as well.
>“I hear rumor that Monterey Jack, cheese shop owner up in that oh-so-hoity-toity Tenpony Tower, has been arrested for deciding that being a thieving jack-ass is the appropriate response to an act of kindness. Remember what I keep telling you, my little ponies: treat each other with kindness and respect. Or don’t and watch it come back to bite you in the tail.
I feel like I ought to be grousing here, but I actually don't hate this turn of events. Having the DJ turn out to just be some busybody autismo who happens to have access to a mass surveillance and broadcast system dating from before the war is actually kind of a funny idea.
However, she's not off the hook. Here, we see her take one of her typically condescending ethical stances against somepony's behavior, but in this case we saw what actually happened. Since we also know that she can see just about everything that goes on in the wasteland and also that she pays close attention to LP, it's not unreasonable to suspect she already knew that MJ had tried to rob her. If so, it's curious that she still bought cheese from him. And in any case, she obviously has a long-standing business relationship with this guy; it's pretty cold-blooded of her to just write off his death with a joke like this.
Anyway, after a page break the two of them go out on the roof to make out and fix one of the DJ's broadcast satellites. Littlepoop is admiring the view of the city, when she notices several weird, monolithic tower things off in the distance:
>I turned to look at her but caught sight of something far off on the horizon that grabbed my attention. A needle-like white tower rose all the way into the clouds. I blinked, realizing I’d seen it before, but not over there. Before, when I’d spotted it in the distance, it was…
>I turned to look out in the direction I knew the tower should have been and saw. There were two of them. I pulled out my binoculars and slowly turned, scanning the horizon. Far off, protruding from the mountains near old Appleloosa, I thought I spotted a third.
If she saw one of these things earlier, it feels like this should have been mentioned somewhere. This story so far has been a continuous deluge of small-detail information, and the author tends to assign the same level of importance to minor and major details alike, so it's possible that it was mentioned somewhere and I just don't remember. However, in any case, this is a missed opportunity. A mysterious tower against the skyline is a detail that should be mentioned over and over in order to reinforce the mystery. By this point, we should have heard about it many, many times, and should be wondering what it is; otherwise, this revelation is just another random tidbit of world trivia.
In any case, the author offers us this explanation for how the DJ's camera system works:
>I lowered the binoculars. “What are they?”
>“No idea,” Homage admitted. “Something pre-war and really sophisticated. What I do know is that each one has a station house at the base and observation eyes about a third of the way up. DJ Pon3 managed to hack into one of them. Between those eyes and reports from loyal listeners, every DJ Pon3 since had been able to keep ponies informed about dangers, uplifted by the tales of heroes, and generally appraised of what goes on in the wasteland. And give them beautiful music to help make life out there more bearable.
This appears to confirm what was said earlier, that "DJ Pon3" is some kind of hereditary title. Each successive DJ uses this system to broadcast music and news, because reasons I guess.
>>300787
>I looked to Homage with amazement bordering on reverence.
*sigh*
Charlie Brown and the motherfucking football. Every time I think I've found something in this story that at least partially redeems it or otherwise deserves a compliment, k "I unironically believe that the estrogen in my boyfriend's soycuck semen gives me literary superpowers" kat yanks it cruelly away and reveals it to be nothing but more of his usual demented bullshit.
The mystery of the DJ's identity turns out to be a nothingburger. Back when this old M.A.S. building was colonized by the antecedents of whatever the group presently running Tenpony Tower calls themselves, one of them chanced upon this emergency broadcast system and got it working. They also hacked this network of mysterious towers that somehow enables 24 hour surveillance of all of Equestria. Subsequently, for the last 200 years, whoever inherits the title of "DJ Pon3" sits up here in this literal ivory tower, playing records, goofing around, and making snarky commentary about all the murder and mayhem going on outside. That's literally all there is to DJ Pon3.
To put it simply, the DJ has turned out to be pretty much what I said earlier: a lone autist who happens to be in possession of some powerful equipment, which she uses for what essentially amounts to a hobby. As I also noted earlier, this would actually be a pretty funny development, except that the author doesn't seem to have intended it as a joke, or even to realize that it might be interpreted as one. Littlepoop learns all of this and views this character's actions with "amazement bordering on reverence."
The DJ summarizes her contribution to post-civilization thusly:
>“It’s all I can do to help everyone. But I figure the most I can do is the least I can do.”
Since this character seems to genuinely believe that she is providing a valuable service, and the author seems to genuinely want us to see her as a force for good in the story, it's worth examining her actions and views a little more closely. Let's start by taking a closer look at the "spin" lel bcuz she's a DJ, get it? :DDDDD she put on this most recent incident with Monterrey Jack:
>Good morning, wastelanders!” Homage cried into the mike, her voice now male and very familiar.
Incidentally, it's "mic," not "mike." "Mic" is a shortening of the word "microphone," whereas Mike is a bouncer at The Manhole Lounge in San Francisco, who gets to use kkat's mouth as an onahole in exchange for waiving the cover charge.
>I hear rumor that Monterey Jack, cheese shop owner up in that oh-so-hoity-toity Tenpony Tower, has been arrested for deciding that being a thieving jack-ass is the appropriate response to an act of kindness. Remember what I keep telling you, my little ponies: treat each other with kindness and respect. Or don’t and watch it come back to bite you in the tail.
Juvenile puns aside, this is pure spin. We all saw exactly what happened with Monterrey Jack: Littlepoop accused him of robbing her without offering any proof beyond her word. Monterrey, for reasons only he understands, confirmed her accusation and admitted attempting to rob her. Apparently, for reasons only they understand, the government of Tenpony Tower imposes the death penalty for attempted robbery outside of the Tower.
Monterrey Jack, father of three soon-to-be orphans, was thus hauled off by the local constabulary to await summary execution. Even Littlepoop found this to be extreme, and she's the one he tried to rob. However, the DJ, who personally witnessed this event, has nothing to say about it beyond implying that it was some kind of karmic retribution. Bear in mind that this same DJ had what appears to be an ongoing business relationship with this guy. Also bear in mind that she has surveillance equipment that makes her a nearly omnipresent observer of everything that happens in the wasteland, and due to her well-documented interest in Littlepoop can reasonably be assumed to have witnessed Monterrey Jack's actual attempted robbery of her. So basically, this "thieving jack-ass" was good enough to buy cheese from for all this time, but not quite good enough to put in a good word for when his misdeeds (which she might very well have known about) were exposed.
Another point worth noting is that there was really no reason to even put this incident in her news broadcast in the first place. The guy who runs the snooty cheese shop in Tenpony Tower committed attempted robbery three weeks ago; is this really the sort of news the average wastelander is going to give a fuck about? Of course not; she basically dunked on this guy just to dunk on him. About the only ponies affected by this event are the handful of yuppie ponies yupponies? who will now have to get their exotic cheese from someplace else. Oh yeah, I suppose Monterrey Jack's three children, who already lost their mother and are about to lose their father, might be interested to know this; however, I'm guessing the "thieving jack-ass" remark might rustle their jimmies a bit. Hope they don't "accidentally" take the completely unguarded elevator to the completely unguarded broadcast room at the top of this largely unguarded tower and pump this self-righteous twat full of rubber bullets.
It's also worth pointing out the DJ's hypocrisy here: Monterrey receiving a death sentence for an attempted (read: unsuccessful) robbery, committed three weeks in the past in an area over which Tenpony Tower's government would have no natural jurisdiction, is apparently karmic retribution for not treating other little ponies "with kindness and respect." However, Littlepoop running around the wasteland, ruthlessly slaughtering everypony who looks at her cockeyed, and stealing anything that isn't nailed down, doesn't bother her a bit; she even seems to regard her as some kind of wasteland hero.
>I looked to Homage with amazement bordering on reverence.
*sigh*
Charlie Brown and the motherfucking football. Every time I think I've found something in this story that at least partially redeems it or otherwise deserves a compliment, k "I unironically believe that the estrogen in my boyfriend's soycuck semen gives me literary superpowers" kat yanks it cruelly away and reveals it to be nothing but more of his usual demented bullshit.
The mystery of the DJ's identity turns out to be a nothingburger. Back when this old M.A.S. building was colonized by the antecedents of whatever the group presently running Tenpony Tower calls themselves, one of them chanced upon this emergency broadcast system and got it working. They also hacked this network of mysterious towers that somehow enables 24 hour surveillance of all of Equestria. Subsequently, for the last 200 years, whoever inherits the title of "DJ Pon3" sits up here in this literal ivory tower, playing records, goofing around, and making snarky commentary about all the murder and mayhem going on outside. That's literally all there is to DJ Pon3.
To put it simply, the DJ has turned out to be pretty much what I said earlier: a lone autist who happens to be in possession of some powerful equipment, which she uses for what essentially amounts to a hobby. As I also noted earlier, this would actually be a pretty funny development, except that the author doesn't seem to have intended it as a joke, or even to realize that it might be interpreted as one. Littlepoop learns all of this and views this character's actions with "amazement bordering on reverence."
The DJ summarizes her contribution to post-civilization thusly:
>“It’s all I can do to help everyone. But I figure the most I can do is the least I can do.”
Since this character seems to genuinely believe that she is providing a valuable service, and the author seems to genuinely want us to see her as a force for good in the story, it's worth examining her actions and views a little more closely. Let's start by taking a closer look at the "spin" lel bcuz she's a DJ, get it? :DDDDD she put on this most recent incident with Monterrey Jack:
>Good morning, wastelanders!” Homage cried into the mike, her voice now male and very familiar.
Incidentally, it's "mic," not "mike." "Mic" is a shortening of the word "microphone," whereas Mike is a bouncer at The Manhole Lounge in San Francisco, who gets to use kkat's mouth as an onahole in exchange for waiving the cover charge.
>I hear rumor that Monterey Jack, cheese shop owner up in that oh-so-hoity-toity Tenpony Tower, has been arrested for deciding that being a thieving jack-ass is the appropriate response to an act of kindness. Remember what I keep telling you, my little ponies: treat each other with kindness and respect. Or don’t and watch it come back to bite you in the tail.
Juvenile puns aside, this is pure spin. We all saw exactly what happened with Monterrey Jack: Littlepoop accused him of robbing her without offering any proof beyond her word. Monterrey, for reasons only he understands, confirmed her accusation and admitted attempting to rob her. Apparently, for reasons only they understand, the government of Tenpony Tower imposes the death penalty for attempted robbery outside of the Tower.
Monterrey Jack, father of three soon-to-be orphans, was thus hauled off by the local constabulary to await summary execution. Even Littlepoop found this to be extreme, and she's the one he tried to rob. However, the DJ, who personally witnessed this event, has nothing to say about it beyond implying that it was some kind of karmic retribution. Bear in mind that this same DJ had what appears to be an ongoing business relationship with this guy. Also bear in mind that she has surveillance equipment that makes her a nearly omnipresent observer of everything that happens in the wasteland, and due to her well-documented interest in Littlepoop can reasonably be assumed to have witnessed Monterrey Jack's actual attempted robbery of her. So basically, this "thieving jack-ass" was good enough to buy cheese from for all this time, but not quite good enough to put in a good word for when his misdeeds (which she might very well have known about) were exposed.
Another point worth noting is that there was really no reason to even put this incident in her news broadcast in the first place. The guy who runs the snooty cheese shop in Tenpony Tower committed attempted robbery three weeks ago; is this really the sort of news the average wastelander is going to give a fuck about? Of course not; she basically dunked on this guy just to dunk on him. About the only ponies affected by this event are the handful of yuppie ponies yupponies? who will now have to get their exotic cheese from someplace else. Oh yeah, I suppose Monterrey Jack's three children, who already lost their mother and are about to lose their father, might be interested to know this; however, I'm guessing the "thieving jack-ass" remark might rustle their jimmies a bit. Hope they don't "accidentally" take the completely unguarded elevator to the completely unguarded broadcast room at the top of this largely unguarded tower and pump this self-righteous twat full of rubber bullets.
It's also worth pointing out the DJ's hypocrisy here: Monterrey receiving a death sentence for an attempted (read: unsuccessful) robbery, committed three weeks in the past in an area over which Tenpony Tower's government would have no natural jurisdiction, is apparently karmic retribution for not treating other little ponies "with kindness and respect." However, Littlepoop running around the wasteland, ruthlessly slaughtering everypony who looks at her cockeyed, and stealing anything that isn't nailed down, doesn't bother her a bit; she even seems to regard her as some kind of wasteland hero.
>>300788
So this DJ tower sees everything (Fucking somehow. I would have said "magic computers use magic sonars and magic computers able to interpret that sonar data to create a fully 3d CGI animation of everything going on outside the tower. then another magic program interprets and understands these events and records everything, and alerts the DJ to anything she'd consider important enough to watch. or rewatch from assorted angles.)
If this DJ truly has the equipment to see everything in all of Equestria, shouldn't people act like it?
Shouldn't people revere "The Voice Of The Radio" as some kind of religious authority, even if it tells them not to? This voice knows EVERYTHING. This voice could direct swarms of bounty hunters and travelling wastelanders and armed farmer militiamen around the country to siege Raider camps, choke them, starve them, and overrun them. This radio voice could tell people about civilized towns that accept anyone willing to get a job or kill to defend it. This radio voice could tell people where to send their orphans and tell people what raider Forward Operating Bases near the orphanages need to go down.
And considering what a "Gamer"(TM) Kkat is, I'm surprised this radio signal isn't used to call out hits and give out "Assassinate this particular character in this particular location for a bounty" sidequests! Homage and her radio tower's faggy irrationally-thriving civilization certainly have enough cash to pay off any Wastelander that brings them a Bounty's head.
This radio host sees and knows everything, fucking somehow, because she has Batman's Batcave and his all-seeing Brother Eye super-surveillance device. So the world should act like it! But it doesn't.
The DJ claims she also gets info from "reports from loyal listeners" but how the fuck does that work? It ain't like all radios are two-way communication systems that can receive radio signals AND transmit radio signals of their own to send messages back to their favourite DJs! When DJs want callers to call in, they give phone numbers for a reason.
If the DJ relies on information from listeners, has anyone ever lied to the DJ, meaning the DJ reports wrong info? Is that why the DJ isn't universally beloved as everypony's main source of information? It just doesn't make sense that she'd rely on the word of some pony when she's got an all-seeing cum-powered faggot machine eating Mike Tyson's ass. Unless she listens to the words of ponies, and verifies it with her all-seeing faggot machine. Which is something the story should fucking specify considering it's details like this that make bullshit machines feel like they're real parts of the world that are used often and not just whenever the author needs this deus ex machina bullshit machine.
Does Spritebot Radio and its generic military tunes have its own all-seeing radio host? Is this the norm for magical radio towers in Equestria? Is the author going to say something intelligent about good intentions going bad and the dangers of surveillance systems?
For fuck's sake, there is an all-seeing radio tower network on Equestrian soil made before the nukes went off. The pre-war Ministry faggots signed off on this. Pre-war ponies didn't riot over this and destroy any of the system's towers. The Wastelanders haven't done anything about the all-seeing towers. The villains in this story, both the Alicorns/Raiders/Slavers we've met and the villains we haven't met yet, fucking none of them have tried to do anything about this colossal threat to the secrecy of their evil activities and evil plans. The 5G Surveillance towers FUCKING WISH they had this level of all-seeing all-knowing surveillance power.
And Kkat is too stupid to realize how bad an all-seeing surveillance system is or how easily it could be abused. So the good guy has all the power and the bad guys don't, which is good for the characters in the world but bad for any kind of "GOVERNMENT POWER IS BAD" moral the story sometimes attempts. And the world doesn't act like the good guy radio cunt has all the power, even though it should radically transform the face of this lawless hellhole.
In this story, there is a Good Radio Station with "nice" music and a "nice" DJ. And there is a Bad Radio Station with a bad leader who plays military music for no real reason. The "good" radio station has an all-seeing surveillance system and uses it to... call people cunts over the airwaves for violating her peacefag moral sensibilities.
Wouldn't it make more sense if the BAD radio station was the one that inherited pre-war government military equipment able to see everything and report on it?
It would certainly make Littlepip's journey through the Wasteland more tense, violent, and action-packed if there was an evil radio host constantly reporting LP's location and calling for bounty hunters and revenge-obsessed raiders to kill her and her friends.
Hell, why isn't there some Alicorn Radio that speaks in some nonsense language from a pre-war book like LOTR's Elvish, knowing all the Alicorns in its hive mind can understand this language even if they're out of Hive Mind range? (Of course they're never out of Hive Mind range because magic is OP in this setting! I hear Project Horizons could only create areas without the Alicorn Hive Mind by introducing zones of Super-Radiation that's so deadly it harms rad-immune creatures and damages their hive mind psychic link).
Fuck DJ Pon3 for wasting time moralfagging on the airwaves and playing I'm An Alabarnma Nigger bass-boosted at 3AM when she could try to create a new civilization for pony wasteland actual-refugees around this radio tower while the best poners are allowed to become citizens inside it, retake the Raider-infested city around it, and help make Equestria less of a lawless raider/slaver-infested shithole.
So this DJ tower sees everything (Fucking somehow. I would have said "magic computers use magic sonars and magic computers able to interpret that sonar data to create a fully 3d CGI animation of everything going on outside the tower. then another magic program interprets and understands these events and records everything, and alerts the DJ to anything she'd consider important enough to watch. or rewatch from assorted angles.)
If this DJ truly has the equipment to see everything in all of Equestria, shouldn't people act like it?
Shouldn't people revere "The Voice Of The Radio" as some kind of religious authority, even if it tells them not to? This voice knows EVERYTHING. This voice could direct swarms of bounty hunters and travelling wastelanders and armed farmer militiamen around the country to siege Raider camps, choke them, starve them, and overrun them. This radio voice could tell people about civilized towns that accept anyone willing to get a job or kill to defend it. This radio voice could tell people where to send their orphans and tell people what raider Forward Operating Bases near the orphanages need to go down.
And considering what a "Gamer"(TM) Kkat is, I'm surprised this radio signal isn't used to call out hits and give out "Assassinate this particular character in this particular location for a bounty" sidequests! Homage and her radio tower's faggy irrationally-thriving civilization certainly have enough cash to pay off any Wastelander that brings them a Bounty's head.
This radio host sees and knows everything, fucking somehow, because she has Batman's Batcave and his all-seeing Brother Eye super-surveillance device. So the world should act like it! But it doesn't.
The DJ claims she also gets info from "reports from loyal listeners" but how the fuck does that work? It ain't like all radios are two-way communication systems that can receive radio signals AND transmit radio signals of their own to send messages back to their favourite DJs! When DJs want callers to call in, they give phone numbers for a reason.
If the DJ relies on information from listeners, has anyone ever lied to the DJ, meaning the DJ reports wrong info? Is that why the DJ isn't universally beloved as everypony's main source of information? It just doesn't make sense that she'd rely on the word of some pony when she's got an all-seeing cum-powered faggot machine eating Mike Tyson's ass. Unless she listens to the words of ponies, and verifies it with her all-seeing faggot machine. Which is something the story should fucking specify considering it's details like this that make bullshit machines feel like they're real parts of the world that are used often and not just whenever the author needs this deus ex machina bullshit machine.
Does Spritebot Radio and its generic military tunes have its own all-seeing radio host? Is this the norm for magical radio towers in Equestria? Is the author going to say something intelligent about good intentions going bad and the dangers of surveillance systems?
For fuck's sake, there is an all-seeing radio tower network on Equestrian soil made before the nukes went off. The pre-war Ministry faggots signed off on this. Pre-war ponies didn't riot over this and destroy any of the system's towers. The Wastelanders haven't done anything about the all-seeing towers. The villains in this story, both the Alicorns/Raiders/Slavers we've met and the villains we haven't met yet, fucking none of them have tried to do anything about this colossal threat to the secrecy of their evil activities and evil plans. The 5G Surveillance towers FUCKING WISH they had this level of all-seeing all-knowing surveillance power.
And Kkat is too stupid to realize how bad an all-seeing surveillance system is or how easily it could be abused. So the good guy has all the power and the bad guys don't, which is good for the characters in the world but bad for any kind of "GOVERNMENT POWER IS BAD" moral the story sometimes attempts. And the world doesn't act like the good guy radio cunt has all the power, even though it should radically transform the face of this lawless hellhole.
In this story, there is a Good Radio Station with "nice" music and a "nice" DJ. And there is a Bad Radio Station with a bad leader who plays military music for no real reason. The "good" radio station has an all-seeing surveillance system and uses it to... call people cunts over the airwaves for violating her peacefag moral sensibilities.
Wouldn't it make more sense if the BAD radio station was the one that inherited pre-war government military equipment able to see everything and report on it?
It would certainly make Littlepip's journey through the Wasteland more tense, violent, and action-packed if there was an evil radio host constantly reporting LP's location and calling for bounty hunters and revenge-obsessed raiders to kill her and her friends.
Hell, why isn't there some Alicorn Radio that speaks in some nonsense language from a pre-war book like LOTR's Elvish, knowing all the Alicorns in its hive mind can understand this language even if they're out of Hive Mind range? (Of course they're never out of Hive Mind range because magic is OP in this setting! I hear Project Horizons could only create areas without the Alicorn Hive Mind by introducing zones of Super-Radiation that's so deadly it harms rad-immune creatures and damages their hive mind psychic link).
Fuck DJ Pon3 for wasting time moralfagging on the airwaves and playing I'm An Alabarnma Nigger bass-boosted at 3AM when she could try to create a new civilization for pony wasteland actual-refugees around this radio tower while the best poners are allowed to become citizens inside it, retake the Raider-infested city around it, and help make Equestria less of a lawless raider/slaver-infested shithole.
>>300785
>The alicorn has a water talisman around its neck. Though it's not really explained, these talismans appear to be somehow responsible for the presence of fresh water in irradiated Equestria.
This is a curious departure from the Fallout series that has a lot of untapped potential. Water talismans were originally introduced as a nod to Fallout 1's water chip, but while the water chip was simply a vital component to a larger water purification system, a water talisman apparently carries out the same rolle through magic. Or generates pure water out of nothing - it's not really clear. Whenever FoE or its spinoffs need a magical techno-doohickey it's usually a something-talisman.
On the one hand, translating Fallout's hokey vacuum tube-based technology into magical devices of various kinds makes sense for a crossover (and goes some way to explaining how Equestria actually managed to achieve pseudo-modern technology in just a generation or two). On the other, there doesn't seem to be much thought given to what magical devices as useful as this might mean to the setting. A single working water talisman ought to be utterly invaluable and treated accordingly, not hung up in a public place.
>Like everything else in this story it's not particularly well explained, but if I'm understanding it correctly, the building now called Tenpony Tower apparently used to belong to the Ministry, or maybe it was their headquarters or something. In any event, they seem to be in possession of a large number of water talismans, and this seems to be the explanation for how they are able to live in luxury in the middle of the wasteland.
Pretty much. Tenpony was originally a big fancy government building which means they have lots of fancy magical stuff/technology. By rights they should be a local superpower.
>>300787
>A mysterious tower against the skyline is a detail that should be mentioned over and over in order to reinforce the mystery. By this point, we should have heard about it many, many times, and should be wondering what it is; otherwise, this revelation is just another random tidbit of world trivia.
This a thousand times. These towers are massive landmarks, completely unique to this setting, and plot-critical - it's shocking that they're only just getting brought up now.
>>300788
>I looked to Homage with amazement bordering on reverence.
Pic related.
>>300801
>And Kkat is too stupid to realize how bad an all-seeing surveillance system is or how easily it could be abused. So the good guy has all the power and the bad guys don't, which is good for the characters in the world but bad for any kind of "GOVERNMENT POWER IS BAD" moral the story sometimes attempts. And the world doesn't act like the good guy radio cunt has all the power, even though it should radically transform the face of this lawless hellhole.
"It's only bad when other people do it" could sum up the entire story's moral message up to this point and all the way to the end, too.
>The alicorn has a water talisman around its neck. Though it's not really explained, these talismans appear to be somehow responsible for the presence of fresh water in irradiated Equestria.
This is a curious departure from the Fallout series that has a lot of untapped potential. Water talismans were originally introduced as a nod to Fallout 1's water chip, but while the water chip was simply a vital component to a larger water purification system, a water talisman apparently carries out the same rolle through magic. Or generates pure water out of nothing - it's not really clear. Whenever FoE or its spinoffs need a magical techno-doohickey it's usually a something-talisman.
On the one hand, translating Fallout's hokey vacuum tube-based technology into magical devices of various kinds makes sense for a crossover (and goes some way to explaining how Equestria actually managed to achieve pseudo-modern technology in just a generation or two). On the other, there doesn't seem to be much thought given to what magical devices as useful as this might mean to the setting. A single working water talisman ought to be utterly invaluable and treated accordingly, not hung up in a public place.
>Like everything else in this story it's not particularly well explained, but if I'm understanding it correctly, the building now called Tenpony Tower apparently used to belong to the Ministry, or maybe it was their headquarters or something. In any event, they seem to be in possession of a large number of water talismans, and this seems to be the explanation for how they are able to live in luxury in the middle of the wasteland.
Pretty much. Tenpony was originally a big fancy government building which means they have lots of fancy magical stuff/technology. By rights they should be a local superpower.
>>300787
>A mysterious tower against the skyline is a detail that should be mentioned over and over in order to reinforce the mystery. By this point, we should have heard about it many, many times, and should be wondering what it is; otherwise, this revelation is just another random tidbit of world trivia.
This a thousand times. These towers are massive landmarks, completely unique to this setting, and plot-critical - it's shocking that they're only just getting brought up now.
>>300788
>I looked to Homage with amazement bordering on reverence.
Pic related.
>>300801
>And Kkat is too stupid to realize how bad an all-seeing surveillance system is or how easily it could be abused. So the good guy has all the power and the bad guys don't, which is good for the characters in the world but bad for any kind of "GOVERNMENT POWER IS BAD" moral the story sometimes attempts. And the world doesn't act like the good guy radio cunt has all the power, even though it should radically transform the face of this lawless hellhole.
"It's only bad when other people do it" could sum up the entire story's moral message up to this point and all the way to the end, too.
>>300788
One last point worth calling attention to is the DJ's rather disparaging characterization of Tenpony Tower itself:
>I hear rumor that Monterey Jack, cheese shop owner up in that oh-so-hoity-toity Tenpony Tower, has been arrested for deciding that being a thieving jack-ass is the appropriate response to an act of kindness.
This isn't the first time she's made pithy remarks about the place that harbors and supports her. Earlier, she had this to say about the Tower and its security chief:
>Well, some of you ponies up in Tenpony Tower didn't get the message. And when Sheriff Rottingtail kept pressin' for him and his ghouls t' be allowed inside, just cuz they were sick of being hounded by manticores an' slaughtered by bloodwings, Chief Grim Star, the head of Tenpony secuity, responded by hiring a bunch of mercenaries to scour the tenements along the Celestia Line and wipe them all out.
>In an interview, when asked how he had managed to be such a supreme douche bag, Chief Grim Star had this to say:
This, of course, is followed by some dialogue that is presumably an example of Chief Grim Star this is the character that Calamity and SteelHooves went off to see, the guy whose name I didn't remember being a "supreme douche bag."
Point is, it's fairly obvious that DJ Homage/Pon3 has a fairly low opinion of Tenpony Tower. Considering that so far she has mostly shown herself to be a pseudo-moralist and all-around self-righteous cunt of the same stripe as Littlepoop herself, this is unsurprising. For the same reason, it is also unsurprising that she would stand on a soapbox and badmouth the place she calls home, while simultaneously benefitting from its luxuries and protection.
I'm now rather curious what the DJ's relationship to Tenpony Tower is exactly. As far as I can tell, this broadcasting room is essentially her exclusive domain. Presumably, whoever runs this place this is another detail I'm hoping the author clears up grants her a considerable amount of freedom to say and do as she pleases, despite her contributing nothing of obvious value to their society, and openly badmouthing it to boot. Also, as I said, she benefits from its luxuries and protection: despite her low opinion of Monterrey Jack, she obviously had no qualms about buying his cheese (which I'm assuming is a delicacy in the wasteland), and without the Tower's security standing between her and the wretched hive of scum and villainy that comprises the rest of Manehattan's population, she would likely become the designated onahole of some raider group in fairly short order (she is described as being of small stature, similar to Littlepoop herself).
Anyway, the chapter ends with the DJ insinuating that she has plans for Littlepoop:
>“You, on the other hoof, it seems can do a lot more. And so I’d like your help…”
inb4 they lez out. Anyway, as I said, the chapter ends here.
Chapter Seventeen: The Villain of the Piece
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>“Bringing you the truth, no matter how bad it hurts.”
The truth, kkat, is that you will never be a woman.
>For weeks, I had been holding onto the illusion that all my questions would be answered if only I could get to Tenpony Tower and talk to DJ Pon3.
Yeah, I'm still not entirely sure how or why she would have arrived at this conclusion. As I've often said, I don't quite understand why she considered speaking with the DJ to be such a high priority in the first place. Granted, it was curious that the DJ kept mentioning her name during news broadcasts. I can see that being a reasonable motivation to want to seek the DJ out; however, up until now, she's been referring to the DJ as some infallible fount of all knowledge, and I've never understood where she gets this impression from disregarding, of course, all of the outside information I've gotten on this story and its connections to Fallout 3.
Anyway, wherever this idea came from, it seems Littlepoop's hopes of learning the answers to...whatever questions she had exactly...have been dashed against the cold hard rocks of reality much like kkat's hopes of becoming a woman. She appears to know nothing whatsoever about Red Eye, as for some reason her all-seeing camera towers are incapable of looking into the areas where he operates. She also was unable to see exactly what went on at Shattered Hoof, due to key parts of the adventure taking place underground I guess. She thanks Littlepoop for filling her in on some of the details.
>I nodded. "And I'm grateful for the chance to tell my side of the story. My... reputation seems to be getting out of control."
Obligatory false humility from the obnoxious Mary Sue protagonist.
>Homage smiled, "Undeservedly?" She pointed a hoof at me. "You might not think of the things you do as anything special, but they are. Simply by treating the way you risk yourself to help others as something anypony would do, you show the wasteland a way to be better."
Obligatory response in which the obnoxious Mary Sue protagonist is reassured that she is, in fact, the most heroic hero the setting has ever seen, and her humble let-this-cup-pass-from-me attitude only serves to confirm her worthiness.
>You're right; that's how ponies should treat each other. But in the Equestrian Wasteland, it's rare enough for a pony to be willing to expend valuable ammunition from afar to rescue a stranger, especially when they know that they might need those bullets tomorrow to save themselves or their families. Putting life and limb in danger?
From what I've seen the ponies of the Equestrian Wasteland are more than willing to expend ammo on strangers. As far as I can tell, this setting is populated entirely by mindless goons who decorate their rooms with entrails and run around murdering each other for the fuck of it. The only significant difference between Littlepoop and the ponies she guns down is that she invents a pseudo-moralistic justification for it instead of just doing it.
One last point worth calling attention to is the DJ's rather disparaging characterization of Tenpony Tower itself:
>I hear rumor that Monterey Jack, cheese shop owner up in that oh-so-hoity-toity Tenpony Tower, has been arrested for deciding that being a thieving jack-ass is the appropriate response to an act of kindness.
This isn't the first time she's made pithy remarks about the place that harbors and supports her. Earlier, she had this to say about the Tower and its security chief:
>Well, some of you ponies up in Tenpony Tower didn't get the message. And when Sheriff Rottingtail kept pressin' for him and his ghouls t' be allowed inside, just cuz they were sick of being hounded by manticores an' slaughtered by bloodwings, Chief Grim Star, the head of Tenpony secuity, responded by hiring a bunch of mercenaries to scour the tenements along the Celestia Line and wipe them all out.
>In an interview, when asked how he had managed to be such a supreme douche bag, Chief Grim Star had this to say:
This, of course, is followed by some dialogue that is presumably an example of Chief Grim Star this is the character that Calamity and SteelHooves went off to see, the guy whose name I didn't remember being a "supreme douche bag."
Point is, it's fairly obvious that DJ Homage/Pon3 has a fairly low opinion of Tenpony Tower. Considering that so far she has mostly shown herself to be a pseudo-moralist and all-around self-righteous cunt of the same stripe as Littlepoop herself, this is unsurprising. For the same reason, it is also unsurprising that she would stand on a soapbox and badmouth the place she calls home, while simultaneously benefitting from its luxuries and protection.
I'm now rather curious what the DJ's relationship to Tenpony Tower is exactly. As far as I can tell, this broadcasting room is essentially her exclusive domain. Presumably, whoever runs this place this is another detail I'm hoping the author clears up grants her a considerable amount of freedom to say and do as she pleases, despite her contributing nothing of obvious value to their society, and openly badmouthing it to boot. Also, as I said, she benefits from its luxuries and protection: despite her low opinion of Monterrey Jack, she obviously had no qualms about buying his cheese (which I'm assuming is a delicacy in the wasteland), and without the Tower's security standing between her and the wretched hive of scum and villainy that comprises the rest of Manehattan's population, she would likely become the designated onahole of some raider group in fairly short order (she is described as being of small stature, similar to Littlepoop herself).
Anyway, the chapter ends with the DJ insinuating that she has plans for Littlepoop:
>“You, on the other hoof, it seems can do a lot more. And so I’d like your help…”
inb4 they lez out. Anyway, as I said, the chapter ends here.
Chapter Seventeen: The Villain of the Piece
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>“Bringing you the truth, no matter how bad it hurts.”
The truth, kkat, is that you will never be a woman.
>For weeks, I had been holding onto the illusion that all my questions would be answered if only I could get to Tenpony Tower and talk to DJ Pon3.
Yeah, I'm still not entirely sure how or why she would have arrived at this conclusion. As I've often said, I don't quite understand why she considered speaking with the DJ to be such a high priority in the first place. Granted, it was curious that the DJ kept mentioning her name during news broadcasts. I can see that being a reasonable motivation to want to seek the DJ out; however, up until now, she's been referring to the DJ as some infallible fount of all knowledge, and I've never understood where she gets this impression from disregarding, of course, all of the outside information I've gotten on this story and its connections to Fallout 3.
Anyway, wherever this idea came from, it seems Littlepoop's hopes of learning the answers to...whatever questions she had exactly...have been dashed against the cold hard rocks of reality much like kkat's hopes of becoming a woman. She appears to know nothing whatsoever about Red Eye, as for some reason her all-seeing camera towers are incapable of looking into the areas where he operates. She also was unable to see exactly what went on at Shattered Hoof, due to key parts of the adventure taking place underground I guess. She thanks Littlepoop for filling her in on some of the details.
>I nodded. "And I'm grateful for the chance to tell my side of the story. My... reputation seems to be getting out of control."
Obligatory false humility from the obnoxious Mary Sue protagonist.
>Homage smiled, "Undeservedly?" She pointed a hoof at me. "You might not think of the things you do as anything special, but they are. Simply by treating the way you risk yourself to help others as something anypony would do, you show the wasteland a way to be better."
Obligatory response in which the obnoxious Mary Sue protagonist is reassured that she is, in fact, the most heroic hero the setting has ever seen, and her humble let-this-cup-pass-from-me attitude only serves to confirm her worthiness.
>You're right; that's how ponies should treat each other. But in the Equestrian Wasteland, it's rare enough for a pony to be willing to expend valuable ammunition from afar to rescue a stranger, especially when they know that they might need those bullets tomorrow to save themselves or their families. Putting life and limb in danger?
From what I've seen the ponies of the Equestrian Wasteland are more than willing to expend ammo on strangers. As far as I can tell, this setting is populated entirely by mindless goons who decorate their rooms with entrails and run around murdering each other for the fuck of it. The only significant difference between Littlepoop and the ponies she guns down is that she invents a pseudo-moralistic justification for it instead of just doing it.
1612894397.png (124.8 KB, 1000x815, d47hxwa-3540a50b-a6df-4761-a934-dcb544f1ef85.png)
>>300830
>Homage shook her head sadly. She had a beautiful mane of short blue hair that fell into her face as she did so. I reached up to brush it out of her eyes so she didn't have to put down her watermelon.
Lol. I wonder if they actually are going to lez out. They're both self-righteous, annoying pipsqueaks with an overinflated sense of their own importance and abilities; they'd actually be a pretty good match for each other, far better than LP and Velvet at any rate. People keep telling me this story is borderline pornographic, but I have yet to see an example of it. I'll admit to being morbidly curious about how kkat approaches sex scenes.
>"I'm afraid the Equestrian Wasteland has no shortage of Monterey Jacks, but faces a crippling lack of Littlepips."
And the award for the most blood-boiling, preposterously arrogant line of dialog praising the shitty actions of the obnoxious Mary Sue protagonist goes to...
Anyway, there's a page break. The author does his weird time-skip thing again, and the next scene opens rather jarringly at a further point in the same conversation. They are discussing Monterrey Jack, and Littlepoop appears to be wondering, as I'm sure we all are, why in the world he would voluntarily confess to a (for some strange reason) capital crime he could easily have gotten away with. She seems to feel guilty about her role in this, and remarks that the law is stupid and overly harsh. Homage has this to say in response:
>"Tenpony Tower has extremely strict laws regarding anything that falls under 'raider activity' to act as a deterrent. Try to remember, we're stuck between the raiders of Shattered Hoof and the slavers of the Fillydelphia Crater. Tenpony doesn't just want to keep undesirables out, they want to send a clear message to anypony from either group that might think of setting hoof near this place."
This is...actually more or less reasonable. However, there are still some discrepancies worth pointing out.
First of all, the term "raider activity" is as vaguely defined as the term "raider." In this context it seems to be a general term for general brigandage (robbery, murder, etc), which is honestly the context I would probably use "raider" in if I were writing something like this. As I recall, the actual crime that Monterrey Jack was charged with was "banditry." However, for most of the story, "raider" has been used as a very specific term to refer to a designated class of wasteland inhabitant, all of whom share a set of unique characteristics that brand them as such (guts on the walls, dirty beds, ridiculous outfits, etc). In this context, "raiders" seem to be defined more as a criminal gang. Being designated a "raider" would therefore require more than simply being accused of acting like a ruffian.
Monterrey's actions at the beginning of the story were morally questionable, but they don't seem to fit the qualifications for being called "raider activity." Raiders, so far as I can tell, are dedicated anarchists who kill, rape and torture for sadistic pleasure rather than profit. Though it happened a long time ago, it may actually be worth taking a closer look at the incident which ultimately led to Monterrey Jack attempting to rob Littlepoop:
Rewinding all the way back to Chapter Two, we find Littlepoop an unwilling companion of three slavers: Cagey, Cracker and Sawed-Off. Monterrey Jack is already in a similar position when she is captured. The slavers lead them to Ponyville, and they expect to have to pay a toll, based on past experience. This implies that whoever formerly held Ponyville held it for the strategic reason of controlling the crossing, and being able to charge a toll to anyone who needed to use it. The slavers seem to accept this as a normal part of doing business and step forward to see what the toll is.
However, instead of being approached by a pony demanding a toll, all three are attacked and summarily executed. I remember being a bit confused by this at the time, due to the author's apparent assumption that anyone reading would already understand what "raider" meant in Fallout. However, we've been reading long enough that it's now clear: Ponyville was taken over by raiders, who killed whatever non-raider group had previously held the crossing.
The raiders are described thusly:
>The two were somehow even filthier than the slavers. The unicorn bore jagged scars across her face and flanks, one of them tearing through her cutie mark, several freshly bleeding. The earth pony was hairless and painfully burned over much of her left side. Both wore barding that looked ragged and cobbled together.
There is also this:
>The unicorn was laughing. Not the mean laugh of Cracker, but a crazed laugh that sent chills down the back of my neck.
Though the author doesn't do a particularly great job of presenting it as such, this is the earliest and most explicit definition of the term "raider" that the text provides us. There is a clear distinction between these ponies and the slavers who had captured them, as well as with the group controlling Ponyville that the slavers seem to have expected to deal with. Though the slavers are just as cartoonishly evil in their own way, at the very least they have a motivation for what they are doing. Slavery is a business, and violence and intimidation are a part of that business. Whatever group had previously controlled Ponyville clearly had the same outlook: they were not above using violence to achieve their ends, but ultimately their aim was profit. The slavers recognized this and were willing to do business with them.
The raiders, however, are a whole different animal. They enjoy killing the slavers, and don't seem to be doing it for any kind of material gain. If they intend to rob them, they are doing it as an afterthought; sadism is their primary motivation here. As the story progresses, this definition of the raiders is further developed: they are a semi-organized band who kill for pleasure, not profit.
>Homage shook her head sadly. She had a beautiful mane of short blue hair that fell into her face as she did so. I reached up to brush it out of her eyes so she didn't have to put down her watermelon.
Lol. I wonder if they actually are going to lez out. They're both self-righteous, annoying pipsqueaks with an overinflated sense of their own importance and abilities; they'd actually be a pretty good match for each other, far better than LP and Velvet at any rate. People keep telling me this story is borderline pornographic, but I have yet to see an example of it. I'll admit to being morbidly curious about how kkat approaches sex scenes.
>"I'm afraid the Equestrian Wasteland has no shortage of Monterey Jacks, but faces a crippling lack of Littlepips."
And the award for the most blood-boiling, preposterously arrogant line of dialog praising the shitty actions of the obnoxious Mary Sue protagonist goes to...
Anyway, there's a page break. The author does his weird time-skip thing again, and the next scene opens rather jarringly at a further point in the same conversation. They are discussing Monterrey Jack, and Littlepoop appears to be wondering, as I'm sure we all are, why in the world he would voluntarily confess to a (for some strange reason) capital crime he could easily have gotten away with. She seems to feel guilty about her role in this, and remarks that the law is stupid and overly harsh. Homage has this to say in response:
>"Tenpony Tower has extremely strict laws regarding anything that falls under 'raider activity' to act as a deterrent. Try to remember, we're stuck between the raiders of Shattered Hoof and the slavers of the Fillydelphia Crater. Tenpony doesn't just want to keep undesirables out, they want to send a clear message to anypony from either group that might think of setting hoof near this place."
This is...actually more or less reasonable. However, there are still some discrepancies worth pointing out.
First of all, the term "raider activity" is as vaguely defined as the term "raider." In this context it seems to be a general term for general brigandage (robbery, murder, etc), which is honestly the context I would probably use "raider" in if I were writing something like this. As I recall, the actual crime that Monterrey Jack was charged with was "banditry." However, for most of the story, "raider" has been used as a very specific term to refer to a designated class of wasteland inhabitant, all of whom share a set of unique characteristics that brand them as such (guts on the walls, dirty beds, ridiculous outfits, etc). In this context, "raiders" seem to be defined more as a criminal gang. Being designated a "raider" would therefore require more than simply being accused of acting like a ruffian.
Monterrey's actions at the beginning of the story were morally questionable, but they don't seem to fit the qualifications for being called "raider activity." Raiders, so far as I can tell, are dedicated anarchists who kill, rape and torture for sadistic pleasure rather than profit. Though it happened a long time ago, it may actually be worth taking a closer look at the incident which ultimately led to Monterrey Jack attempting to rob Littlepoop:
Rewinding all the way back to Chapter Two, we find Littlepoop an unwilling companion of three slavers: Cagey, Cracker and Sawed-Off. Monterrey Jack is already in a similar position when she is captured. The slavers lead them to Ponyville, and they expect to have to pay a toll, based on past experience. This implies that whoever formerly held Ponyville held it for the strategic reason of controlling the crossing, and being able to charge a toll to anyone who needed to use it. The slavers seem to accept this as a normal part of doing business and step forward to see what the toll is.
However, instead of being approached by a pony demanding a toll, all three are attacked and summarily executed. I remember being a bit confused by this at the time, due to the author's apparent assumption that anyone reading would already understand what "raider" meant in Fallout. However, we've been reading long enough that it's now clear: Ponyville was taken over by raiders, who killed whatever non-raider group had previously held the crossing.
The raiders are described thusly:
>The two were somehow even filthier than the slavers. The unicorn bore jagged scars across her face and flanks, one of them tearing through her cutie mark, several freshly bleeding. The earth pony was hairless and painfully burned over much of her left side. Both wore barding that looked ragged and cobbled together.
There is also this:
>The unicorn was laughing. Not the mean laugh of Cracker, but a crazed laugh that sent chills down the back of my neck.
Though the author doesn't do a particularly great job of presenting it as such, this is the earliest and most explicit definition of the term "raider" that the text provides us. There is a clear distinction between these ponies and the slavers who had captured them, as well as with the group controlling Ponyville that the slavers seem to have expected to deal with. Though the slavers are just as cartoonishly evil in their own way, at the very least they have a motivation for what they are doing. Slavery is a business, and violence and intimidation are a part of that business. Whatever group had previously controlled Ponyville clearly had the same outlook: they were not above using violence to achieve their ends, but ultimately their aim was profit. The slavers recognized this and were willing to do business with them.
The raiders, however, are a whole different animal. They enjoy killing the slavers, and don't seem to be doing it for any kind of material gain. If they intend to rob them, they are doing it as an afterthought; sadism is their primary motivation here. As the story progresses, this definition of the raiders is further developed: they are a semi-organized band who kill for pleasure, not profit.
>>300832
Next, let's take a look at Monterrey's actions:
The two raiders who killed the three slavers now turn their attention to LP and MJ, however they are defeated. Monterrey kills one of them, and LP knocks the other one unconscious. MJ then finishes off the unconscious one, and begins stripping them of their possessions. Littlepoop attempts to do likewise, but is too disgusted by the idea of touching a corpse to go through with it, and heaves up her lunch. It is at this point that Monterrey turns his new shotgun, which he took from one of the slavers, on her and demands that she turn over whatever she has.
LP manages to get hold of the other shotgun, and they end up in a Mexican standoff or whatever the pony equivalent of a Mexican standoff would be. Since LP has the better shotgun for reasons we will never know, Monterrey, who clearly knows more about life in the wasteland, took the old beat-up slaver shotgun instead of the combat shotgun that the raider had, and because her Rainman-tier autism enabled her to keep an accurate count of how many shots were left in all of the guns, Monterrey realizes he probably can't beat her, sensibly concedes the fight, and goes peacefully on his way.
Monterrey Jack's actions here are not particularly noble; Littlepoop saved his life, and he repays her by pointing a gun at her. However, there is no indication that he intends to do her any actual harm. He sees her as a greenhorn, and assumes she probably won't last long on her own out here. Teaming up with her would not make any sense, as she has no valuable skills to contribute and he would likely have to protect her, and a possibility exists that she might be simply pretending to be a greenhorn with the intent of killing and robbing him the first chance she gets. Either way she'd be a burden without being an asset, but she is carrying supplies that he could use. He has no guarantee of resupplying himself between here and wherever he's going, so he calculates that the sensible thing to do is to take the advantage she's given him and rob her.
Again, this is probably not something he'd want to go home and tell his kids about, but I can see his logic here, and as far as naughty wasteland behavior goes this is fairly mild. He points a gun at her, but I don't get the impression he intends to actually kill her unless she does something extremely stupid. I'd hardly say that anything he does qualifies as "raider-like behavior," at least if the term is still defined as the kind of psychopathy we just witnessed. If he wanted to behave like a raider, he could easily rape and kill her in addition to robbing her; the fact that he has no interest in doing so shows he is thinking in purely practical, non-raiderish terms.
As far as the laws of Tenpony Tower go, there's actually nothing preventing them from making any silly law they want. The author here seems to want us to agree with Littlepoop and see Monterrey's sentence as unreasonably harsh, which he more or less accomplishes. However, the whole thing still feels completely implausible. To understand why, we need to look closer at what the DJ actually says here, in light of what I outlined above:
>Try to remember, we're stuck between the raiders of Shattered Hoof and the slavers of the Fillydelphia Crater. Tenpony doesn't just want to keep undesirables out, they want to send a clear message to anypony from either group that might think of setting hoof near this place.
While the term "raider activity" she used earlier could plausibly refer to general banditry or otherwise undesirable behavior, in this context we're back to the author's usual definition of "raider" as a specific term for a specific group of ponies. As a side note, I'm actually a little confused on what she means by the raiders of Shattered Hoof; is she referring specifically to the organized band of raiders that Littlepoop dealt with (the group that was headed by Deadeyes), or is she referring to raiders in general, who occupy the general region of Shattered Hoof?
This actually goes back to one of my earlier complaints, which is that the author never clearly defined what Shattered Hoof is exactly. It was alternately described as a mountain range, a battle, the location of a battle, and the rock-breaking plant that eventually became the main location associated with that name. In this context I suspect it's meant to refer to a general region, from which the facility takes it's name; however, the author is so bloody vague about things like this that it's impossible to know exactly what Homage is talking about here. Also, I am going to once again protest that large parts of this story would be much clearer if the author had provided a map, or at least defined his geography a little more explicitly. Fantasy writers take note.
Anyway, back to what I was originally getting at. When Homage talks about the raiders of Shattered Hoof and the slavers of the Fillydelphia Crater, she is talking about two very specific groups. She goes on to explain that the settlement's law against banditry is designed to specifically deter members of those two groups from entering, and presumably from having citizens joining up with them. I would therefore argue that Monterrey Jack's actions don't really constitute raider activity by this definition; he's not working with or on behalf of this (rather vaguely defined) Shattered Hoof raider collective, nor is his behavior consistent with the behavior of raiders in general. The act of attempted robbery was committed a long ways from Tenpony Tower, against somepony who is not a citizen of Tenpony and does not have any rights under their law. Moreover, Monterrey is a well-respected member of their business community, and Littlepoop is just some lunatic who wandered in yesterday. There is no rational reason why the settlement should wish to impose a penalty this harsh as punishment for a deed like this.
Next, let's take a look at Monterrey's actions:
The two raiders who killed the three slavers now turn their attention to LP and MJ, however they are defeated. Monterrey kills one of them, and LP knocks the other one unconscious. MJ then finishes off the unconscious one, and begins stripping them of their possessions. Littlepoop attempts to do likewise, but is too disgusted by the idea of touching a corpse to go through with it, and heaves up her lunch. It is at this point that Monterrey turns his new shotgun, which he took from one of the slavers, on her and demands that she turn over whatever she has.
LP manages to get hold of the other shotgun, and they end up in a Mexican standoff or whatever the pony equivalent of a Mexican standoff would be. Since LP has the better shotgun for reasons we will never know, Monterrey, who clearly knows more about life in the wasteland, took the old beat-up slaver shotgun instead of the combat shotgun that the raider had, and because her Rainman-tier autism enabled her to keep an accurate count of how many shots were left in all of the guns, Monterrey realizes he probably can't beat her, sensibly concedes the fight, and goes peacefully on his way.
Monterrey Jack's actions here are not particularly noble; Littlepoop saved his life, and he repays her by pointing a gun at her. However, there is no indication that he intends to do her any actual harm. He sees her as a greenhorn, and assumes she probably won't last long on her own out here. Teaming up with her would not make any sense, as she has no valuable skills to contribute and he would likely have to protect her, and a possibility exists that she might be simply pretending to be a greenhorn with the intent of killing and robbing him the first chance she gets. Either way she'd be a burden without being an asset, but she is carrying supplies that he could use. He has no guarantee of resupplying himself between here and wherever he's going, so he calculates that the sensible thing to do is to take the advantage she's given him and rob her.
Again, this is probably not something he'd want to go home and tell his kids about, but I can see his logic here, and as far as naughty wasteland behavior goes this is fairly mild. He points a gun at her, but I don't get the impression he intends to actually kill her unless she does something extremely stupid. I'd hardly say that anything he does qualifies as "raider-like behavior," at least if the term is still defined as the kind of psychopathy we just witnessed. If he wanted to behave like a raider, he could easily rape and kill her in addition to robbing her; the fact that he has no interest in doing so shows he is thinking in purely practical, non-raiderish terms.
As far as the laws of Tenpony Tower go, there's actually nothing preventing them from making any silly law they want. The author here seems to want us to agree with Littlepoop and see Monterrey's sentence as unreasonably harsh, which he more or less accomplishes. However, the whole thing still feels completely implausible. To understand why, we need to look closer at what the DJ actually says here, in light of what I outlined above:
>Try to remember, we're stuck between the raiders of Shattered Hoof and the slavers of the Fillydelphia Crater. Tenpony doesn't just want to keep undesirables out, they want to send a clear message to anypony from either group that might think of setting hoof near this place.
While the term "raider activity" she used earlier could plausibly refer to general banditry or otherwise undesirable behavior, in this context we're back to the author's usual definition of "raider" as a specific term for a specific group of ponies. As a side note, I'm actually a little confused on what she means by the raiders of Shattered Hoof; is she referring specifically to the organized band of raiders that Littlepoop dealt with (the group that was headed by Deadeyes), or is she referring to raiders in general, who occupy the general region of Shattered Hoof?
This actually goes back to one of my earlier complaints, which is that the author never clearly defined what Shattered Hoof is exactly. It was alternately described as a mountain range, a battle, the location of a battle, and the rock-breaking plant that eventually became the main location associated with that name. In this context I suspect it's meant to refer to a general region, from which the facility takes it's name; however, the author is so bloody vague about things like this that it's impossible to know exactly what Homage is talking about here. Also, I am going to once again protest that large parts of this story would be much clearer if the author had provided a map, or at least defined his geography a little more explicitly. Fantasy writers take note.
Anyway, back to what I was originally getting at. When Homage talks about the raiders of Shattered Hoof and the slavers of the Fillydelphia Crater, she is talking about two very specific groups. She goes on to explain that the settlement's law against banditry is designed to specifically deter members of those two groups from entering, and presumably from having citizens joining up with them. I would therefore argue that Monterrey Jack's actions don't really constitute raider activity by this definition; he's not working with or on behalf of this (rather vaguely defined) Shattered Hoof raider collective, nor is his behavior consistent with the behavior of raiders in general. The act of attempted robbery was committed a long ways from Tenpony Tower, against somepony who is not a citizen of Tenpony and does not have any rights under their law. Moreover, Monterrey is a well-respected member of their business community, and Littlepoop is just some lunatic who wandered in yesterday. There is no rational reason why the settlement should wish to impose a penalty this harsh as punishment for a deed like this.
>>300834
I feel like I'm starting to veer off topic and talk in circles, but I'd like to address one more point of confusion about the Monterrey Jack question (MJQ) before moving on: the issue of just what the fuck MJ was doing out there in the wasteland that far from home to begin with. To me, this is actually even more of a glaring logic issue than the issue of why he received such a harsh punishment for something so minor (despite all of my arguments, this could still be explained away by just saying that Tenpony Tower has unusually draconian laws) or the issue of why he confessed in the first place (this could just be explained away by saying that MJ is a stubborn, impulsive retard).
What we know about Monterrey Jack is that he is a cheese vendor who works, and presumably lives, in Tenpony Tower. What we don't know about him is how exactly he produces his cheese, or where he sources it from if he doesn't actually produce it. If he makes it, he would presumably need ingredients, and if he sources it from somewhere, he would need a distributor or distributors. Either way, his business could plausibly take him away from the Tower, assuming the Tower can't supply what he needs and he has to deal with outside vendors. My best guess is that the author would offer this as an explanation if he was asked what MJ was doing so far from home.
However, as with the banditry laws of Tenpony Tower, this just doesn't feel plausible, even if the author can technically explain it. LP first encountered MJ at an encampment not far from Stable 2, which we know is located underneath (or at least near) Sweet Apple Acres. From the show, we know that Sweet Apple Acres is very near Ponyville, so presumably this encounter occurred between these two locations. Again, not having access to a map** or any clear sense of geography provided by the author, we have no way of knowing how far any location in this story is from any other, but since it's been about three weeks since LP left the stable, and she's journeyed in a more or less straight line from Stable 2 to Manehattan, we can assume that MJ was a fair distance from home when the slavers picked him up. Considering how dangerous the wasteland is, it seems pretty farfetched to imagine a well-to-do citizen of a place like Tenpony Tower journeying that far from home, alone, with no apparent protection, just to obtain ingredients to make cheese.
All of this ties into my gripe about Tenpony Tower being a rather implausible location to begin with. If they have the resources to make things like cheese and spa products and whatnot on their own, then fine, but in that case there's no obvious reason for MJ to have been anywhere in the wasteland where slavers might have caught him. If they need to source all of that from outside, it raises the issue that these luxuries might be more trouble to produce than they're actually worth. MJ's shop is implied to be high-end, but if making cheese means he needs to be away from his two motherless children for weeks at a time, while risking life and limb, every time he goes shopping for ingredients, he ought to be charging more; and in any event, there are any number of more sensible businesses he could go into that would require far less personal risk. Also, if the Tower laws are so strict that they define normal wasteland survival tactics as a capital crime, he's essentially risking his life twice. No matter how I look at it, none of this makes much sense.
Anyway, Littlepoop doesn't fare much better than I have in trying to reason this out. She wonders aloud if there was a chance that Monterrey Jack hadn't known what would happen to him if he confessed to being a butt bandit, and Homage tells her it isn't possible. Learning the law is one of the first things ponies who want to become citzens/residents/whatever of Tenpony Tower have to do.
This line is potentially interesting:
>Monterey Jack's had that cheese shop here for five years now, and before that he was a caravan guard for the merchants that the former shop owner got his supplies from.
It's possible that MJ has more of a past than we realize, and that he has some combat experience that makes him a little more suited to life in the wasteland than one might expect a cheese shop proprietor to be. If he's accustomed to a more rugged life it might explain what he was doing adventuring so far away from home. It's entirely possible there is more to this character than meets the eye. However, it isequally possible far more likely he's just a poorly designed character with a poorly planned backstory. Either way though, I'm actually a little curious what will happen to him.
----------
**Being a complete autismo, I've actually attempted to pinpoint some of these locations using Hasbro's official Equestria map (see pic related), which is the same map I use to plot out rough locations and distances whenever I attempt to write in the MLP universe. I immediately noticed some discrepancies. First, you'll note that several canon locations visited in this story (Appleoosa, Ponyville, Cloudsdale, Manehattan) are nowhere near each other and located in completely different directions. If the characters were to travel between these places as they do in the story, they would be doing a lot of weird zigzagging around. There is also nothing on this map with the name Shattered Hoof, so I can only assume that this was a location that kkat thought up on his own (unless it's an obscure reference to something mentioned somewhere in the show that I don't remember). Given the age of this story (2012 or thereabouts) combined with the fact that this map shows locations not mentioned until much later on (Starlight's Village, Yakyakistan), I can only assume that this map either didn't exist when kkat was writing this, or that he didn't use it as a reference; thus, it is of no use to us in determining the geography of this story.
I feel like I'm starting to veer off topic and talk in circles, but I'd like to address one more point of confusion about the Monterrey Jack question (MJQ) before moving on: the issue of just what the fuck MJ was doing out there in the wasteland that far from home to begin with. To me, this is actually even more of a glaring logic issue than the issue of why he received such a harsh punishment for something so minor (despite all of my arguments, this could still be explained away by just saying that Tenpony Tower has unusually draconian laws) or the issue of why he confessed in the first place (this could just be explained away by saying that MJ is a stubborn, impulsive retard).
What we know about Monterrey Jack is that he is a cheese vendor who works, and presumably lives, in Tenpony Tower. What we don't know about him is how exactly he produces his cheese, or where he sources it from if he doesn't actually produce it. If he makes it, he would presumably need ingredients, and if he sources it from somewhere, he would need a distributor or distributors. Either way, his business could plausibly take him away from the Tower, assuming the Tower can't supply what he needs and he has to deal with outside vendors. My best guess is that the author would offer this as an explanation if he was asked what MJ was doing so far from home.
However, as with the banditry laws of Tenpony Tower, this just doesn't feel plausible, even if the author can technically explain it. LP first encountered MJ at an encampment not far from Stable 2, which we know is located underneath (or at least near) Sweet Apple Acres. From the show, we know that Sweet Apple Acres is very near Ponyville, so presumably this encounter occurred between these two locations. Again, not having access to a map** or any clear sense of geography provided by the author, we have no way of knowing how far any location in this story is from any other, but since it's been about three weeks since LP left the stable, and she's journeyed in a more or less straight line from Stable 2 to Manehattan, we can assume that MJ was a fair distance from home when the slavers picked him up. Considering how dangerous the wasteland is, it seems pretty farfetched to imagine a well-to-do citizen of a place like Tenpony Tower journeying that far from home, alone, with no apparent protection, just to obtain ingredients to make cheese.
All of this ties into my gripe about Tenpony Tower being a rather implausible location to begin with. If they have the resources to make things like cheese and spa products and whatnot on their own, then fine, but in that case there's no obvious reason for MJ to have been anywhere in the wasteland where slavers might have caught him. If they need to source all of that from outside, it raises the issue that these luxuries might be more trouble to produce than they're actually worth. MJ's shop is implied to be high-end, but if making cheese means he needs to be away from his two motherless children for weeks at a time, while risking life and limb, every time he goes shopping for ingredients, he ought to be charging more; and in any event, there are any number of more sensible businesses he could go into that would require far less personal risk. Also, if the Tower laws are so strict that they define normal wasteland survival tactics as a capital crime, he's essentially risking his life twice. No matter how I look at it, none of this makes much sense.
Anyway, Littlepoop doesn't fare much better than I have in trying to reason this out. She wonders aloud if there was a chance that Monterrey Jack hadn't known what would happen to him if he confessed to being a butt bandit, and Homage tells her it isn't possible. Learning the law is one of the first things ponies who want to become citzens/residents/whatever of Tenpony Tower have to do.
This line is potentially interesting:
>Monterey Jack's had that cheese shop here for five years now, and before that he was a caravan guard for the merchants that the former shop owner got his supplies from.
It's possible that MJ has more of a past than we realize, and that he has some combat experience that makes him a little more suited to life in the wasteland than one might expect a cheese shop proprietor to be. If he's accustomed to a more rugged life it might explain what he was doing adventuring so far away from home. It's entirely possible there is more to this character than meets the eye. However, it is
----------
**Being a complete autismo, I've actually attempted to pinpoint some of these locations using Hasbro's official Equestria map (see pic related), which is the same map I use to plot out rough locations and distances whenever I attempt to write in the MLP universe. I immediately noticed some discrepancies. First, you'll note that several canon locations visited in this story (Appleoosa, Ponyville, Cloudsdale, Manehattan) are nowhere near each other and located in completely different directions. If the characters were to travel between these places as they do in the story, they would be doing a lot of weird zigzagging around. There is also nothing on this map with the name Shattered Hoof, so I can only assume that this was a location that kkat thought up on his own (unless it's an obscure reference to something mentioned somewhere in the show that I don't remember). Given the age of this story (2012 or thereabouts) combined with the fact that this map shows locations not mentioned until much later on (Starlight's Village, Yakyakistan), I can only assume that this map either didn't exist when kkat was writing this, or that he didn't use it as a reference; thus, it is of no use to us in determining the geography of this story.
>>300714
>I feel concerned that, when writing pony fanfiction, there should be some effort to anchor it into the universe it's based off of in some way. If you had what amounts to a modern American military story with just ponies replacing the human protags, would that really count as a pony fanfic, then? So personally I feel like there should be some connection to the setting of MLP, don't you agree?
The idea I was getting at is not so much that you should avoid connecting your story to the universe or to the story and characters of the world you're writing in; you absolutely should. My point was that any story you write should stand on its own as a complete work in itself, it shouldn't simply be a bunch of pony characters or references strung together, just because they are in the show or are popular.
Think of it this way: the only actual difference between writing fanfiction and writing something original is that with fanfiction, you didn't create the characters or setting you're working with. Other than that, the approach to writing is exactly the same: you want to tell a complete, coherent story that stands on its own and can be enjoyed on its own merits, with or without a prior understanding of the characters and setting. It might help or enhance the reader's experience if they are already familiar with the world you're writing in, but it shouldn't be necessary for them to simply enjoy, or at least understand, what you've written.
I actually think a better term to use than "fanfiction" is "derivative fiction," because it's a more accurate description of what you're really doing. You're creating an original work of fiction, but instead of thinking up your own world and characters, you're taking ones from a preexisting property and are using them to make something of your own.
If you really think about it, the show itself is derivative fiction. Here's an exercise: pick a random episode you like. Take a look at who wrote it. Unless it's one of the episodes of the two part pilot that Faust herself wrote, you're examining a work of derivative fiction, based on Faust's world and characters. The writer who wrote that episode didn't invent the characters or the setting, they are just using them to tell an original story set in that world. With this in mind, try to examine how the writer handles those characters and that setting. Do they try to connect every single character in the franchise to what's going on in the story, simply because those characters exist? Does the story unnecessarily veer off track and try to connect itself to random events from past episodes that have nothing to do with the story being told? Have unnecessary or annoying OCs been created and injected into the story, despite their having no good reason to be in there?
Well, depending on which episode you selected, the answer is maybe. However, if you selected one of the good early ones, odds are you'll find that the writer did none of these things. They came up with an idea, picked a couple of characters to focus on, built a story around those characters, and brought in other elements of the world and other characters purely on an as-needed basis. That's what I was trying to get at.
When you're writing a story set in the MLP universe, just focus on the story you're writing and let it be its own thing, don't try to connect everything in your story to everything that exists in MLP's overall story. Just because the Elements of Harmony are in some episodes doesn't mean that every episode needs to mention them. Likewise, just because the Elements are a thing in the universe doesn't mean they have a place in your story. If you have an idea about a story involving the Elements then by all means put them in. Like Celestia and feel like writing a story about her? Go right ahead; just don't feel like you need to inject her into a story that she doesn't belong in simply because you like her.
Imo the best approach to writing a derivative work is to think about what it is that drew you to that universe in the first place, and try to evoke that same feeling in your writing. Select characters you like, but make sure they belong in the story you're telling. You can throw in little side references if you want, just make sure they don't start sucking up the spotlight. Don't do the kind of shit Peen Stroke did, ie grab random background ponies who have fuck-all to do with anything and just drop them into the story for no reason beyond showing everyone that you're a devoted enough fan to know the name of that obscure background pony. If your story is just a discordant cluster of your favorite characters acting out a zany, shoddily constructed drama while saying "20% cooler" to each other every five minutes, you might get some lowest-common-denominator praise from the kind of mouth-breathers who haunt the comments section on FimFiction, but it won't be a quality work.
I can probably elaborate on this topic a bit more later, but I need some sleep first.
>I feel concerned that, when writing pony fanfiction, there should be some effort to anchor it into the universe it's based off of in some way. If you had what amounts to a modern American military story with just ponies replacing the human protags, would that really count as a pony fanfic, then? So personally I feel like there should be some connection to the setting of MLP, don't you agree?
The idea I was getting at is not so much that you should avoid connecting your story to the universe or to the story and characters of the world you're writing in; you absolutely should. My point was that any story you write should stand on its own as a complete work in itself, it shouldn't simply be a bunch of pony characters or references strung together, just because they are in the show or are popular.
Think of it this way: the only actual difference between writing fanfiction and writing something original is that with fanfiction, you didn't create the characters or setting you're working with. Other than that, the approach to writing is exactly the same: you want to tell a complete, coherent story that stands on its own and can be enjoyed on its own merits, with or without a prior understanding of the characters and setting. It might help or enhance the reader's experience if they are already familiar with the world you're writing in, but it shouldn't be necessary for them to simply enjoy, or at least understand, what you've written.
I actually think a better term to use than "fanfiction" is "derivative fiction," because it's a more accurate description of what you're really doing. You're creating an original work of fiction, but instead of thinking up your own world and characters, you're taking ones from a preexisting property and are using them to make something of your own.
If you really think about it, the show itself is derivative fiction. Here's an exercise: pick a random episode you like. Take a look at who wrote it. Unless it's one of the episodes of the two part pilot that Faust herself wrote, you're examining a work of derivative fiction, based on Faust's world and characters. The writer who wrote that episode didn't invent the characters or the setting, they are just using them to tell an original story set in that world. With this in mind, try to examine how the writer handles those characters and that setting. Do they try to connect every single character in the franchise to what's going on in the story, simply because those characters exist? Does the story unnecessarily veer off track and try to connect itself to random events from past episodes that have nothing to do with the story being told? Have unnecessary or annoying OCs been created and injected into the story, despite their having no good reason to be in there?
Well, depending on which episode you selected, the answer is maybe. However, if you selected one of the good early ones, odds are you'll find that the writer did none of these things. They came up with an idea, picked a couple of characters to focus on, built a story around those characters, and brought in other elements of the world and other characters purely on an as-needed basis. That's what I was trying to get at.
When you're writing a story set in the MLP universe, just focus on the story you're writing and let it be its own thing, don't try to connect everything in your story to everything that exists in MLP's overall story. Just because the Elements of Harmony are in some episodes doesn't mean that every episode needs to mention them. Likewise, just because the Elements are a thing in the universe doesn't mean they have a place in your story. If you have an idea about a story involving the Elements then by all means put them in. Like Celestia and feel like writing a story about her? Go right ahead; just don't feel like you need to inject her into a story that she doesn't belong in simply because you like her.
Imo the best approach to writing a derivative work is to think about what it is that drew you to that universe in the first place, and try to evoke that same feeling in your writing. Select characters you like, but make sure they belong in the story you're telling. You can throw in little side references if you want, just make sure they don't start sucking up the spotlight. Don't do the kind of shit Peen Stroke did, ie grab random background ponies who have fuck-all to do with anything and just drop them into the story for no reason beyond showing everyone that you're a devoted enough fan to know the name of that obscure background pony. If your story is just a discordant cluster of your favorite characters acting out a zany, shoddily constructed drama while saying "20% cooler" to each other every five minutes, you might get some lowest-common-denominator praise from the kind of mouth-breathers who haunt the comments section on FimFiction, but it won't be a quality work.
I can probably elaborate on this topic a bit more later, but I need some sleep first.
>>300839
Good stuff, and thank you for the advice. I look forward to your later elaborations. Sleep well!
For clarification, my story is in fact centered around the Elements of harmony and their impact and relation to history in a post-apocalyptic Equestria. So they're definitely quite integral. I'm not going out of my way to add random show elements. Everything exists for a reason important to the story, such as cloudsdale, part of the mane six, Celestia, etc.
>Imo the best approach to writing a derivative work is to think about what it is that drew you to that universe in the first place, and try to evoke that same feeling in your writing.
Good stuff. I want to evoke the same feeling of adventure and a wild, mysterious world to be explored that I felt when enjoying the show, so that's what i'm aiming for.
Good stuff, and thank you for the advice. I look forward to your later elaborations. Sleep well!
For clarification, my story is in fact centered around the Elements of harmony and their impact and relation to history in a post-apocalyptic Equestria. So they're definitely quite integral. I'm not going out of my way to add random show elements. Everything exists for a reason important to the story, such as cloudsdale, part of the mane six, Celestia, etc.
>Imo the best approach to writing a derivative work is to think about what it is that drew you to that universe in the first place, and try to evoke that same feeling in your writing.
Good stuff. I want to evoke the same feeling of adventure and a wild, mysterious world to be explored that I felt when enjoying the show, so that's what i'm aiming for.
>>300832
Homage is a very frustrating character for a number of reasons, many of which we've yet to see, but I can't help but think that she'd have been a far, far better character with a few relatively simple tweaks. One wouldn't even need to stray very far from Fallout 3 to do it. Homage is clearly based on Three Dog, Fo3's omniscient douche-DJ who comments on your actions and hints at future quests. In fact I'm pretty sure he says the exact words "hoity-toity Tenpenny Tower" in relation to that section of the game. Of course, this makes more sense because he doesn't operate anywhere near Tenpenny. He's snide and judgmental, generally opposed to obviously evil characters and actions, but you're not obligated to pay him any attention. You can even kill him if you want. In principle, the character concept is fine - a well-informed and connected radio operator who provides music, news and survival tips to whoever wants them.
However, there's another radio operator elsewhere in the game - an elderly widow called Agatha who lives in a well hidden shack. If you complete her sidequest (recovering sheet music and her ancestor's pre-war violin from a ruined vault), she starts her own radio channel where she plays for you and whoever else will listen out of gratitude. You also get a unique scoped magnum out of the deal, incidentally, which is one of the best handguns in the game and probably the inspiration for Little Macintosh. So Kkat knows Agatha's a thing.
If DJ Pon3 had been a kindly old mare doing what she does out of gratitude or kindness - or hell, even an old world ghoul (Vinyl perhaps? Pretty much anyone could be shoehorned in thanks to the time gap) she might have been less obnoxious. But nah, she's the worst aspects of Three Dog glued to the worst aspects of Littlepip.
>>300836
>Being a complete autismo, I've actually attempted to pinpoint some of these locations using Hasbro's official Equestria map (see pic related), which is the same map I use to plot out rough locations and distances whenever I attempt to write in the MLP universe. I immediately noticed some discrepancies. First, you'll note that several canon locations visited in this story (Appleoosa, Ponyville, Cloudsdale, Manehattan) are nowhere near each other and located in completely different directions. If the characters were to travel between these places as they do in the story, they would be doing a lot of weird zigzagging around. There is also nothing on this map with the name Shattered Hoof, so I can only assume that this was a location that kkat thought up on his own (unless it's an obscure reference to something mentioned somewhere in the show that I don't remember). Given the age of this story (2012 or thereabouts) combined with the fact that this map shows locations not mentioned until much later on (Starlight's Village, Yakyakistan), I can only assume that this map either didn't exist when kkat was writing this, or that he didn't use it as a reference; thus, it is of no use to us in determining the geography of this story.
I'll throw a small bone to Kkat here - unless I'm very much mistaken FoE predates pretty much any official canon map of Equestria, so all he had to work with are the (very) rough locations of Ponyville, Appleloosa and Canterlot relative to one another and the occasional mention of places like Fillydelphia and Manehattan in season one. Obviously this left a massive opportunity to actually build a world, but who needs a sense of proportion and direction when you have a pipbuck automap and an omniscient radio questgiver?
There have been a few attempts at mapping FoE's version of Equestria, but given how Kkat writes his setting in such low resolution their accuracy is dubious. Pic related is probably the best I've seen, obviously an attempt to harmonize FoE with the more recent official map, but it's still dubious.
Homage is a very frustrating character for a number of reasons, many of which we've yet to see, but I can't help but think that she'd have been a far, far better character with a few relatively simple tweaks. One wouldn't even need to stray very far from Fallout 3 to do it. Homage is clearly based on Three Dog, Fo3's omniscient douche-DJ who comments on your actions and hints at future quests. In fact I'm pretty sure he says the exact words "hoity-toity Tenpenny Tower" in relation to that section of the game. Of course, this makes more sense because he doesn't operate anywhere near Tenpenny. He's snide and judgmental, generally opposed to obviously evil characters and actions, but you're not obligated to pay him any attention. You can even kill him if you want. In principle, the character concept is fine - a well-informed and connected radio operator who provides music, news and survival tips to whoever wants them.
However, there's another radio operator elsewhere in the game - an elderly widow called Agatha who lives in a well hidden shack. If you complete her sidequest (recovering sheet music and her ancestor's pre-war violin from a ruined vault), she starts her own radio channel where she plays for you and whoever else will listen out of gratitude. You also get a unique scoped magnum out of the deal, incidentally, which is one of the best handguns in the game and probably the inspiration for Little Macintosh. So Kkat knows Agatha's a thing.
If DJ Pon3 had been a kindly old mare doing what she does out of gratitude or kindness - or hell, even an old world ghoul (Vinyl perhaps? Pretty much anyone could be shoehorned in thanks to the time gap) she might have been less obnoxious. But nah, she's the worst aspects of Three Dog glued to the worst aspects of Littlepip.
>>300836
>Being a complete autismo, I've actually attempted to pinpoint some of these locations using Hasbro's official Equestria map (see pic related), which is the same map I use to plot out rough locations and distances whenever I attempt to write in the MLP universe. I immediately noticed some discrepancies. First, you'll note that several canon locations visited in this story (Appleoosa, Ponyville, Cloudsdale, Manehattan) are nowhere near each other and located in completely different directions. If the characters were to travel between these places as they do in the story, they would be doing a lot of weird zigzagging around. There is also nothing on this map with the name Shattered Hoof, so I can only assume that this was a location that kkat thought up on his own (unless it's an obscure reference to something mentioned somewhere in the show that I don't remember). Given the age of this story (2012 or thereabouts) combined with the fact that this map shows locations not mentioned until much later on (Starlight's Village, Yakyakistan), I can only assume that this map either didn't exist when kkat was writing this, or that he didn't use it as a reference; thus, it is of no use to us in determining the geography of this story.
I'll throw a small bone to Kkat here - unless I'm very much mistaken FoE predates pretty much any official canon map of Equestria, so all he had to work with are the (very) rough locations of Ponyville, Appleloosa and Canterlot relative to one another and the occasional mention of places like Fillydelphia and Manehattan in season one. Obviously this left a massive opportunity to actually build a world, but who needs a sense of proportion and direction when you have a pipbuck automap and an omniscient radio questgiver?
There have been a few attempts at mapping FoE's version of Equestria, but given how Kkat writes his setting in such low resolution their accuracy is dubious. Pic related is probably the best I've seen, obviously an attempt to harmonize FoE with the more recent official map, but it's still dubious.
>>300836
On Fimfic the end of chapter 20 has a link pointing to a sex scene, calling it a "canon or non-canon deleted scene". So it's canon when it gives the author diversity points for validating lesbian sex fanfics but conveniently not canon when someone criticizes the orgasming horse sex. Its author might also be Kkat on an alt account.
https://www.fimfiction.net/story/123136/fallout-equestria-a-mare-worth-fighting-for
Are you reading this story on Fimfic or the google docs?
On Fimfic the end of chapter 20 has a link pointing to a sex scene, calling it a "canon or non-canon deleted scene". So it's canon when it gives the author diversity points for validating lesbian sex fanfics but conveniently not canon when someone criticizes the orgasming horse sex. Its author might also be Kkat on an alt account.
https://www.fimfiction.net/story/123136/fallout-equestria-a-mare-worth-fighting-for
Are you reading this story on Fimfic or the google docs?
>>300801
>Introducing zones of super radiation.
Yea, those enervation zones with no real active counter and their origins are mad spooky yo. adds lots of tension when it comes up because the solution isnt a radaway away.
>Introducing zones of super radiation.
Yea, those enervation zones with no real active counter and their origins are mad spooky yo. adds lots of tension when it comes up because the solution isnt a radaway away.
>>300836
>>300902
Chapter 20.5 was a recursive porn fanfic written by someone other than Kkat. Kkat really liked it and got permission to include it in FoE, but refuses to vouch for or take any credit for it. In other words, "this is mine, but it's only part of my story if you like it and if you don't like it it's not my fault."
>>300902
Chapter 20.5 was a recursive porn fanfic written by someone other than Kkat. Kkat really liked it and got permission to include it in FoE, but refuses to vouch for or take any credit for it. In other words, "this is mine, but it's only part of my story if you like it and if you don't like it it's not my fault."
>>300906
Do you think that super-radiation is a symptom of FE:PH's "Everything must be bigger than it was in FE" habit or a clever way to turn radiation zones from a mild hazard that rarely if ever negatively effects the heroes into a big threat to the heroes?
Do you think that super-radiation is a symptom of FE:PH's "Everything must be bigger than it was in FE" habit or a clever way to turn radiation zones from a mild hazard that rarely if ever negatively effects the heroes into a big threat to the heroes?
>>300836
Anyway, there's a page break, and in the next scene Littlepoop and Homage are walking through Twilight's Sparkle's athenaeum basically a fancy word for a library, specifically a library containing technical or scientific books; I'm actually a little curious where kkat managed to pick up a word like this. Homage appears to live here.
Littlepoop comments on the number of books in the library athenaeum, whatever, and Homage, apparently in response, goes to a terminal and plays an old recording. The recording is a message from Rarity to Twilight Sparkle, informing her that her ministry (Ministry of Image if I'm following the story correctly) is purging "ideologically incompatible" books from the Ponyville library. Instead of destroying them she is diverting the shipment to Twilight Sparkle to store here. The recording also subtly implies that Twilight and Pinkie are still fighting, for whatever that's worth.
>I looked from Homage to the shelves with new respect. Not only a lot of books, but a lot of preserved, original versions of books.
Seriously, when did Littlepoop become so interested in books? This is literally out of nowhere.
Homage tells LP that she needs to get back to blabbering about stuff and whatever on the radio, but she is free to hang out here and comb through her collection of 200 year old technical manuals if she wants to. Littlepoop is more than happy to oblige, because apparently for some reason she is some kind of bibliophile now, but she wants to find her friends and tell them where she is first. As the DJ heads off to her broadcasting room, LP remembers the large, clunky vinyl records she's been carrying around with her on top of all the other heavy, cumbersome shit in her saddlebags, and hands them over.
>She bounced up and down, letting out a squee of delight.
If I ever become the dictator of a dystopian retro-futurist society, my first order will be that all authors who unironically type the word "squee" into their manuscripts be publicly drawn and quartered, then shot.
>Homage’s horn glowed as she took possession of the records. “You have no idea how much this means! Not just to me, but to Equestria!”
I just want to point out once again how absurd it is that Littlepoop went to all the trouble of doing this. Vinyl records are a pain in the ass to lug around; they're large, bulky, awkwardly shaped, and if you have enough of them they're heavy as hell. Where the hell is she storing all of this crap? I've been joking about her saddlebags containing their own magical pocket dimension, but in all seriousness that would be the only way it would be possible for her to even hold most of this stuff, let alone lug it across the wasteland for three weeks.
If I ever become the dictator of a dystopian retro-futurist society, my second order will be to have someone sit kkat down, show him a saddlebag that would reasonably fit a pony, and ask him to demonstrate how a collection of vinyl records, several books, a dress, an armored dress, hundreds of pounds of ammunition, two medium-sized bronze statuettes, at least three rifles, a revolver, and a reasonably-sized assortment of canned food and medical supplies could all simultaneously fit inside. If he can't do it, he will be drawn and quartered, shot, sewn back together, resuscitated, kneed in the groin, and then drawn and quartered and shot again.
Anyway, page break. Apparently, the satisfaction of having given some old Bee Gees records to some spergy DJ was enough of a rush to make her forget all about the fact that her autism has just made orphans of a complete stranger's kids. However, her dopamine rush proves as short-lived as kkat's confidence that the sailors he tries to pick up won't notice his Adam's apple. As she arrives at their hotel room, she overhears Calamity and Velvet discussing some kind of radical treatment for her drug problem, because even though it hasn't come up much lately, she apparently still has one of those. The treatment seems to involve some kind of radical detox therapy, that will cure physical addiction to the drug, but Velvet stresses will not cure her psychological dependence on it.
>I raised my hoof to stomp it in fury. But then set it down, not wanting them to hear. There were so many things wrong with this!
For once we're thinking along the same lines, though I'm guessing for entirely different reasons.
>First, how dare they?!
greta_meme.jpg
>Second, what addiction?
Good question.
>I hadn’t had a Party-Time Mint-al in what, two days? What kind of addict can say that?
This is actually a reasonable point. Nothing in her behavior suggests she is actually addicted to these things; if she were, she would probably be experiencing some unpleasant withdrawal symptoms after two days cold turkey. I'm not sure if the author actually knows this, however.
>And three… “Helpinghoof”? Really?
Agreed; Dr. Helpinghoof is considered something of a quack in post-apocalyptic Equestrian medical circles. Dr. Demandypants is a far more respected addiction specialist.
Anyway, it looks like Velvet is in favor of checking Littlepoop into rehab whether she wants to go or not, whereas Calamity is against it:
>Instead, he neighed, “Li’lpip don’t exactly handle feelin’s of betrayal well. Ah’ve seen her reactions to the Stables we’ve been in…”
Is that supposed to be what her deal with the stables is? It's clear she's uncomfortable exploring the ruined stables, and that it has something to do with the resemblance they bear to her old home, but if I had to brainstorm words to describe my impressions of her feelings there, "betrayal" would not be near the top. I don't see how "fear of betrayal" is a huge motivator for her. The author clearly has something in mind for this character, but he does a very poor job of communicating what's in his head.
Anyway, she eavesdrops on them for awhile longer, gets pissy, and goes back upstairs without telling them where she is.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUmZp8pR1uc
Anyway, there's a page break, and in the next scene Littlepoop and Homage are walking through Twilight's Sparkle's athenaeum basically a fancy word for a library, specifically a library containing technical or scientific books; I'm actually a little curious where kkat managed to pick up a word like this. Homage appears to live here.
Littlepoop comments on the number of books in the library athenaeum, whatever, and Homage, apparently in response, goes to a terminal and plays an old recording. The recording is a message from Rarity to Twilight Sparkle, informing her that her ministry (Ministry of Image if I'm following the story correctly) is purging "ideologically incompatible" books from the Ponyville library. Instead of destroying them she is diverting the shipment to Twilight Sparkle to store here. The recording also subtly implies that Twilight and Pinkie are still fighting, for whatever that's worth.
>I looked from Homage to the shelves with new respect. Not only a lot of books, but a lot of preserved, original versions of books.
Seriously, when did Littlepoop become so interested in books? This is literally out of nowhere.
Homage tells LP that she needs to get back to blabbering about stuff and whatever on the radio, but she is free to hang out here and comb through her collection of 200 year old technical manuals if she wants to. Littlepoop is more than happy to oblige, because apparently for some reason she is some kind of bibliophile now, but she wants to find her friends and tell them where she is first. As the DJ heads off to her broadcasting room, LP remembers the large, clunky vinyl records she's been carrying around with her on top of all the other heavy, cumbersome shit in her saddlebags, and hands them over.
>She bounced up and down, letting out a squee of delight.
If I ever become the dictator of a dystopian retro-futurist society, my first order will be that all authors who unironically type the word "squee" into their manuscripts be publicly drawn and quartered, then shot.
>Homage’s horn glowed as she took possession of the records. “You have no idea how much this means! Not just to me, but to Equestria!”
I just want to point out once again how absurd it is that Littlepoop went to all the trouble of doing this. Vinyl records are a pain in the ass to lug around; they're large, bulky, awkwardly shaped, and if you have enough of them they're heavy as hell. Where the hell is she storing all of this crap? I've been joking about her saddlebags containing their own magical pocket dimension, but in all seriousness that would be the only way it would be possible for her to even hold most of this stuff, let alone lug it across the wasteland for three weeks.
If I ever become the dictator of a dystopian retro-futurist society, my second order will be to have someone sit kkat down, show him a saddlebag that would reasonably fit a pony, and ask him to demonstrate how a collection of vinyl records, several books, a dress, an armored dress, hundreds of pounds of ammunition, two medium-sized bronze statuettes, at least three rifles, a revolver, and a reasonably-sized assortment of canned food and medical supplies could all simultaneously fit inside. If he can't do it, he will be drawn and quartered, shot, sewn back together, resuscitated, kneed in the groin, and then drawn and quartered and shot again.
Anyway, page break. Apparently, the satisfaction of having given some old Bee Gees records to some spergy DJ was enough of a rush to make her forget all about the fact that her autism has just made orphans of a complete stranger's kids. However, her dopamine rush proves as short-lived as kkat's confidence that the sailors he tries to pick up won't notice his Adam's apple. As she arrives at their hotel room, she overhears Calamity and Velvet discussing some kind of radical treatment for her drug problem, because even though it hasn't come up much lately, she apparently still has one of those. The treatment seems to involve some kind of radical detox therapy, that will cure physical addiction to the drug, but Velvet stresses will not cure her psychological dependence on it.
>I raised my hoof to stomp it in fury. But then set it down, not wanting them to hear. There were so many things wrong with this!
For once we're thinking along the same lines, though I'm guessing for entirely different reasons.
>First, how dare they?!
greta_meme.jpg
>Second, what addiction?
Good question.
>I hadn’t had a Party-Time Mint-al in what, two days? What kind of addict can say that?
This is actually a reasonable point. Nothing in her behavior suggests she is actually addicted to these things; if she were, she would probably be experiencing some unpleasant withdrawal symptoms after two days cold turkey. I'm not sure if the author actually knows this, however.
>And three… “Helpinghoof”? Really?
Agreed; Dr. Helpinghoof is considered something of a quack in post-apocalyptic Equestrian medical circles. Dr. Demandypants is a far more respected addiction specialist.
Anyway, it looks like Velvet is in favor of checking Littlepoop into rehab whether she wants to go or not, whereas Calamity is against it:
>Instead, he neighed, “Li’lpip don’t exactly handle feelin’s of betrayal well. Ah’ve seen her reactions to the Stables we’ve been in…”
Is that supposed to be what her deal with the stables is? It's clear she's uncomfortable exploring the ruined stables, and that it has something to do with the resemblance they bear to her old home, but if I had to brainstorm words to describe my impressions of her feelings there, "betrayal" would not be near the top. I don't see how "fear of betrayal" is a huge motivator for her. The author clearly has something in mind for this character, but he does a very poor job of communicating what's in his head.
Anyway, she eavesdrops on them for awhile longer, gets pissy, and goes back upstairs without telling them where she is.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUmZp8pR1uc
>>300960
Littlepoop gets huffy about being called a drug addict by her friends, and goes back upstairs to bury herself in Homage's book collection, because being into books is a huge thing for her now. She spends a few hours reading some books on arcane science and locksmithing, gaining knowledge that will probably make her even more obnoxiously powerful in these areas than she was to begin with.
>Apparently, making books “ideologically compatible” also involved removing the sorts of advanced information that could inspire troublemakers. I smiled a little, realizing that the cutie-mark questing activities of my youth would have definitely put me in the “troublemaker” category.
Obligatory passage in which the obnoxious Mary Sue protagonist reminisces upon her youth, realizing that her unusually precocious interest in certain subjects was really just one more sign that she was destined for greatness.
After a few hours of this, Homage eventually comes back into the room, carrying her phonograph and the records that Littlepoop brought her. She begins playing records and bobbing her head while Littlepoop continues to read.
>Only once was my study interrupted. Homage got about halfway through a rather energetic song (about mending friendships, notably -- the assertion in the chorus that life without friends, quite bluntly, sucked struck home pointedly enough that I wasn’t able to focus on my reading anyway).
Her worries here are no doubt meant to be a reflection on her feelings of anger and resentment toward Velvet and Calamity, because even though it feels like she's being insulted, her friends are really just looking out for her because they care, and blah blah all of that.
The problem is that none of this feels particularly real. LP's addiction, her friends' concern for her supposed addiction, her friendship with Calamity and Velvet, Calamity and Velvet's supposed feelings for each other; all of it just feels like bad play acting. As I've mentioned before, I don't really believe the bonds of friendship these characters are supposed to feel for each other. They've been traveling as a group for awhile now, sure, and they've been through some tough times together, but does that automatically make them friends? Simply placing characters in proximity to each other, keeping them together for awhile, and saying that they're friends doesn't make it so, any more than two people working together at the same office will be automatically become friends. Characters need to find common ground with each other and form meaningful bonds. Common experiences, like fighting enemies or working together towards a common goal, can help strengthen bonds, but it's not enough on its own. LP & Co. have spent a lot of time together, but to me they feel more like co-workers than friends.
Really, it's the same issue as with the developing romance between Velvet and Calamity. Why exactly are we supposed to believe that these two have feelings for each other? They've been traveling together for weeks now, have barely had any meaningful interaction, and then suddenly out of absolutely nowhere they're falling in love? Why? Because he's male and she's female? It might work that way sometimes in reality, but in a story you need to develop it so the reader can understand what it is that these two characters bond over. Why does Character X fall in love with Character Y and not Character Z? It's the same thing with friendships or really any sort of meaningful relationship between characters. Peen Stroke's mother-daughter dynamic with Twilight and Nyx was the same type of thing; he didn't build it through natural interaction, he just stated that it was a thing and then had them hug each other and cry all the time to emphasize it. It never felt natural.
It's a tricky thing to explain because there's no universal step by step way to accomplish this, your character interactions either feel genuine or they don't. It's like singing a song; either you hit the right notes in the right way, or else your neighbors call the cops on you because they think you're sexually abusing your cat or something. As a positive example, I actually really liked the way soulpeener handled the friendship between Gareth and Private Styre in Sun & Rose. There was a lot less actual interaction between those two characters than there has been between Littlepoop and Calamity. However, Gareth and Styre felt like real friends, whereas Calamity and Littlepoop do not. Why? I can't really articulate it, it's just a matter of whether or not their interactions feel like they actually convey meaningful affection.
Anyway, whatever; back to this.
As Littlepoop is thinking about her friends, Homage suddenly decides to restart her song from the beginning so she can dance to it. However, she feels awkward dancing alone in front of company, so she insists that Littlepoop get up and dance with her as well. At first LP is self-conscious, but she gradually lets go and begins to have fun with it.
It's weird that this should happen just as I'm returning from a tangent about writing meaningful interactions between friends, because this is a surprisingly nice example of what a good, meaningful interaction looks like. The premise is simple and unassuming: Homage feels like dancing, she doesn't want to dance alone, Littlepoop doesn't usually dance and finds the idea of dancing with another pony embarrassing, but she does it anyway because Homage wants to. As they dance together, LP loses her self-consciousness and they both end up having fun. It's a nice moment. Granted, I pretty much hate both of these characters, but I'm happy they like each other. Writers take note; this is a very nice, simple way to slowly build any kind of dynamic you like between two characters. Any meaningful relationship is just a succession of little moments like this.
Littlepoop gets huffy about being called a drug addict by her friends, and goes back upstairs to bury herself in Homage's book collection, because being into books is a huge thing for her now. She spends a few hours reading some books on arcane science and locksmithing, gaining knowledge that will probably make her even more obnoxiously powerful in these areas than she was to begin with.
>Apparently, making books “ideologically compatible” also involved removing the sorts of advanced information that could inspire troublemakers. I smiled a little, realizing that the cutie-mark questing activities of my youth would have definitely put me in the “troublemaker” category.
Obligatory passage in which the obnoxious Mary Sue protagonist reminisces upon her youth, realizing that her unusually precocious interest in certain subjects was really just one more sign that she was destined for greatness.
After a few hours of this, Homage eventually comes back into the room, carrying her phonograph and the records that Littlepoop brought her. She begins playing records and bobbing her head while Littlepoop continues to read.
>Only once was my study interrupted. Homage got about halfway through a rather energetic song (about mending friendships, notably -- the assertion in the chorus that life without friends, quite bluntly, sucked struck home pointedly enough that I wasn’t able to focus on my reading anyway).
Her worries here are no doubt meant to be a reflection on her feelings of anger and resentment toward Velvet and Calamity, because even though it feels like she's being insulted, her friends are really just looking out for her because they care, and blah blah all of that.
The problem is that none of this feels particularly real. LP's addiction, her friends' concern for her supposed addiction, her friendship with Calamity and Velvet, Calamity and Velvet's supposed feelings for each other; all of it just feels like bad play acting. As I've mentioned before, I don't really believe the bonds of friendship these characters are supposed to feel for each other. They've been traveling as a group for awhile now, sure, and they've been through some tough times together, but does that automatically make them friends? Simply placing characters in proximity to each other, keeping them together for awhile, and saying that they're friends doesn't make it so, any more than two people working together at the same office will be automatically become friends. Characters need to find common ground with each other and form meaningful bonds. Common experiences, like fighting enemies or working together towards a common goal, can help strengthen bonds, but it's not enough on its own. LP & Co. have spent a lot of time together, but to me they feel more like co-workers than friends.
Really, it's the same issue as with the developing romance between Velvet and Calamity. Why exactly are we supposed to believe that these two have feelings for each other? They've been traveling together for weeks now, have barely had any meaningful interaction, and then suddenly out of absolutely nowhere they're falling in love? Why? Because he's male and she's female? It might work that way sometimes in reality, but in a story you need to develop it so the reader can understand what it is that these two characters bond over. Why does Character X fall in love with Character Y and not Character Z? It's the same thing with friendships or really any sort of meaningful relationship between characters. Peen Stroke's mother-daughter dynamic with Twilight and Nyx was the same type of thing; he didn't build it through natural interaction, he just stated that it was a thing and then had them hug each other and cry all the time to emphasize it. It never felt natural.
It's a tricky thing to explain because there's no universal step by step way to accomplish this, your character interactions either feel genuine or they don't. It's like singing a song; either you hit the right notes in the right way, or else your neighbors call the cops on you because they think you're sexually abusing your cat or something. As a positive example, I actually really liked the way soulpeener handled the friendship between Gareth and Private Styre in Sun & Rose. There was a lot less actual interaction between those two characters than there has been between Littlepoop and Calamity. However, Gareth and Styre felt like real friends, whereas Calamity and Littlepoop do not. Why? I can't really articulate it, it's just a matter of whether or not their interactions feel like they actually convey meaningful affection.
Anyway, whatever; back to this.
As Littlepoop is thinking about her friends, Homage suddenly decides to restart her song from the beginning so she can dance to it. However, she feels awkward dancing alone in front of company, so she insists that Littlepoop get up and dance with her as well. At first LP is self-conscious, but she gradually lets go and begins to have fun with it.
It's weird that this should happen just as I'm returning from a tangent about writing meaningful interactions between friends, because this is a surprisingly nice example of what a good, meaningful interaction looks like. The premise is simple and unassuming: Homage feels like dancing, she doesn't want to dance alone, Littlepoop doesn't usually dance and finds the idea of dancing with another pony embarrassing, but she does it anyway because Homage wants to. As they dance together, LP loses her self-consciousness and they both end up having fun. It's a nice moment. Granted, I pretty much hate both of these characters, but I'm happy they like each other. Writers take note; this is a very nice, simple way to slowly build any kind of dynamic you like between two characters. Any meaningful relationship is just a succession of little moments like this.
>>300960
It's stupid that Kkat gives LP a boner for books NOW, after spending all this time in "gamer brain" mode where the only books worth saying Littlepip ever reads are renamed copies of Fallout's "Skill Books" and "Skill Magazines", such as magazines about guns or books about speech. As you've probably guessed, reading those things in Fallout games boosts your character's Skill for whatever the book's about. Reading a Book on some skill like Speech or Small Guns permanently raises that skill by a few points, and Magazine on Lockpicking provides a temporary increase to the skill (a perk called Retention makes you retain this temporary stat buff for longer)
Littlepip has never been consistently characterized as one who likes books. She doesn't typically read fiction for fun. And she isn't characterized as someone who goes out of her way to read books she deems useful over fantasy novels she dismisses as useless.
Sure, she said yes when Watcher/Frank told her to get certain books from Ponyville but that was a stupid gamer moment. One of many, and Littlepip's consistently characterized as a bloodthirsty junkie murderhobo desperate to impress the audience with big action movie explosions and "speech skill moments" that really shouldn't convince anyone.
She isn't normally characterized as the type who would stop to save books during a life or death mission. When she blew up that Chimera-infested Vault, she didn't stop in its library to grab everything that wasn't nailed down, even though she made sure to do the same for the medical supplies in the "Ponies were killed by its AI for destroying their only water talisman even though more water talismans exist and if anyone should know how to repair a water talisman through magic or manufacturing it should be an AI" vault.
also am I having a stroke or did Littlepip originally escape from Ponyville, encounter Frank who tells her to go back into Ponyville, say yes, return to Ponyville despite the danger, and fight her way through the town and a Raider-infested Tree Library just to get The Wasteland Survival Guide, even though it was made by Derpy Hooves who she swiftly met anyway after she got her gun and teammate Calamity through happensance causing her to luck out and stumble upon these things? And was there a black book or was that introduced later?
It's hard to keep track of all the stupid shit that happens in this story.
Also, it's fucking stupid that Littlepip, a pony raised in an underground bunker with no contact with the outside world before she threw herself into a hellish wasteland, a pony descended from poners whose country was destroyed by ziggers, after spending all this time risking death to stay alive in a wasteland created by dumb poners who treated ziggers too softly, would be impressed at the sight of a fuckton of books Rarity's Ministry Of Censoring And Burning Books deemed too anti-Equestrian to exist.
Kkat might assume "Hurr durr a good guy protagonist I keep trying to make into this party's Twilight should like books, riiiight?" but that's fucking wrong! Books don't magically obtain value just for being books, their value depends on what's in them! If you've never read a book that's made you want to toss it into a bonfire with The Boys at 3AM while chanting "We consign you to the fire!" you haven't read enough books.
And if Littlepip's supposed to be characterized as somepony above the urge to hate ziggers, why does she refuse to crack open one of these "Banned by Rarity's Ministry Of Image" books to see what all the fuss was about and what kind of thing Rarity and her ministry deemed too seditious, or communist, or anti-life or pro-life, or pro-degeneracy, or non-monarchist, or anti-equestrian, or pro-zigger, or pro-peace, or whatever to exist?
Nothing about Littlepip's life experiences, upbringing, surroundings, or inheritance influence who she is unless you count her alcoholic mother also being addicted to bad shit(booze).
Kkat's thoughts on what kind of ministry Rarity would form if given the chance were "Hurr durr soemthing to do with image I guess because she's the shallow one" and then he made it edgy by making it the censorship book-burning ministry just like Pinkie's "fun ministry" put sad poners in camps and mental institutions that tried to cure unhappiness with pills, but absolutely no significant thought went into how the ministry of image really functions or what it does or what Rarity's influence on it is.
Rarity sent copies of the books she had destroyed to Twilight for safekeeping, but why? Why not keep them herself? Why not create an official bunker full of the only remaining copies of bad books and have your whole ministry maintain it? Why bother keeping any copies of something if your ministry's destroying all other copies of it? Do you plan on making a "Museum of bad books, here are the only remaining copies" once the war's won by poners or do you plan on printing new copies of the books once peace is achieved?
What your intentions are with something like this says a lot about you but that went right over Kkunt's head. Kkunt just said "hurr durr book burning is wrong so Rarity secretly saved books from burning even though she ran a book-burning ministry" but she's the motherfucking pony who chose to create that ministry and she's the pony who decides what it does!
If Rarity didn't like what her ministry was doing... She was in charge, so she could have changed it!
>Hammerspace Saddlebags
Once read a fantasy novel where a character destructively shoved delicate stuff into his backpack. Whenever destroyed tools/crushed food/damaged sellable crap got retrieved from the bags, the character used magic to fix whatever he retrieved before using/selling it/cooking the food and frying eggs/whatever. It was smarter than this.
Also read a sci-fi novel where everything in your pockets is stored as weightless data and only exists when taken out of your pocket because they're all in a simulation anyway.
It's stupid that Kkat gives LP a boner for books NOW, after spending all this time in "gamer brain" mode where the only books worth saying Littlepip ever reads are renamed copies of Fallout's "Skill Books" and "Skill Magazines", such as magazines about guns or books about speech. As you've probably guessed, reading those things in Fallout games boosts your character's Skill for whatever the book's about. Reading a Book on some skill like Speech or Small Guns permanently raises that skill by a few points, and Magazine on Lockpicking provides a temporary increase to the skill (a perk called Retention makes you retain this temporary stat buff for longer)
Littlepip has never been consistently characterized as one who likes books. She doesn't typically read fiction for fun. And she isn't characterized as someone who goes out of her way to read books she deems useful over fantasy novels she dismisses as useless.
Sure, she said yes when Watcher/Frank told her to get certain books from Ponyville but that was a stupid gamer moment. One of many, and Littlepip's consistently characterized as a bloodthirsty junkie murderhobo desperate to impress the audience with big action movie explosions and "speech skill moments" that really shouldn't convince anyone.
She isn't normally characterized as the type who would stop to save books during a life or death mission. When she blew up that Chimera-infested Vault, she didn't stop in its library to grab everything that wasn't nailed down, even though she made sure to do the same for the medical supplies in the "Ponies were killed by its AI for destroying their only water talisman even though more water talismans exist and if anyone should know how to repair a water talisman through magic or manufacturing it should be an AI" vault.
also am I having a stroke or did Littlepip originally escape from Ponyville, encounter Frank who tells her to go back into Ponyville, say yes, return to Ponyville despite the danger, and fight her way through the town and a Raider-infested Tree Library just to get The Wasteland Survival Guide, even though it was made by Derpy Hooves who she swiftly met anyway after she got her gun and teammate Calamity through happensance causing her to luck out and stumble upon these things? And was there a black book or was that introduced later?
It's hard to keep track of all the stupid shit that happens in this story.
Also, it's fucking stupid that Littlepip, a pony raised in an underground bunker with no contact with the outside world before she threw herself into a hellish wasteland, a pony descended from poners whose country was destroyed by ziggers, after spending all this time risking death to stay alive in a wasteland created by dumb poners who treated ziggers too softly, would be impressed at the sight of a fuckton of books Rarity's Ministry Of Censoring And Burning Books deemed too anti-Equestrian to exist.
Kkat might assume "Hurr durr a good guy protagonist I keep trying to make into this party's Twilight should like books, riiiight?" but that's fucking wrong! Books don't magically obtain value just for being books, their value depends on what's in them! If you've never read a book that's made you want to toss it into a bonfire with The Boys at 3AM while chanting "We consign you to the fire!" you haven't read enough books.
And if Littlepip's supposed to be characterized as somepony above the urge to hate ziggers, why does she refuse to crack open one of these "Banned by Rarity's Ministry Of Image" books to see what all the fuss was about and what kind of thing Rarity and her ministry deemed too seditious, or communist, or anti-life or pro-life, or pro-degeneracy, or non-monarchist, or anti-equestrian, or pro-zigger, or pro-peace, or whatever to exist?
Nothing about Littlepip's life experiences, upbringing, surroundings, or inheritance influence who she is unless you count her alcoholic mother also being addicted to bad shit(booze).
Kkat's thoughts on what kind of ministry Rarity would form if given the chance were "Hurr durr soemthing to do with image I guess because she's the shallow one" and then he made it edgy by making it the censorship book-burning ministry just like Pinkie's "fun ministry" put sad poners in camps and mental institutions that tried to cure unhappiness with pills, but absolutely no significant thought went into how the ministry of image really functions or what it does or what Rarity's influence on it is.
Rarity sent copies of the books she had destroyed to Twilight for safekeeping, but why? Why not keep them herself? Why not create an official bunker full of the only remaining copies of bad books and have your whole ministry maintain it? Why bother keeping any copies of something if your ministry's destroying all other copies of it? Do you plan on making a "Museum of bad books, here are the only remaining copies" once the war's won by poners or do you plan on printing new copies of the books once peace is achieved?
What your intentions are with something like this says a lot about you but that went right over Kkunt's head. Kkunt just said "hurr durr book burning is wrong so Rarity secretly saved books from burning even though she ran a book-burning ministry" but she's the motherfucking pony who chose to create that ministry and she's the pony who decides what it does!
If Rarity didn't like what her ministry was doing... She was in charge, so she could have changed it!
>Hammerspace Saddlebags
Once read a fantasy novel where a character destructively shoved delicate stuff into his backpack. Whenever destroyed tools/crushed food/damaged sellable crap got retrieved from the bags, the character used magic to fix whatever he retrieved before using/selling it/cooking the food and frying eggs/whatever. It was smarter than this.
Also read a sci-fi novel where everything in your pockets is stored as weightless data and only exists when taken out of your pocket because they're all in a simulation anyway.
>>300963
Unfortunately, the author decides to completely ruin this moment by having them veer off into a stupid conversation about some old painting of Twilight Sparkle's while they dance, which draws attention away from what's going on to some bullshit that happened 200 years ago. It's hard to give a shit about the details, but because it will probably be important later, the place is called Splendid Valley and the M.A.S. performed weird experiments out there.
There is a page break, and we rejoin the two of them in the DJ booth. This time, Littlepoop is watching Homage as she does her DJ Pon3 routine.
I'd actually like to make a little side note at this time. Earlier, we learned that the original DJ Pon3, Vinyl Scratch, was a resident of Stable 28 or 24 or whatever, the one with the broken water talisman. It is heavily implied that she died along with all the other residents of that stable while DJing a party. We know that the stables were essentially sealed bunkers; nopony went in or out. However, we also know that there has been a "DJ Pon3" for the last 200 years, and that it is a hereditary title of some sort that has been passed between several different ponies. It's not stated, but there seems to be an implication that Homage is a descendent of Vinyl (she bears a striking physical resemblance to her), which would suggest it's a mother-to-daughter thing. So, assuming that Vinyl was indeed the original DJ Pon3 of the wasteland, how exactly did she get from the stable to this building in the middle of Manehattan? Did she somehow escape after the massacre and make her way here, and then start broadcasting news and music because she was bored or something?
Details like "how did this canon pony end up in the legendary position she holds," or "who is that canon pony's descendant," and so forth, I usually call "brony details" because they're the kinds of autistic details the uber-fans seem most interested in, and focus most of their attention on. Unfortunately, as many of the authors we've read seem to be the same sort of fans, they often put priority on details like this at the expense of some of the more important aspects of their stories I'm talking to you, Peen Stroke, you sperm-gargling megafaggot. Anyway, this author tends to be pretty good about keeping track of his brony details at least, so I'm going to assume for now that he has an explanation for this and he will be working it into the story later. However, I thought I would point it out anyway, because if he doesn't explain it, it's a huge, gaping continuity error.
Anyway, the author uses Homage's DJ monologue here as an information dump. As I've often complained in this and other stories, I'm not a huge fan of large information dumps concentrated in blocks of dialogue, and this one is particularly irritating because the information being dumped has nothing to do with anything currently going on. However, it actually manages to clear up some points of confusion I've brought up, so it's worth going over.
One quick thing, though, before we get too far:
>There was something amazing about watching this equally little unicorn pony become the voice of the Equestrian Wasteland.
Presumably, by "equally little" Littlepoop means equally little in comparison to herself. However, she doesn't state this, and there is nothing in this sentence that could be equated with Homage's size. Thus, she is just making a comparison to nothing here. Don't do shit like this, it annoys the crap out of grammar Nazis like myself.
Anyway, today's block paragraph lecture is about kkat's taint, and it's every bit as pleasant a topic as you might think. Pretty much the only upshot of slogging through this mess is that finally, after 100,000 some-odd words, we get a coherent explanation of just what the hell that radioactive-whatever-stuff that's floating around the wasteland air actually is, and what effect it actually has on the average equine.
Though I'm fairly certain kkat has used the two terms interchangeably before now, "radiation" and "taint" are apparently two different things. Radiation in Equestria means more or less the same thing that radiation in our world means, except for having a flimsy "it's magic" explanation slapped over it in place of the scientific one. Radiation in FoE is some kind of magical residue left over from the "megaspells" that detonated during the war. It tends to be at its highest concentrations in the epicenters where the spells went off, namely Fillydelphia and Manehattan. Why these two places also seem to still be highly concentrated population centers in spite of this fact is beyond me; just because they were big cities 200 years ago doesn't mean that ponies need to live there now. One would think they'd want to settle as far away from the radioactive bomb craters as possible.
Anyway, the exact effects of radiation are not explained, but since kkat seems to have very little imagination I'm assuming they are identical to whatever the effects of radiation are in Fallout, which I assume are more or less comparable to the effects of actual radiation on a human. From here on out I will be working from this definition of it. Also, it has a tendency to seep into water and food, which probably includes rivers and ground water in irradiated areas. I'm assuming food grown in radioactive soil is affected as well. It's effects can apparently be countered, however, by some sort of product called RadAway. I'm assuming this is another cheap knockoff of something from the games, but my questions here are more about supply. If this is something pre-war, there would logically be a finite amount of it in the world, which means that it should be a sought-after commodity just like water and canned food. If it's something being currently made, the question of who manufactures and distributes it arises. Based on past experience, I'm assuming kkat has not thought any of this through and will not be explaining it.
Unfortunately, the author decides to completely ruin this moment by having them veer off into a stupid conversation about some old painting of Twilight Sparkle's while they dance, which draws attention away from what's going on to some bullshit that happened 200 years ago. It's hard to give a shit about the details, but because it will probably be important later, the place is called Splendid Valley and the M.A.S. performed weird experiments out there.
There is a page break, and we rejoin the two of them in the DJ booth. This time, Littlepoop is watching Homage as she does her DJ Pon3 routine.
I'd actually like to make a little side note at this time. Earlier, we learned that the original DJ Pon3, Vinyl Scratch, was a resident of Stable 28 or 24 or whatever, the one with the broken water talisman. It is heavily implied that she died along with all the other residents of that stable while DJing a party. We know that the stables were essentially sealed bunkers; nopony went in or out. However, we also know that there has been a "DJ Pon3" for the last 200 years, and that it is a hereditary title of some sort that has been passed between several different ponies. It's not stated, but there seems to be an implication that Homage is a descendent of Vinyl (she bears a striking physical resemblance to her), which would suggest it's a mother-to-daughter thing. So, assuming that Vinyl was indeed the original DJ Pon3 of the wasteland, how exactly did she get from the stable to this building in the middle of Manehattan? Did she somehow escape after the massacre and make her way here, and then start broadcasting news and music because she was bored or something?
Details like "how did this canon pony end up in the legendary position she holds," or "who is that canon pony's descendant," and so forth, I usually call "brony details" because they're the kinds of autistic details the uber-fans seem most interested in, and focus most of their attention on. Unfortunately, as many of the authors we've read seem to be the same sort of fans, they often put priority on details like this at the expense of some of the more important aspects of their stories I'm talking to you, Peen Stroke, you sperm-gargling megafaggot. Anyway, this author tends to be pretty good about keeping track of his brony details at least, so I'm going to assume for now that he has an explanation for this and he will be working it into the story later. However, I thought I would point it out anyway, because if he doesn't explain it, it's a huge, gaping continuity error.
Anyway, the author uses Homage's DJ monologue here as an information dump. As I've often complained in this and other stories, I'm not a huge fan of large information dumps concentrated in blocks of dialogue, and this one is particularly irritating because the information being dumped has nothing to do with anything currently going on. However, it actually manages to clear up some points of confusion I've brought up, so it's worth going over.
One quick thing, though, before we get too far:
>There was something amazing about watching this equally little unicorn pony become the voice of the Equestrian Wasteland.
Presumably, by "equally little" Littlepoop means equally little in comparison to herself. However, she doesn't state this, and there is nothing in this sentence that could be equated with Homage's size. Thus, she is just making a comparison to nothing here. Don't do shit like this, it annoys the crap out of grammar Nazis like myself.
Anyway, today's block paragraph lecture is about kkat's taint, and it's every bit as pleasant a topic as you might think. Pretty much the only upshot of slogging through this mess is that finally, after 100,000 some-odd words, we get a coherent explanation of just what the hell that radioactive-whatever-stuff that's floating around the wasteland air actually is, and what effect it actually has on the average equine.
Though I'm fairly certain kkat has used the two terms interchangeably before now, "radiation" and "taint" are apparently two different things. Radiation in Equestria means more or less the same thing that radiation in our world means, except for having a flimsy "it's magic" explanation slapped over it in place of the scientific one. Radiation in FoE is some kind of magical residue left over from the "megaspells" that detonated during the war. It tends to be at its highest concentrations in the epicenters where the spells went off, namely Fillydelphia and Manehattan. Why these two places also seem to still be highly concentrated population centers in spite of this fact is beyond me; just because they were big cities 200 years ago doesn't mean that ponies need to live there now. One would think they'd want to settle as far away from the radioactive bomb craters as possible.
Anyway, the exact effects of radiation are not explained, but since kkat seems to have very little imagination I'm assuming they are identical to whatever the effects of radiation are in Fallout, which I assume are more or less comparable to the effects of actual radiation on a human. From here on out I will be working from this definition of it. Also, it has a tendency to seep into water and food, which probably includes rivers and ground water in irradiated areas. I'm assuming food grown in radioactive soil is affected as well. It's effects can apparently be countered, however, by some sort of product called RadAway. I'm assuming this is another cheap knockoff of something from the games, but my questions here are more about supply. If this is something pre-war, there would logically be a finite amount of it in the world, which means that it should be a sought-after commodity just like water and canned food. If it's something being currently made, the question of who manufactures and distributes it arises. Based on past experience, I'm assuming kkat has not thought any of this through and will not be explaining it.
>>300968
>Radiation in Equestria means more or less the same thing that radiation in our world means, except for having a flimsy "it's magic" explanation slapped over it in place of the scientific one. Radiation in FoE is some kind of magical residue left over from the "megaspells" that detonated during the war.
Again I'm going to give Kkat a tiny bit of credit here - Fallout's radiation isn't realistic to begin with. For the most part it follows fantasy radiation logic - it mutates things (usually making them bigger in the process) and tends not to be fatal or even particularly dangerous except in extreme cases. FoE's radiation being explicitly magical at least justifies it working differently to the real world.
>It's effects can apparently be countered, however, by some sort of product called RadAway. I'm assuming this is another cheap knockoff of something from the games, but my questions here are more about supply. If this is something pre-war, there would logically be a finite amount of it in the world, which means that it should be a sought-after commodity just like water and canned food. If it's something being currently made, the question of who manufactures and distributes it arises. Based on past experience, I'm assuming kkat has not thought any of this through and will not be explaining it.
Radaway isn't even a knockoff - it's literally the exact same substance as in the games. In Fallout lore Radaway is an intravenous diuretic which essentially works like an idealized, fast-acting version of Prussian Blue.
Your question of where it comes from is valid - in practice it's just another potion. Healing potions make the green bar go up, radaway makes the bad click-click number go down.
>Radiation in Equestria means more or less the same thing that radiation in our world means, except for having a flimsy "it's magic" explanation slapped over it in place of the scientific one. Radiation in FoE is some kind of magical residue left over from the "megaspells" that detonated during the war.
Again I'm going to give Kkat a tiny bit of credit here - Fallout's radiation isn't realistic to begin with. For the most part it follows fantasy radiation logic - it mutates things (usually making them bigger in the process) and tends not to be fatal or even particularly dangerous except in extreme cases. FoE's radiation being explicitly magical at least justifies it working differently to the real world.
>It's effects can apparently be countered, however, by some sort of product called RadAway. I'm assuming this is another cheap knockoff of something from the games, but my questions here are more about supply. If this is something pre-war, there would logically be a finite amount of it in the world, which means that it should be a sought-after commodity just like water and canned food. If it's something being currently made, the question of who manufactures and distributes it arises. Based on past experience, I'm assuming kkat has not thought any of this through and will not be explaining it.
Radaway isn't even a knockoff - it's literally the exact same substance as in the games. In Fallout lore Radaway is an intravenous diuretic which essentially works like an idealized, fast-acting version of Prussian Blue.
Your question of where it comes from is valid - in practice it's just another potion. Healing potions make the green bar go up, radaway makes the bad click-click number go down.
>>300973
Yeah. Fallout's radiation is part of the whole retrofuturism aesthetic--it's based off the crazy IDEAS of what radiation did to you back in 50's speculation. It would give you another arm or a leg or zombify you or something. Correct me if i'm wrong, but isn't the radiation in Fallout supposed to contain trace amounts of the FEV? That's the explanation for it mutating things, right? Or did I hear that somewhere from an incorrect source perhaps.
Yeah. Fallout's radiation is part of the whole retrofuturism aesthetic--it's based off the crazy IDEAS of what radiation did to you back in 50's speculation. It would give you another arm or a leg or zombify you or something. Correct me if i'm wrong, but isn't the radiation in Fallout supposed to contain trace amounts of the FEV? That's the explanation for it mutating things, right? Or did I hear that somewhere from an incorrect source perhaps.
>>300975
Nah, FEV and radiation are seperate things. FEV is responsible for the most dramatic mutations so it's easy to confuse the causes sometimes, but it's explicitly a purpose-made mutagenic virus. Radiation doesn't spread viruses, even in Fallout.
Taint is (loosely) FoE's equivalent to FEV, so the distinction carries over.
Nah, FEV and radiation are seperate things. FEV is responsible for the most dramatic mutations so it's easy to confuse the causes sometimes, but it's explicitly a purpose-made mutagenic virus. Radiation doesn't spread viruses, even in Fallout.
Taint is (loosely) FoE's equivalent to FEV, so the distinction carries over.
>>300968
How DJ-Pon3 survived her death at that stable to become Homage's ancestor is a massive plot hole, the Homage family is canonically related to that DJ and not just a bunch of crazed fans desperate to "keep her dream alive" or whatever.
>>300960
>The treatment seems to involve some kind of radical detox therapy, that will cure physical addiction to the drug, but Velvet stresses will not cure her psychological dependence on it.
*GUITAR NOISES*
*HOLDS A BALL OF PIZZA WITH DEVIL MAY CRY STICKING OUT OF IT*
"Time for another GAMER MOMENT!"
*GUITAR RIFFS*
*CAMERA MOVES BADLY*
But seriously, fuck this gamer moment in the writing since it's so contrived and stupid AND IT HAS REGULAR BAD WRITING BUILT IN!
Littlepip specifically came to the DJ thinking "She could help me get Monterry Jack freed! I don't want Jack dead any more!"
And the DJ just says "Haha fuck Monterry Jack for being a bastard thief, it's like I always say what goes around comes around teehee like and subscribe if you agree" on the radio
And LP is too fucking impressed by the illegal copies of anti-equestrian burned books around her to be pissed at the DJ for saying that about someone whose life she supposedly wants to save.
You're on a time limit in Fallout 1 and 2, a strict deadline. Moving around on the world map can take days from this time limit. Drugs provide videogame stat buffs but each use carries the risk of getting Addicted to that drug. If you're addicted, you'll get stat penalties for 7 days or until you go out of your way to visit a doctor in some town and pay him to cure your drug addictions. Being cured this way costs some time. Addiction to the drug Jet (Supermeth) doesn't wear off with time and needs its own dedicated cure since it's OP.
In this story's inspiration, Fallout 3, you have no time limit and addictions last forever and are incredibly minor penalties. But you can pay any doctor ever to cure your addictions instantly WITHOUT any time loss. Owning a house in either Megaton or Tenpenny Tower enables no-cost addiction removal if the My First Laboratory house improvement is installed.
Anyway, Cheese Dumbass has already signed his own death warrant right now. He's guaranteed to be killed. Littlepip is going to hate herself and resent her friend a little soon, because she's egotistical enough to think her non-citizen word could save his life. DANCING AND REHAB WASTES LIFESAVING TIME
So she goes back to her friends for no reason (where is Cheesetard?) and hears them talk about forcing her into rehab like it's just going to cure her nonexistent physical cravings without doing anything to her psychological dependence on them even though she has NO dependence. She didn't get sick, masturbate, and vomit in the bed of a pony she failed to save when she tried going a few days without Party-Time Mint-Als. The pony just sort of saved himself even though they were specifically after something that could let the ponies open his armour up and repair his life-support system, since LP started off knowing how to repair his armour but spontaneously lost that ability once the drugs wore off.
By the way that's a really stupid way to adapt Fallout 3's videogame-drugs and "Sometimes there is a bullshit busywork filler quest during the main quest but you can skip it if you have a sufficiently high skill and succeed in a dice roll" system.
Anyway, after hearing them talk about forcing her into rehab she doesn't need, she fucks off back to the DJ and reads some books for fun. Nothing useful.
Nothing about old Equestrian law or current tenpony tower law.
She isn't thinking of any wacky courtroom antics to attempt like "Let's cross-reference a parrot" or "Maybe if I say I threatened the lives of his kids and forced him to confess to trying to rob me even though he didn't do that, the courts will consider me a criminal without rights and let him go, forcing me to escape from prison with my epic gamer skills"?
However the author makes sure to make Rarity's Ministry Of Image and Rarity herself and every other Mane Six member look bad by saying Rarity's lot banned books that contained "advanced information that could inspire troublemakers" whatever the CUNTING FUCK that means.
Is he saying Rarity banned everything more ideologically complex than kid's action-cartoon shonen entertainment, or banned all books with any sort of information that could potentially make someone want to thoughtcrime? And "thoughtcrime" against what? "Misbehave" in what way? We never get the sense that Equestria was a place of censorship and oppression and mandatory patriotism despite the existence of Rarity's Propaganda+Fashion Police and Pinkie Pie's Fun Police. Kkat is imitating the iconography of a totalitarian state and misusing terms used to describe the crimes against human rights it typically commits, but he doesn't understand governance well enough to figure out how the mane six would realistically govern ministries under Luna or what, if any, role Luna herself would play in things.
Of fucking course, Kkunt's a subhuman leftist retard so he thinks a child "crusading for her Cutie Mark" (Even though that isn't a common thing in Equestria and the CMCs didn't make it one) and whatever that child considers rebellion would be a severe enough form of "rebellion" for a cartoon-fascist book-burning government to care about when deciding what books get banned and what books don't and how much submission/conformity is mandatory. Like a faggoted porn-addicted attention-whore and self-proclaimed "queer" maliciously gloating that a fascist state would execute it for failing as an individual and actively trying to undermine the dying society it burdens. Fucking hell, imagine being so privileged you have to talk in a silly voice and make up a silly "sexual ethnicity" and turn a degenerate fetish and your immature behaviour into your mindset before you can convince yourself the people tired of your bullshit actually loathe you solely on ethnic/class grounds. Fuck leftists.
How DJ-Pon3 survived her death at that stable to become Homage's ancestor is a massive plot hole, the Homage family is canonically related to that DJ and not just a bunch of crazed fans desperate to "keep her dream alive" or whatever.
>>300960
>The treatment seems to involve some kind of radical detox therapy, that will cure physical addiction to the drug, but Velvet stresses will not cure her psychological dependence on it.
*GUITAR NOISES*
*HOLDS A BALL OF PIZZA WITH DEVIL MAY CRY STICKING OUT OF IT*
"Time for another GAMER MOMENT!"
*GUITAR RIFFS*
*CAMERA MOVES BADLY*
But seriously, fuck this gamer moment in the writing since it's so contrived and stupid AND IT HAS REGULAR BAD WRITING BUILT IN!
Littlepip specifically came to the DJ thinking "She could help me get Monterry Jack freed! I don't want Jack dead any more!"
And the DJ just says "Haha fuck Monterry Jack for being a bastard thief, it's like I always say what goes around comes around teehee like and subscribe if you agree" on the radio
And LP is too fucking impressed by the illegal copies of anti-equestrian burned books around her to be pissed at the DJ for saying that about someone whose life she supposedly wants to save.
You're on a time limit in Fallout 1 and 2, a strict deadline. Moving around on the world map can take days from this time limit. Drugs provide videogame stat buffs but each use carries the risk of getting Addicted to that drug. If you're addicted, you'll get stat penalties for 7 days or until you go out of your way to visit a doctor in some town and pay him to cure your drug addictions. Being cured this way costs some time. Addiction to the drug Jet (Supermeth) doesn't wear off with time and needs its own dedicated cure since it's OP.
In this story's inspiration, Fallout 3, you have no time limit and addictions last forever and are incredibly minor penalties. But you can pay any doctor ever to cure your addictions instantly WITHOUT any time loss. Owning a house in either Megaton or Tenpenny Tower enables no-cost addiction removal if the My First Laboratory house improvement is installed.
Anyway, Cheese Dumbass has already signed his own death warrant right now. He's guaranteed to be killed. Littlepip is going to hate herself and resent her friend a little soon, because she's egotistical enough to think her non-citizen word could save his life. DANCING AND REHAB WASTES LIFESAVING TIME
So she goes back to her friends for no reason (where is Cheesetard?) and hears them talk about forcing her into rehab like it's just going to cure her nonexistent physical cravings without doing anything to her psychological dependence on them even though she has NO dependence. She didn't get sick, masturbate, and vomit in the bed of a pony she failed to save when she tried going a few days without Party-Time Mint-Als. The pony just sort of saved himself even though they were specifically after something that could let the ponies open his armour up and repair his life-support system, since LP started off knowing how to repair his armour but spontaneously lost that ability once the drugs wore off.
By the way that's a really stupid way to adapt Fallout 3's videogame-drugs and "Sometimes there is a bullshit busywork filler quest during the main quest but you can skip it if you have a sufficiently high skill and succeed in a dice roll" system.
Anyway, after hearing them talk about forcing her into rehab she doesn't need, she fucks off back to the DJ and reads some books for fun. Nothing useful.
Nothing about old Equestrian law or current tenpony tower law.
She isn't thinking of any wacky courtroom antics to attempt like "Let's cross-reference a parrot" or "Maybe if I say I threatened the lives of his kids and forced him to confess to trying to rob me even though he didn't do that, the courts will consider me a criminal without rights and let him go, forcing me to escape from prison with my epic gamer skills"?
However the author makes sure to make Rarity's Ministry Of Image and Rarity herself and every other Mane Six member look bad by saying Rarity's lot banned books that contained "advanced information that could inspire troublemakers" whatever the CUNTING FUCK that means.
Is he saying Rarity banned everything more ideologically complex than kid's action-cartoon shonen entertainment, or banned all books with any sort of information that could potentially make someone want to thoughtcrime? And "thoughtcrime" against what? "Misbehave" in what way? We never get the sense that Equestria was a place of censorship and oppression and mandatory patriotism despite the existence of Rarity's Propaganda+Fashion Police and Pinkie Pie's Fun Police. Kkat is imitating the iconography of a totalitarian state and misusing terms used to describe the crimes against human rights it typically commits, but he doesn't understand governance well enough to figure out how the mane six would realistically govern ministries under Luna or what, if any, role Luna herself would play in things.
Of fucking course, Kkunt's a subhuman leftist retard so he thinks a child "crusading for her Cutie Mark" (Even though that isn't a common thing in Equestria and the CMCs didn't make it one) and whatever that child considers rebellion would be a severe enough form of "rebellion" for a cartoon-fascist book-burning government to care about when deciding what books get banned and what books don't and how much submission/conformity is mandatory. Like a faggoted porn-addicted attention-whore and self-proclaimed "queer" maliciously gloating that a fascist state would execute it for failing as an individual and actively trying to undermine the dying society it burdens. Fucking hell, imagine being so privileged you have to talk in a silly voice and make up a silly "sexual ethnicity" and turn a degenerate fetish and your immature behaviour into your mindset before you can convince yourself the people tired of your bullshit actually loathe you solely on ethnic/class grounds. Fuck leftists.
>>300976
Oh I know, I just remember hearing somewhere that there was some form of FEV in the ambient radiation, but I guess I misheard wherever I read that.
Oh I know, I just remember hearing somewhere that there was some form of FEV in the ambient radiation, but I guess I misheard wherever I read that.
>>300839
>>300840
Well I slept, and then I went to work, and then I completely lost whatever train of thought I had for this. Oh well. I guess my overall point is that you can basically put whatever you want in your story, but it's important that it engages people on its own merits rather than simply relying on references to the source material.
Actually, if you don't mind me tooting my own lower horn for a moment, I can use one of my own projects as an example of the kind of thought process I'm trying to get at. A few years ago someone posted a writing prompt about Dale Gribble landing in Equestria and I wound up squeezing a pretty successful greentext epic out of it. Here's the thread if you're interested:
https://mlpol.net/mlpol/archive/146529
Anyway, if I'd wanted to take a clunky, meme-heavy fanfiction approach to this idea, I could have just gone with something like this:
>Dale lands in Equestria
>he meets Twilight Sparkle
>they don't understand each other and it's funny
>she introduces him to the Mane 6
>a series of jokey scenes ensue, mostly stemming from misunderstandings
>suddenly the Mane 6 have to fight Chrysalis or Tirek or something
>Dale helps
>something is 20% cooler
>story ends
To be fair, you could probably take this setup and make it entertaining enough. Also, on its surface this isn't really that different from what I actually wound up doing. However, it's a little stale and generic as-is. Dale meets Twilight Sparkle; why? Is there any particular reason why those two characters would make a good duo, or did I just pick her because she is the main character of MLP? Does the presence of the other M6 characters add anything to the story, or am I just putting them in there because it's an MLP story and the M6 need to be in there? Again, I could probably have taken those characters and spun up something entertaining enough, but I don't think people would have enjoyed the final product as much.
This was basically my thought process for the story I wound up writing:
Dale is already an established character with his own personality, so I wanted to pair him up with an MLP character who would act as a good foil and allow him to use his Gribble-esque craziness to maximum effect. However, I also wanted the other character to have their own role in the story. The main theme of MLP is friendship, so I thought Dale ought to make a real friend while he's in Equestria, not just have a zany adventure. Something should happen to him there that changes his life for the better. In order for that to work, there needs to be a good dynamic between the two friends; it can't just be a story about Dale being silly and paranoid, with a pony sidekick occasionally cracking jokes about it.
Pinkie Pie might seem like an obvious choice to pair him up with, but she's a little too wacky; Dale's crazy shit would just bounce right off of her. I remember thinking Trixie might be kind of a funny choice, but I discarded that too. AJ is very serious and pragmatic, and could probably become a pretty good Hank, but that also didn't quite feel right.
What I ultimately decided is that Dale is basically a man-child larping as an adult. He "works" as an exterminator, but in the show it's heavily implied that his wife's salary at the TV station is their main source of income. His life revolves around alien conspiracy theories and pretending to be a bounty hunter, which he's able to do because the people around him all indulge him and take care of him. Basically, he has a child's personality and worldview, so I thought it would be most effective for him to bond with some of the child characters on the show and experience their version of Equestria, rather than that of the adult ponies. Naturally this led to ideas like Dale going to school in Ponyville and Dale joining the CMC, which were just too funny not to do.
So, I figured one of the CMC would be the most sensible choice to fill in the friend role for him. I picked Sweetie Belle because she's my favorite of the three. From there it was just a matter of building up a dynamic between them. Even though Dale is the "adult", SB is probably more mature and level headed, but at the same time she's a kid and lives in a kid's world; her understanding of the world around her doesn't extend much farther than her school life.
Meanwhile, Dale brings in his own crazy worldview, that causes him to completely misinterpret everything he sees in Equestria. He thinks Diamond Tiara is an alien and cutie marks are mind control devices and whatever other wacky shit I wrote in there. The story is told from Dale's perspective so we see his reasoning behind everything, but at the same time we get Sweetie Belle's perspective secondhand. She just sees everything as an elementary-school-level social problem; she likes Dale and wants to be friends with him, and wants him to make friends in Ponyville, so it constantly frustrates her that he does these weird, inexplicable things that make it hard for other ponies to like him. Most of the humor in the story is derived from these two seeing the same situations completely differently, and being unable to understand each other.
Anyway, that's probably enough about my thing. Point is, if you want to write effective fanfiction (or derivative fiction I guess), the best approach is to put serious thought into which characters and elements you are selecting from the world. Don't just grab characters you like, think about why you like them and what kinds of dynamics you could build from their personalities that allow them to play off of each other effectively. My story wasn't particularly original or innovative in terms of its concept; basically it was just a HiE story involving a changeling invasion, both of which are pretty well-traveled ideas. It derives nearly all of its entertainment value from character interaction, or at least I think it does.
Anyway, I'm talking out my ass and probably need to sleep again.
>>300840
Well I slept, and then I went to work, and then I completely lost whatever train of thought I had for this. Oh well. I guess my overall point is that you can basically put whatever you want in your story, but it's important that it engages people on its own merits rather than simply relying on references to the source material.
Actually, if you don't mind me tooting my own lower horn for a moment, I can use one of my own projects as an example of the kind of thought process I'm trying to get at. A few years ago someone posted a writing prompt about Dale Gribble landing in Equestria and I wound up squeezing a pretty successful greentext epic out of it. Here's the thread if you're interested:
https://mlpol.net/mlpol/archive/146529
Anyway, if I'd wanted to take a clunky, meme-heavy fanfiction approach to this idea, I could have just gone with something like this:
>Dale lands in Equestria
>he meets Twilight Sparkle
>they don't understand each other and it's funny
>she introduces him to the Mane 6
>a series of jokey scenes ensue, mostly stemming from misunderstandings
>suddenly the Mane 6 have to fight Chrysalis or Tirek or something
>Dale helps
>something is 20% cooler
>story ends
To be fair, you could probably take this setup and make it entertaining enough. Also, on its surface this isn't really that different from what I actually wound up doing. However, it's a little stale and generic as-is. Dale meets Twilight Sparkle; why? Is there any particular reason why those two characters would make a good duo, or did I just pick her because she is the main character of MLP? Does the presence of the other M6 characters add anything to the story, or am I just putting them in there because it's an MLP story and the M6 need to be in there? Again, I could probably have taken those characters and spun up something entertaining enough, but I don't think people would have enjoyed the final product as much.
This was basically my thought process for the story I wound up writing:
Dale is already an established character with his own personality, so I wanted to pair him up with an MLP character who would act as a good foil and allow him to use his Gribble-esque craziness to maximum effect. However, I also wanted the other character to have their own role in the story. The main theme of MLP is friendship, so I thought Dale ought to make a real friend while he's in Equestria, not just have a zany adventure. Something should happen to him there that changes his life for the better. In order for that to work, there needs to be a good dynamic between the two friends; it can't just be a story about Dale being silly and paranoid, with a pony sidekick occasionally cracking jokes about it.
Pinkie Pie might seem like an obvious choice to pair him up with, but she's a little too wacky; Dale's crazy shit would just bounce right off of her. I remember thinking Trixie might be kind of a funny choice, but I discarded that too. AJ is very serious and pragmatic, and could probably become a pretty good Hank, but that also didn't quite feel right.
What I ultimately decided is that Dale is basically a man-child larping as an adult. He "works" as an exterminator, but in the show it's heavily implied that his wife's salary at the TV station is their main source of income. His life revolves around alien conspiracy theories and pretending to be a bounty hunter, which he's able to do because the people around him all indulge him and take care of him. Basically, he has a child's personality and worldview, so I thought it would be most effective for him to bond with some of the child characters on the show and experience their version of Equestria, rather than that of the adult ponies. Naturally this led to ideas like Dale going to school in Ponyville and Dale joining the CMC, which were just too funny not to do.
So, I figured one of the CMC would be the most sensible choice to fill in the friend role for him. I picked Sweetie Belle because she's my favorite of the three. From there it was just a matter of building up a dynamic between them. Even though Dale is the "adult", SB is probably more mature and level headed, but at the same time she's a kid and lives in a kid's world; her understanding of the world around her doesn't extend much farther than her school life.
Meanwhile, Dale brings in his own crazy worldview, that causes him to completely misinterpret everything he sees in Equestria. He thinks Diamond Tiara is an alien and cutie marks are mind control devices and whatever other wacky shit I wrote in there. The story is told from Dale's perspective so we see his reasoning behind everything, but at the same time we get Sweetie Belle's perspective secondhand. She just sees everything as an elementary-school-level social problem; she likes Dale and wants to be friends with him, and wants him to make friends in Ponyville, so it constantly frustrates her that he does these weird, inexplicable things that make it hard for other ponies to like him. Most of the humor in the story is derived from these two seeing the same situations completely differently, and being unable to understand each other.
Anyway, that's probably enough about my thing. Point is, if you want to write effective fanfiction (or derivative fiction I guess), the best approach is to put serious thought into which characters and elements you are selecting from the world. Don't just grab characters you like, think about why you like them and what kinds of dynamics you could build from their personalities that allow them to play off of each other effectively. My story wasn't particularly original or innovative in terms of its concept; basically it was just a HiE story involving a changeling invasion, both of which are pretty well-traveled ideas. It derives nearly all of its entertainment value from character interaction, or at least I think it does.
Anyway, I'm talking out my ass and probably need to sleep again.
Oh, also. It looks like GOG is having a sale, and most of the Fallout games are on there:
Fallout 1 - $2.99
Fallout 2 - $2.99
Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition - $7.99
Fallout New Vegas: Ultimate Edition - $9.99
I could probably afford to buy all of them but I don't think I want to. Which of these triggers are most worth pulling?
Fallout 1 - $2.99
Fallout 2 - $2.99
Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition - $7.99
Fallout New Vegas: Ultimate Edition - $9.99
I could probably afford to buy all of them but I don't think I want to. Which of these triggers are most worth pulling?
>>300989
1, 2, NV. Don't even bother listening to Niggel, !!!FAR-OUT Tactics!!! is awful. Flat out, awful. I don't even want to describe everything wrong with that game. 3 is a NU-CAWWADOTY wannabe MMORPG rail-shooter waste of time: you never get off the rails, no matter where you go especially since all of those 'random encounters' and 'secret locations' take ZERO effort to find since they're always on trails that lead out into 'somewhere' beyond the main railroad that you don't have a choice to get off of'
Just.. be aware that if you do play Fo1 and/or Fo2, that they are old games. By that I mean:
#1: little is EVER explained to you except for what knowledge you find, trade for, pay for, or receive.
#3: save. often.
#4: ROTATE YOUR SAVES whenever you think you are at a crucial plot point or juncture. May CHIM guide your so-called '''savescumming'''.
#2 was going to be something about 'dated graphics" but no one fucking cares. To this day there's still millions of people that play the Ultima series, the Bard's Tale series (pre-PS2 one), Diablo 1/2, and hundreds of other 'old' games. Also, if you DO play Fallout 2, get Killap's Restoration Patch, it fixes a lot of shit that Chris Avellone was told to abandon 95% of the way through development.
1, 2, NV. Don't even bother listening to Niggel, !!!FAR-OUT Tactics!!! is awful. Flat out, awful. I don't even want to describe everything wrong with that game. 3 is a NU-CAWWADOTY wannabe MMORPG rail-shooter waste of time: you never get off the rails, no matter where you go especially since all of those 'random encounters' and 'secret locations' take ZERO effort to find since they're always on trails that lead out into 'somewhere' beyond the main railroad that you don't have a choice to get off of'
Just.. be aware that if you do play Fo1 and/or Fo2, that they are old games. By that I mean:
#1: little is EVER explained to you except for what knowledge you find, trade for, pay for, or receive.
#3: save. often.
#4: ROTATE YOUR SAVES whenever you think you are at a crucial plot point or juncture. May CHIM guide your so-called '''savescumming'''.
#2 was going to be something about 'dated graphics" but no one fucking cares. To this day there's still millions of people that play the Ultima series, the Bard's Tale series (pre-PS2 one), Diablo 1/2, and hundreds of other 'old' games. Also, if you DO play Fallout 2, get Killap's Restoration Patch, it fixes a lot of shit that Chris Avellone was told to abandon 95% of the way through development.
>>300989
NEW VEGAS
1
2
Anything else
3
that's my ranking because 3 sucks
Kkat ripped off a ton of things from Fallout, mostly from F3 and basically namedropped things from F1 or 2 or NV while sometimes mixing them with F3 stuff. F3's ideas are so shallow that typically nothing is lost in translation from game to fic and elements are added from better fallout games for flavour.
But FNV is the overall best game of the four
And it has the best mods
And there's a bit in this story coming up where Kkunt rips off Fallout NV's "Dead Money" questline without any origiinal spins and without understanding of the incredible depth within Dead Money.
So if you get FNV, the mysterious signal (not the drive through theatre one or the caravanfags, the other one) takes you to Dead Money
I've been meaning to ask, how do you think a Pokemon fanfic should function when it comes to taking things from the source material?
story-wise you're a kid who beats all pokemon trainers ever including the 8 Gym Leaders and Elite Four and current Champion, taking out a criminal syndicate with dreams of world domination or destruction along the way because they (and plot-based progress blockers) get in your way.
The anime adapts the videogame mechanics into kid friendly battles where a giant wolf using Crunch or a giant dragon using Hyper Beam or a sword-armed bug using Slash on your baby Skitty just makes it dirty and tired instead of horribly injured or dead. Even moves like Bite will just randomly cause explosions sometimes so the move can still look strong even though it never breaks skin. You never really feel like any pokemon is really in danger as a result, just in danger of losing a match and making his trainer sad.
But there are moments in the anime where Ash loses pokemon fights because there's something he doesn't know yet like "don't rely on one pokemon" or "learn how to roll with the punches" or "learn your fucking type matchups holy shit". And he'll train for a bit and win when he's learned his pokemon-related lesson.
There are also moments where a trainer tells his pokemon to do something smart that would work logically but not in the games. Like a metal and sword-armed pokemon resisting electric attacks by stabbing its swords into the ground, literally grounding itself.
And even character arcs where a human gets more confident and less dumb over time or a pokemon gradually gets better at using a move over time.
While there have been dark edgy pokemon fanfics with gore and death dangerous untamed wilds, they all get really cheesy whenever teenagers and the author and the world temporarily forget about the risk of injury/death and treat pokemon battling like a full contact sport they and their city-destroying magic pet monsters are really good at.
Not to mention Pokemon Trading. You can trade pokemon but the story's constantly going on about the bonds between people and pokemon. What kind of bond is there between some guy and his Torchic if he'll trade it for a Treecko? Not to mention how you'll breed hundreds of Eevees until you get yourself a shiny one with the correct Nature and IVs. Individual Values are invisible stats that are randonly generated at birth, they influence your pokemon's visible stats like attack/defence/HP so one Eevee with shit IVs will always be slower than one with better IVs.
Then there are Held Items that are invisible when held by pokemon yet magically make the pokemon stronger or faster or whatever. Leftovers heals you over time. Life Orb makes you stronger but attacking costsyour own health. Choice Band boosts your Attack Stat but after you are sent out you're locked into only using the first move you choose until you're switched out or defeated.
Then there's EV training where you train against fast pokemon to make your mon faster or strong mons to get stronger but some items multiply EV gains
How can any of this stuff work in a serious story?
NEW VEGAS
1
2
Anything else
3
that's my ranking because 3 sucks
Kkat ripped off a ton of things from Fallout, mostly from F3 and basically namedropped things from F1 or 2 or NV while sometimes mixing them with F3 stuff. F3's ideas are so shallow that typically nothing is lost in translation from game to fic and elements are added from better fallout games for flavour.
But FNV is the overall best game of the four
And it has the best mods
And there's a bit in this story coming up where Kkunt rips off Fallout NV's "Dead Money" questline without any origiinal spins and without understanding of the incredible depth within Dead Money.
So if you get FNV, the mysterious signal (not the drive through theatre one or the caravanfags, the other one) takes you to Dead Money
I've been meaning to ask, how do you think a Pokemon fanfic should function when it comes to taking things from the source material?
story-wise you're a kid who beats all pokemon trainers ever including the 8 Gym Leaders and Elite Four and current Champion, taking out a criminal syndicate with dreams of world domination or destruction along the way because they (and plot-based progress blockers) get in your way.
The anime adapts the videogame mechanics into kid friendly battles where a giant wolf using Crunch or a giant dragon using Hyper Beam or a sword-armed bug using Slash on your baby Skitty just makes it dirty and tired instead of horribly injured or dead. Even moves like Bite will just randomly cause explosions sometimes so the move can still look strong even though it never breaks skin. You never really feel like any pokemon is really in danger as a result, just in danger of losing a match and making his trainer sad.
But there are moments in the anime where Ash loses pokemon fights because there's something he doesn't know yet like "don't rely on one pokemon" or "learn how to roll with the punches" or "learn your fucking type matchups holy shit". And he'll train for a bit and win when he's learned his pokemon-related lesson.
There are also moments where a trainer tells his pokemon to do something smart that would work logically but not in the games. Like a metal and sword-armed pokemon resisting electric attacks by stabbing its swords into the ground, literally grounding itself.
And even character arcs where a human gets more confident and less dumb over time or a pokemon gradually gets better at using a move over time.
While there have been dark edgy pokemon fanfics with gore and death dangerous untamed wilds, they all get really cheesy whenever teenagers and the author and the world temporarily forget about the risk of injury/death and treat pokemon battling like a full contact sport they and their city-destroying magic pet monsters are really good at.
Not to mention Pokemon Trading. You can trade pokemon but the story's constantly going on about the bonds between people and pokemon. What kind of bond is there between some guy and his Torchic if he'll trade it for a Treecko? Not to mention how you'll breed hundreds of Eevees until you get yourself a shiny one with the correct Nature and IVs. Individual Values are invisible stats that are randonly generated at birth, they influence your pokemon's visible stats like attack/defence/HP so one Eevee with shit IVs will always be slower than one with better IVs.
Then there are Held Items that are invisible when held by pokemon yet magically make the pokemon stronger or faster or whatever. Leftovers heals you over time. Life Orb makes you stronger but attacking costsyour own health. Choice Band boosts your Attack Stat but after you are sent out you're locked into only using the first move you choose until you're switched out or defeated.
Then there's EV training where you train against fast pokemon to make your mon faster or strong mons to get stronger but some items multiply EV gains
How can any of this stuff work in a serious story?
>>300989
1 and 2 absolutely. Fallout: New Vegas as well for a decent translation of the RPG experience into first-person and modern-ish format. 3 is viewed as the sort of bastard child of the franchise, before 4 and then 76 came along BoS doesn't exist.
3 was made by an entirely different company than the first two originals and has a lot less care when it comes to the story writing, and rpg elements which is what the series was founded upon, and lots of lore rape. It was a clunky transition from isometric view to first-person 3d by a different, uncaring company, whereas new vegas uses the same engine and assets, but made by the ORIGINAL developers who care about the franchise, and it's pretty damn good and beloved.
There's lots of unbalanced stuff in the first two games, but they're roleplaying experiences first and foremost and loved and appreciated for that. Gameplay is a bit of a secondary but it's passable.
Do you have much experience roleplaying and immersing yourself into playing a character? (D&D for example). It's kind of the point of these games, so they're less enjoyable if that's not your cup of tea.
Honestly you could grab Fallout 3 as well because that's what 90% of FO:E is based upon and you'll get a direct, firsthand experience to refer to what Kkat was drawing from. Only do it for the memes though, not for fun.
1 and 2 absolutely. Fallout: New Vegas as well for a decent translation of the RPG experience into first-person and modern-ish format. 3 is viewed as the sort of bastard child of the franchise, before 4 and then 76 came along BoS doesn't exist.
3 was made by an entirely different company than the first two originals and has a lot less care when it comes to the story writing, and rpg elements which is what the series was founded upon, and lots of lore rape. It was a clunky transition from isometric view to first-person 3d by a different, uncaring company, whereas new vegas uses the same engine and assets, but made by the ORIGINAL developers who care about the franchise, and it's pretty damn good and beloved.
There's lots of unbalanced stuff in the first two games, but they're roleplaying experiences first and foremost and loved and appreciated for that. Gameplay is a bit of a secondary but it's passable.
Do you have much experience roleplaying and immersing yourself into playing a character? (D&D for example). It's kind of the point of these games, so they're less enjoyable if that's not your cup of tea.
Honestly you could grab Fallout 3 as well because that's what 90% of FO:E is based upon and you'll get a direct, firsthand experience to refer to what Kkat was drawing from. Only do it for the memes though, not for fun.
>>300989
1 and 2 are the originals and probably the best examples of what Fallout was intended to and "should" be, though they do show their age now. As other anons have pointed out, they're RPGs with a heavier focus on the RP part than the more modern games.
3 is Bethesda's attempt to translate the series into FPS format, and while it was commercially successful and reinvigorated the franchise, the writing and roleplay elements suffered badly. Bethesda later went on to make Fallout 4 and more recently Fallout 76, but they're barely worth acknowledging.
New Vegas was made by a different studio than 3 but uses 3's engine and core mechanics as a baseline. A lot of people will tell you it's the best in the series. It also carries on a lot of plot threads from 2 and ignores 3 almost entirely. It was also the most recent entry into the franchise when FoE was written.
Insofar as it's relevant to this thread, FoE draws most heavily from Fallout 3 but takes large elements from pretty much every game. Protip: compare the opening narrations of Fallouts 1, 2 and 3 to FoE's prologue and prepare to die a little more on the inside.
1 and 2 are the originals and probably the best examples of what Fallout was intended to and "should" be, though they do show their age now. As other anons have pointed out, they're RPGs with a heavier focus on the RP part than the more modern games.
3 is Bethesda's attempt to translate the series into FPS format, and while it was commercially successful and reinvigorated the franchise, the writing and roleplay elements suffered badly. Bethesda later went on to make Fallout 4 and more recently Fallout 76, but they're barely worth acknowledging.
New Vegas was made by a different studio than 3 but uses 3's engine and core mechanics as a baseline. A lot of people will tell you it's the best in the series. It also carries on a lot of plot threads from 2 and ignores 3 almost entirely. It was also the most recent entry into the franchise when FoE was written.
Insofar as it's relevant to this thread, FoE draws most heavily from Fallout 3 but takes large elements from pretty much every game. Protip: compare the opening narrations of Fallouts 1, 2 and 3 to FoE's prologue and prepare to die a little more on the inside.
>>300990
>>300992
>>300993
>>300995
Cool, thanks for the tips. I went ahead and picked up 1, 2 and NV.
>old games
Honestly most my favorite games are pre-2005, with the bulk being from the 90s. I tend to think of anything XBOX 360 era and later as "new games."
>Do you have much experience roleplaying and immersing yourself into playing a character? (D&D for example). It's kind of the point of these games, so they're less enjoyable if that's not your cup of tea.
Generally I do enjoy that sort of thing. The more immersive a game is the more I tend to enjoy it. Games that require a lot of mechanical dexterity (platformers, shooters, etc) I'm usually not very good at, but immersive RPGs I tend to do well, at least if the world is interesting enough to get into.
>Protip: compare the opening narrations of Fallouts 1, 2 and 3 to FoE's prologue and prepare to die a little more on the inside.
For the sake of my own sanity, I'm actually thinking I will hold off playing any of these until I'm done with kkat's story. I just wanted to pick them up for now.
>>300992
>>300993
>>300995
Cool, thanks for the tips. I went ahead and picked up 1, 2 and NV.
>old games
Honestly most my favorite games are pre-2005, with the bulk being from the 90s. I tend to think of anything XBOX 360 era and later as "new games."
>Do you have much experience roleplaying and immersing yourself into playing a character? (D&D for example). It's kind of the point of these games, so they're less enjoyable if that's not your cup of tea.
Generally I do enjoy that sort of thing. The more immersive a game is the more I tend to enjoy it. Games that require a lot of mechanical dexterity (platformers, shooters, etc) I'm usually not very good at, but immersive RPGs I tend to do well, at least if the world is interesting enough to get into.
>Protip: compare the opening narrations of Fallouts 1, 2 and 3 to FoE's prologue and prepare to die a little more on the inside.
For the sake of my own sanity, I'm actually thinking I will hold off playing any of these until I'm done with kkat's story. I just wanted to pick them up for now.
>>300990
>Don't even bother listening to Niggel, !!!FAR-OUT Tactics!!! is awful.
I have never said anything good about Fallout Tactics or played it. Image checks out.
>Don't even bother listening to Niggel, !!!FAR-OUT Tactics!!! is awful.
I have never said anything good about Fallout Tactics or played it. Image checks out.
>>300949
Your mileage may vary but for me its the latter.
Additionally it arguably is a worse form of radiation because as long as you dont get injured or take drugs while under its effects you can avoid it, and once youre out your basically okay. Which means radiation has the potential to be scarier but ive yet to read a fallout equestria fic that doesnt shit out radaway to its protagonists like its candy unless its the hightower arc in project horizons.
So yes and no. Then again im biased because i just fucking love project horizons
Your mileage may vary but for me its the latter.
Additionally it arguably is a worse form of radiation because as long as you dont get injured or take drugs while under its effects you can avoid it, and once youre out your basically okay. Which means radiation has the potential to be scarier but ive yet to read a fallout equestria fic that doesnt shit out radaway to its protagonists like its candy unless its the hightower arc in project horizons.
So yes and no. Then again im biased because i just fucking love project horizons
>>300989
Fallout new vegas ultimate edition. Very solid but if you have a decent rig dont expect to get much use out of it, you need an unofficial patch to get it to use up to 4gb of ram. 1/2 are also great but they didnt age as well.
Fallout 3 would be the worst of the series if 4 and 76 didnt exist.
Fallout new vegas ultimate edition. Very solid but if you have a decent rig dont expect to get much use out of it, you need an unofficial patch to get it to use up to 4gb of ram. 1/2 are also great but they didnt age as well.
Fallout 3 would be the worst of the series if 4 and 76 didnt exist.
>>301020
Doesn't the gog version of Ultimate Edition come pre-patched for 4GB?
also get Yukikai's Unofficial Patch or whatever it's called from the Mod Nexus since it bugfixes stuff.
I wouldn't recommend doing your first playthrough with advanced intrusive mods like difficulty rebalances, new guns, World of Warcraft swords, The Frontier, and so on. Even getting a Sprint Mod is pushing it since that lets you outrun certain faggots at the fag quarry. I love my custom Archimedes V and minimap and driveable vehicles and tactical vision and shove button and hologram spawner and Twilight companion and godawful OC waifus but that tactical god waifu squad bullshit isn't part of the vanilla experience.
>>301021
4 has main quest overhauls and modded anime girls and non-shit guns thanks to mods and 76 doesn't exist. I beat all of Depravity/Valkyrie and it was amazing how this mod bascially bugfixes Fallout 4's fucking awful main quest through adding new main questline routes and new characters who interact with existing ones for you in unique ways. They even made Youngest Elder Maxson something besides a meme. But these days I only play 4 and Skyrim when MXR shows off sufficiently good new mods for them. But no sex mods. A surprising number of Skyrim/4 mods are purely visual so when you've seen them in the video you've seen everything and have no reason to install them. It's funny how 4 gets so many weapon and armour mods instead of more interesting stuff.
Doesn't the gog version of Ultimate Edition come pre-patched for 4GB?
also get Yukikai's Unofficial Patch or whatever it's called from the Mod Nexus since it bugfixes stuff.
I wouldn't recommend doing your first playthrough with advanced intrusive mods like difficulty rebalances, new guns, World of Warcraft swords, The Frontier, and so on. Even getting a Sprint Mod is pushing it since that lets you outrun certain faggots at the fag quarry. I love my custom Archimedes V and minimap and driveable vehicles and tactical vision and shove button and hologram spawner and Twilight companion and godawful OC waifus but that tactical god waifu squad bullshit isn't part of the vanilla experience.
>>301021
4 has main quest overhauls and modded anime girls and non-shit guns thanks to mods and 76 doesn't exist. I beat all of Depravity/Valkyrie and it was amazing how this mod bascially bugfixes Fallout 4's fucking awful main quest through adding new main questline routes and new characters who interact with existing ones for you in unique ways. They even made Youngest Elder Maxson something besides a meme. But these days I only play 4 and Skyrim when MXR shows off sufficiently good new mods for them. But no sex mods. A surprising number of Skyrim/4 mods are purely visual so when you've seen them in the video you've seen everything and have no reason to install them. It's funny how 4 gets so many weapon and armour mods instead of more interesting stuff.
>>300988
I thought I would give some input. I like this post. Why? Because something Leaf-sempai Rip once told me.
Here you provide insight on how to create something rather than explaining why something is wrong. I know that you have done this before. You shouldn't stop explaining why something is wrong either. That's not what I'm saying. I'm just giving you my feedback on this matter. I don't even know if I should post this since the elephant in the room is that the thread I created followes the former philosophy and I worry that there might be some misunderstanding that I'm implying that this type of thread is inferior, which I don't.
I just wanna give you my two cents. I thinkg both forms of thinking about litterature is important to become good at writing, I just think there is a distinction between them.
It ties into what Leaf"I'm gonna insert some maple syrup between Applejack's flapjacks" said. He compared writing to cooking, as one cannot cook a dish by just knowing what not to do. One has to know what to do. So you need to have a recipe and an understanding for what works and why. Like, the principles that you mentioned in this posted. You had a character and then you sought out a foil to contrast and emphasize each characters' traits.
So like, one writing rule is about pairing up characters taht are polar opposites of each other and another rule could be to be consitent with in-universe rules, like a magic system. Both of these rules should be followed, but one is a thing that you do or create in your text and the other is something you should avoid doing in your text.
Of course, there is knowing the rules to break them well and exceptions but mostly one will follow these rules either subconciouslyOne seeks out the most intresting development as a writer, usually meaning conflicts and stuff. or conciously.
I thought I would give some input. I like this post. Why? Because something Leaf-sempai Rip once told me.
Here you provide insight on how to create something rather than explaining why something is wrong. I know that you have done this before. You shouldn't stop explaining why something is wrong either. That's not what I'm saying. I'm just giving you my feedback on this matter. I don't even know if I should post this since the elephant in the room is that the thread I created followes the former philosophy and I worry that there might be some misunderstanding that I'm implying that this type of thread is inferior, which I don't.
I just wanna give you my two cents. I thinkg both forms of thinking about litterature is important to become good at writing, I just think there is a distinction between them.
It ties into what Leaf"I'm gonna insert some maple syrup between Applejack's flapjacks" said. He compared writing to cooking, as one cannot cook a dish by just knowing what not to do. One has to know what to do. So you need to have a recipe and an understanding for what works and why. Like, the principles that you mentioned in this posted. You had a character and then you sought out a foil to contrast and emphasize each characters' traits.
So like, one writing rule is about pairing up characters taht are polar opposites of each other and another rule could be to be consitent with in-universe rules, like a magic system. Both of these rules should be followed, but one is a thing that you do or create in your text and the other is something you should avoid doing in your text.
Of course, there is knowing the rules to break them well and exceptions but mostly one will follow these rules either subconciouslyOne seeks out the most intresting development as a writer, usually meaning conflicts and stuff. or conciously.
>>301068
>by just knowing what not to do. One has to know what to do.
Of course, you can figure out what do do by just knowing what not to do if we're dealing with something binary but I mean mostly.
>by just knowing what not to do. One has to know what to do.
Of course, you can figure out what do do by just knowing what not to do if we're dealing with something binary but I mean mostly.
>>301044
i mean the guns are like the one quality selling point of fo4 over nv so it makes sense that people expand on it especially when its so low effort
i mean the guns are like the one quality selling point of fo4 over nv so it makes sense that people expand on it especially when its so low effort
>>301105
Funny how Fallout 4's gun customization was advertised as a "do it your way" system but it turns out to be a boring one-dimensional upgrade system where Comfort Grips and Hair Triggers objectively make your gun better so you have a reason to play the looter-shooter gameplay loop and kill respawning raiders for resources that can be used to upgrade your gear.
You even need to pay real world microtransactions money for some customization options and bonus weapons. Mini-DLCs my ass. And while Fallout NV had multiple ammo types, Fallout 4 didn't have that until modders added it in.
Still, the guns are more customizable than how you complete the main story.
But when modders get access to this system they include shittons of tiered upgrades and interesting sidegrades and even alterations that radically transform your gun into completely different things with a completely different use in combat. Graphical customization can put names on your Halo armour and nametags or memes on your rifles. You can even change what ammo the gun shoots, I fucking love it.
My playable big tiddy anime girl has dumb shit and cool shit like a bigass animu monster hunter sword, a flaming chainsaw knife that paralyzes and freezes you, Doom's laser sword, a tactical knife with 45 handgun that levels up with kills like a pokemon and instead of a knife it's a dildo, pokeballs that summon deathclaws and synths, a portal gun, an Archimedes gun that can have its mode changed whenever I equip it, a long-range scoped 50cal silenced rifle with "It's over 9000" on it for bonus cringe points, tactical gear, plasma revolver, flechette shotgun minigun, a minigun that pisses out a stream of cluster nuke bombs for when carpet bombing needs to be Extra Tactical, and more. Even has a slutty OC waifu companion with sniper rifle and laser sword and I-DM the godlike eyebot I completely overdesigned with optimal weaponry. And this character has nothing to do because once you give yourself the resources to skip over 9000 hours of grinding and make your ideal character you also remove the main reason to play the game modless Fallout 4 relies on.
Who else hates when stories blend scifi and magic so their bad science has a justification instead of doing anything creative like giving a glock an enchanted snakeskin grip that magically poisons its bullets or a hollywood silencer and recoil-negating magic stock for your impractical hand destroying eardrum destroying joke gun that just got magicked into a top tier sidearm.
This story's "enchanted gun that spits flaming bullets" shit is pointless. Why not just use flaming bullets from the start, then enchant the bullets to give your targets paralysis or AIDS? The new industrial revolution in Equestria caused by coal burning tech and enchanted diamond bullshit logically shouldn't have changed Equestria much but Kkat seems to think it's enough to completely obliterate Equestria's morality overnight but only sometimes.
Funny how Fallout 4's gun customization was advertised as a "do it your way" system but it turns out to be a boring one-dimensional upgrade system where Comfort Grips and Hair Triggers objectively make your gun better so you have a reason to play the looter-shooter gameplay loop and kill respawning raiders for resources that can be used to upgrade your gear.
You even need to pay real world microtransactions money for some customization options and bonus weapons. Mini-DLCs my ass. And while Fallout NV had multiple ammo types, Fallout 4 didn't have that until modders added it in.
Still, the guns are more customizable than how you complete the main story.
But when modders get access to this system they include shittons of tiered upgrades and interesting sidegrades and even alterations that radically transform your gun into completely different things with a completely different use in combat. Graphical customization can put names on your Halo armour and nametags or memes on your rifles. You can even change what ammo the gun shoots, I fucking love it.
My playable big tiddy anime girl has dumb shit and cool shit like a bigass animu monster hunter sword, a flaming chainsaw knife that paralyzes and freezes you, Doom's laser sword, a tactical knife with 45 handgun that levels up with kills like a pokemon and instead of a knife it's a dildo, pokeballs that summon deathclaws and synths, a portal gun, an Archimedes gun that can have its mode changed whenever I equip it, a long-range scoped 50cal silenced rifle with "It's over 9000" on it for bonus cringe points, tactical gear, plasma revolver, flechette shotgun minigun, a minigun that pisses out a stream of cluster nuke bombs for when carpet bombing needs to be Extra Tactical, and more. Even has a slutty OC waifu companion with sniper rifle and laser sword and I-DM the godlike eyebot I completely overdesigned with optimal weaponry. And this character has nothing to do because once you give yourself the resources to skip over 9000 hours of grinding and make your ideal character you also remove the main reason to play the game modless Fallout 4 relies on.
Who else hates when stories blend scifi and magic so their bad science has a justification instead of doing anything creative like giving a glock an enchanted snakeskin grip that magically poisons its bullets or a hollywood silencer and recoil-negating magic stock for your impractical hand destroying eardrum destroying joke gun that just got magicked into a top tier sidearm.
This story's "enchanted gun that spits flaming bullets" shit is pointless. Why not just use flaming bullets from the start, then enchant the bullets to give your targets paralysis or AIDS? The new industrial revolution in Equestria caused by coal burning tech and enchanted diamond bullshit logically shouldn't have changed Equestria much but Kkat seems to think it's enough to completely obliterate Equestria's morality overnight but only sometimes.
>>301119
in defense of the world building, the conflict that caused the bombs to fall was supposed to take place over like 20 years, 20 years of constant conflict and "How can we kill ziggers better" tends to change the culture of a nation a little
in defense of the world building, the conflict that caused the bombs to fall was supposed to take place over like 20 years, 20 years of constant conflict and "How can we kill ziggers better" tends to change the culture of a nation a little
>>301143
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't recall FoE ever giving a clear timeline. Even if we're generous and allow a 40 year gap between FiM S1 and the end of the war, that's barely a generation. One hell of a short time for the idyllic Equestria of the show to become comparable to - if not worse than - 2077's America.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't recall FoE ever giving a clear timeline. Even if we're generous and allow a 40 year gap between FiM S1 and the end of the war, that's barely a generation. One hell of a short time for the idyllic Equestria of the show to become comparable to - if not worse than - 2077's America.
>>301143
>>301194
Nope, 20 years is headcanon
Solid numbers and dates are never given for pre-war events and fans are STILL struggling to piece together the pre-war chronology https://falloutequestria.fandom.com/wiki/Timeline
The only thing telling us this war lasted more than a year before the nukes dropped is one newspaper clipping that says something good just happened and the war's gone on for thirteen years so far. And that thing's probably the latest piece of pre-war info found in the entire fic, since it's at the end of the fanmade timeline.
Glim plz don't look at that link it has huge spoilers where all the pre-war terminal entries and newspapers and memory orbs and holotapes and whatnot are arranged in what fans think the correct order probably is, though there are many events that are impossible to place within the timeline definitively due to lacking mentions of other important moments in the world/timeline that have or haven't happened yet.
>>301194
Nope, 20 years is headcanon
Solid numbers and dates are never given for pre-war events and fans are STILL struggling to piece together the pre-war chronology https://falloutequestria.fandom.com/wiki/Timeline
The only thing telling us this war lasted more than a year before the nukes dropped is one newspaper clipping that says something good just happened and the war's gone on for thirteen years so far. And that thing's probably the latest piece of pre-war info found in the entire fic, since it's at the end of the fanmade timeline.
Glim plz don't look at that link it has huge spoilers where all the pre-war terminal entries and newspapers and memory orbs and holotapes and whatnot are arranged in what fans think the correct order probably is, though there are many events that are impossible to place within the timeline definitively due to lacking mentions of other important moments in the world/timeline that have or haven't happened yet.
Hey, Glim
Every character I make up for serious settings has no parents or a bad relationship with them because it's all I know. But isn't that repetitive and therefore bad writing?
At best the parents are irrelevant and out of touch and easily ignored non-issues, or I just say the parents are good and then never feature them. But usually they're one of many bad issues the heroes have to deal with.
The only good parents I can think of come from media. Iroh from Avatar, Uncle from Jackie Chan Adventures, and Spongebob's grandma. Anime usually kills off its parents or makes them dumb cunts and then pretends they're amazing people.
How do I get better at writing good parents?
Every character I make up for serious settings has no parents or a bad relationship with them because it's all I know. But isn't that repetitive and therefore bad writing?
At best the parents are irrelevant and out of touch and easily ignored non-issues, or I just say the parents are good and then never feature them. But usually they're one of many bad issues the heroes have to deal with.
The only good parents I can think of come from media. Iroh from Avatar, Uncle from Jackie Chan Adventures, and Spongebob's grandma. Anime usually kills off its parents or makes them dumb cunts and then pretends they're amazing people.
How do I get better at writing good parents?
I still can't believe this fic didn't think to introduce an evil rich asshole villain and name him "Baron Wasteland"
or say that's a new name he made up and his real name's something stupid.
or say that's a new name he made up and his real name's something stupid.
>>301393
>But isn't that repetitive and therefore bad writing?
I'll give my opinion even though it wasn't asked.
No, I don't think so. I don't think it is wise to explore every facet of one's world, unless that's what you want to do. It's okay that characters are one-note so long they serve their function in the story. A story should only be what you want it to be.
This is a lesson I have learned the hard-way. Perfectionism combined with a will to emulate reality is monkey on one's back.
>But isn't that repetitive and therefore bad writing?
I'll give my opinion even though it wasn't asked.
No, I don't think so. I don't think it is wise to explore every facet of one's world, unless that's what you want to do. It's okay that characters are one-note so long they serve their function in the story. A story should only be what you want it to be.
This is a lesson I have learned the hard-way. Perfectionism combined with a will to emulate reality is monkey on one's back.
>>301401
Thank you.
I think it's cool for a hero to succeed despite the best efforts of others since it's more interesting than if everyone and their god is rigging things in his favour. So if a hero had shit parents that sabotaged him growing up but he still becomes epic, that makes him super epic, right?
Plus I essentially have no idea what good parents look like. At least when writing romance I can write what I'd like to see, how I think characters would act in this situation, or what I think would be funny. Every man has thought about what dates he'd take his pony waifu on. But good parents... that's a concept as alien to me as green skies and blue grass.
A proof-reader friend of mine asked me why all my heroes have shit upbringings so it got me thinking about that.
Thank you.
I think it's cool for a hero to succeed despite the best efforts of others since it's more interesting than if everyone and their god is rigging things in his favour. So if a hero had shit parents that sabotaged him growing up but he still becomes epic, that makes him super epic, right?
Plus I essentially have no idea what good parents look like. At least when writing romance I can write what I'd like to see, how I think characters would act in this situation, or what I think would be funny. Every man has thought about what dates he'd take his pony waifu on. But good parents... that's a concept as alien to me as green skies and blue grass.
A proof-reader friend of mine asked me why all my heroes have shit upbringings so it got me thinking about that.
>I think it's cool for a hero to succeed despite the best efforts of others since it's more interesting than if everyone and their god is rigging things in his favour. So if a hero had shit parents that sabotaged him growing up but he still becomes epic, that makes him super epic, right?
I don't know. You probably have a point in there somewhere but I can't help but question like if there is a difference between me making a character is just given a super power or a character that through his own efforts makes himself the most powerful character in the universe. I mean in the end, in fiction I can make any character go through hell and back and train for years without paus. I'm mean is there really any difference between someone who is given their powers or someone who trained to get it. Both will be special in their setting because of their powerlevel. I don't know if what I'm saying makes sense.
>Plus I essentially have no idea what good parents look like. At least when writing romance I can write what I'd like to see.
Do the same with parents. Write what you want to see. Like imagine yourself as a parent or a child and think about what you would have wanted from the other. Or something, that's my best advice.
I don't know. You probably have a point in there somewhere but I can't help but question like if there is a difference between me making a character is just given a super power or a character that through his own efforts makes himself the most powerful character in the universe. I mean in the end, in fiction I can make any character go through hell and back and train for years without paus. I'm mean is there really any difference between someone who is given their powers or someone who trained to get it. Both will be special in their setting because of their powerlevel. I don't know if what I'm saying makes sense.
>Plus I essentially have no idea what good parents look like. At least when writing romance I can write what I'd like to see.
Do the same with parents. Write what you want to see. Like imagine yourself as a parent or a child and think about what you would have wanted from the other. Or something, that's my best advice.
>>301432
Captain Marvel's an obnoxious pompous piece of shit with the charisma of blargian gnat cheese. Everything that makes her special happened to her accidentally, but the story tries to sell this power-tripping brat as a symbol of female empowerment. It would work better as a cautionary tale against female empowerment. From the start she was a military asshole and she ended her story as a bigger military asshole despite all the flashbacks claiming she once struggled to hold ropes and do normal military training shit. She was born perfect thanks to her bloodline and never had to grow or improve. For all the movie tries to rip off Iron Man and Captain America, she has none of the charm their first films had back when they had to try a little.
Compare that to Naruto, who was a loser at the start of the series. An unwanted orphan with shit ninja skills who's hated by everyone around him, he lives alone in a shitty apartment, all he can afford is cup ramen, he's resented because of the dark power sealed within him, and he does pranks for attention. He's put on a shit team that hates him and no matter how hard he trains he can't git gud fast enough. There's always someone faster and stronger than him. From the first arc, his ninja teacher tells him "There are people out there who are younger than you and stronger than me". He nearly dies against pretty much everyone he fights, clever tricks and raw determination carry him, and right after his cunt of a rival Sasuke starts to respect him, shit goes south and Sasuke betrays the ninja village to study under Snakeman. He spends the rest of the series trying and failing to get him back while dealing with other bullshit like the bootleg Organization XIII after his head and the Ninja Fourth World War.
Every time he makes some great accomplishment like saving the day or mastering some new ninja spell it's a big deal that feels earned. Goku was born a strong bulletproof kid who got stronger over time but better-written shonen heroes start as underdogs who have to git gud and fast.
The best story arc for this has to be where he fights this guy, Neji, who's trapped by his fate as a Branch Member of the Hyuga family. The Hyuga have white eyes with 360-degree x-ray vision and the Branch Family are slaves to their cousins in the main house family. To cope, Neji tells himself and anyone who'll listen that everyone's trapped by their destiny and can never improve, even though he works his ass off training to be the best fighter and illegally learned a Main Family martial arts technique. He hurt Naruto's Hyuga girlfriend, so Naruto wants to kick his ass. And when Naruto kicks his ass using a trick involving a ninja spell he used to suck at doing, he proves people can improve and nobody is bound by their destiny.
Then the bad writing kicks in, so Hinata's dad decides to reveal Neji's not like this because his own life is shit but instead because his dad died for Hinata's dad's sake in a FUCKTARDED plotline that makes no sense. Don't get me started on the hyuga kidnapping plotline or we'll be here for 4k more letters. Anyway this instantly makes Neji nicer now that he knows his slave-dad chose to die for his free brother's sake.
Near the end when the author decided to retcon Naruto's unknown parents so they were always the most important people ever most fans hated it, because it took away from Naruto's story as the underdog who rose up thanks to his own merit. And because it made ignorant twats who've never read the manga say "Hurr durr naruto was always destined for greatness because of his bloodline and the demon fox sealed inside him. That demon fox did all the real work!" just because that's what the other ignorant twats are saying.
To this day people still say Rock Lee would have made a better protagonist than Naruto, since Lee can't do ninja magic. He can only do kung fu. So he trains hard and becomes the best at it.
Sure, whether you just say the hero trained for 1000 years offscreen or got his power thrust upon him overnight makes little difference to the end result of a strong character. But if you show the training and make it meaningful and grow his power and mastery of it over the course of the story, it makes it feel earned in the audience's mind.
It would certainly make it cooler than Littlepip.
The story says Littlepip is a total newfag at everything but she can pick any lock and score any headshot and survive any number of gunshot wounds without the pain ever inconveniencing her meaningfully. Nothing gets in the way of her murderhobo rampages.
Her Pip-Buck's Auto-Aim S.A.T.S. program is her excuse for her ability to score perfect shots except when she isn't using it, and her training as a pipbuck technician is her excuse for her ability to open all manner of locks including gun safe locks and hack damn near any computer into doing whatever she wants.
She's got bullshit powers instantly and bad excuses for them. She didn't grow or learn or evolve. And it's sad that Kkat doesn't know the difference. All of her victories are hollow as a result. Whenever she's about to fail, the author will cheat for her sake and make her enemies super retarded or instantly cure the guy she failed to save.
Captain Marvel's an obnoxious pompous piece of shit with the charisma of blargian gnat cheese. Everything that makes her special happened to her accidentally, but the story tries to sell this power-tripping brat as a symbol of female empowerment. It would work better as a cautionary tale against female empowerment. From the start she was a military asshole and she ended her story as a bigger military asshole despite all the flashbacks claiming she once struggled to hold ropes and do normal military training shit. She was born perfect thanks to her bloodline and never had to grow or improve. For all the movie tries to rip off Iron Man and Captain America, she has none of the charm their first films had back when they had to try a little.
Compare that to Naruto, who was a loser at the start of the series. An unwanted orphan with shit ninja skills who's hated by everyone around him, he lives alone in a shitty apartment, all he can afford is cup ramen, he's resented because of the dark power sealed within him, and he does pranks for attention. He's put on a shit team that hates him and no matter how hard he trains he can't git gud fast enough. There's always someone faster and stronger than him. From the first arc, his ninja teacher tells him "There are people out there who are younger than you and stronger than me". He nearly dies against pretty much everyone he fights, clever tricks and raw determination carry him, and right after his cunt of a rival Sasuke starts to respect him, shit goes south and Sasuke betrays the ninja village to study under Snakeman. He spends the rest of the series trying and failing to get him back while dealing with other bullshit like the bootleg Organization XIII after his head and the Ninja Fourth World War.
Every time he makes some great accomplishment like saving the day or mastering some new ninja spell it's a big deal that feels earned. Goku was born a strong bulletproof kid who got stronger over time but better-written shonen heroes start as underdogs who have to git gud and fast.
The best story arc for this has to be where he fights this guy, Neji, who's trapped by his fate as a Branch Member of the Hyuga family. The Hyuga have white eyes with 360-degree x-ray vision and the Branch Family are slaves to their cousins in the main house family. To cope, Neji tells himself and anyone who'll listen that everyone's trapped by their destiny and can never improve, even though he works his ass off training to be the best fighter and illegally learned a Main Family martial arts technique. He hurt Naruto's Hyuga girlfriend, so Naruto wants to kick his ass. And when Naruto kicks his ass using a trick involving a ninja spell he used to suck at doing, he proves people can improve and nobody is bound by their destiny.
Then the bad writing kicks in, so Hinata's dad decides to reveal Neji's not like this because his own life is shit but instead because his dad died for Hinata's dad's sake in a FUCKTARDED plotline that makes no sense. Don't get me started on the hyuga kidnapping plotline or we'll be here for 4k more letters. Anyway this instantly makes Neji nicer now that he knows his slave-dad chose to die for his free brother's sake.
Near the end when the author decided to retcon Naruto's unknown parents so they were always the most important people ever most fans hated it, because it took away from Naruto's story as the underdog who rose up thanks to his own merit. And because it made ignorant twats who've never read the manga say "Hurr durr naruto was always destined for greatness because of his bloodline and the demon fox sealed inside him. That demon fox did all the real work!" just because that's what the other ignorant twats are saying.
To this day people still say Rock Lee would have made a better protagonist than Naruto, since Lee can't do ninja magic. He can only do kung fu. So he trains hard and becomes the best at it.
Sure, whether you just say the hero trained for 1000 years offscreen or got his power thrust upon him overnight makes little difference to the end result of a strong character. But if you show the training and make it meaningful and grow his power and mastery of it over the course of the story, it makes it feel earned in the audience's mind.
It would certainly make it cooler than Littlepip.
The story says Littlepip is a total newfag at everything but she can pick any lock and score any headshot and survive any number of gunshot wounds without the pain ever inconveniencing her meaningfully. Nothing gets in the way of her murderhobo rampages.
Her Pip-Buck's Auto-Aim S.A.T.S. program is her excuse for her ability to score perfect shots except when she isn't using it, and her training as a pipbuck technician is her excuse for her ability to open all manner of locks including gun safe locks and hack damn near any computer into doing whatever she wants.
She's got bullshit powers instantly and bad excuses for them. She didn't grow or learn or evolve. And it's sad that Kkat doesn't know the difference. All of her victories are hollow as a result. Whenever she's about to fail, the author will cheat for her sake and make her enemies super retarded or instantly cure the guy she failed to save.
>>301443
We might wanna take this somewhere else since we are veering off-topic.
Yeah, sure. I guess if you wanna send a message about how nothing is impossible and about how hard work is important, then granting your character power from no training at all is bad. And of course great execution of any idea is good.
I guess, I just don't think this is so intresting for a number of reasons.
We might wanna take this somewhere else since we are veering off-topic.
Yeah, sure. I guess if you wanna send a message about how nothing is impossible and about how hard work is important, then granting your character power from no training at all is bad. And of course great execution of any idea is good.
I guess, I just don't think this is so intresting for a number of reasons.
>>301393
>How do I write a character type?
Read, study, pretend, imagine, and delve deeply into the core components of what a good parent is (with consideration to flawed traits). That definitely depends on context and the setting. Clinical lifetime development might help with broad strokes (a psychological text book about average normal people from birth to death).
The next important thing is where the parent character has their focus on and how they accomplish it.
One ideal situation is that the parent and child are mutually beneficial and happen to enjoy each other's company. IE bestest friend situation with no malicious.
Learn every type of parent and the sliding scales for every combination for a rough over view.
>>301443
But the issue is the writing and the goal, and the audiences' interest for what power means.
FoE, the target audience is watching a glitchless speedrun with ponies and carpet munchers. Power is the ability to do stuff, so Littlepoop must be able to do anything to maintain a safe sandbox environment. There is no conflict just seeing what this one playthrough will do to get there.
Nardo the ninja has a risk of imminent death (except that it's not). Safely taking down someone without killing them should be really fucking hard. Yet real failure can't happen removing the stakes. All that is left is character interactions which boil down to. Fight, bs talking points, friendship or to be continued.
Guy and Rock Lee are limited, but excel in one area. Ideally the situation is unknown about how it'll all play out, or what can be done and if either side has minor victories.
>Sure, whether you just say the hero trained for 1000 years offscreen or got his power thrust upon him overnight makes little difference to the end result of a strong character. But if you show the training and make it meaningful and grow his power and mastery of it over the course of the story, it makes it feel earned in the audience's mind.
People enjoy seeing true masters of a craft at work.
Power without wisdom and creativity to utilize it can be irritating.
So many anime protagonists occupy the role of the curveball disrupting other characters. The whole gimmick is to be more screwier and curvier than anyone else.
Inversely giving a character power with no training, but with little to no control. Means they have to create favorable situations before hand or else.
Another thing is that the power at hand isn't used or can apply to the current problem. Such as One Punch Man he has a societal problem due to his own moral code (not being a massive dick, and being a hero). He could do anything he wants and no one could stop him, but he plays fair in the rules and limits of the society he lives in.
Then there are masters of the current rules and limitations, and the masters of the meta-rules and limitations.
One thing people do enjoy is watching someone become a master of something (because that means the people watching get a little more knowledge about how to be a master of mastering things).
People enjoy success as much as failure depending on who it happens to and how.
>Litte Pip
So LittlePip does not exhibit those traits. Little poop is in her own little world that little ponies happen to be in. Everything is perfect in LP world, with murderbandits and stuff to steal. Nothing can break that little world, because nothing can ever happen with meaning.
>The Cool Factor
Too big to cover.
>Power and being bullshit
In ye olden days Journey to the West has The Monkey King.
>Ender's Game where to maximize power
The rules are clear and set, the limited resources are there. He goes and does the thing in the right manner to properly accomplish the task.
The main goal, and personal goal diverge and well to do the personal goal he should have accumulated a lot more power.
>Dune
Sand and magic space drugs. About getting the skills and stuff.
>The Lord of the Flies
Social power and sociopathy don't play nice when kids decide to imitate The Prince, and the Art of War.
>How do I write a character type?
Read, study, pretend, imagine, and delve deeply into the core components of what a good parent is (with consideration to flawed traits). That definitely depends on context and the setting. Clinical lifetime development might help with broad strokes (a psychological text book about average normal people from birth to death).
The next important thing is where the parent character has their focus on and how they accomplish it.
One ideal situation is that the parent and child are mutually beneficial and happen to enjoy each other's company. IE bestest friend situation with no malicious.
Learn every type of parent and the sliding scales for every combination for a rough over view.
>>301443
But the issue is the writing and the goal, and the audiences' interest for what power means.
FoE, the target audience is watching a glitchless speedrun with ponies and carpet munchers. Power is the ability to do stuff, so Littlepoop must be able to do anything to maintain a safe sandbox environment. There is no conflict just seeing what this one playthrough will do to get there.
Nardo the ninja has a risk of imminent death (except that it's not). Safely taking down someone without killing them should be really fucking hard. Yet real failure can't happen removing the stakes. All that is left is character interactions which boil down to. Fight, bs talking points, friendship or to be continued.
Guy and Rock Lee are limited, but excel in one area. Ideally the situation is unknown about how it'll all play out, or what can be done and if either side has minor victories.
>Sure, whether you just say the hero trained for 1000 years offscreen or got his power thrust upon him overnight makes little difference to the end result of a strong character. But if you show the training and make it meaningful and grow his power and mastery of it over the course of the story, it makes it feel earned in the audience's mind.
People enjoy seeing true masters of a craft at work.
Power without wisdom and creativity to utilize it can be irritating.
So many anime protagonists occupy the role of the curveball disrupting other characters. The whole gimmick is to be more screwier and curvier than anyone else.
Inversely giving a character power with no training, but with little to no control. Means they have to create favorable situations before hand or else.
Another thing is that the power at hand isn't used or can apply to the current problem. Such as One Punch Man he has a societal problem due to his own moral code (not being a massive dick, and being a hero). He could do anything he wants and no one could stop him, but he plays fair in the rules and limits of the society he lives in.
Then there are masters of the current rules and limitations, and the masters of the meta-rules and limitations.
One thing people do enjoy is watching someone become a master of something (because that means the people watching get a little more knowledge about how to be a master of mastering things).
People enjoy success as much as failure depending on who it happens to and how.
>Litte Pip
So LittlePip does not exhibit those traits. Little poop is in her own little world that little ponies happen to be in. Everything is perfect in LP world, with murderbandits and stuff to steal. Nothing can break that little world, because nothing can ever happen with meaning.
>The Cool Factor
Too big to cover.
>Power and being bullshit
In ye olden days Journey to the West has The Monkey King.
>Ender's Game where to maximize power
The rules are clear and set, the limited resources are there. He goes and does the thing in the right manner to properly accomplish the task.
The main goal, and personal goal diverge and well to do the personal goal he should have accumulated a lot more power.
>Dune
Sand and magic space drugs. About getting the skills and stuff.
>The Lord of the Flies
Social power and sociopathy don't play nice when kids decide to imitate The Prince, and the Art of War.
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>>300968
Taint, meanwhile, is very poorly defined. The author clarifies it as is its own distinct concept, but we get absolutely no explanation of what it is, or precisely how it differs from radiation beyond its effects. Unlike radiation, it can't be cured or warded off with protective clothing, and it has some kind of mutative effect on creatures (presumably this is where the radroaches and such came from). It apparently can also have "fatally malignant" (this is a bit redundant btw) effects on ponies. I'm guessing this explains the existence of both "ghouls" and "zombies."
>Sounded to me like the best way to hide something was to stick it in a cave and hang a sign saying “Danger: Taint” outside.
Durr hurr hurr. Seriously though, it sounds like kkat's taint is actually a fairly terrifying thing in this world. It's malignant, incurable, and can't be detected by any other means beyond stumbling across it. Pockets of this stuff are presumably still lurking around in some of this world's unexplored places. One would think this would weigh on Littlepoop's mind a little more heavily when considering whether or not to open the door of some long-abandoned underground vault. Maybe she has a more adventurous spirit than I do, but I would probably not consider a few moldy cassette tapes and pieces of random bric a brac a prize worth risking potentially lethal exposure to kkat's taint.
>Most of this I already knew, thanks to the Wasteland Survival Guide, so I was only half-listening.
Since it has only really been mentioned a couple of times in passing, I'd more or less forgotten about the Wasteland Survival Guide. However, I'm beginning to suspect this might be the answer to a few of my questions about how Littlepoop is able to know this or that about the world.
The problem with this is that the author seems to think he can just drop a book into Littlepoop's possession, call it an all-purpose guide, and assume that this is sufficient explanation for her suddenly being knowledgeable about subjects it doesn't seem like she ought to know about. He hasn't told us anything about the contents of this book at all. Moreover, it isn't even like he's told us that this is why she knows what she knows; he just leaves it to us to assume. It would go a long way to just have her say something like "I remembered reading in the Wasteland Survival Guide that..." every time she remembers some random factoid that can get her out of a jam, but we don't even get that much.
Also, even though this guide might explain why Littlepoop, who had never set foot in the wasteland before three weeks ago, is now suddenly an expert on all aspects of wasteland survival, it doesn't really help the reader out much. We still don't know any of this stuff. Here, Littlepoop is shrugging off the DJ's lecture on radiation and the "fatally malignant" effects of kkat's taint by saying "pfft, I already know this stuff;" however, this is the first time it's actually been explained to us, and I can say that for me at least it's been a source of confusion for awhile now. We're already a good 125k words into this thing, and despite the fact that both radiation and kkat's taint have factored heavily into the story, this is the first time we've ever gotten any sort of coherent explanation as to what the fuck these things even are. This is bad; if your story depends heavily on concepts that the average person can't be expected to understand from general knowledge, you need to explain it to them. We don't need to know everything there is to know about kkat's taint, but by this point in the story we should at least know as much as Littlepoop does, especially since she is the one telling us the story. As ever, the author seems to just assume that anyone reading has played the games, and that they would already know most of this. Even if that's probably a safe assumption, it's still a lazy writing habit to get into, one you'll want to consciously work to break yourself of in your own writing.
Anyway, the DJ also mentions that a settlement in Manehattan called "Gutterville" presumably where kkat's mom is from, BUUUURN has suddenly gone dark. This could either be the author foreshadowing a future plotline, or just randomly dumping in a reference to something that will never be mentioned again; with this story it's usually about a 50/50 chance. After this, she embarrasses Littlepoop by telling everyone that the Stable Dweller loves them, as evidenced by the fact that she now has some new records to play on the air. The toaster repairpony joke is once again referenced. Then, she signs off.
Also, this is rather curious:
>Homage fixed me with a serious look. “Do you think the stuck up ponies of Tenpony Tower like the idea of having a ghoul sympathizer living in their tower? Much less broadcasting from it? If they knew who I was, then I wouldn’t have the freedom to tell it like it is. In fact, they would probably ban me from the tower altogether.”
Once again, I'm a little curious what exactly her relationship to this place is. I'd like to quote something I remember from earlier:
>"That's stupid. Everypony knows DJ Pon3's station comes outta Tenpony Tower in the Manehatten Ruins!"
This quotation appears in Chapter 5, which to my recollection is the earliest mention of the DJ. Littlepoop is in a bar, and various ponies are shouting tidbits of information. To be fair, the ponies in the tavern are all shouting at once here and seem to have conflicting information; one pony believes that the DJ is a pegasus broadcasting from Cloudsdayle. However, what the pony I quoted says proves to be accurate, and moreover, Littlepoop seems to accept this assertion as fact, and this is why she has been talking about going to Tenpony Tower intermittently for most of the book.
Taint, meanwhile, is very poorly defined. The author clarifies it as is its own distinct concept, but we get absolutely no explanation of what it is, or precisely how it differs from radiation beyond its effects. Unlike radiation, it can't be cured or warded off with protective clothing, and it has some kind of mutative effect on creatures (presumably this is where the radroaches and such came from). It apparently can also have "fatally malignant" (this is a bit redundant btw) effects on ponies. I'm guessing this explains the existence of both "ghouls" and "zombies."
>Sounded to me like the best way to hide something was to stick it in a cave and hang a sign saying “Danger: Taint” outside.
Durr hurr hurr. Seriously though, it sounds like kkat's taint is actually a fairly terrifying thing in this world. It's malignant, incurable, and can't be detected by any other means beyond stumbling across it. Pockets of this stuff are presumably still lurking around in some of this world's unexplored places. One would think this would weigh on Littlepoop's mind a little more heavily when considering whether or not to open the door of some long-abandoned underground vault. Maybe she has a more adventurous spirit than I do, but I would probably not consider a few moldy cassette tapes and pieces of random bric a brac a prize worth risking potentially lethal exposure to kkat's taint.
>Most of this I already knew, thanks to the Wasteland Survival Guide, so I was only half-listening.
Since it has only really been mentioned a couple of times in passing, I'd more or less forgotten about the Wasteland Survival Guide. However, I'm beginning to suspect this might be the answer to a few of my questions about how Littlepoop is able to know this or that about the world.
The problem with this is that the author seems to think he can just drop a book into Littlepoop's possession, call it an all-purpose guide, and assume that this is sufficient explanation for her suddenly being knowledgeable about subjects it doesn't seem like she ought to know about. He hasn't told us anything about the contents of this book at all. Moreover, it isn't even like he's told us that this is why she knows what she knows; he just leaves it to us to assume. It would go a long way to just have her say something like "I remembered reading in the Wasteland Survival Guide that..." every time she remembers some random factoid that can get her out of a jam, but we don't even get that much.
Also, even though this guide might explain why Littlepoop, who had never set foot in the wasteland before three weeks ago, is now suddenly an expert on all aspects of wasteland survival, it doesn't really help the reader out much. We still don't know any of this stuff. Here, Littlepoop is shrugging off the DJ's lecture on radiation and the "fatally malignant" effects of kkat's taint by saying "pfft, I already know this stuff;" however, this is the first time it's actually been explained to us, and I can say that for me at least it's been a source of confusion for awhile now. We're already a good 125k words into this thing, and despite the fact that both radiation and kkat's taint have factored heavily into the story, this is the first time we've ever gotten any sort of coherent explanation as to what the fuck these things even are. This is bad; if your story depends heavily on concepts that the average person can't be expected to understand from general knowledge, you need to explain it to them. We don't need to know everything there is to know about kkat's taint, but by this point in the story we should at least know as much as Littlepoop does, especially since she is the one telling us the story. As ever, the author seems to just assume that anyone reading has played the games, and that they would already know most of this. Even if that's probably a safe assumption, it's still a lazy writing habit to get into, one you'll want to consciously work to break yourself of in your own writing.
Anyway, the DJ also mentions that a settlement in Manehattan called "Gutterville" presumably where kkat's mom is from, BUUUURN has suddenly gone dark. This could either be the author foreshadowing a future plotline, or just randomly dumping in a reference to something that will never be mentioned again; with this story it's usually about a 50/50 chance. After this, she embarrasses Littlepoop by telling everyone that the Stable Dweller loves them, as evidenced by the fact that she now has some new records to play on the air. The toaster repairpony joke is once again referenced. Then, she signs off.
Also, this is rather curious:
>Homage fixed me with a serious look. “Do you think the stuck up ponies of Tenpony Tower like the idea of having a ghoul sympathizer living in their tower? Much less broadcasting from it? If they knew who I was, then I wouldn’t have the freedom to tell it like it is. In fact, they would probably ban me from the tower altogether.”
Once again, I'm a little curious what exactly her relationship to this place is. I'd like to quote something I remember from earlier:
>"That's stupid. Everypony knows DJ Pon3's station comes outta Tenpony Tower in the Manehatten Ruins!"
This quotation appears in Chapter 5, which to my recollection is the earliest mention of the DJ. Littlepoop is in a bar, and various ponies are shouting tidbits of information. To be fair, the ponies in the tavern are all shouting at once here and seem to have conflicting information; one pony believes that the DJ is a pegasus broadcasting from Cloudsdayle. However, what the pony I quoted says proves to be accurate, and moreover, Littlepoop seems to accept this assertion as fact, and this is why she has been talking about going to Tenpony Tower intermittently for most of the book.
>>301519
The reason this matters is that if some random pony, clear the fuck out in New Appleoosa, knows that DJ Pon3 broadcasts out of Tenpony Tower, it can pretty much be considered common knowledge; therefore, the residents of Tenpony themselves should reasonably know about it. Moreover, it's almost impossible to imagine that a setup this sophisticated could go unnoticed by the powers that be in Tenpony. Homage doesn't just live there, she basically has the penthouse suite reserved for her own exclusive use (I'm also a little curious about how she managed to swing this arrangement).
You'll recall that when Littlepoop got off the elevator, she took note of the opulent lobby and the fountain with its own designated water talisman. This is obviously a pretty nice part of the tower. On top of that, the emergency broadcast system is located up here, which it stands to reason the Tower's government would know about, as well as Twilight's personal library, which they also should know about (Twilight's library, with its massive collection of rare books, is Homage's personal living space; this arrangement also seems unlikely if Homage is just some nopony). On top of that, the roof of the building appears to be covered with sophisticated broadcasting equipment that can be seen from the ground. I can't imagine functional equipment of that sort is common in the wasteland, so if anyone curious about where the DJ is broadcasting from tried to narrow it down, they would have to consider that there are an extremely limited number of possibilities. In short, it is virtually impossible that the DJ would be able to operate as she does without the ponies living in the tower beneath her knowing about it.
As a side note, not only is this illogical, it's potentially another missed opportunity for kkat. If the DJ's broadcasting location is meant to be this huge mystery, it should be treated as such. The author could have made an entire plotline out of Littlepoop trying to track down the source of the broadcasts she keeps hearing. Remember how I keep mentioning that Littlepoop needs some kind of central goal to drive the story along? That the story needs to be about something? Well, why not this?
Again, we return to the issue of the total lack of focus in this story. The author's problem is that he has too many ideas; he's thought up this entire complex world with a complex history, and he wants to cram all of it into the space of a single, gargantuan tome. The result is this meandering, purposeless narrative that tries to be about everything and ends up not being about anything at all. A novel like this should have, at most, two or three major plotlines to focus on. Littlepoop searching for Velvet Remedy, or trying to track down the source of a mysterious radio broadcast, or seeking revenge on the one-armed pony that murdered her parents; any of these would be fine. Just pick a goal or a quest for the character, and build a story around that. The details of the world can be filled in as you go, but don't expect to tell us everything about the world in the space of this one story. This world is complex enough that it could easily form the basis for an entire series of novels or stories, ideally set in different time periods and told from the perspectives of several different characters.
Anyway, I'm veering off track again. Homage has made the assertion that she is somehow able to occupy the entire top floor of Tenpony Tower, the most ostentatious and prosperous settlement for miles, and use gigawatts of electricity or magic, or whatever to power her complex broadcasting equipment, without any of the occupants of said tower being any the wiser. She also implies that some sort of widespread anti-ghoul prejudice pervades this settlement (this was hinted at earlier in one of her broadcasts), and that due to her own pro-ghoul sentiments, she would likely be run out of town on a rail if anypony found out that she was here. Lucky break for her that the Tenponies are apparently as dumb as everypony else in this story.
>There were two things left that I wanted to ask Homage, and only one which I could bring myself to voice, so when we returned from the broadcast station I finally brought it up.
Littlepoop brings up Thing 1 with the DJ, without clarifying to us what Thing 2 is. I'm not sure if this is something we're supposed to know about from earlier, or if the author is intentionally leaving it for us to wonder about. Again, it tends to be about 50/50 with these kinds of things.
Anyway, Thing 1 is apparently this:
>“This morning, you said you needed my help?”
This is presumably in reference to what the DJ said at the close of the previous chapter:
>"You, on the other hoof, it seems can do a lot more. And so I'd like your help..."
This was part of a larger conversation, in which the DJ was praising Littlepoop's ability to affect positive change in the wasteland. The way this trails off and ends the chapter seems to suggest that Homage is planning something big, for which she needs the talents of an accomplished hero. Could the grand, epic quest that Homage intends to send Littlepoop on finally, finally be the glimmer of something resembling an actual plot? Let's find out.
There is a rather long and silly preamble, in which Littlepoop tries to get Homage to tell her what she has in mind. Homage, though she definitely seems to have a task in mind for Littlepoop, is embarrassed and hesitant to ask her. After some coaxing, she finally gets it out of her. So, what is the grand quest that Homage has in mind for Littlepoop? Taking out Redeye? Raising an army and sweeping the baddies out of the wasteland? Tracking down a time spell so they can go back and change the outcome of the war?
The reason this matters is that if some random pony, clear the fuck out in New Appleoosa, knows that DJ Pon3 broadcasts out of Tenpony Tower, it can pretty much be considered common knowledge; therefore, the residents of Tenpony themselves should reasonably know about it. Moreover, it's almost impossible to imagine that a setup this sophisticated could go unnoticed by the powers that be in Tenpony. Homage doesn't just live there, she basically has the penthouse suite reserved for her own exclusive use (I'm also a little curious about how she managed to swing this arrangement).
You'll recall that when Littlepoop got off the elevator, she took note of the opulent lobby and the fountain with its own designated water talisman. This is obviously a pretty nice part of the tower. On top of that, the emergency broadcast system is located up here, which it stands to reason the Tower's government would know about, as well as Twilight's personal library, which they also should know about (Twilight's library, with its massive collection of rare books, is Homage's personal living space; this arrangement also seems unlikely if Homage is just some nopony). On top of that, the roof of the building appears to be covered with sophisticated broadcasting equipment that can be seen from the ground. I can't imagine functional equipment of that sort is common in the wasteland, so if anyone curious about where the DJ is broadcasting from tried to narrow it down, they would have to consider that there are an extremely limited number of possibilities. In short, it is virtually impossible that the DJ would be able to operate as she does without the ponies living in the tower beneath her knowing about it.
As a side note, not only is this illogical, it's potentially another missed opportunity for kkat. If the DJ's broadcasting location is meant to be this huge mystery, it should be treated as such. The author could have made an entire plotline out of Littlepoop trying to track down the source of the broadcasts she keeps hearing. Remember how I keep mentioning that Littlepoop needs some kind of central goal to drive the story along? That the story needs to be about something? Well, why not this?
Again, we return to the issue of the total lack of focus in this story. The author's problem is that he has too many ideas; he's thought up this entire complex world with a complex history, and he wants to cram all of it into the space of a single, gargantuan tome. The result is this meandering, purposeless narrative that tries to be about everything and ends up not being about anything at all. A novel like this should have, at most, two or three major plotlines to focus on. Littlepoop searching for Velvet Remedy, or trying to track down the source of a mysterious radio broadcast, or seeking revenge on the one-armed pony that murdered her parents; any of these would be fine. Just pick a goal or a quest for the character, and build a story around that. The details of the world can be filled in as you go, but don't expect to tell us everything about the world in the space of this one story. This world is complex enough that it could easily form the basis for an entire series of novels or stories, ideally set in different time periods and told from the perspectives of several different characters.
Anyway, I'm veering off track again. Homage has made the assertion that she is somehow able to occupy the entire top floor of Tenpony Tower, the most ostentatious and prosperous settlement for miles, and use gigawatts of electricity or magic, or whatever to power her complex broadcasting equipment, without any of the occupants of said tower being any the wiser. She also implies that some sort of widespread anti-ghoul prejudice pervades this settlement (this was hinted at earlier in one of her broadcasts), and that due to her own pro-ghoul sentiments, she would likely be run out of town on a rail if anypony found out that she was here. Lucky break for her that the Tenponies are apparently as dumb as everypony else in this story.
>There were two things left that I wanted to ask Homage, and only one which I could bring myself to voice, so when we returned from the broadcast station I finally brought it up.
Littlepoop brings up Thing 1 with the DJ, without clarifying to us what Thing 2 is. I'm not sure if this is something we're supposed to know about from earlier, or if the author is intentionally leaving it for us to wonder about. Again, it tends to be about 50/50 with these kinds of things.
Anyway, Thing 1 is apparently this:
>“This morning, you said you needed my help?”
This is presumably in reference to what the DJ said at the close of the previous chapter:
>"You, on the other hoof, it seems can do a lot more. And so I'd like your help..."
This was part of a larger conversation, in which the DJ was praising Littlepoop's ability to affect positive change in the wasteland. The way this trails off and ends the chapter seems to suggest that Homage is planning something big, for which she needs the talents of an accomplished hero. Could the grand, epic quest that Homage intends to send Littlepoop on finally, finally be the glimmer of something resembling an actual plot? Let's find out.
There is a rather long and silly preamble, in which Littlepoop tries to get Homage to tell her what she has in mind. Homage, though she definitely seems to have a task in mind for Littlepoop, is embarrassed and hesitant to ask her. After some coaxing, she finally gets it out of her. So, what is the grand quest that Homage has in mind for Littlepoop? Taking out Redeye? Raising an army and sweeping the baddies out of the wasteland? Tracking down a time spell so they can go back and change the outcome of the war?
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>>301523
Nope. None of the above.
>She took a deep breath. Then let it all out in a rush. “I want you to get some new songs for me. Specific songs. I know that Sweetie Belle was really close with the other two founders of Stable-Tec, one of whom was Scootaloo. And Scootaloo also founded Red Racer, whose office and factory is right here in Manehattan. I came across information a few years ago that told me Scootaloo’s office safe should still contain a few demos for music that have never been heard before. I’ve been wanting to get them and listen to them ever since. But I can’t because it’s really dangerous. The place is just lousy with manticores.”
Anyone hoping for a grand quest or a central plot will once again be disappointed; it's just another mundane, pointless errand that probably involves breaking into some empty stable and sifting through some dead stranger's belongings.
There will be no grand Herculean labors for you, Littlepoop, O Hero of Heroes. No mission to destroy the Death Star, no casting the One Ring in to the fires of Mount Doom, no journey home to Ithaca. No, I'm afraid it's just more of the same kind of mind-numbingly stupid shit we've been slogging through for 124,915 words now. This time, it's records. The DJ wants you to find some goddamn records. Not the records you just brought her, mind you; she wants different records. Apparently the only thing on this twat's mind is tracking down her very own copy of "Scootaloo Sings Yoko Ono's Greatest Hits."
Jesus H. Christ. Every single time. Every. Single. Fucking. Time. Every time I want to give this author a tiny shred of praise for finally taking his story in some kind of sensible direction, he fakes me out and turns whatever I thought was shaping up to be a good idea into something incomprehensibly stupid. And I keep falling for it, over and over. Charlie Brown and his goddamn motherfucking football.
Anyway, fuck. Littlepoop needs to go find some stupid records for this rug-munching DJ now, and I guess that's the closest thing she's going to have to an objective for awhile. I'm curious if she still wants to go to Fillydelphia to punch some more slavers in the face; seems like that objective has been dropping in and out of view for some time now. But who the fuck cares; let's just keep moving.
So, what is Littlepoop's reaction to being asked to risk life and limb on such a mind-bogglingly idiotic quest?
>Wow. Okay, yes, I could definitely see why Homage would consider that a silly request, considering the records. And she didn’t even know about Velvet Remedy yet.
Gosh golly gee whiz jimminy jillickers, Radioactive Man! That sure is a humdinger of a request, by gum.
Also, what about Velvet Remedy? Something about her singing, or getting a recording contract, or something? I forget. It's hard to keep track of all the strands of autism this author has going at any given time.
>Which reminded me that I had to return to Velvet Remedy and Calamity, the friends who had been skulking around behind my back, and tell them I had no better idea what to do next than I had before we got here. I needed a distraction. And, really, it was for a good cause. Not to mention I really wanted to see Homage’s face light up again.
You know your story is bad when even your main character is pointing out that it is a meandering, plotless pile of absolute bullshit. Seriously; if you were to chain a thousand monkeys to a thousand typewriters, they probably wouldn't write Shakespeare, and they would almost certainly break some of the typewriters, but I'm sure they would still be able to think up something better than Fallout: Equestria. They wouldn't even have to type it out, they could just fling it at each other and smear it on the wall.
Anyway, to the DJ's complete surprise, Littlepoop agrees to go on her staggeringly idiotic quest.
>I considered trying to make my reasoning sound more noble, or falsifying it all together.
Altogether.
>But a bigger part of me felt that lies had no place in DJ Pon3’s domain.
Why, exactly?
>So instead, I told her, “Because I have no idea what to do next. And my companions are expecting me to come back with a plan. And, really, because you asked me to.” Gilding my words just a little, I added, “I would love to do Homage a favor.”
"I will do the nonsensical thing you're asking me to do because I can't think of anything better to do and we still have 375,000 words of plotless gibberish to slog through." Truly, kkat is the master storyteller of our age.
Anyway, the rest of the subchapter is just hashing out the details. Apparently they are going to have to fight some manticores or something, because why the hell not, but Littlepoop doesn't care because she knows that she is Mary Sue, the author's chosen, and no harm could ever possibly befall her. Also, Homage determines that LP is entitled to some kind of reward for undertaking such a dangerous and stupid mission. Since she has (somehow) learned that Calamity needs something called a flux regulator for God only knows what purpose, she promises to give them the one that she conveniently has for some reason. I've completely forgotten what this thing is or what Calamity needs it for; I think he's trying to fix up an old bus he found or something. Jesus Christ, do we seriously still have another 375,000 words of this garbage left to go? It feels like I've been reading this forever. Anyway, page break.
>I wasn't sure I really wanted us to have a flux regulator. The idea of traveling around in a pegasus-pulled bomb had dubious appeal.
That's right. They found an old airbus or flying motorhome or something, and Calamity thinks he can get it working and use it as a means of conveyance for them. If they ever have somewhere worthwhile to travel to, they will at least be able to travel there in style.
Anyway, after some more rambling, LP informs us that she is going to try and speak with Monterrey Jack before he is executed.
Nope. None of the above.
>She took a deep breath. Then let it all out in a rush. “I want you to get some new songs for me. Specific songs. I know that Sweetie Belle was really close with the other two founders of Stable-Tec, one of whom was Scootaloo. And Scootaloo also founded Red Racer, whose office and factory is right here in Manehattan. I came across information a few years ago that told me Scootaloo’s office safe should still contain a few demos for music that have never been heard before. I’ve been wanting to get them and listen to them ever since. But I can’t because it’s really dangerous. The place is just lousy with manticores.”
Anyone hoping for a grand quest or a central plot will once again be disappointed; it's just another mundane, pointless errand that probably involves breaking into some empty stable and sifting through some dead stranger's belongings.
There will be no grand Herculean labors for you, Littlepoop, O Hero of Heroes. No mission to destroy the Death Star, no casting the One Ring in to the fires of Mount Doom, no journey home to Ithaca. No, I'm afraid it's just more of the same kind of mind-numbingly stupid shit we've been slogging through for 124,915 words now. This time, it's records. The DJ wants you to find some goddamn records. Not the records you just brought her, mind you; she wants different records. Apparently the only thing on this twat's mind is tracking down her very own copy of "Scootaloo Sings Yoko Ono's Greatest Hits."
Jesus H. Christ. Every single time. Every. Single. Fucking. Time. Every time I want to give this author a tiny shred of praise for finally taking his story in some kind of sensible direction, he fakes me out and turns whatever I thought was shaping up to be a good idea into something incomprehensibly stupid. And I keep falling for it, over and over. Charlie Brown and his goddamn motherfucking football.
Anyway, fuck. Littlepoop needs to go find some stupid records for this rug-munching DJ now, and I guess that's the closest thing she's going to have to an objective for awhile. I'm curious if she still wants to go to Fillydelphia to punch some more slavers in the face; seems like that objective has been dropping in and out of view for some time now. But who the fuck cares; let's just keep moving.
So, what is Littlepoop's reaction to being asked to risk life and limb on such a mind-bogglingly idiotic quest?
>Wow. Okay, yes, I could definitely see why Homage would consider that a silly request, considering the records. And she didn’t even know about Velvet Remedy yet.
Gosh golly gee whiz jimminy jillickers, Radioactive Man! That sure is a humdinger of a request, by gum.
Also, what about Velvet Remedy? Something about her singing, or getting a recording contract, or something? I forget. It's hard to keep track of all the strands of autism this author has going at any given time.
>Which reminded me that I had to return to Velvet Remedy and Calamity, the friends who had been skulking around behind my back, and tell them I had no better idea what to do next than I had before we got here. I needed a distraction. And, really, it was for a good cause. Not to mention I really wanted to see Homage’s face light up again.
You know your story is bad when even your main character is pointing out that it is a meandering, plotless pile of absolute bullshit. Seriously; if you were to chain a thousand monkeys to a thousand typewriters, they probably wouldn't write Shakespeare, and they would almost certainly break some of the typewriters, but I'm sure they would still be able to think up something better than Fallout: Equestria. They wouldn't even have to type it out, they could just fling it at each other and smear it on the wall.
Anyway, to the DJ's complete surprise, Littlepoop agrees to go on her staggeringly idiotic quest.
>I considered trying to make my reasoning sound more noble, or falsifying it all together.
Altogether.
>But a bigger part of me felt that lies had no place in DJ Pon3’s domain.
Why, exactly?
>So instead, I told her, “Because I have no idea what to do next. And my companions are expecting me to come back with a plan. And, really, because you asked me to.” Gilding my words just a little, I added, “I would love to do Homage a favor.”
"I will do the nonsensical thing you're asking me to do because I can't think of anything better to do and we still have 375,000 words of plotless gibberish to slog through." Truly, kkat is the master storyteller of our age.
Anyway, the rest of the subchapter is just hashing out the details. Apparently they are going to have to fight some manticores or something, because why the hell not, but Littlepoop doesn't care because she knows that she is Mary Sue, the author's chosen, and no harm could ever possibly befall her. Also, Homage determines that LP is entitled to some kind of reward for undertaking such a dangerous and stupid mission. Since she has (somehow) learned that Calamity needs something called a flux regulator for God only knows what purpose, she promises to give them the one that she conveniently has for some reason. I've completely forgotten what this thing is or what Calamity needs it for; I think he's trying to fix up an old bus he found or something. Jesus Christ, do we seriously still have another 375,000 words of this garbage left to go? It feels like I've been reading this forever. Anyway, page break.
>I wasn't sure I really wanted us to have a flux regulator. The idea of traveling around in a pegasus-pulled bomb had dubious appeal.
That's right. They found an old airbus or flying motorhome or something, and Calamity thinks he can get it working and use it as a means of conveyance for them. If they ever have somewhere worthwhile to travel to, they will at least be able to travel there in style.
Anyway, after some more rambling, LP informs us that she is going to try and speak with Monterrey Jack before he is executed.
>>301068
My reviews of these stories tend to skew negative because of the simple fact that most of them have been awful. As such, I tend to focus on pointing out things that are wrong more than trying to give positive or constructive advice. Whenever possible, I like to point out things I think the author could have done differently or better, but sometimes there's just nothing else to say besides "this sucks, the author's a faggot, here are 80 things wrong with this paragraph alone."
I won't lie, part of the reason I do this is that I genuinely enjoy shitting on bad fiction, and bad pony fiction tends to be especially hilarious. However, I actually keep hoping that one of these stories is going to pleasantly surprise me. Sun and Rose was probably the best story we've read so far, but honestly the nicest thing I was able to say about it was that the author had a good idea that he could have developed better. I would love to crack into one of these FimFiction stories one day and discover something genuinely well-written; a compelling story, told elegantly by someone who at least has a basic grasp of what the fuck they're doing. Nothing would make me happier than to be able to go through a story and have nothing to say about it besides "this is great, the author likes vaginas, do what this guy did." It might make for a less entertaining thread, but I still think it would be nice to find some positive examples of how to write well, instead of just negative examples of how not to write.
>>301393
>Every character I make up for serious settings has no parents or a bad relationship with them because it's all I know. But isn't that repetitive and therefore bad writing?
What makes you think that being repetitive automatically makes it bad writing? There's nothing wrong with writing the same type of character over and over. If every character in a single story is exactly the same it can be bad, but using the same character types over and over from story to story is perfectly acceptable; if anything you're more likely to get better if you just stick to practicing the same thing over and over for awhile.
Everyone has their "favorite" type of character to write about, and personal experience is an excellent well of material to draw from. For example, I find that almost all of my protagonists tend to be male, misanthropic to some degree, and socially isolated, because that's just the kind of experience I know the most about. As a challenge to myself I once tried to write a story about a gregarious, outgoing Chad type guy, and even he wound up being kind of moody and withdrawn a lot of the time, despite being popular.
If you had shitty parents, then instead of trying to think about how to write nicer parents, why not use your shitty parents as source material? Give your character shitty parents, and use your own experience of having shitty parents to make their experience more real. What kind of people were your parents? How did they act? What were their mannerisms? What kinds of things did your parents do that made them shitty? How did you react to that kind of treatment? Take your experiences and use them to make your character's life feel more authentic.
On the other hand, if you are trying to write a character whose experience is different from yours (eventually you'll have to do this anyway; like I said it's boring and monotonous if every single character in a story is the same sort of person), you just have to go outside your own experience for inspiration. You mention using characters from anime and whatnot as a basis and that's a perfectly ok thing to do. Basing characters on preexisting characters is perfectly acceptable, in fact you can rip off just about anything you want, as long as you can do something unique and interesting with it. Authors do it all the time. The kind of plagiarism kkat does is fairly lazy and uninspired, since he basically just grabs stuff from the Fallout games, gives it a weak pony twist, and dumps it into his own work. Conversely, that story from this board that Sven keeps bringing up, Castles Made of Vapor, basically lifts its plot and most of its characters from a Raymond Chandler novel, but the author's treatment of it is unique, so it can be enjoyed as an original work even if the reader is aware of the plagiarism.
Another thing you can do is to base your characters on real people. Fitzgerald for instance was fond of using people in his social circle as the basis for characters. You can use friends, enemies, acquaintances, or even famous people as characters; as long as you don't cross over into libel they can't really stop you even if you're obvious about it. As far as your issue with parent characters go, if you know someone whose parents were nice people, you can always use them as a base. Otherwise, you could just take TV sitcom parents and use them, or even just leave the parents out of the story entirely if they don't do anything important.
>>301432
>Write what you want to see. Like imagine yourself as a parent or a child and think about what you would have wanted from the other. Or something, that's my best advice.
This is actually also pretty good advice. Take your own experiences and invert them; instead of writing what you experienced, write what you would have liked to experience.
My reviews of these stories tend to skew negative because of the simple fact that most of them have been awful. As such, I tend to focus on pointing out things that are wrong more than trying to give positive or constructive advice. Whenever possible, I like to point out things I think the author could have done differently or better, but sometimes there's just nothing else to say besides "this sucks, the author's a faggot, here are 80 things wrong with this paragraph alone."
I won't lie, part of the reason I do this is that I genuinely enjoy shitting on bad fiction, and bad pony fiction tends to be especially hilarious. However, I actually keep hoping that one of these stories is going to pleasantly surprise me. Sun and Rose was probably the best story we've read so far, but honestly the nicest thing I was able to say about it was that the author had a good idea that he could have developed better. I would love to crack into one of these FimFiction stories one day and discover something genuinely well-written; a compelling story, told elegantly by someone who at least has a basic grasp of what the fuck they're doing. Nothing would make me happier than to be able to go through a story and have nothing to say about it besides "this is great, the author likes vaginas, do what this guy did." It might make for a less entertaining thread, but I still think it would be nice to find some positive examples of how to write well, instead of just negative examples of how not to write.
>>301393
>Every character I make up for serious settings has no parents or a bad relationship with them because it's all I know. But isn't that repetitive and therefore bad writing?
What makes you think that being repetitive automatically makes it bad writing? There's nothing wrong with writing the same type of character over and over. If every character in a single story is exactly the same it can be bad, but using the same character types over and over from story to story is perfectly acceptable; if anything you're more likely to get better if you just stick to practicing the same thing over and over for awhile.
Everyone has their "favorite" type of character to write about, and personal experience is an excellent well of material to draw from. For example, I find that almost all of my protagonists tend to be male, misanthropic to some degree, and socially isolated, because that's just the kind of experience I know the most about. As a challenge to myself I once tried to write a story about a gregarious, outgoing Chad type guy, and even he wound up being kind of moody and withdrawn a lot of the time, despite being popular.
If you had shitty parents, then instead of trying to think about how to write nicer parents, why not use your shitty parents as source material? Give your character shitty parents, and use your own experience of having shitty parents to make their experience more real. What kind of people were your parents? How did they act? What were their mannerisms? What kinds of things did your parents do that made them shitty? How did you react to that kind of treatment? Take your experiences and use them to make your character's life feel more authentic.
On the other hand, if you are trying to write a character whose experience is different from yours (eventually you'll have to do this anyway; like I said it's boring and monotonous if every single character in a story is the same sort of person), you just have to go outside your own experience for inspiration. You mention using characters from anime and whatnot as a basis and that's a perfectly ok thing to do. Basing characters on preexisting characters is perfectly acceptable, in fact you can rip off just about anything you want, as long as you can do something unique and interesting with it. Authors do it all the time. The kind of plagiarism kkat does is fairly lazy and uninspired, since he basically just grabs stuff from the Fallout games, gives it a weak pony twist, and dumps it into his own work. Conversely, that story from this board that Sven keeps bringing up, Castles Made of Vapor, basically lifts its plot and most of its characters from a Raymond Chandler novel, but the author's treatment of it is unique, so it can be enjoyed as an original work even if the reader is aware of the plagiarism.
Another thing you can do is to base your characters on real people. Fitzgerald for instance was fond of using people in his social circle as the basis for characters. You can use friends, enemies, acquaintances, or even famous people as characters; as long as you don't cross over into libel they can't really stop you even if you're obvious about it. As far as your issue with parent characters go, if you know someone whose parents were nice people, you can always use them as a base. Otherwise, you could just take TV sitcom parents and use them, or even just leave the parents out of the story entirely if they don't do anything important.
>>301432
>Write what you want to see. Like imagine yourself as a parent or a child and think about what you would have wanted from the other. Or something, that's my best advice.
This is actually also pretty good advice. Take your own experiences and invert them; instead of writing what you experienced, write what you would have liked to experience.
>Again, we return to the issue of the total lack of focus in this story. The author's problem is that he has too many ideas; he's thought up this entire complex world with a complex history, and he wants to cram all of it into the space of a single, gargantuan tome. The result is this meandering, purposeless narrative that tries to be about everything and ends up not being about anything at all. A novel like this should have, at most, two or three major plotlines to focus on. Littlepoop searching for Velvet Remedy, or trying to track down the source of a mysterious radio broadcast, or seeking revenge on the one-armed pony that murdered her parents; any of these would be fine. Just pick a goal or a quest for the character, and build a story around that. The details of the world can be filled in as you go, but don't expect to tell us everything about the world in the space of this one story. This world is complex enough that it could easily form the basis for an entire series of novels or stories, ideally set in different time periods and told from the perspectives of several different characters.
As a point of interest, this is pretty much the FoE subfandom in a nutshell. FoE has an ungodly number of spinoffs, most of them incomplete or similarly shoddy, but very few of them address the places or events in the original story directly. They often take place in entirely different time periods or regions, with the events of Littlepip's murdehobo adventure referenced only in passing if they come up at all.
Granted, this is a very 'Fallout' thing to do, as the successive games in the series all take place in distinct regions and time periods. Still, I get the impression that for people who enjoy this sort of thing enough to stick around, playing in Kkat's sandbox is a lot more fun than playing with Kkat's toys.
As a point of interest, this is pretty much the FoE subfandom in a nutshell. FoE has an ungodly number of spinoffs, most of them incomplete or similarly shoddy, but very few of them address the places or events in the original story directly. They often take place in entirely different time periods or regions, with the events of Littlepip's murdehobo adventure referenced only in passing if they come up at all.
Granted, this is a very 'Fallout' thing to do, as the successive games in the series all take place in distinct regions and time periods. Still, I get the impression that for people who enjoy this sort of thing enough to stick around, playing in Kkat's sandbox is a lot more fun than playing with Kkat's toys.
>>301525
Giving collectables to a tech-loving faggot in a penthouse suite...
This reminds me of how you gave Snowglobes to Mr House in Fallout NV only shite.
Mr House likes Snowglobes so he'll give you 2000 caps for each one you give him. It's a nice optional sidequest to reward exploration.
Of course, because House is a well-written character with goals and values and not just a plot device, he's got things on his mind besides Collectables.
When you meet him, he wants you to get him the Platinum Chip because that life-changing McGuffin's way more important than some snowglobes.
The snowglobes are a side objective and they're treated as such.
There is world-alteringly important shit at stake, so he NEVER postpones his main questline to say "Now go get some fucking snowglobes/records for me".
It's retarded that Littlepip just met this DJ, who has perfectly good excuses to know basically everything and give Littlepip her missions from now on AND a base of operations even nicer than whatever house she got as a reward for the Shattered Hoof shite, but even though LP just gave the DJ some records the DJ is still hungry for even more fucking records.
Surely this DJ has something better she could ask of Littlepoop, such as:
"Can you go save a loyal listener who's in danger because his failing hometown's surrounded by raider bases?"
or "I heard some rumors that an evil bounty hunter who loves raping and killing innocents for fun during his bounty hunts was spotted west of Manehattan with a lasergun that matches the description of an almighty matter-obliterating experimental pre-war energy weapon, so go and kill him and take his sick laser gun right fucking now because I don't want that gun in evil hands plus it'll help you when I send you on more dangerous missions"
or "Can you help me perform a coup on my tower to take absolute control of it? The current ruling class want my head and I don't know how much longer it'll take them to figure out I'm the radio host constantly calling them wankers! I promise I'll make this settlement nicer to outside once I'm its radio god-queen! Come on, it'll be fun!"
>>301542
I've always found it funny how so many Fallout Equestria fics, if they aren't just ripping off Fallout elements Kkat never got around to ripping off, include unique stuff that would work better in their own takes on post-apocalyptic equestrias unsaddled by the nonsense Kkunt forced into his own retarded timeline.
So many canon FIM characters are basically off-limits because this story includes enough about their role in pre-downfall Equestria to make it damn near impossible to use them in any other manner without retcons.
For example, you can't write about a badass in power armour who personally fought side by side with Twilight Sparkle because she was canonically managing a ministry that only ever invented a handful of Fallout elements despite leapfrogging over countless tech innovations needed to make them possible.
You could shoehorn in elements from FIM's later season like the Kirins and Yaks and Crystal Empire but that would just be a cheap gimmick. How interesting could a joke race like Yaks possibly be in Equestria, or in a dead Equestria?
You can't unite the mane six and give them a heroic last stand against evil, because that isn't how they died. You'd have to retcon shit to make that possible, and that would piss off the braindead zombie consoomer fanfags who think Kkunt's the ultimate pony writer.
It's like you're scavenging for scraps in Kkunt's bin because he already cannibalized Fallout and Equestria for his "Fallout Equestria" garbage.
Giving collectables to a tech-loving faggot in a penthouse suite...
This reminds me of how you gave Snowglobes to Mr House in Fallout NV only shite.
Mr House likes Snowglobes so he'll give you 2000 caps for each one you give him. It's a nice optional sidequest to reward exploration.
Of course, because House is a well-written character with goals and values and not just a plot device, he's got things on his mind besides Collectables.
When you meet him, he wants you to get him the Platinum Chip because that life-changing McGuffin's way more important than some snowglobes.
The snowglobes are a side objective and they're treated as such.
There is world-alteringly important shit at stake, so he NEVER postpones his main questline to say "Now go get some fucking snowglobes/records for me".
It's retarded that Littlepip just met this DJ, who has perfectly good excuses to know basically everything and give Littlepip her missions from now on AND a base of operations even nicer than whatever house she got as a reward for the Shattered Hoof shite, but even though LP just gave the DJ some records the DJ is still hungry for even more fucking records.
Surely this DJ has something better she could ask of Littlepoop, such as:
"Can you go save a loyal listener who's in danger because his failing hometown's surrounded by raider bases?"
or "I heard some rumors that an evil bounty hunter who loves raping and killing innocents for fun during his bounty hunts was spotted west of Manehattan with a lasergun that matches the description of an almighty matter-obliterating experimental pre-war energy weapon, so go and kill him and take his sick laser gun right fucking now because I don't want that gun in evil hands plus it'll help you when I send you on more dangerous missions"
or "Can you help me perform a coup on my tower to take absolute control of it? The current ruling class want my head and I don't know how much longer it'll take them to figure out I'm the radio host constantly calling them wankers! I promise I'll make this settlement nicer to outside once I'm its radio god-queen! Come on, it'll be fun!"
>>301542
I've always found it funny how so many Fallout Equestria fics, if they aren't just ripping off Fallout elements Kkat never got around to ripping off, include unique stuff that would work better in their own takes on post-apocalyptic equestrias unsaddled by the nonsense Kkunt forced into his own retarded timeline.
So many canon FIM characters are basically off-limits because this story includes enough about their role in pre-downfall Equestria to make it damn near impossible to use them in any other manner without retcons.
For example, you can't write about a badass in power armour who personally fought side by side with Twilight Sparkle because she was canonically managing a ministry that only ever invented a handful of Fallout elements despite leapfrogging over countless tech innovations needed to make them possible.
You could shoehorn in elements from FIM's later season like the Kirins and Yaks and Crystal Empire but that would just be a cheap gimmick. How interesting could a joke race like Yaks possibly be in Equestria, or in a dead Equestria?
You can't unite the mane six and give them a heroic last stand against evil, because that isn't how they died. You'd have to retcon shit to make that possible, and that would piss off the braindead zombie consoomer fanfags who think Kkunt's the ultimate pony writer.
It's like you're scavenging for scraps in Kkunt's bin because he already cannibalized Fallout and Equestria for his "Fallout Equestria" garbage.
>>301542
>>301546
This sort of thing really depresses me. I hear verbatim from the FO:E subfandom that, even if the person you ask despises the original story, they admit that the world is the draw. But what about the worldbuilding is the draw? Almost every instance of it is so horribly constructed, executed, pointless details, or bogs down the story. People tell me they like the IDEAS put forth by the story, but those too are shoddy or ridiculous with how they are presented. So it's more that they like the IDEA of an idea, separate entirely from the story, since it is rarely ever pulled off even decently.
So what then is that worth? Why is it so special? To take only the idea and put so many layers of abstraction between yourself and how the story handles these ideas you may as well be reading from a worldbuilding PDF that presents the concepts themselves, free of any sort of narrative.
So why this story, and not someone else's story, who actually knows how to write and present worldbuilding? Surely there's at least a hundred adventure stories on fimfic that are both well-written and have some decent lore. So why is it this story is the only one with "A wonderful sandbox to play in" when in actuality it's full of dog turds and the sand is gravel?
I get this story is an indomitable titan of the fandom, but I hope you guys understand what I mean when I genuinely feel puzzled by the concession of
>"but the world tho!"
When the worldbuilding is done so fucking poorly, with plagiarized and narratively-obstructive ideas spread over an excess of 500k words. Yet this story is the best and most special one to express yourself with.
>>301546
This sort of thing really depresses me. I hear verbatim from the FO:E subfandom that, even if the person you ask despises the original story, they admit that the world is the draw. But what about the worldbuilding is the draw? Almost every instance of it is so horribly constructed, executed, pointless details, or bogs down the story. People tell me they like the IDEAS put forth by the story, but those too are shoddy or ridiculous with how they are presented. So it's more that they like the IDEA of an idea, separate entirely from the story, since it is rarely ever pulled off even decently.
So what then is that worth? Why is it so special? To take only the idea and put so many layers of abstraction between yourself and how the story handles these ideas you may as well be reading from a worldbuilding PDF that presents the concepts themselves, free of any sort of narrative.
So why this story, and not someone else's story, who actually knows how to write and present worldbuilding? Surely there's at least a hundred adventure stories on fimfic that are both well-written and have some decent lore. So why is it this story is the only one with "A wonderful sandbox to play in" when in actuality it's full of dog turds and the sand is gravel?
I get this story is an indomitable titan of the fandom, but I hope you guys understand what I mean when I genuinely feel puzzled by the concession of
>"but the world tho!"
When the worldbuilding is done so fucking poorly, with plagiarized and narratively-obstructive ideas spread over an excess of 500k words. Yet this story is the best and most special one to express yourself with.
>>301531
>Whenever possible, I like to point out things I think the author could have done differently or better
I know. I like when you do that. But I also get,
>but sometimes there's just nothing else to say besides "this sucks, the author's a faggot, here are 80 things wrong with this paragraph alone."
>I won't lie, part of the reason I do this is that I genuinely enjoy shitting on bad fiction
This is completely fine. I like what you're doing here. I hope you don't take this as if I want you to change anything. I'm just giving you my perspective.
>>301551
I think ideas alone have merit. Obviously, if that's all your story has and you have to go through half a million words to get them, then they are likely not worth it.
>Whenever possible, I like to point out things I think the author could have done differently or better
I know. I like when you do that. But I also get,
>but sometimes there's just nothing else to say besides "this sucks, the author's a faggot, here are 80 things wrong with this paragraph alone."
>I won't lie, part of the reason I do this is that I genuinely enjoy shitting on bad fiction
This is completely fine. I like what you're doing here. I hope you don't take this as if I want you to change anything. I'm just giving you my perspective.
>>301551
I think ideas alone have merit. Obviously, if that's all your story has and you have to go through half a million words to get them, then they are likely not worth it.
>>301542
> playing in Kkat's sandbox is a lot more fun than playing with Kkat's toys.
O'boy, hehe. Clever double entendres my dude.
> playing in Kkat's sandbox is a lot more fun than playing with Kkat's toys.
O'boy, hehe. Clever double entendres my dude.
>>301551
Eliminate the impossible and whatever remains is the truth.
The FE fans that say "But I like Kkat's world" while going out of their way to create a more logically consistent corner of a nonsense world and try and tell a better story than Kkat within their better world are actually just trying to use the FE label for marketing and turn FE fans into their own fans.
Like having your metal band perform a superior cover of a pop song in the charts. It's all about getting those clicks and views. Pretending to like what you're covering even as you improve as many elements of the song as you can get away with is a marketing trick to avoid pissing off the song's fans.
But it won't work here. Blind fans of FE love it for its trashiness and overlook or fail to notice its absurdity. They'll turn up their nose at fillet minion because they're used to eating worms from Kkat's infected cockpussy. They want more of the same when they read fanfics of fanfics and the only fic to truly inspire wonder within them and gain fame points is Project Horizons because it out-darks and out-edges and out-lesbians and out-longs the original. Two other fics also get fame points in the fandom. Murky Number Sixty Nine is also darker than the original and Puppysmiles has more darkness and is 90% aimless pointless filler and 10 faker forced-cuteness than the nyx fic. It even has a forced NMM plotline with all the same problems but worse. Fuck that fic in particular.
Eliminate the impossible and whatever remains is the truth.
The FE fans that say "But I like Kkat's world" while going out of their way to create a more logically consistent corner of a nonsense world and try and tell a better story than Kkat within their better world are actually just trying to use the FE label for marketing and turn FE fans into their own fans.
Like having your metal band perform a superior cover of a pop song in the charts. It's all about getting those clicks and views. Pretending to like what you're covering even as you improve as many elements of the song as you can get away with is a marketing trick to avoid pissing off the song's fans.
But it won't work here. Blind fans of FE love it for its trashiness and overlook or fail to notice its absurdity. They'll turn up their nose at fillet minion because they're used to eating worms from Kkat's infected cockpussy. They want more of the same when they read fanfics of fanfics and the only fic to truly inspire wonder within them and gain fame points is Project Horizons because it out-darks and out-edges and out-lesbians and out-longs the original. Two other fics also get fame points in the fandom. Murky Number Sixty Nine is also darker than the original and Puppysmiles has more darkness and is 90% aimless pointless filler and 10 faker forced-cuteness than the nyx fic. It even has a forced NMM plotline with all the same problems but worse. Fuck that fic in particular.
>>301594
>The FE fans that say "But I like Kkat's world"
I don't think it's even this a lot of the time. It's more that people are drawn to the concept of ponies tackling a post-apocalyptic setting but FoE, sadly, is the only game in town. It was written when the fandom was in its initial explosive growth period, and the sheer volume of spinoffs have given it a lot of inertia that it wouldn't otherwise have had. Perhaps if the dice had fallen differently we'd be talking about the ten year old Past Sins or End of Ponies fandom instead.
>The FE fans that say "But I like Kkat's world"
I don't think it's even this a lot of the time. It's more that people are drawn to the concept of ponies tackling a post-apocalyptic setting but FoE, sadly, is the only game in town. It was written when the fandom was in its initial explosive growth period, and the sheer volume of spinoffs have given it a lot of inertia that it wouldn't otherwise have had. Perhaps if the dice had fallen differently we'd be talking about the ten year old Past Sins or End of Ponies fandom instead.
>>301594
>>301615
I'm glad you two seem to have understood what I was getting at: Could you really say you love Kkat's world if you try to change and fix so much, and only like the IDEAS in premise, not execution? It's something i've thought about for a long time now.
It's a huge shame that this story seems to be this all-consuming void where anyone wanting to write a more serious or AU adventure story, or post-apocalyptic pony fic, ends up being absorbed by FO:E whether intentionally or unintentionally. I couldn't help but imagine all the potential settings or adventure ideas out there that ended up being contributed toward FO:E instead.
The nebulous and expansive subfandom also bothers me in a different way: It is one of the few, if not ONLY current examples of people contributing to a piece of fanwork. If you're an artist that is going to do fanart for a piece of fan content, it is GOING TO BE FO:E. If you're a popular artist drawing art for a story you like, it is going to be FO:E. I really wish people spread out more, so to speak, and drew art for other stories they enjoy, or put their fan love and appreciation into something else that is more deserving, or starved of content.
I get that's just the nature of popular things, but it's a shame that this fandom's content drought exists for everything except this absolutely abhorrently-written story. It's a damn shame, and I wish I saw more fics getting attention, discussion, or content in its stead.
>It's more that people are drawn to the concept of ponies tackling a post-apocalyptic setting but FoE, sadly, is the only game in town.
Sometimes I wonder if things can even be made different at this point. The fandom is in its waning years and less energetic, and I wonder if anything, even if it were the literal BEST FIC EVER, could receive even a smidgen of attention at this point. I wonder about all the fics that might be going under the radar that could be the next FO:E. I know it could never happen anymore, but I wish we were at the point where we had many interesting settings and fics to choose from that stand as the face of interesting subfandoms in this fandom, instead of ONLY FO:E.
I have always wanted to write a post-apocalyptic pony fic. I still wish to do so, and I hope to give other folks like myself something else to read instead of FO:E, that still approaches the idea of ponies in such a setting because it's my favorite.
>>301615
I'm glad you two seem to have understood what I was getting at: Could you really say you love Kkat's world if you try to change and fix so much, and only like the IDEAS in premise, not execution? It's something i've thought about for a long time now.
It's a huge shame that this story seems to be this all-consuming void where anyone wanting to write a more serious or AU adventure story, or post-apocalyptic pony fic, ends up being absorbed by FO:E whether intentionally or unintentionally. I couldn't help but imagine all the potential settings or adventure ideas out there that ended up being contributed toward FO:E instead.
The nebulous and expansive subfandom also bothers me in a different way: It is one of the few, if not ONLY current examples of people contributing to a piece of fanwork. If you're an artist that is going to do fanart for a piece of fan content, it is GOING TO BE FO:E. If you're a popular artist drawing art for a story you like, it is going to be FO:E. I really wish people spread out more, so to speak, and drew art for other stories they enjoy, or put their fan love and appreciation into something else that is more deserving, or starved of content.
I get that's just the nature of popular things, but it's a shame that this fandom's content drought exists for everything except this absolutely abhorrently-written story. It's a damn shame, and I wish I saw more fics getting attention, discussion, or content in its stead.
>It's more that people are drawn to the concept of ponies tackling a post-apocalyptic setting but FoE, sadly, is the only game in town.
Sometimes I wonder if things can even be made different at this point. The fandom is in its waning years and less energetic, and I wonder if anything, even if it were the literal BEST FIC EVER, could receive even a smidgen of attention at this point. I wonder about all the fics that might be going under the radar that could be the next FO:E. I know it could never happen anymore, but I wish we were at the point where we had many interesting settings and fics to choose from that stand as the face of interesting subfandoms in this fandom, instead of ONLY FO:E.
I have always wanted to write a post-apocalyptic pony fic. I still wish to do so, and I hope to give other folks like myself something else to read instead of FO:E, that still approaches the idea of ponies in such a setting because it's my favorite.
>>301525
Getting past the guards is apparently no problem. She downs one of her crack mints and uses her super-charisma to charm her way past them, because that's how things work in this shoddily constructed clusterfuck of a universe. Also, it appears that she is once again bouncing from objective to objective:
>The flux regulator was going to be an astounding benefit. After finishing up business in Tenpony Tower, we would go back and fix up the Sky Bandit. Maybe take a trip back home to Junction R-7 for a little equipment maintenance and inventory housekeeping. Then we should be able to go straight to Fillydelphia, bypassing all the dangers along the way...
She literally just got done telling Homage that she was going to track down records for her or whatever. Now she's going to Fillydelphia again? And I say again because my understanding is that she was supposed to be going there to begin with, but then for some reason decided to come here instead. Not only does this character have a laundry list of pointless non-objectives in place of any tangible goals, it's like the author can't even keep track of which non-objective she's working on even from paragraph to paragraph.
>"What do you want?" The sour voice of Monterey Jack cut through my preoccupation with my Party-Time-enhanced brilliance.
Oh boy, this should be good. I'm sure a coked-up version of the pony who got him sent to death row is exactly who this guy would like to speak to right about now.
Anyway, it looks like he's about to explain the reasoning behind his completely nonsensical actions just now. Might as well hear him out. Littlepoop approaches his cell and asks him what the fuck, and he responds thusly:
>Monterey Jack fixed me with a cool stare. And finally, as if speaking to a child, “Because the Equestrian Wasteland demands sacrifices. You haven’t been out here long enough to get that…” He looked me over. “But I’m guessing you’ve started to. Not the innocent little filly you were just three weeks ago, are you? You’ve killed. And not just monsters, you’ve killed other ponies. Tell me, when you stepped out of that Stable, were you a killer?
He goes on like this for a few paragraphs. Far from clarifying anything, his spiel here actually makes his actions seem even more incomprehensible. He basically describes the Equestrian Wasteland as a grim, terrible place where the line between good and evil is hopelessly blurred and a pony needs to do whatever they can to survive. If this is his philosophy, then why cop to something he didn't have to cop to, especially knowing the consequences? The same "me first" impulse that drove him to rob Littlepoop in the first place should logically have driven him to deny her accusation. Anyway, he keeps going, so maybe he'll get to the point eventually.
>“You betrayed anypony yet? Left anypony to die just to save your own skin? Killed an innocent yet because it was the only way to protect you and your own?” He stared at me, reading the revulsion in my eyes. “No? How about lesser things. Ever just walked away?”
>My mind flashed to the blue pony being chased down by her rapists. But that didn’t count! We’d saved her life. Calamity had even brought her healing potions. It wasn’t as if we just left her to her fate. We helped! …and then we left her. Velvet Remedy, I realized with PTM-laced insight, would never have let us walk away without seeing the girl safely home had she not been traumatized by the sight of Calamity slaying the colt. But why didn’t I insist that? What was wrong with me?
First of all, this is the first we've heard about Calamity bringing the raped mare healing potions. At the time, the author just did one of his obnoxious time skips after Calamity shot the kid and we rejoined the group some time later; I had assumed they simply sniped the ponies who had attacked the kid and gone on their way.
We are now told for the first time that apparently they stopped and gave aid to the wounded mare. There's actually a bit of a logic issue here, since at the time they would have been atop the monorail tracks, and the mare as I understand it was on the street below. In order to help her, they would have needed to find a way down from the tracks, which likely would have required backtracking until they found a staircase or something. Then again, Calamity can fly, and Littlepoop has her obnoxious overpowered levitation ability, so maybe this detail isn't important.
In any event, MJ's dialogue here is written in a rather accusatory tone, and Littlepoop seems to be trying to justify her actions against his accusations. However, it's not clear what he's accusing her of or what she feels guilty about. I get that Calamity's killing the colt was supposed to be a traumatic thing for her, but that isn't the focus here. She didn't abandon the mare afterward, either; they apparently went all the way down there to help her, which they didn't even need to do in the first place. However, LP feels guilty because...they didn't quite help her enough? I guess? If she hadn't been preoccupied thinking about child murder she might have thought to offer to escort the mare back home, and if Velvet hadn't been also preoccupied with child murder she would have reminded her to escort the mare back home? I guess? Meanwhile, Monterrey is accusing her of...betraying her principles? I guess? Also, the whole point of this was supposed to be Monterrey explaining why he confessed to robbing Littlepoop, which he still hasn't done.
I'm starting to wonder if I ought to go out and get a covid vaccine; I feel like I may not have the requisite levels of autism to make sense of most of this text.
Getting past the guards is apparently no problem. She downs one of her crack mints and uses her super-charisma to charm her way past them, because that's how things work in this shoddily constructed clusterfuck of a universe. Also, it appears that she is once again bouncing from objective to objective:
>The flux regulator was going to be an astounding benefit. After finishing up business in Tenpony Tower, we would go back and fix up the Sky Bandit. Maybe take a trip back home to Junction R-7 for a little equipment maintenance and inventory housekeeping. Then we should be able to go straight to Fillydelphia, bypassing all the dangers along the way...
She literally just got done telling Homage that she was going to track down records for her or whatever. Now she's going to Fillydelphia again? And I say again because my understanding is that she was supposed to be going there to begin with, but then for some reason decided to come here instead. Not only does this character have a laundry list of pointless non-objectives in place of any tangible goals, it's like the author can't even keep track of which non-objective she's working on even from paragraph to paragraph.
>"What do you want?" The sour voice of Monterey Jack cut through my preoccupation with my Party-Time-enhanced brilliance.
Oh boy, this should be good. I'm sure a coked-up version of the pony who got him sent to death row is exactly who this guy would like to speak to right about now.
Anyway, it looks like he's about to explain the reasoning behind his completely nonsensical actions just now. Might as well hear him out. Littlepoop approaches his cell and asks him what the fuck, and he responds thusly:
>Monterey Jack fixed me with a cool stare. And finally, as if speaking to a child, “Because the Equestrian Wasteland demands sacrifices. You haven’t been out here long enough to get that…” He looked me over. “But I’m guessing you’ve started to. Not the innocent little filly you were just three weeks ago, are you? You’ve killed. And not just monsters, you’ve killed other ponies. Tell me, when you stepped out of that Stable, were you a killer?
He goes on like this for a few paragraphs. Far from clarifying anything, his spiel here actually makes his actions seem even more incomprehensible. He basically describes the Equestrian Wasteland as a grim, terrible place where the line between good and evil is hopelessly blurred and a pony needs to do whatever they can to survive. If this is his philosophy, then why cop to something he didn't have to cop to, especially knowing the consequences? The same "me first" impulse that drove him to rob Littlepoop in the first place should logically have driven him to deny her accusation. Anyway, he keeps going, so maybe he'll get to the point eventually.
>“You betrayed anypony yet? Left anypony to die just to save your own skin? Killed an innocent yet because it was the only way to protect you and your own?” He stared at me, reading the revulsion in my eyes. “No? How about lesser things. Ever just walked away?”
>My mind flashed to the blue pony being chased down by her rapists. But that didn’t count! We’d saved her life. Calamity had even brought her healing potions. It wasn’t as if we just left her to her fate. We helped! …and then we left her. Velvet Remedy, I realized with PTM-laced insight, would never have let us walk away without seeing the girl safely home had she not been traumatized by the sight of Calamity slaying the colt. But why didn’t I insist that? What was wrong with me?
First of all, this is the first we've heard about Calamity bringing the raped mare healing potions. At the time, the author just did one of his obnoxious time skips after Calamity shot the kid and we rejoined the group some time later; I had assumed they simply sniped the ponies who had attacked the kid and gone on their way.
We are now told for the first time that apparently they stopped and gave aid to the wounded mare. There's actually a bit of a logic issue here, since at the time they would have been atop the monorail tracks, and the mare as I understand it was on the street below. In order to help her, they would have needed to find a way down from the tracks, which likely would have required backtracking until they found a staircase or something. Then again, Calamity can fly, and Littlepoop has her obnoxious overpowered levitation ability, so maybe this detail isn't important.
In any event, MJ's dialogue here is written in a rather accusatory tone, and Littlepoop seems to be trying to justify her actions against his accusations. However, it's not clear what he's accusing her of or what she feels guilty about. I get that Calamity's killing the colt was supposed to be a traumatic thing for her, but that isn't the focus here. She didn't abandon the mare afterward, either; they apparently went all the way down there to help her, which they didn't even need to do in the first place. However, LP feels guilty because...they didn't quite help her enough? I guess? If she hadn't been preoccupied thinking about child murder she might have thought to offer to escort the mare back home, and if Velvet hadn't been also preoccupied with child murder she would have reminded her to escort the mare back home? I guess? Meanwhile, Monterrey is accusing her of...betraying her principles? I guess? Also, the whole point of this was supposed to be Monterrey explaining why he confessed to robbing Littlepoop, which he still hasn't done.
I'm starting to wonder if I ought to go out and get a covid vaccine; I feel like I may not have the requisite levels of autism to make sense of most of this text.
>>301626
He eventually gets to the point:
>“The Equestrian Wasteland demands sacrifices. It makes you whittle away bits of yourself until you can’t recognize you anymore. So you find a virtue. You find something in yourself that you believe in, that you do not compromise. Ever. And as long as you can keep that part of you, that one good thing, then you can bear to look at yourself in the mirror each morning. It becomes your anchor, the thing that lets you live with yourself.
>“My virtue, my anchor, is that I’m an honest pony. I keep to my word. I have never cheated a customer. I do not lie. And as long as I can look at myself and know that I’m still an honest pony, then I can bear everything I’ve ever had to do to provide a safe place for my filly and colts.”
This appears to be the best explanation we're going to get. As far as I can tell, this pony is basically shell-shocked by all the grim shit he's seen or done or had to do while he was out wandering the wasteland, scavenging for cheese or whatever the fuck he was doing out there (this point still hasn't been cleared up btw), and in order to make peace with it, has chosen one inviolable principle to cling to.
This seems to be an elaboration on the "virtue" concept that has been brought up once or twice. However, this story's concept of virtue is...strange...and Monterrey's personal interpretation of his own virtue is...also strange. In a nutshell, "virtue" in this story seems to mean an unshakable principle that defines you; you adhere to it no matter what, even if you have to compromise everything else you believe in. Monterrey's virtue is "honesty," which he seems to interpret in its most literal context: he refuses to lie no matter what the circumstances.
What's perplexing here is not that he refuses to lie, so much as that he refuses to lie while simultaneously choosing to do things he'd be better off lying about. His concept of "virtue" is extremely narrow and seems to affect only one narrow portion of his personal values system. He had no particular moral compunctions about stealing from Littlepoop, and it's implied that he's done other things he's not proud of over the years, yet he seems to believe that as long as he never fibs to anyone or shortchanges one of his fucking cheese customers that this somehow makes up for whatever rape and murder and grand larceny he might commit while out in the wasteland. However, the catch is that if caught, he can't lie about any of it. This makes less and less sense the more I actually sit and think about it.
There is an old Jim Carrey movie called Liar Liar, in which Carrey plays a dishonest lawyer. His son gets tired of his father lying to everyone all the time, so on his birthday he wishes that he not be able to lie anymore. The wish comes true, and for the rest of the movie Carrey is physically prevented from telling lies. This leads to all sorts of inconveniences for him. Not only is he unable to do his job effectively, he is forced to tell the truth even in situations where telling a harmless fib is the expected and far more prudent response; for instance, a woman he is sleeping with asks him if the sex was good, and he is forced to respond with "I've had better." At another point, his son says he learned in school that "true beauty is on the inside," and Carrey has to respond with "that's just something ugly people say." The film finds its humor in exploring how inconvenient life could become if we weren't able to tell all of the little white lies that are part and parcel of living with other humans.
Monterrey's interpretation of honesty reminds me a little of this movie, except there's no magic spell. He holds himself to this rule entirely on his own, yet his belief in this virtue has no effect on any other aspect of his behavior. Seems to me that if he really considered "honesty" to be his personal virtue, and took it seriously enough to treat it as an unbreakable code even in the face of death, it would extend into his entire worldview and affect his behavior in any situation. His encounter with Littlepoop is a good example of how this might work.
His reasons for robbing (or attempting to rob) her are logically sound. He doesn't (and shouldn't) trust her, and she has nothing to offer him as a traveling companion, so there's no point in letting her join him. She's green and inexperienced and will probably be killed out here one way or the other, and she's carrying a lot of valuable stuff. He has the advantage and could easily rob her, so it makes sense that he ought to. However, this is pure logic; the moral side of the issue is more complicated.
If Monterrey considers "honesty" to be his one unassailable virtue, it should extend to all aspects of his conduct, not just a refusal to tell lies. Ergo, when faced with the decision to rob or not to rob Littlepoop, his virtue ought to have directed him to not rob her, even though he had the opportunity and it made sense to. Even if it was a matter of survival, if his principles are supposed to be this strong, he should have still opted not to do it and accepted the hazards. That he robbed her anyway indicates that his whole idea of "virtue" is horse shit; this isn't a principle he believes in, it's just a self-imposed arbitrary rule he follows to the point of absurdity.
In Buddhism, aspirants are given a set of moral precepts to follow: chastity, truthfulness, commitment to nonviolence, and so forth. However, the teachings also stress that the ultimate goal is enlightenment, and the purpose of "right conduct" is to orient the aspirant's mind in this direction; if these ideas are taken simply as commandments to be obeyed for the sake of obedience it defeats the point. In Christianity, many of Christ's parables approach moral questions the same way, stressing that the overall purpose of morality is to direct one's mind toward God, rather than simply following rules for the sake of following rules.
He eventually gets to the point:
>“The Equestrian Wasteland demands sacrifices. It makes you whittle away bits of yourself until you can’t recognize you anymore. So you find a virtue. You find something in yourself that you believe in, that you do not compromise. Ever. And as long as you can keep that part of you, that one good thing, then you can bear to look at yourself in the mirror each morning. It becomes your anchor, the thing that lets you live with yourself.
>“My virtue, my anchor, is that I’m an honest pony. I keep to my word. I have never cheated a customer. I do not lie. And as long as I can look at myself and know that I’m still an honest pony, then I can bear everything I’ve ever had to do to provide a safe place for my filly and colts.”
This appears to be the best explanation we're going to get. As far as I can tell, this pony is basically shell-shocked by all the grim shit he's seen or done or had to do while he was out wandering the wasteland, scavenging for cheese or whatever the fuck he was doing out there (this point still hasn't been cleared up btw), and in order to make peace with it, has chosen one inviolable principle to cling to.
This seems to be an elaboration on the "virtue" concept that has been brought up once or twice. However, this story's concept of virtue is...strange...and Monterrey's personal interpretation of his own virtue is...also strange. In a nutshell, "virtue" in this story seems to mean an unshakable principle that defines you; you adhere to it no matter what, even if you have to compromise everything else you believe in. Monterrey's virtue is "honesty," which he seems to interpret in its most literal context: he refuses to lie no matter what the circumstances.
What's perplexing here is not that he refuses to lie, so much as that he refuses to lie while simultaneously choosing to do things he'd be better off lying about. His concept of "virtue" is extremely narrow and seems to affect only one narrow portion of his personal values system. He had no particular moral compunctions about stealing from Littlepoop, and it's implied that he's done other things he's not proud of over the years, yet he seems to believe that as long as he never fibs to anyone or shortchanges one of his fucking cheese customers that this somehow makes up for whatever rape and murder and grand larceny he might commit while out in the wasteland. However, the catch is that if caught, he can't lie about any of it. This makes less and less sense the more I actually sit and think about it.
There is an old Jim Carrey movie called Liar Liar, in which Carrey plays a dishonest lawyer. His son gets tired of his father lying to everyone all the time, so on his birthday he wishes that he not be able to lie anymore. The wish comes true, and for the rest of the movie Carrey is physically prevented from telling lies. This leads to all sorts of inconveniences for him. Not only is he unable to do his job effectively, he is forced to tell the truth even in situations where telling a harmless fib is the expected and far more prudent response; for instance, a woman he is sleeping with asks him if the sex was good, and he is forced to respond with "I've had better." At another point, his son says he learned in school that "true beauty is on the inside," and Carrey has to respond with "that's just something ugly people say." The film finds its humor in exploring how inconvenient life could become if we weren't able to tell all of the little white lies that are part and parcel of living with other humans.
Monterrey's interpretation of honesty reminds me a little of this movie, except there's no magic spell. He holds himself to this rule entirely on his own, yet his belief in this virtue has no effect on any other aspect of his behavior. Seems to me that if he really considered "honesty" to be his personal virtue, and took it seriously enough to treat it as an unbreakable code even in the face of death, it would extend into his entire worldview and affect his behavior in any situation. His encounter with Littlepoop is a good example of how this might work.
His reasons for robbing (or attempting to rob) her are logically sound. He doesn't (and shouldn't) trust her, and she has nothing to offer him as a traveling companion, so there's no point in letting her join him. She's green and inexperienced and will probably be killed out here one way or the other, and she's carrying a lot of valuable stuff. He has the advantage and could easily rob her, so it makes sense that he ought to. However, this is pure logic; the moral side of the issue is more complicated.
If Monterrey considers "honesty" to be his one unassailable virtue, it should extend to all aspects of his conduct, not just a refusal to tell lies. Ergo, when faced with the decision to rob or not to rob Littlepoop, his virtue ought to have directed him to not rob her, even though he had the opportunity and it made sense to. Even if it was a matter of survival, if his principles are supposed to be this strong, he should have still opted not to do it and accepted the hazards. That he robbed her anyway indicates that his whole idea of "virtue" is horse shit; this isn't a principle he believes in, it's just a self-imposed arbitrary rule he follows to the point of absurdity.
In Buddhism, aspirants are given a set of moral precepts to follow: chastity, truthfulness, commitment to nonviolence, and so forth. However, the teachings also stress that the ultimate goal is enlightenment, and the purpose of "right conduct" is to orient the aspirant's mind in this direction; if these ideas are taken simply as commandments to be obeyed for the sake of obedience it defeats the point. In Christianity, many of Christ's parables approach moral questions the same way, stressing that the overall purpose of morality is to direct one's mind toward God, rather than simply following rules for the sake of following rules.
>>301628
If this story has any redeeming literary value at all, it comes less from what the author actually wrote and more from what he says unintentionally. The way this story handles moral issues is interesting as a study of the author's view of these topics, both as an individual and as a representative of the modern West.
If morality is viewed as a tool one uses to orient oneself toward a higher goal, right conduct or godliness or whatever you want to call it, then living in the wasteland shouldn't present any more of a moral challenge than living anywhere else. Granted, one might encounter tough choices that wouldn't be present in a more civilized environment, such having to kill one pony to save another or something like that, but for anyone who has a clear sense of who he is and what he believes in, it shouldn't be that difficult to make moral choices most of the time. Monterrey's question of whether or not to rob Littlepoop for instance is a fairly easy one; having the extra junk that LP is carrying isn't likely to mean the difference between life and death, so even though he can rob her and might benefit from it, an honest pony still wouldn't do it. If he valued honesty to the point where he'd rather die than do something dishonest, it should follow that he'd rather risk being alone in the wasteland without supplies than rob an innocent pony.
However, if you view morality as a set of rigid rules and dogmas that must be obeyed at all times, ie "always do X" or "never do Y," it becomes more complicated as the consequences of following one rule can make it difficult to follow another. Modern society is heavily focused on following strict rules and procedures, rather than just setting standards of behavior and letting people reason the details out for themselves. When people who depend on rules to tell them how to live run into a situation where the rules don't have a clear application, they get confused, even if the moral question isn't all that difficult.
The situation with the colt earlier is a good example. If you believe strongly that an orderly, peaceful world is ideal, then random acts of depravity and pointless violence are anathema; you'd see the kid raping the mare, grok wrongness, and eliminate it. Or at least stand aside and let your friend do it if you're squeamish. However, if you just have one rule that says "don't rape" and another that says "don't kill children," and you don't really grasp the reasoning behind either one, then a fairly simple matter becomes a serious moral paradox.
What's interesting about FoE is that it contains multiple characters who profess certain singular virtues or guiding principles, but who react oddly when faced with a challenge to those principles. Velvet Remedy, as we've seen, professes a philosophy of non-violence, but aside from making a few soapbox speeches every now and then doesn't seem to live any differently than her murderhobo friends. While she occasionally lectures her friends about their violent behavior, she never takes any action to prevent them from behaving this way, nor does she separate herself from companions who obviously don't share her values. She deals with moral questions by ignoring them, while simultaneously preaching her beliefs. In a way, she's the most modern character in the whole group: she's a complete hypocrite, and is perfectly comfortable being a hypocrite. She doesn't even seem to realize she's a hypocrite. In all likelihood, the author doesn't even realize that he wrote her as one.
Monterrey Jack seems to deal with the conflicts between the various dogmatic rules he subscribes to by choosing one rule to follow and ignoring all the rest of them. In this case, he has chosen "honesty" as the golden rule, which he interprets in the basest and most literal way possible: don't lie. Simply put, he views himself as being free to steal, rob, rape, kill or any combination of the above, he just doesn't believe he should lie about doing these things if asked about it afterward. This is about as nonsensical a moral code as it is possible to come up with. Not only is it not admirable, it serves no purpose either tangible or intangible. It's comparable to putting oneself on a no-sugar diet in order to lose weight, and then following the diet by living off of cheeseburgers and french fries while abstaining from ice cream. He follows the letter of a rule without understanding its essence or purpose, and since it's just an arbitrary rule he imposed on himself anyway, this makes very little sense from any perspective.
It's worth mentioning that the text also addresses a point I brought up earlier: why didn't Monterrey just keep quiet and stonewall the guards? This would have allowed him to uphold what I will generously call his principles, while conveniently saving his own bacon. MJ replies thusly:
>I come back, and you’re all over the damn radio. My children listen every day for news of your Celestia-damned heroism. They idolize the fuck out of you. And every day, I know that I’ve met their idol and I tried to rob her. And I keep silent, but a lie of omission is still a lie. And that poison has been killing me as surely as any noose.
So, in addition to all this other nonsense, we once again have Littlepoop's Mary Sueness raising its ugly head. MJ's children "idolize" the famed Stable-Dweller, and every day MJ wakes up wracked with guilt, knowing that he committed the unforgivable sin of trying (not even succeeding) to take her canteen and ammo clips and whatever other worthless junk she happened to be carrying in Chapter 2. Never mind that it was dark, he had no idea who Littlepoop was at the time, would have had no reason to remember this one botched robbery as a pivotal moment, and the reports of her on the radio would have probably only given a vague description of her, which he would not necessarily have connected with the mostly unremarkable pony he had a single run-in with three weeks ago.
If this story has any redeeming literary value at all, it comes less from what the author actually wrote and more from what he says unintentionally. The way this story handles moral issues is interesting as a study of the author's view of these topics, both as an individual and as a representative of the modern West.
If morality is viewed as a tool one uses to orient oneself toward a higher goal, right conduct or godliness or whatever you want to call it, then living in the wasteland shouldn't present any more of a moral challenge than living anywhere else. Granted, one might encounter tough choices that wouldn't be present in a more civilized environment, such having to kill one pony to save another or something like that, but for anyone who has a clear sense of who he is and what he believes in, it shouldn't be that difficult to make moral choices most of the time. Monterrey's question of whether or not to rob Littlepoop for instance is a fairly easy one; having the extra junk that LP is carrying isn't likely to mean the difference between life and death, so even though he can rob her and might benefit from it, an honest pony still wouldn't do it. If he valued honesty to the point where he'd rather die than do something dishonest, it should follow that he'd rather risk being alone in the wasteland without supplies than rob an innocent pony.
However, if you view morality as a set of rigid rules and dogmas that must be obeyed at all times, ie "always do X" or "never do Y," it becomes more complicated as the consequences of following one rule can make it difficult to follow another. Modern society is heavily focused on following strict rules and procedures, rather than just setting standards of behavior and letting people reason the details out for themselves. When people who depend on rules to tell them how to live run into a situation where the rules don't have a clear application, they get confused, even if the moral question isn't all that difficult.
The situation with the colt earlier is a good example. If you believe strongly that an orderly, peaceful world is ideal, then random acts of depravity and pointless violence are anathema; you'd see the kid raping the mare, grok wrongness, and eliminate it. Or at least stand aside and let your friend do it if you're squeamish. However, if you just have one rule that says "don't rape" and another that says "don't kill children," and you don't really grasp the reasoning behind either one, then a fairly simple matter becomes a serious moral paradox.
What's interesting about FoE is that it contains multiple characters who profess certain singular virtues or guiding principles, but who react oddly when faced with a challenge to those principles. Velvet Remedy, as we've seen, professes a philosophy of non-violence, but aside from making a few soapbox speeches every now and then doesn't seem to live any differently than her murderhobo friends. While she occasionally lectures her friends about their violent behavior, she never takes any action to prevent them from behaving this way, nor does she separate herself from companions who obviously don't share her values. She deals with moral questions by ignoring them, while simultaneously preaching her beliefs. In a way, she's the most modern character in the whole group: she's a complete hypocrite, and is perfectly comfortable being a hypocrite. She doesn't even seem to realize she's a hypocrite. In all likelihood, the author doesn't even realize that he wrote her as one.
Monterrey Jack seems to deal with the conflicts between the various dogmatic rules he subscribes to by choosing one rule to follow and ignoring all the rest of them. In this case, he has chosen "honesty" as the golden rule, which he interprets in the basest and most literal way possible: don't lie. Simply put, he views himself as being free to steal, rob, rape, kill or any combination of the above, he just doesn't believe he should lie about doing these things if asked about it afterward. This is about as nonsensical a moral code as it is possible to come up with. Not only is it not admirable, it serves no purpose either tangible or intangible. It's comparable to putting oneself on a no-sugar diet in order to lose weight, and then following the diet by living off of cheeseburgers and french fries while abstaining from ice cream. He follows the letter of a rule without understanding its essence or purpose, and since it's just an arbitrary rule he imposed on himself anyway, this makes very little sense from any perspective.
It's worth mentioning that the text also addresses a point I brought up earlier: why didn't Monterrey just keep quiet and stonewall the guards? This would have allowed him to uphold what I will generously call his principles, while conveniently saving his own bacon. MJ replies thusly:
>I come back, and you’re all over the damn radio. My children listen every day for news of your Celestia-damned heroism. They idolize the fuck out of you. And every day, I know that I’ve met their idol and I tried to rob her. And I keep silent, but a lie of omission is still a lie. And that poison has been killing me as surely as any noose.
So, in addition to all this other nonsense, we once again have Littlepoop's Mary Sueness raising its ugly head. MJ's children "idolize" the famed Stable-Dweller, and every day MJ wakes up wracked with guilt, knowing that he committed the unforgivable sin of trying (not even succeeding) to take her canteen and ammo clips and whatever other worthless junk she happened to be carrying in Chapter 2. Never mind that it was dark, he had no idea who Littlepoop was at the time, would have had no reason to remember this one botched robbery as a pivotal moment, and the reports of her on the radio would have probably only given a vague description of her, which he would not necessarily have connected with the mostly unremarkable pony he had a single run-in with three weeks ago.
>>301633
Anyway, Monterrey Jack feels so guilty about his attempted robbery once again I will remind you that he didn't actually steal anything from Littlepoop and that she suffered no harm from this incident whatsoever of the author's Chosen One, and decides that only death can cleanse his sins:
>Eyes narrowing, he leaned his muzzle against the bars, as close to me as he could get. “Don’t think I spoke up for you. I spoke up to save me. Even if it kills me.”
None of this makes any sense no matter what angle you look at it from. I guess I could drone on about metaphysics for another post, but the issue here more than anything else is just bad writing and bad character design.
The kind of thing kkat is trying to do here isn't necessarily a bad idea. I think his vision for Monterrey Jack is basically a hard-edged, cynical, jaded guy whose ideals were crushed by the realities of the wasteland long ago, but at the same time has a code of honor that he upholds and adheres to, and refuses to bend regardless of the circumstances. This kind of thing is common with anti-hero type characters: the hard-boiled detective (Sam Spade, Philip Marlowe, Batman, etc.) is the most common example, but you see it in classic Westerns, crime fiction, and so forth as well. However, in order to make this work, you have to actually understand the character's moral code, and then tailor his behavior to make sure everything he does is consistent with it.
If Monterrey Jack's "virtue" is honesty, then he wouldn't have tried to rob Littlepoop in the first place, for the same reason he refuses to cheat his customers. If he is honest to the point where he would rather face summary execution than tell a lie, he should be honest to the point that he would rather starve to death than take advantage of some poor innocent mare fresh off the turnip truck. There's no consistency to this character; neither his actions nor the reasoning behind them make any sense. The more the author tries to have him explain himself, the more he ends up emphasizing how poorly he thought this character through.
The author ends the segment with this weak attempt at shoehorning in some character-defining moment for Littlepoop:
>As I moved out through the door, he called out after me. “If you haven’t found your own virtue yet, you best hurry up. While there’s still anything left of you to save.”
To be fair, there's actually a sound observation underneath all of this. Velvet is a chronic hypocrite who is oblivious to her own hypocrisy, and Monterrey Jack interprets his "virtue" from such a narrow and literal perspective that he ends up defeating the point of having a virtue in the first place. However, at least both of these characters attempt to have a virtue. Littlepoop, despite all of her soapbox moralizing, doesn't even do this much. So far she has spent the story cutting a bloody swath across the wasteland, stealing any piece of useless junk that isn't nailed down, and generally disrupting all areas of post-apocalyptic Equestrian society, all without any apparent reason or motive.
The concept of "virtue" has been brought up before: Frank mentioned it to her fairly early on, and I feel like it's popped up in a couple of the diaries and side conversations as well. I get the impression this is all part of the author's hamfisted attempt at developing his protagonist: her goal, overall, is to find her virtue. What I assume this is going to actually entail is another 375,000 some-odd words of LP slaughtering random baddies and looting random dungeons, until eventually she will find some cornball way to justify all of this through the lens of some generic MLP ideal she discovers like honesty, loyalty, laughter, generosity, etc etc. We shall see, I suppose.
Anyway, there is a page break. Littlepoop returns to her friends, still high on crack mints, and uses her +200 charisma to convince them that the mind-numbingly stupid quest the DJ has given them is worth risking their lives over. However, even without the mints it would probably not have been very difficult to convince them, as these characters have little in the way of personality and usually just go along with whatever she says. She is, after all, the Author's Chosen, and as such has become the de-facto leader of the group.
>Calamity was in the moment I mentioned the flux regulator.
Calamity in particular is pretty much an empty shell; it's still not clear to me why he is traveling with this group in the first place, let alone why he goes along with every idiotic idea that Littlepoop comes up with. In this case, all he needs is an offer of some kind of material reward, such as the thingamabob he needs to fix his doohickey, and he's ready to go cap some bitches.
>I phrased it to Velvet Remedy as a chance to impress DJ Pon3 and maybe get to record some of her own music. She reminded me that she was a medical pony now, not some Stable’s songbird, but it was a half-hearted reluctance that I was able to overcome by suggesting this would allow her beautiful music to fly free.
Velvet, as ever, is a tiresome, wishy-washy twat with no will or drive or anything resembling a mind of her own, a fact which is made all the more pathetic by the fact that from time to time she attempts, weakly, to clarify her own goals and desires. Here, we have Littlepoop convincing her that she should come along on this dumb errand of hers in order to impress this DJ she's never met, and also to get her music played on the radio, something she's never once claimed to be interested in. Instead of objecting on these grounds, all she can do is weakly remind LP that she left the stable in order to leave her music career behind and pursue a career in medicine. Then, she immediately concedes that doing the complete opposite of that would probably be fine as well. I wonder if Iron Will has any surviving descendants in Edgequestria? If so, this bitch should seriously think about attending a seminar.
Anyway, Monterrey Jack feels so guilty about his attempted robbery once again I will remind you that he didn't actually steal anything from Littlepoop and that she suffered no harm from this incident whatsoever of the author's Chosen One, and decides that only death can cleanse his sins:
>Eyes narrowing, he leaned his muzzle against the bars, as close to me as he could get. “Don’t think I spoke up for you. I spoke up to save me. Even if it kills me.”
None of this makes any sense no matter what angle you look at it from. I guess I could drone on about metaphysics for another post, but the issue here more than anything else is just bad writing and bad character design.
The kind of thing kkat is trying to do here isn't necessarily a bad idea. I think his vision for Monterrey Jack is basically a hard-edged, cynical, jaded guy whose ideals were crushed by the realities of the wasteland long ago, but at the same time has a code of honor that he upholds and adheres to, and refuses to bend regardless of the circumstances. This kind of thing is common with anti-hero type characters: the hard-boiled detective (Sam Spade, Philip Marlowe, Batman, etc.) is the most common example, but you see it in classic Westerns, crime fiction, and so forth as well. However, in order to make this work, you have to actually understand the character's moral code, and then tailor his behavior to make sure everything he does is consistent with it.
If Monterrey Jack's "virtue" is honesty, then he wouldn't have tried to rob Littlepoop in the first place, for the same reason he refuses to cheat his customers. If he is honest to the point where he would rather face summary execution than tell a lie, he should be honest to the point that he would rather starve to death than take advantage of some poor innocent mare fresh off the turnip truck. There's no consistency to this character; neither his actions nor the reasoning behind them make any sense. The more the author tries to have him explain himself, the more he ends up emphasizing how poorly he thought this character through.
The author ends the segment with this weak attempt at shoehorning in some character-defining moment for Littlepoop:
>As I moved out through the door, he called out after me. “If you haven’t found your own virtue yet, you best hurry up. While there’s still anything left of you to save.”
To be fair, there's actually a sound observation underneath all of this. Velvet is a chronic hypocrite who is oblivious to her own hypocrisy, and Monterrey Jack interprets his "virtue" from such a narrow and literal perspective that he ends up defeating the point of having a virtue in the first place. However, at least both of these characters attempt to have a virtue. Littlepoop, despite all of her soapbox moralizing, doesn't even do this much. So far she has spent the story cutting a bloody swath across the wasteland, stealing any piece of useless junk that isn't nailed down, and generally disrupting all areas of post-apocalyptic Equestrian society, all without any apparent reason or motive.
The concept of "virtue" has been brought up before: Frank mentioned it to her fairly early on, and I feel like it's popped up in a couple of the diaries and side conversations as well. I get the impression this is all part of the author's hamfisted attempt at developing his protagonist: her goal, overall, is to find her virtue. What I assume this is going to actually entail is another 375,000 some-odd words of LP slaughtering random baddies and looting random dungeons, until eventually she will find some cornball way to justify all of this through the lens of some generic MLP ideal she discovers like honesty, loyalty, laughter, generosity, etc etc. We shall see, I suppose.
Anyway, there is a page break. Littlepoop returns to her friends, still high on crack mints, and uses her +200 charisma to convince them that the mind-numbingly stupid quest the DJ has given them is worth risking their lives over. However, even without the mints it would probably not have been very difficult to convince them, as these characters have little in the way of personality and usually just go along with whatever she says. She is, after all, the Author's Chosen, and as such has become the de-facto leader of the group.
>Calamity was in the moment I mentioned the flux regulator.
Calamity in particular is pretty much an empty shell; it's still not clear to me why he is traveling with this group in the first place, let alone why he goes along with every idiotic idea that Littlepoop comes up with. In this case, all he needs is an offer of some kind of material reward, such as the thingamabob he needs to fix his doohickey, and he's ready to go cap some bitches.
>I phrased it to Velvet Remedy as a chance to impress DJ Pon3 and maybe get to record some of her own music. She reminded me that she was a medical pony now, not some Stable’s songbird, but it was a half-hearted reluctance that I was able to overcome by suggesting this would allow her beautiful music to fly free.
Velvet, as ever, is a tiresome, wishy-washy twat with no will or drive or anything resembling a mind of her own, a fact which is made all the more pathetic by the fact that from time to time she attempts, weakly, to clarify her own goals and desires. Here, we have Littlepoop convincing her that she should come along on this dumb errand of hers in order to impress this DJ she's never met, and also to get her music played on the radio, something she's never once claimed to be interested in. Instead of objecting on these grounds, all she can do is weakly remind LP that she left the stable in order to leave her music career behind and pursue a career in medicine. Then, she immediately concedes that doing the complete opposite of that would probably be fine as well. I wonder if Iron Will has any surviving descendants in Edgequestria? If so, this bitch should seriously think about attending a seminar.
>>301635
Could you not shit spoilers everywhere? Jesus Christ.
Could you not shit spoilers everywhere? Jesus Christ.
>>301634
My understanding of the logic behind the whole virtue thing is essentially as follows:
>the wasteland is a horrible place to live, and in order to survive there one must inevitably do horrible things
>living this way corrodes a pony/person's moral character, eventually making them irreparably jaded, broken or just plain insane
>what separates a regular pony/person from a raider is that they have at least one guiding moral principle to act as an anchor
>it's better to die clinging to your virtue than to become a drug-addled videogame trash enemy.
The FoE tabletop game has a brief section on virtue that describes them as follows:
>Your virtue is that one good trait that can help you weather the worst that the wasteland throws at you. Having a virtue is what separates player characters, even the wicked ones, from the completely irredeemable raiders. A player may choose to play a character who has not discovered her virtue yet. But all player characters must have a virtue.
Amusingly, that's all it has to say. There's no virtue-related rules. It's literally "if you're going to play my game you must roleplay exactly the way I tell you."
In other words, this section isn't just a self-righteous rant on MJ's part - it's exposition about the very metaphysical constants of the setting. Never mind whether or not the guy's trustworthy. There's a logic to it but it's largely divorced from most world conceptions of morality.
As >>301635 alludes to in his giant spoiler-filled mess of a post, the story (well, mostly Pip's internal rambling) returns to the concept of virtues frequently.
My understanding of the logic behind the whole virtue thing is essentially as follows:
>the wasteland is a horrible place to live, and in order to survive there one must inevitably do horrible things
>living this way corrodes a pony/person's moral character, eventually making them irreparably jaded, broken or just plain insane
>what separates a regular pony/person from a raider is that they have at least one guiding moral principle to act as an anchor
>it's better to die clinging to your virtue than to become a drug-addled videogame trash enemy.
The FoE tabletop game has a brief section on virtue that describes them as follows:
>Your virtue is that one good trait that can help you weather the worst that the wasteland throws at you. Having a virtue is what separates player characters, even the wicked ones, from the completely irredeemable raiders. A player may choose to play a character who has not discovered her virtue yet. But all player characters must have a virtue.
Amusingly, that's all it has to say. There's no virtue-related rules. It's literally "if you're going to play my game you must roleplay exactly the way I tell you."
In other words, this section isn't just a self-righteous rant on MJ's part - it's exposition about the very metaphysical constants of the setting. Never mind whether or not the guy's trustworthy. There's a logic to it but it's largely divorced from most world conceptions of morality.
As >>301635 alludes to in his giant spoiler-filled mess of a post, the story (well, mostly Pip's internal rambling) returns to the concept of virtues frequently.
>>301594
>>301615
>>301619
Rather than saying they're fans of kkat's world, it would be more accurate to say that they are fans of his idea. What this really boils down to is that while Fallout: Equestria itself indisputably sucks, and a few people in the fandom are perceptive enough to realize it, some of them still find the idea of combining Fallout with MLP to be interesting. Unfortunately, kkat was the guy who got famous for doing Fallout-in-Equestria, so the concept essentially belongs to him. Realistically, there's nothing preventing another writer from starting their own version of the same idea from scratch, but the existing fandom might react poorly to what they see as a ripoff, even if the ripoff is actually a superior work. This is just one of the unfortunate realities of working in any creative medium; popularity usually wins out over quality, and in any case it's a generally accepted rule that an idea belongs to whoever develops it first and most successfully.
For example, even though I might be able to write a better "boy wizard goes to magic school" story than J.K. Rowling, if I attempted to do so I would be accused of ripping her off and lambasted by her fanbase or whatever remains of her fanbase after she alienated them all by not worshipping trannies. My only real options would be to either modify the idea until it becomes distinct enough from Rowling's work to be called original, or else call it a fanfiction and set it in her world, while using as few of her ideas as possible. However, the guy who wrote that Willy the Wizard story back in the 1970s or whatever doesn't have the same power, even though Rowling technically ripped him off, simply because Rowling is the one who got famous for the concept and thus "owns" it. It's not fair, but then again, neither is life itself.
In the case of FoE, my guess is there are probably a lot of other authors who read kkat's original, thought it sucked, but liked the idea and wanted to try to do it better. However, since it's kkat's idea, they decided to be diplomatic about it and write an original story in "kkat's universe" instead of trying to reinvent the concept and one-up him. This unfortunately requires them to either accept all of the nonsensical bullshit he came up with as canon, or else to try to deal with areas of the canon that he didn't cover in his original text.
>>301615
>>301619
Rather than saying they're fans of kkat's world, it would be more accurate to say that they are fans of his idea. What this really boils down to is that while Fallout: Equestria itself indisputably sucks, and a few people in the fandom are perceptive enough to realize it, some of them still find the idea of combining Fallout with MLP to be interesting. Unfortunately, kkat was the guy who got famous for doing Fallout-in-Equestria, so the concept essentially belongs to him. Realistically, there's nothing preventing another writer from starting their own version of the same idea from scratch, but the existing fandom might react poorly to what they see as a ripoff, even if the ripoff is actually a superior work. This is just one of the unfortunate realities of working in any creative medium; popularity usually wins out over quality, and in any case it's a generally accepted rule that an idea belongs to whoever develops it first and most successfully.
For example, even though I might be able to write a better "boy wizard goes to magic school" story than J.K. Rowling, if I attempted to do so I would be accused of ripping her off and lambasted by her fanbase or whatever remains of her fanbase after she alienated them all by not worshipping trannies. My only real options would be to either modify the idea until it becomes distinct enough from Rowling's work to be called original, or else call it a fanfiction and set it in her world, while using as few of her ideas as possible. However, the guy who wrote that Willy the Wizard story back in the 1970s or whatever doesn't have the same power, even though Rowling technically ripped him off, simply because Rowling is the one who got famous for the concept and thus "owns" it. It's not fair, but then again, neither is life itself.
In the case of FoE, my guess is there are probably a lot of other authors who read kkat's original, thought it sucked, but liked the idea and wanted to try to do it better. However, since it's kkat's idea, they decided to be diplomatic about it and write an original story in "kkat's universe" instead of trying to reinvent the concept and one-up him. This unfortunately requires them to either accept all of the nonsensical bullshit he came up with as canon, or else to try to deal with areas of the canon that he didn't cover in his original text.
By the way, Glim, is it bad writing that right after spending all this time trying to set up a love triangle between Velvet and LP and Calamity, this radio DJ suddenly captures LP's heart to break the love triangle?
>>301626
>We helped! …and then we moved on with our lives because we've done all we could reasonably be expected to do instead of escorting her through Raider Hell. Well, a Raider-filled hell. Raider Hell would either be something so insufferably cutesy they'd hate it forever or a super-wasteland where they're preyed upon by super-raiders forever.
It's really dumb that Kkat tries to make a moral "OH GOD WHAT HAVE I DONE" moment out of this.
You're not obligated to save the life of another in a grimdark world where resources are limited and bullets are precious and saving a scavenger's life today means she might rob you/pick clean and scavenge resources you wanted
Saving her's still nice and it gives you an excuse to kill Raiders, not that you need an excuse to do so
But walking the mare home like you're teenagers and she's the date you have to get home by 10 even though you've already fucked her and she thinks it's funny to drop innuendos and hint at the sex right in front of her fucktarded alcoholic father? That's just excessive, why would this story's "heroes" go out of their way to walk some random mare home in a city where you can't walk ten meters without running into a Raider or Bandit or Slaver pack? What if she has no home and sleeps in random ruins? What if she's a bandit leading them into an ambush to exploit/rob them? It's one thing to spare a few seconds and some of your many bullets to stop some raiders from pussy raiding but taking a detour from your world-saving main quest for something like that?
Then again, the hero's main quest is currently a clusterfuck and taking all these detours hasn't fucked anypony over so far, not even when things are supposed to have a time limit.
So fuck it, Littlepoop clearly has her "Unlimited Time" GameShark cheat activated. Along with "God Mode" and "Lockpick Anything" and "Safes were never picked before you got there" and "Perfect S.A.T.S. accuracy".
>>301628
Isn't it funny how bronies take the Elements Of Harmony, especially Honesty, in such a literal and one-dimensional direction when making "their own Element Bearers"?
All sorts of stereotypical one-note characters can have niceness/generousity/being happy as their gimmick, anyone can have a handful of pony friends and great magical might given to them by the author, and the loyal character is stated to be loyal if he lacks any other redeeming feature.
But honesty?
That's always interpreted in the most literal lazy sense: "This character never lies usually".
There is never a deeper kind of honesty, li
>>301626
>We helped! …and then we moved on with our lives because we've done all we could reasonably be expected to do instead of escorting her through Raider Hell. Well, a Raider-filled hell. Raider Hell would either be something so insufferably cutesy they'd hate it forever or a super-wasteland where they're preyed upon by super-raiders forever.
It's really dumb that Kkat tries to make a moral "OH GOD WHAT HAVE I DONE" moment out of this.
You're not obligated to save the life of another in a grimdark world where resources are limited and bullets are precious and saving a scavenger's life today means she might rob you/pick clean and scavenge resources you wanted
Saving her's still nice and it gives you an excuse to kill Raiders, not that you need an excuse to do so
But walking the mare home like you're teenagers and she's the date you have to get home by 10 even though you've already fucked her and she thinks it's funny to drop innuendos and hint at the sex right in front of her fucktarded alcoholic father? That's just excessive, why would this story's "heroes" go out of their way to walk some random mare home in a city where you can't walk ten meters without running into a Raider or Bandit or Slaver pack? What if she has no home and sleeps in random ruins? What if she's a bandit leading them into an ambush to exploit/rob them? It's one thing to spare a few seconds and some of your many bullets to stop some raiders from pussy raiding but taking a detour from your world-saving main quest for something like that?
Then again, the hero's main quest is currently a clusterfuck and taking all these detours hasn't fucked anypony over so far, not even when things are supposed to have a time limit.
So fuck it, Littlepoop clearly has her "Unlimited Time" GameShark cheat activated. Along with "God Mode" and "Lockpick Anything" and "Safes were never picked before you got there" and "Perfect S.A.T.S. accuracy".
>>301628
Isn't it funny how bronies take the Elements Of Harmony, especially Honesty, in such a literal and one-dimensional direction when making "their own Element Bearers"?
All sorts of stereotypical one-note characters can have niceness/generousity/being happy as their gimmick, anyone can have a handful of pony friends and great magical might given to them by the author, and the loyal character is stated to be loyal if he lacks any other redeeming feature.
But honesty?
That's always interpreted in the most literal lazy sense: "This character never lies usually".
There is never a deeper kind of honesty, li
>>301639
ke a private investigator obsessed with finding the truth, or a lawyer obsessed with revealing the truth, or a scientist/wizard/magic scientist focused on finding the world's inviolable truths and learning everything and/or spreading this knowledge for free, or someone who wants to be "True" to themselves and all their many good moral principles. The ways honesty can manifest is kind of an alien concept to most jewed idiots and to them, honesty is to be taken literally and at surface level.
This is something Kkat revealed outside the story(so it's not a spoiler for something within the story but outside context needed to appreciate how truly shit it is), and possibly didn't plan when writing the story, but I'll spoiler tag the incredibly mild spoilers. And add new ones so the guy crying "spoiler" can be right.
This story is supposed to contain a new set of Elements Of Harmony, except many of them became retards because Kkat says they are lost without Littlepoop's guidance as "Not magic/friendship, but The Spark that brings the elements together" (Which is literally the fucking job of the Magic/Friendship Element IN FIM CANON, Kkat just wasn't paying attention during those episodes)
Kkat's attempt at writing "The Elements but corrupted" leaves much to be desired.
Velvet Remedy is a hypocritical cunt who wants to feel morally superior to everyone even if it means screwing the party over or bitching at them now and then over nothing. Sometimes she'll think nothing of killing Raiders and helping her friends in firefights, and sometimes she might give away the party's overly-plentiful medical supplies to bandits who shot at the heroes first, and if she does that she'll never proceed to encounter wounded innocents who she cannot help because she ran out of medical supplies like a retard.
The story isn't interested in proving her wrong and making her grow into a hardcore saintly paragon of virtue or proving her right and making her an inspiration to the others in Team LP. Her character trait is "kindness" but only when it is pretentious, inefficient, self-defeating, and inconsistently punished/rewarded. And now I'll add actual spoilers: In the end, her decision to spare Alicorns means they join her side and form a hybrid of the NCR and The Followers Of The Apocalypse even though the Followers are supposed to be travelling anarchist doctors who do it for free and the NCR is taxation and annexation.
Littlepoop is stated to be "The spark that brings the elements together" by Kkat but she's only interested in recruiting a pony if they seem useful to her in the moment and the author wants her to do so
Littlepoop isn't a coherent character and functions as the playable avatar of Kkat in a world created by Kkat to try and make Littlepoop look impressive and vital
If she went out of her way to befriend or "redeem" somepony her murderhobo gamer brain tells her has the role of "Villain" in her story, it would make her more interesting.
One villain, a cunt named Red Eye, forcing his regime onto everyone is stated to be "generousity" because conquering the world and enslaving poners with a slave empiree "for the good of others" is just sooo generous. edit: ok i added the spoiler
Fake Pinkie/Silver Belle's stated by the author to be laughter even though she's an incredibly minor character with no overall significance to anything
And even though her love of Pinkie Pie and desire to be her is treated as a bad thing during the actual story
And even though it would make sense to make Homage into a bright and sunny voice of hope and optimism and source of Laughter for the wasteland
Guess Kkat really thinks a crazy child in denial's imitation of a cheerful crack addict qualifies you for the role of spirit-lifting embodiment of cheer
Calamity's supposedly Loyalty (wow a loyalty pegasus how original. Oh wait he is original because he's male instead of female like RD and he's orange and talks western like Applejack!) except offscreen and before the story started, he already transitioned from an Enclave member to an Enclave hater on the side of good. He said this during the "I'm a dashite" scene so it's not a spoiler, but it is a huge missed opportunity on the author's part because it means this character and his arc is already complete long before Littlepoop hires him for free by throwing herself in the way of some traders.
He was a dashite before the story started and he revealed this early on. The author's done a piss-poor job of explaining what the enclave is for non Fallout fans so far, but everyone who played Fallout already knows what the Enclave is. They're baddies.
His loyalty to the side of good/his principles/his bitch Velvet are never tested.
Any loyalty he should feel to that organization never gets in the way of his role as Littlepoop's armed cowboy-talking fren
He has no problems with treating the organization he was once a part of like faceless nameless Star Wars Stormtroopers even if he should say something like "If I can change, so can they! Let's try redeeming them, and by redeeming I mean re-educating them and making them fight on our side because a western retard wrote this story and that's where morality begins and ends in his book".
Oh and near the end of the story some nameless OC is stated to be the new/real magic element: an alicorn with Twilight Sparkle's cutie mark "but reversed", because Kkat apparently thought you must be born with immense might to be Magic
Even though LP has that in spades
even before its retarded justification kicks in
ke a private investigator obsessed with finding the truth, or a lawyer obsessed with revealing the truth, or a scientist/wizard/magic scientist focused on finding the world's inviolable truths and learning everything and/or spreading this knowledge for free, or someone who wants to be "True" to themselves and all their many good moral principles. The ways honesty can manifest is kind of an alien concept to most jewed idiots and to them, honesty is to be taken literally and at surface level.
This is something Kkat revealed outside the story(so it's not a spoiler for something within the story but outside context needed to appreciate how truly shit it is), and possibly didn't plan when writing the story, but I'll spoiler tag the incredibly mild spoilers. And add new ones so the guy crying "spoiler" can be right.
This story is supposed to contain a new set of Elements Of Harmony, except many of them became retards because Kkat says they are lost without Littlepoop's guidance as "Not magic/friendship, but The Spark that brings the elements together" (Which is literally the fucking job of the Magic/Friendship Element IN FIM CANON, Kkat just wasn't paying attention during those episodes)
Kkat's attempt at writing "The Elements but corrupted" leaves much to be desired.
Velvet Remedy is a hypocritical cunt who wants to feel morally superior to everyone even if it means screwing the party over or bitching at them now and then over nothing. Sometimes she'll think nothing of killing Raiders and helping her friends in firefights, and sometimes she might give away the party's overly-plentiful medical supplies to bandits who shot at the heroes first, and if she does that she'll never proceed to encounter wounded innocents who she cannot help because she ran out of medical supplies like a retard.
The story isn't interested in proving her wrong and making her grow into a hardcore saintly paragon of virtue or proving her right and making her an inspiration to the others in Team LP. Her character trait is "kindness" but only when it is pretentious, inefficient, self-defeating, and inconsistently punished/rewarded. And now I'll add actual spoilers: In the end, her decision to spare Alicorns means they join her side and form a hybrid of the NCR and The Followers Of The Apocalypse even though the Followers are supposed to be travelling anarchist doctors who do it for free and the NCR is taxation and annexation.
Littlepoop is stated to be "The spark that brings the elements together" by Kkat but she's only interested in recruiting a pony if they seem useful to her in the moment and the author wants her to do so
Littlepoop isn't a coherent character and functions as the playable avatar of Kkat in a world created by Kkat to try and make Littlepoop look impressive and vital
If she went out of her way to befriend or "redeem" somepony her murderhobo gamer brain tells her has the role of "Villain" in her story, it would make her more interesting.
One villain, a cunt named Red Eye, forcing his regime onto everyone is stated to be "generousity" because conquering the world and enslaving poners with a slave empiree "for the good of others" is just sooo generous. edit: ok i added the spoiler
Fake Pinkie/Silver Belle's stated by the author to be laughter even though she's an incredibly minor character with no overall significance to anything
And even though her love of Pinkie Pie and desire to be her is treated as a bad thing during the actual story
And even though it would make sense to make Homage into a bright and sunny voice of hope and optimism and source of Laughter for the wasteland
Guess Kkat really thinks a crazy child in denial's imitation of a cheerful crack addict qualifies you for the role of spirit-lifting embodiment of cheer
Calamity's supposedly Loyalty (wow a loyalty pegasus how original. Oh wait he is original because he's male instead of female like RD and he's orange and talks western like Applejack!) except offscreen and before the story started, he already transitioned from an Enclave member to an Enclave hater on the side of good. He said this during the "I'm a dashite" scene so it's not a spoiler, but it is a huge missed opportunity on the author's part because it means this character and his arc is already complete long before Littlepoop hires him for free by throwing herself in the way of some traders.
He was a dashite before the story started and he revealed this early on. The author's done a piss-poor job of explaining what the enclave is for non Fallout fans so far, but everyone who played Fallout already knows what the Enclave is. They're baddies.
His loyalty to the side of good/his principles/his bitch Velvet are never tested.
Any loyalty he should feel to that organization never gets in the way of his role as Littlepoop's armed cowboy-talking fren
He has no problems with treating the organization he was once a part of like faceless nameless Star Wars Stormtroopers even if he should say something like "If I can change, so can they! Let's try redeeming them, and by redeeming I mean re-educating them and making them fight on our side because a western retard wrote this story and that's where morality begins and ends in his book".
Oh and near the end of the story some nameless OC is stated to be the new/real magic element: an alicorn with Twilight Sparkle's cutie mark "but reversed", because Kkat apparently thought you must be born with immense might to be Magic
Even though LP has that in spades
even before its retarded justification kicks in
>>301638
>Rather than saying they're fans of kkat's world, it would be more accurate to say that they are fans of his idea. What this really boils down to is that while Fallout: Equestria itself indisputably sucks, and a few people in the fandom are perceptive enough to realize it, some of them still find the idea of combining Fallout with MLP to be interesting. Unfortunately, kkat was the guy who got famous for doing Fallout-in-Equestria, so the concept essentially belongs to him. Realistically, there's nothing preventing another writer from starting their own version of the same idea from scratch, but the existing fandom might react poorly to what they see as a ripoff, even if the ripoff is actually a superior work. This is just one of the unfortunate realities of working in any creative medium; popularity usually wins out over quality, and in any case it's a generally accepted rule that an idea belongs to whoever develops it first and most successfully.
Yup, pretty much.
>Rather than saying they're fans of kkat's world, it would be more accurate to say that they are fans of his idea. What this really boils down to is that while Fallout: Equestria itself indisputably sucks, and a few people in the fandom are perceptive enough to realize it, some of them still find the idea of combining Fallout with MLP to be interesting. Unfortunately, kkat was the guy who got famous for doing Fallout-in-Equestria, so the concept essentially belongs to him. Realistically, there's nothing preventing another writer from starting their own version of the same idea from scratch, but the existing fandom might react poorly to what they see as a ripoff, even if the ripoff is actually a superior work. This is just one of the unfortunate realities of working in any creative medium; popularity usually wins out over quality, and in any case it's a generally accepted rule that an idea belongs to whoever develops it first and most successfully.
Yup, pretty much.
>>301619
>I have always wanted to write a post-apocalyptic pony fic. I still wish to do so, and I hope to give other folks like myself something else to read instead of FO:E, that still approaches the idea of ponies in such a setting because it's my favorite.
Btw, "post-apocalypse" is a general enough category that you could easily get away with doing your own version of it. Your work might be compared to FoE, but it won't necessarily be seen as a ripoff so long as you avoid a lot of obvious similarities. For instance, you might want to avoid using the same atompunk aesthetic that this storyrips off from Fallout utilizes, and think up something more original as the cause of the apocalypse. If the focus of the story is on the lives of the ponies trying to scrape by in the grim present, then it doesn't really matter that much how exactly the world ended; you can make the apocalypse be anything you want, so get creative with it.
I always thought the idea of Celestia and Luna being suddenly killed would make an interesting end-of-the-world scenario for Equestria: the sun and the moon suddenly stop moving, and even the most powerful unicorns in the country can't figure out how to get them to move again. Meanwhile, one side of the planet would bake and the other side would freeze; the ponies would likely have to all move to a sliver of space in the middle where the temperature is mostly hospitable. There are all sorts of directions you could take something like this: the other creatures in the world could find themselves in the same predicament, causing all life on Equus to have to fight it out for the same tiny sliver of habitable land. Or, you could have your protagonist undertake a quest to the inhospitable regions of the world. Maybe life there adapted to the harsh conditions and evolved into huge monsters capable of surviving extreme heat and extreme cold. You could do all sorts of things with it. This is just one idea btw; you could come up with pretty much any end of the world scenario you like. Don't think that just because kkat has a monopoly on the Fallout-MLP idea that he has a monopoly on all of the post-apocalypse scenarios.
>>301639
>By the way, Glim, is it bad writing that right after spending all this time trying to set up a love triangle between Velvet and LP and Calamity, this radio DJ suddenly captures LP's heart to break the love triangle?
Actually, no. I would argue that the timing is clumsy, and also that the author hasn't really bothered to develop LP's crush on Velvet, Velvet and Calamity's relationship, or even LP and Velvet's characters enough for the storyline to have the emotional resonance he wants it to. However, LP getting her heart broken and then finding someone else is a perfectly fine direction for the romantic subplot to take.
I never really believed LP and Velvet as a potential couple in the first place, even disregarding the author's clumsy handling of their interactions and respective characters. It's a one-sided unspoken crush, Velvet is older than Littlepoop, and we've had no indication that her barn door swings the same way as Littlepoop's, so it was always rather implausible that they would ever end up together.
Littlepoop's crush on Velvet is part of her earlier, more innocent life that she had when she lived in the stable. Her character arc, to the extent that she has one, involves her loss of that innocence as she ventures out into the wasteland and sees what the world is actually like. Realizing that her dream of eating out the illustrious Velvet Remedy's ponut will never come true, no matter how badly she wants it to, is just one of the many harsh lessons she has to learn before she can grow up and find her virtue, or whatever the fuck she's trying to do.
From a literary perspective, kkat made the right call here by making her first love unrequited; in fact I'm actually a little surprised he had the instinct to take it in this mature of a direction. I had always more or less assumed that the Velvet X Calamity storyline was going to end up being just another hurdle for Littlepoop to cross, but that ultimately kkat would end it with some kind of over the top lesbian hookup scene between LP and Velvet. Either that or Velvet would die or something. However, for once, he managed to pleasantly surprise me, instead of baiting me into running for the football and then yanking it away. In this one single, specific instance, kkat has exhibited tendencies of a biological male who prefers biological females; in other words, today he was not a faggot.
As far as his execution goes, it's far from perfect, but at the same time he hasn't really developed the LP X Homage plot much yet, so I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and see where it goes. Ideally, at this stage LP should be noticing Homage but not consciously acknowledging that she's attracted to her, which seems to be what's happening so far. Consciously, her affections should still be focused primarily on Velvet, though ideally the author should be mixing panic and desperation in there bit by bit as it begins to dawn on her that it's probably not meant to be. The tensions created by the love triangle should continue to grow and cause friction between the three friends until the issue is resolved.
I would actually recommend having LP follow the traditional 5 stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance) in order to work through this. As soon as she gets into the depression stage, her friendship with Homage should begin to take on a more significant role, and it can start to blossom into actual romantic affection as soon as she's finally come to terms with Velvet and Calamity doing the horizontal Kentucky Derby behind her back. That's how I'd handle it, at least.
>I have always wanted to write a post-apocalyptic pony fic. I still wish to do so, and I hope to give other folks like myself something else to read instead of FO:E, that still approaches the idea of ponies in such a setting because it's my favorite.
Btw, "post-apocalypse" is a general enough category that you could easily get away with doing your own version of it. Your work might be compared to FoE, but it won't necessarily be seen as a ripoff so long as you avoid a lot of obvious similarities. For instance, you might want to avoid using the same atompunk aesthetic that this story
I always thought the idea of Celestia and Luna being suddenly killed would make an interesting end-of-the-world scenario for Equestria: the sun and the moon suddenly stop moving, and even the most powerful unicorns in the country can't figure out how to get them to move again. Meanwhile, one side of the planet would bake and the other side would freeze; the ponies would likely have to all move to a sliver of space in the middle where the temperature is mostly hospitable. There are all sorts of directions you could take something like this: the other creatures in the world could find themselves in the same predicament, causing all life on Equus to have to fight it out for the same tiny sliver of habitable land. Or, you could have your protagonist undertake a quest to the inhospitable regions of the world. Maybe life there adapted to the harsh conditions and evolved into huge monsters capable of surviving extreme heat and extreme cold. You could do all sorts of things with it. This is just one idea btw; you could come up with pretty much any end of the world scenario you like. Don't think that just because kkat has a monopoly on the Fallout-MLP idea that he has a monopoly on all of the post-apocalypse scenarios.
>>301639
>By the way, Glim, is it bad writing that right after spending all this time trying to set up a love triangle between Velvet and LP and Calamity, this radio DJ suddenly captures LP's heart to break the love triangle?
Actually, no. I would argue that the timing is clumsy, and also that the author hasn't really bothered to develop LP's crush on Velvet, Velvet and Calamity's relationship, or even LP and Velvet's characters enough for the storyline to have the emotional resonance he wants it to. However, LP getting her heart broken and then finding someone else is a perfectly fine direction for the romantic subplot to take.
I never really believed LP and Velvet as a potential couple in the first place, even disregarding the author's clumsy handling of their interactions and respective characters. It's a one-sided unspoken crush, Velvet is older than Littlepoop, and we've had no indication that her barn door swings the same way as Littlepoop's, so it was always rather implausible that they would ever end up together.
Littlepoop's crush on Velvet is part of her earlier, more innocent life that she had when she lived in the stable. Her character arc, to the extent that she has one, involves her loss of that innocence as she ventures out into the wasteland and sees what the world is actually like. Realizing that her dream of eating out the illustrious Velvet Remedy's ponut will never come true, no matter how badly she wants it to, is just one of the many harsh lessons she has to learn before she can grow up and find her virtue, or whatever the fuck she's trying to do.
From a literary perspective, kkat made the right call here by making her first love unrequited; in fact I'm actually a little surprised he had the instinct to take it in this mature of a direction. I had always more or less assumed that the Velvet X Calamity storyline was going to end up being just another hurdle for Littlepoop to cross, but that ultimately kkat would end it with some kind of over the top lesbian hookup scene between LP and Velvet. Either that or Velvet would die or something. However, for once, he managed to pleasantly surprise me, instead of baiting me into running for the football and then yanking it away. In this one single, specific instance, kkat has exhibited tendencies of a biological male who prefers biological females; in other words, today he was not a faggot.
As far as his execution goes, it's far from perfect, but at the same time he hasn't really developed the LP X Homage plot much yet, so I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and see where it goes. Ideally, at this stage LP should be noticing Homage but not consciously acknowledging that she's attracted to her, which seems to be what's happening so far. Consciously, her affections should still be focused primarily on Velvet, though ideally the author should be mixing panic and desperation in there bit by bit as it begins to dawn on her that it's probably not meant to be. The tensions created by the love triangle should continue to grow and cause friction between the three friends until the issue is resolved.
I would actually recommend having LP follow the traditional 5 stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance) in order to work through this. As soon as she gets into the depression stage, her friendship with Homage should begin to take on a more significant role, and it can start to blossom into actual romantic affection as soon as she's finally come to terms with Velvet and Calamity doing the horizontal Kentucky Derby behind her back. That's how I'd handle it, at least.
>>301637
I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that a story written by an obsessive gamer who appears completely detached from all other facets of reality would function according to extremely linear rules.
>Amusingly, that's all it has to say. There's no virtue-related rules. It's literally "if you're going to play my game you must roleplay exactly the way I tell you."
It might actually be an interesting exercise to write a story in this world according to kkat's rules, but push those rules to their most ridiculous extremes. Like a good-guy character whose virtue is leaving bits or bottle caps, I suppose behind to pay for all the random crap he loots, so he is constantly having to think up complex money-making schemes in order to finance his looting. Or a villain whose virtue is correcting everyone's grammar.
I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that a story written by an obsessive gamer who appears completely detached from all other facets of reality would function according to extremely linear rules.
>Amusingly, that's all it has to say. There's no virtue-related rules. It's literally "if you're going to play my game you must roleplay exactly the way I tell you."
It might actually be an interesting exercise to write a story in this world according to kkat's rules, but push those rules to their most ridiculous extremes. Like a good-guy character whose virtue is leaving bits or bottle caps, I suppose behind to pay for all the random crap he loots, so he is constantly having to think up complex money-making schemes in order to finance his looting. Or a villain whose virtue is correcting everyone's grammar.
>>301645
>Btw, "post-apocalypse" is a general enough category that you could easily get away with doing your own version of it.
Oh absolutely. I don't know if I came off as defeatist or didn't explain myself well enough, but I want to and i'm GOING to write my own post-apocalyptic pony fic with some (hopefully) interesting ideas of my own someday.
I'm pretty tired of my favorite genre being dominated so utterly by a story I am so thoroughly repulsed by, and would hope to write more of what I want to see in the world and this fandom. Hopefully it provides a nice story for other anons who enjoy the genre to experience as well, since there's a sore lack of this kind of fiction that ISN'T FO:E. I also wished to come up with a reason that fits more sensibly with ponies, instead of "oh yeah they turned into violent jingoistic americans in a decade or two from what we know of them in the show".
As for the apocalypse, it might be a bit generic, but dark shadows and monsters of the void are the focus of the cataclysm in my premise. As for the "aesthetic" it leans more toward what is seen in the show, coupled with a kind of exaggerated, cartoony focus on farm lifestyles and equipment, since the primary faction operating on the ground are earth ponies and I thought it would be a fun premise to base their stuff on advancements of farm clothes and gear.
>Btw, "post-apocalypse" is a general enough category that you could easily get away with doing your own version of it.
Oh absolutely. I don't know if I came off as defeatist or didn't explain myself well enough, but I want to and i'm GOING to write my own post-apocalyptic pony fic with some (hopefully) interesting ideas of my own someday.
I'm pretty tired of my favorite genre being dominated so utterly by a story I am so thoroughly repulsed by, and would hope to write more of what I want to see in the world and this fandom. Hopefully it provides a nice story for other anons who enjoy the genre to experience as well, since there's a sore lack of this kind of fiction that ISN'T FO:E. I also wished to come up with a reason that fits more sensibly with ponies, instead of "oh yeah they turned into violent jingoistic americans in a decade or two from what we know of them in the show".
As for the apocalypse, it might be a bit generic, but dark shadows and monsters of the void are the focus of the cataclysm in my premise. As for the "aesthetic" it leans more toward what is seen in the show, coupled with a kind of exaggerated, cartoony focus on farm lifestyles and equipment, since the primary faction operating on the ground are earth ponies and I thought it would be a fun premise to base their stuff on advancements of farm clothes and gear.
Littlepip's loot and shoot locations have been pretty mundane so far.
Raider-infested Ponyville
A vault full of chimera mutants
Old Appleoosa the slaver town
Shattered Hoof Prison
some junkyard full of ghouls and randomly exploding cars that blow up when touched by melee atks
that vault with the medical supplies and killer Crusader Maneframe AI
Littlepip should explore something cooler like a crashed cruise ship full of pre-war civilian loot!
In this setting, flying cars and boats exist. So why not a crashed airship cruise liner nuclear blimp thingy? Could justify the monster presence by saying it had a magic radioactive core that attracted and further mutated local wildlife. And make it into some big commentary on the folly of rich Equestrian boomers who wanted to "flee from their war" by fucking off on a boat into international waters while leaving the poor behind. Make the boat three times bigger than the Titanic and name it something super ironic. That'd be a fun place to explore since if it had flooded underwater sections you'd need diving equipment for that. And if it had irradiated segments you'd need an anti-radiation suit for that too. And if anti-rad suits aren't waterproof meaning irradiated water slowly corrupts and kills you no matter what you wear, this creates a tense race against time as the heroes alternate between getting irradiated for treasure and pissing away their radiation and rad damage with Radaway. The closer they cut it, the more they risk death.
Could even use this as characterization when Team LP is all "the loot here fucking sucks balls!" while looting dead rich cruisegoers and complaining about how they only find "useless crap" like broken gold watches and pre-war money and clothes with little protective value from damage or the elements and other things that would be luxurious amd super-fancy to us but worthless in the eyes of hardened Wasteland veterans whose brains are stuck in pragmatic survivalist "If I can't eat it or shoot it or wear it and it ain't so much better than what I'm already carrying that it's worth adding its weight to my heavy pack, it has no fucking value and belongs in the fucking trash. I'll only carry useless trash for trade and barter if it's light and worth something to a pragmatic survivalist trader since they see more business and therefore have more cash than rich collectors obsessed with buying fancy prewar shit" mode.
Raider-infested Ponyville
A vault full of chimera mutants
Old Appleoosa the slaver town
Shattered Hoof Prison
some junkyard full of ghouls and randomly exploding cars that blow up when touched by melee atks
that vault with the medical supplies and killer Crusader Maneframe AI
Littlepip should explore something cooler like a crashed cruise ship full of pre-war civilian loot!
In this setting, flying cars and boats exist. So why not a crashed airship cruise liner nuclear blimp thingy? Could justify the monster presence by saying it had a magic radioactive core that attracted and further mutated local wildlife. And make it into some big commentary on the folly of rich Equestrian boomers who wanted to "flee from their war" by fucking off on a boat into international waters while leaving the poor behind. Make the boat three times bigger than the Titanic and name it something super ironic. That'd be a fun place to explore since if it had flooded underwater sections you'd need diving equipment for that. And if it had irradiated segments you'd need an anti-radiation suit for that too. And if anti-rad suits aren't waterproof meaning irradiated water slowly corrupts and kills you no matter what you wear, this creates a tense race against time as the heroes alternate between getting irradiated for treasure and pissing away their radiation and rad damage with Radaway. The closer they cut it, the more they risk death.
Could even use this as characterization when Team LP is all "the loot here fucking sucks balls!" while looting dead rich cruisegoers and complaining about how they only find "useless crap" like broken gold watches and pre-war money and clothes with little protective value from damage or the elements and other things that would be luxurious amd super-fancy to us but worthless in the eyes of hardened Wasteland veterans whose brains are stuck in pragmatic survivalist "If I can't eat it or shoot it or wear it and it ain't so much better than what I'm already carrying that it's worth adding its weight to my heavy pack, it has no fucking value and belongs in the fucking trash. I'll only carry useless trash for trade and barter if it's light and worth something to a pragmatic survivalist trader since they see more business and therefore have more cash than rich collectors obsessed with buying fancy prewar shit" mode.
Aside from accents, everypony in this story kind of talks the same. I'm not sure if I am describing it right but everyone's voice is way too similar when it comes to word choice and how they describe things.
Some characters might be meaner or more knowledgeable than others but nobody has a distinct manner of speaking that is entirely their own unless it's a gimmick.
Why is it so common for bad authors to write all "correct" characters to talk and think like them, or do that but with a gimmick on top like an accent or weird speech syntax, and then make all the villains weirdoes with bad justifications for being very different from how the author thinks and talks?
What if Velvet tried to speak in a flowery and fancy way, flexing her lyrical skills to contrast with the down to earth and straightforward Calamity?
Meanwhile because Littlepip lived a boring life in an ordinary stable full of pop culture she constantly makes pop culture references and references to her old stable life. Heh heh, "stable" life. Because it wasn't constantly in danger. I can't believe Kkat didn't notice the pun opportunity there.
Say there's a firefight where the heroes almost died, and they are in a raider infested city, and they argue with each other over whether they keep going or rest up and heal...
"That sucked," Calamity understated. "Want to keep going?"
"We must rest!" Velvet insists. "If we continue this mad dash into hell, death shall be our fate! We must find a place to rest in this desolate city."
"I'll take 'something that would get us all killed' for 200, Alex," Littlepip says. "Fuck, I haven't seen blasts like this since taco night at Taco Belle's house. Or Kut Cobalt's last performance."
"Five ponies left on the planet know who Kut Cobalt is and I ain't one of them." Calamity says.
Or let's say Littlepip solves some mystery. "Look at me go, I'm a regular Dick Tracy."
"You're dick-crazy?" One pony asks, confused.
"I remember when I used to be regular," an elderly ghoul mopes miserably.
Team Littlepip could wander upon some Raider Art with gore and poop splattered everywhere and some pony with a head smashed in by a big rock by a raider.
"Poor bastard" Calamity says.
Velvet is disgusted and says whiny poet stuff and a lot of it.
"Wow, Gallagher got a gig." Littlepip snarks, referencing that comedian Gallagher who likes smashing watermelons with hammers.
"Babe, what the fuck?" Velvet asks, horrified. Hee to the point ness here sticks out.
Littlepip cries. "bad jokes is my coping mechanism and I hate it too"
Some characters might be meaner or more knowledgeable than others but nobody has a distinct manner of speaking that is entirely their own unless it's a gimmick.
Why is it so common for bad authors to write all "correct" characters to talk and think like them, or do that but with a gimmick on top like an accent or weird speech syntax, and then make all the villains weirdoes with bad justifications for being very different from how the author thinks and talks?
What if Velvet tried to speak in a flowery and fancy way, flexing her lyrical skills to contrast with the down to earth and straightforward Calamity?
Meanwhile because Littlepip lived a boring life in an ordinary stable full of pop culture she constantly makes pop culture references and references to her old stable life. Heh heh, "stable" life. Because it wasn't constantly in danger. I can't believe Kkat didn't notice the pun opportunity there.
Say there's a firefight where the heroes almost died, and they are in a raider infested city, and they argue with each other over whether they keep going or rest up and heal...
"That sucked," Calamity understated. "Want to keep going?"
"We must rest!" Velvet insists. "If we continue this mad dash into hell, death shall be our fate! We must find a place to rest in this desolate city."
"I'll take 'something that would get us all killed' for 200, Alex," Littlepip says. "Fuck, I haven't seen blasts like this since taco night at Taco Belle's house. Or Kut Cobalt's last performance."
"Five ponies left on the planet know who Kut Cobalt is and I ain't one of them." Calamity says.
Or let's say Littlepip solves some mystery. "Look at me go, I'm a regular Dick Tracy."
"You're dick-crazy?" One pony asks, confused.
"I remember when I used to be regular," an elderly ghoul mopes miserably.
Team Littlepip could wander upon some Raider Art with gore and poop splattered everywhere and some pony with a head smashed in by a big rock by a raider.
"Poor bastard" Calamity says.
Velvet is disgusted and says whiny poet stuff and a lot of it.
"Wow, Gallagher got a gig." Littlepip snarks, referencing that comedian Gallagher who likes smashing watermelons with hammers.
"Babe, what the fuck?" Velvet asks, horrified. Hee to the point ness here sticks out.
Littlepip cries. "bad jokes is my coping mechanism and I hate it too"
>>301958
*Gallopgher.
also is it bad writing that makes Littlepip excellent at everything or at the very least, good enough at it to get by?
She can hack. And repair guns. And repair pipbucks. And fix military grade life support systems encased in a damaged power armour suit while having some bizarre fever. She fixes so much shit you'll forget Calamity is supposed to be the one who likes fixing and upgrading guns sometimes. She is a lockpicking god. And kill accurately with any gun or melee weapon. She can sneak well enough to get by. And she's a magical god able to levitate herself and friends and boxcars. She can usually talk anyone into anything. She has no problem maintaining her friendships with her murderhobo friends. She can easily ignore the pain from gunshots and broken bones and keep fighting on. She can carry at least two hundred pounds of gear in her saddlebags on a trek across half the country without complaint. And she is almost never wrong.
Cleverly building your character to be good at certain things is a vital part of fallout. You need to decide what to spend your skill points and Special Stats on and what skills to level up. Try to be good at everything and you end up mediocre at everything.
Some wimpy smooth talker with maximum Charisma won't be as strong as a min-maxed 10 Agility 10 Strength 1 Charisma stealthy sniper unkillable walking apocalypse turbo-badass.
Well except in Fallout 3 where becoming OP at everything is way too easy and therefore boring and unearned.
Littlepip should run into situations she can't handle and either ask her friends to handle challenges her skillset isn't suited for or think "damn I wish I had a friend who is good at this and can do this for me". It could give her friends, the pacifist musician and experienced badass cowboy, chances to shine.
I get that Kkat desperately wants LP to be this "impressive combat god". Even though Silver could kick her ass. But Fallout ain't Fist Of The North Star. It's not about the power fantasy. Getting to become OP in these games is a reward for finding the best loot and making the best characters. The power fantasy of being able to kill deathclaws with boxing gloves or alicorns with boxcars instantly means nothing if the author never sets these things up as threats.
Littlepip should rely on her friends a lot like in One Piece where the charismatic headstrong Luffy has friends who are great at shit he sucks at like sniping, cooking, swords, lying, ship maintenance, and so on.
Maybe Littlepip should have made one friend by now who dies during combat to make things tense and make the alicorns into a legitimate threat and give Littleshit some Survivor's Guilt?
Every time Littlepip effortlessly trivializes the challenges living in a post apocalyptic world presents, it ruins the audience's ability to see those challenges as huge threats that suck to go through. There is never any tension because LP will only fail sometimes and in tiny easily overlooked ways. Saying the wrong thing here and there and missing one of every one hundred gunshots and wasting four bobby pins for every lock she picks open can't add up and buttfuck her. The author just isn't willing to let Littlepip lose even when she really should because the alternative is jacking up her stats or lowering the difficulty to make foes retarded.
*Gallopgher.
also is it bad writing that makes Littlepip excellent at everything or at the very least, good enough at it to get by?
She can hack. And repair guns. And repair pipbucks. And fix military grade life support systems encased in a damaged power armour suit while having some bizarre fever. She fixes so much shit you'll forget Calamity is supposed to be the one who likes fixing and upgrading guns sometimes. She is a lockpicking god. And kill accurately with any gun or melee weapon. She can sneak well enough to get by. And she's a magical god able to levitate herself and friends and boxcars. She can usually talk anyone into anything. She has no problem maintaining her friendships with her murderhobo friends. She can easily ignore the pain from gunshots and broken bones and keep fighting on. She can carry at least two hundred pounds of gear in her saddlebags on a trek across half the country without complaint. And she is almost never wrong.
Cleverly building your character to be good at certain things is a vital part of fallout. You need to decide what to spend your skill points and Special Stats on and what skills to level up. Try to be good at everything and you end up mediocre at everything.
Some wimpy smooth talker with maximum Charisma won't be as strong as a min-maxed 10 Agility 10 Strength 1 Charisma stealthy sniper unkillable walking apocalypse turbo-badass.
Well except in Fallout 3 where becoming OP at everything is way too easy and therefore boring and unearned.
Littlepip should run into situations she can't handle and either ask her friends to handle challenges her skillset isn't suited for or think "damn I wish I had a friend who is good at this and can do this for me". It could give her friends, the pacifist musician and experienced badass cowboy, chances to shine.
I get that Kkat desperately wants LP to be this "impressive combat god". Even though Silver could kick her ass. But Fallout ain't Fist Of The North Star. It's not about the power fantasy. Getting to become OP in these games is a reward for finding the best loot and making the best characters. The power fantasy of being able to kill deathclaws with boxing gloves or alicorns with boxcars instantly means nothing if the author never sets these things up as threats.
Littlepip should rely on her friends a lot like in One Piece where the charismatic headstrong Luffy has friends who are great at shit he sucks at like sniping, cooking, swords, lying, ship maintenance, and so on.
Maybe Littlepip should have made one friend by now who dies during combat to make things tense and make the alicorns into a legitimate threat and give Littleshit some Survivor's Guilt?
Every time Littlepip effortlessly trivializes the challenges living in a post apocalyptic world presents, it ruins the audience's ability to see those challenges as huge threats that suck to go through. There is never any tension because LP will only fail sometimes and in tiny easily overlooked ways. Saying the wrong thing here and there and missing one of every one hundred gunshots and wasting four bobby pins for every lock she picks open can't add up and buttfuck her. The author just isn't willing to let Littlepip lose even when she really should because the alternative is jacking up her stats or lowering the difficulty to make foes retarded.
>>301634
>SteelHooves took no persuasion at all, neither eager nor reluctant.
SteelHooves is thus far a poorly-developed character even by the standards of FoE. Like Calamity and Velvet, he has no obvious goals or motivations, so he just goes along with whatever Littlepoop wants to do. Littlepoop doesn't have any goals or motivations either, but since she's the Author's Chosen, deciding where to go and what to do naturally falls to her.
Anyway, now that the pesky matter of convincing everypony to risk life and limb to get some rare collectible vinyl for Littlepoop's latest rug-muncher crush has been resolved, they set out for the Red Racer factory. As a quick refresher, here is why they chose this location:
>I want you to get some new songs for me. Specific songs. I know that Sweetie Belle was really close with the other two founders of Stable-Tec, one of whom was Scootaloo. And Scootaloo also founded Red Racer, whose office and factory is right here in Manehattan.
Kkat's autism here is as hard to follow as ever, but apparently DJ Lickitysplit somehow learned that there are rare recordings stored in this building, demos recorded by either Sweetie Belle or Scootaloo. We are not told how exactly she came by this oddly specific information.
>The Red Racer factory was nowhere near either the Luna or Celestia Lines, so within half an hour, we were walking through the urban blight of the Manehattan Ruins. The crash from the Mint-als was worse than before, and the only thing that kept me from chomping another one was a promise to myself that I would the moment we got to Red Racer. I couldn’t fight like this, stupid and half-blind. I needed that edge. And if I took another one now, I ran the risk of crashing in the middle of combat. I couldn’t risk that.
This drug addiction side-plot is more annoying than anything else. Kkat clearly has no idea how substance addiction works, how addicts behave, what sorts of effects drugs have on a person, or what a comedown or a hangover is like. As far as I can tell, these crack mints don't serve any purpose in the story besides giving Littlepoop improbable boosts of mental acuity at convenient moments, and her addiction to them isn't believable at all.
>I dropped back to walk alongside SteelHooves, noticing how Calamity and Velvet Remedy unconsciously changed their paces to put distance between each other. I rolled my eyes. They were bad enough before. Depression was setting in, and their stupid silent fight wasn’t helping.
So they're supposed to be fighting now, is that what I'm meant to gather from this? What are they fighting about? Is Velvet still assblasted about the dead colt thing, or is this about checking Littlepoop into rehab? No matter what these characters are doing, all of their interactions feel wooden and awkward. I'm starting to feel like I'm just repeating the same complaints over and over: Littlepoop's addiction isn't believable, Velvet and Calamity's relationship isn't believable, the characters in this story have no personality or motivations, etc.
Anyway, speaking of characters with no personality or motivations, Littlepoop decides to fall back and make small talk with SteelHooves. She asks him why he is still tagging along with them, which is actually a fair question. His response is about what you'd expect:
>“Maybe I have nothing better to do.”
This is pretty much the personal motto of every character in this story. Littlepoop herself has openly acknowledged having no goals or objectives; at this point she's just pointlessly risking her life on stupid errands to no good purpose. On top of that, she drags these three along with her and risks their lives as well. They have no more reason to tag along with her than she has to do any of the shit she does, and none of them really seem to care about much of anything.
Boredom and apathy are pretty much the only solid themes in this rambling tome of pure autism. Why is this protagonist wandering the wasteland having adventures? “Maybe I have nothing better to do.” Why is out fighting manticores just so she can lay her hands on some classic vinyl? “Maybe I have nothing better to do.” Why do her friends choose to follow her? “Maybe I have nothing better to do.” It's as if the author's subconscious is screaming something at him about both his writing and his life that he's too dense to pick up on. As I've said before, this text is more interesting as a psychological profile of its author than it is as a work of fiction.
<kkat, why did you pour hundreds of hours of your life into playing a single video game?
>“Maybe I have nothing better to do.”
<and why did you write this 500,000 word novel about the same video game being played by a bunch of ponies?
>“Maybe I have nothing better to do.”
<for that matter, why am I taking the time to read and review it?
>“Maybe you have nothing better to do.”
Well, whatever. Since we've all got nothing better to do, let's just keep going.
Even though SteelHooves' response to the question of why he is following her is the same response she would give were she asked why she is going on this quest in the first place, LP seems to interpret his words with suspicion:
>I stared ahead, not believing that at all. Why would he lie though? It seemed like all my companions were on the edge of turning on me. Was I being paranoid? Or was SteelHooves a threat?
It's possible that kkat is building a plotline here where LP's paranoia will grow as her drug use continues, likely resulting in her turning on her friends due to the mistaken belief that they are plotting against her. That's the best explanation I can figure, anyway; nothing in SteelHooves' words or behavior suggests that he has anything to hide. Then again, with this story, who knows? I have no choice but to run at the football one more time.
>SteelHooves took no persuasion at all, neither eager nor reluctant.
SteelHooves is thus far a poorly-developed character even by the standards of FoE. Like Calamity and Velvet, he has no obvious goals or motivations, so he just goes along with whatever Littlepoop wants to do. Littlepoop doesn't have any goals or motivations either, but since she's the Author's Chosen, deciding where to go and what to do naturally falls to her.
Anyway, now that the pesky matter of convincing everypony to risk life and limb to get some rare collectible vinyl for Littlepoop's latest rug-muncher crush has been resolved, they set out for the Red Racer factory. As a quick refresher, here is why they chose this location:
>I want you to get some new songs for me. Specific songs. I know that Sweetie Belle was really close with the other two founders of Stable-Tec, one of whom was Scootaloo. And Scootaloo also founded Red Racer, whose office and factory is right here in Manehattan.
Kkat's autism here is as hard to follow as ever, but apparently DJ Lickitysplit somehow learned that there are rare recordings stored in this building, demos recorded by either Sweetie Belle or Scootaloo. We are not told how exactly she came by this oddly specific information.
>The Red Racer factory was nowhere near either the Luna or Celestia Lines, so within half an hour, we were walking through the urban blight of the Manehattan Ruins. The crash from the Mint-als was worse than before, and the only thing that kept me from chomping another one was a promise to myself that I would the moment we got to Red Racer. I couldn’t fight like this, stupid and half-blind. I needed that edge. And if I took another one now, I ran the risk of crashing in the middle of combat. I couldn’t risk that.
This drug addiction side-plot is more annoying than anything else. Kkat clearly has no idea how substance addiction works, how addicts behave, what sorts of effects drugs have on a person, or what a comedown or a hangover is like. As far as I can tell, these crack mints don't serve any purpose in the story besides giving Littlepoop improbable boosts of mental acuity at convenient moments, and her addiction to them isn't believable at all.
>I dropped back to walk alongside SteelHooves, noticing how Calamity and Velvet Remedy unconsciously changed their paces to put distance between each other. I rolled my eyes. They were bad enough before. Depression was setting in, and their stupid silent fight wasn’t helping.
So they're supposed to be fighting now, is that what I'm meant to gather from this? What are they fighting about? Is Velvet still assblasted about the dead colt thing, or is this about checking Littlepoop into rehab? No matter what these characters are doing, all of their interactions feel wooden and awkward. I'm starting to feel like I'm just repeating the same complaints over and over: Littlepoop's addiction isn't believable, Velvet and Calamity's relationship isn't believable, the characters in this story have no personality or motivations, etc.
Anyway, speaking of characters with no personality or motivations, Littlepoop decides to fall back and make small talk with SteelHooves. She asks him why he is still tagging along with them, which is actually a fair question. His response is about what you'd expect:
>“Maybe I have nothing better to do.”
This is pretty much the personal motto of every character in this story. Littlepoop herself has openly acknowledged having no goals or objectives; at this point she's just pointlessly risking her life on stupid errands to no good purpose. On top of that, she drags these three along with her and risks their lives as well. They have no more reason to tag along with her than she has to do any of the shit she does, and none of them really seem to care about much of anything.
Boredom and apathy are pretty much the only solid themes in this rambling tome of pure autism. Why is this protagonist wandering the wasteland having adventures? “Maybe I have nothing better to do.” Why is out fighting manticores just so she can lay her hands on some classic vinyl? “Maybe I have nothing better to do.” Why do her friends choose to follow her? “Maybe I have nothing better to do.” It's as if the author's subconscious is screaming something at him about both his writing and his life that he's too dense to pick up on. As I've said before, this text is more interesting as a psychological profile of its author than it is as a work of fiction.
<kkat, why did you pour hundreds of hours of your life into playing a single video game?
>“Maybe I have nothing better to do.”
<and why did you write this 500,000 word novel about the same video game being played by a bunch of ponies?
>“Maybe I have nothing better to do.”
<for that matter, why am I taking the time to read and review it?
>“Maybe you have nothing better to do.”
Well, whatever. Since we've all got nothing better to do, let's just keep going.
Even though SteelHooves' response to the question of why he is following her is the same response she would give were she asked why she is going on this quest in the first place, LP seems to interpret his words with suspicion:
>I stared ahead, not believing that at all. Why would he lie though? It seemed like all my companions were on the edge of turning on me. Was I being paranoid? Or was SteelHooves a threat?
It's possible that kkat is building a plotline here where LP's paranoia will grow as her drug use continues, likely resulting in her turning on her friends due to the mistaken belief that they are plotting against her. That's the best explanation I can figure, anyway; nothing in SteelHooves' words or behavior suggests that he has anything to hide. Then again, with this story, who knows? I have no choice but to run at the football one more time.
>>301980
As she is thinking about this, she fails to notice that the others have stopped walking and bumps into Calamity. Curious as to why they stopped, she looks up and sees everyone staring at another old wartime poster. The poster depicts a pony wearing the same sort of armor as SteelHooves, except it's slightly more menacing-looking, and it is worn by a pegasus. The author uses the word "insectoid" this is not a real word, btw to describe it. This description is reinforced with mention of antennae-like protrusions from a carapace-like battle saddle. A scorpion-like tail, apparently a weapon of some sort, completes the effect. As with most of the propaganda posters we've seen in the wasteland, this one includes a slogan: "Fear not, Equestria! We will save you."
The poster appears to have an effect on Calamity:
>Calamity finally nickered, scoffing. “That’s right. One day, the Grand Pegasus Enclave will come swoopin’ down outta the skies t’ rescue all y’all little ponies. Maybe after they’re done with their naps.”
So presumably, this has to do with whatever his deal is; being a "dashite" or whatever. He makes another cryptic statement as he walks away:
>“Lazy. Arrogant. It’s like they took the greatest of us, stripped away everything t’was good an’ admirable ‘till they were left with nothin’ but her flaws, and decided ‘hey, let’s go with that!’”
It's not clear just what the fuck he's on about, but I suspect we are not meant to understand it just yet. I'll note that the author is actually doing a fairly decent job of building up Calamity's backstory: he gradually feeds us small morsels of information that fill in bits and pieces of his past, while leaving enough unexplained that we remain curious. Calamity is probably the least objectionable character in this story so far.
Anyway, there is a page break. When the next scene begins, they have arrived at the Red Rider factory. SteelHooves voices his concern that something is following them. Littlepoop immediately scans the space behind them, using both her eyes and her EFS, but sees nothing. However, she trusts SteelHooves' instincts, as she has sensed something lurking in the periphery of her vision for some time now.
>As if on cue, a notice flashed across the upper edge of my Eyes-Forward Sparkle. I had discovered “Hoofbeats”. I turned back to look at the building again, eyeing it with surprise. I knew what this skyscraper had once been: this was the Ministry of Morale’s Manehattan hub. I’d seen it from the roof of Tenpony Tower. Yet sure enough, the façade before us proclaimed itself (in sheer audacity of style as well as neon lettering) to be the center of loud, musical urban rebellion.
This paragraph is confusing and terribly written. I'm going to walk through it step by step:
>As if on cue, a notice flashed across the upper edge of my Eyes-Forward Sparkle. I had discovered “Hoofbeats”.
I'm not clear on what "Hoofbeats" is, but I think what's happening here is that her radar is giving her the name of another location. According to an earlier paragraph, though, they are supposed to be at the Red Rider factory, so I'm not sure what the fuck.
>I knew what this skyscraper had once been: this was the Ministry of Morale’s Manehattan hub.
How does she know this? I thought the place was called "Hoofbeats." What does that have to do with the Ministry of Morale? Once again, LP seems to be making connections that don't logically follow each other; either that or the author is leaving out vital information that might allow us to make the connection.
>I’d seen it from the roof of Tenpony Tower.
This was not mentioned to my recollection. The only thing she explicitly mentions seeing from the roof are the gigantic communications towers that are apparently a major part of the skyline yet were never brought up before that moment. If she saw this building from the roof of the Tower then it should have been pointed out, in the same way that the communications towers should have been pointed out much earlier if they were a major part of the landscape. Having the protagonist observe significant locations from a distance, just to wonder about what they are, is an easy way to foreshadow future events and make the story feel less disconnected and random.
>Yet sure enough, the façade before us proclaimed itself (in sheer audacity of style as well as neon lettering) to be the center of loud, musical urban rebellion.
I don't have the slightest idea what she's on about here. Apparently the building is decorated ostentatiously, and has some kind of neon lettering which may or may not still be functioning. Seems like this is something they would have noticed from a good distance away, actually, but we'll put a pin in that for now. How she reaches the conclusion that this building is the center of "loud, musical urban rebellion" is beyond me. My best guess is that "hoofbeats" was some kind of pre-war politically-subversive dance troupe, and this building was their headquarters.
You can see why all of this is confusing. The author leaps through a series of very strange connections and arrives at a conclusion which does not grok. First they arrive at the Red Rider factory, then Littlepoop's radar tells her the building is actually called "Hoofbeats," then she somehow draws the conclusion that this is the Ministry of Morale's headquarters, and then from there she decides that it's also some kind of urban arts center, which I guess is what "Hoofbeats" is alluding to. None of this makes even a lick of sense.
Addendum: I actually misread an earlier passage. This is from the opening paragraph of the scene:
>I was staring at my PipBuck’s automapping spell; the Red Racer factory should be directly in front of us.
I understood this to mean that they had arrived at the Red Racer building. However, what I think this is saying is that her radar misled her; the building that is supposed to be the Red Racer factory turned out to be this building.
As she is thinking about this, she fails to notice that the others have stopped walking and bumps into Calamity. Curious as to why they stopped, she looks up and sees everyone staring at another old wartime poster. The poster depicts a pony wearing the same sort of armor as SteelHooves, except it's slightly more menacing-looking, and it is worn by a pegasus. The author uses the word "insectoid" this is not a real word, btw to describe it. This description is reinforced with mention of antennae-like protrusions from a carapace-like battle saddle. A scorpion-like tail, apparently a weapon of some sort, completes the effect. As with most of the propaganda posters we've seen in the wasteland, this one includes a slogan: "Fear not, Equestria! We will save you."
The poster appears to have an effect on Calamity:
>Calamity finally nickered, scoffing. “That’s right. One day, the Grand Pegasus Enclave will come swoopin’ down outta the skies t’ rescue all y’all little ponies. Maybe after they’re done with their naps.”
So presumably, this has to do with whatever his deal is; being a "dashite" or whatever. He makes another cryptic statement as he walks away:
>“Lazy. Arrogant. It’s like they took the greatest of us, stripped away everything t’was good an’ admirable ‘till they were left with nothin’ but her flaws, and decided ‘hey, let’s go with that!’”
It's not clear just what the fuck he's on about, but I suspect we are not meant to understand it just yet. I'll note that the author is actually doing a fairly decent job of building up Calamity's backstory: he gradually feeds us small morsels of information that fill in bits and pieces of his past, while leaving enough unexplained that we remain curious. Calamity is probably the least objectionable character in this story so far.
Anyway, there is a page break. When the next scene begins, they have arrived at the Red Rider factory. SteelHooves voices his concern that something is following them. Littlepoop immediately scans the space behind them, using both her eyes and her EFS, but sees nothing. However, she trusts SteelHooves' instincts, as she has sensed something lurking in the periphery of her vision for some time now.
>As if on cue, a notice flashed across the upper edge of my Eyes-Forward Sparkle. I had discovered “Hoofbeats”. I turned back to look at the building again, eyeing it with surprise. I knew what this skyscraper had once been: this was the Ministry of Morale’s Manehattan hub. I’d seen it from the roof of Tenpony Tower. Yet sure enough, the façade before us proclaimed itself (in sheer audacity of style as well as neon lettering) to be the center of loud, musical urban rebellion.
This paragraph is confusing and terribly written. I'm going to walk through it step by step:
>As if on cue, a notice flashed across the upper edge of my Eyes-Forward Sparkle. I had discovered “Hoofbeats”.
I'm not clear on what "Hoofbeats" is, but I think what's happening here is that her radar is giving her the name of another location. According to an earlier paragraph, though, they are supposed to be at the Red Rider factory, so I'm not sure what the fuck.
>I knew what this skyscraper had once been: this was the Ministry of Morale’s Manehattan hub.
How does she know this? I thought the place was called "Hoofbeats." What does that have to do with the Ministry of Morale? Once again, LP seems to be making connections that don't logically follow each other; either that or the author is leaving out vital information that might allow us to make the connection.
>I’d seen it from the roof of Tenpony Tower.
This was not mentioned to my recollection. The only thing she explicitly mentions seeing from the roof are the gigantic communications towers that are apparently a major part of the skyline yet were never brought up before that moment. If she saw this building from the roof of the Tower then it should have been pointed out, in the same way that the communications towers should have been pointed out much earlier if they were a major part of the landscape. Having the protagonist observe significant locations from a distance, just to wonder about what they are, is an easy way to foreshadow future events and make the story feel less disconnected and random.
>Yet sure enough, the façade before us proclaimed itself (in sheer audacity of style as well as neon lettering) to be the center of loud, musical urban rebellion.
I don't have the slightest idea what she's on about here. Apparently the building is decorated ostentatiously, and has some kind of neon lettering which may or may not still be functioning. Seems like this is something they would have noticed from a good distance away, actually, but we'll put a pin in that for now. How she reaches the conclusion that this building is the center of "loud, musical urban rebellion" is beyond me. My best guess is that "hoofbeats" was some kind of pre-war politically-subversive dance troupe, and this building was their headquarters.
You can see why all of this is confusing. The author leaps through a series of very strange connections and arrives at a conclusion which does not grok. First they arrive at the Red Rider factory, then Littlepoop's radar tells her the building is actually called "Hoofbeats," then she somehow draws the conclusion that this is the Ministry of Morale's headquarters, and then from there she decides that it's also some kind of urban arts center, which I guess is what "Hoofbeats" is alluding to. None of this makes even a lick of sense.
Addendum: I actually misread an earlier passage. This is from the opening paragraph of the scene:
>I was staring at my PipBuck’s automapping spell; the Red Racer factory should be directly in front of us.
I understood this to mean that they had arrived at the Red Racer building. However, what I think this is saying is that her radar misled her; the building that is supposed to be the Red Racer factory turned out to be this building.
>>301981
Okay, I've read a little further, and I think I understand what we're supposed to be looking at here.
>Unlike the Ministry of Magic’s local hub, the Ministry of Morale didn’t announce itself with signs along the Celestia Line or even a name in small font somewhere on the wall. It was a nameless, faceless skyscraper.
This directly contradicts what we just read, about the building being covered with ostentatious decorations and flashing neon signs about urban rebellion. However, the text further elaborates:
>Unassumingly monolithic from the third floor up. The first two floors, however, were dedicated to what I had already come to think of as one of Manehattan’s most popular dance clubs (remembering Velvet Remedy’s passing acknowledgement that Pinkie Pie and Vinyl Scratch had performed music together at Hoofbeats at least once.)
Okay. So, it looks like we're dealing with a single building, the first two floors of which are a brightly painted dance club, with the remainder of the building being a nondescript skyscraper. There are about a zillion ways the author could have better described this, but at least he (eventually) made it clear what we are supposed to be looking at. However, there is also this little autism bomb to contend with:
>(remembering Velvet Remedy’s passing acknowledgement that Pinkie Pie and Vinyl Scratch had performed music together at Hoofbeats at least once.)
This seems to imply that "Hoofbeats" has already been mentioned somewhere in the text, and I don't even faintly remember hearing the name anywhere. This could mean one of two things. One is that this is a detail that actually was mentioned before, but was not given any particular emphasis; Littlepoop and Velvet were having a casual conversation, they mentioned a club called Hoofbeats, and the author figured that since the club had technically been named in the story that it would be fine to just drop it into the story 10 chapters later without explanation. The second possibility is that this conversation is like the communications towers that LP observed but didn't tell us she observed; an "off-camera" event that technically happened but we would have no way of knowing had happened. The only way to verify which it is would be to go back through every previous chapter and ctrl-F for Hoofbeats, which I just plain don't have the energy to do. It's far simpler to just make a joke about how k "I left my cock in San Francisco" kat is an autistic tranny and move on.
And finally:
>Even my PipBuck didn’t label it as a Ministry hub, as if it was a secret… but one that everypony already knew.
It is still not even remotely clear how LP would know that this is a Ministry hub, let alone how she would know which specific ministry out of six it was connected to Nothing about the description of the building, or the information given to her in her PipBuck, even remotely suggests this information.
This may also allude to some random tiny detail that was mentioned eight chapters ago that the author expects us all to remember, or it may just be the author following some autistic line of reasoning all his own, which he doesn't feel is worth explaining to us or that he thinks is somehow obvious. Who knows. At this point, the puzzle is probably not worth solving. Long story short, they are standing at a skyscraper that was a combination disco and Ministry of Morale hangout. Moving on.
>From the MoM hub’s apparent lack of defenses to its perch atop a public party-house, this was assuredly not.
What was assuredly not what? This sentence is even more grammatically atrocious than usual.
It's not any clearer in context, either:
>In its time, the Ministry of Magic’s hub had been exactly what I expected of a Ministry building, down to the insane magical defenses that protected it from the balefire bomb. From the MoM hub’s apparent lack of defenses to its perch atop a public party-house, this was assuredly not.
Anyway, whatever; fuck it. Moving on. Littlepoop is about to go poke around inside the remnants of Club Manhole, when suddenly she sees a bunch of red blips on her radar and recalls DJ Fluffernutter's comment about manticores. And then:
>The Red Racer factory was literally right across a back alley from Hoofbeats.
Kkat, you dickless son of a bitch.
*sigh* This is giving me a headache. So, it looks like they actually did find the Red Racer factory after all. However, despite the fact that this was their intended destination, the author decided to go on for a few paragraphs about this seemingly unimportant skyscraper which is across the street from the factory, while leaving the factory's location, as well as whether or not they had even actually arrived at the goddamn factory, completely ambiguous. Jesus tapdancing Christ.
>The red and orange bulks of manticores roamed all over the facility. I watched as several took off from a terrace twelve stories up and began to circle the building before one-by-one landing on new perches. There were two of them in the back alley alone, one had its back to me, its tail inches from my muzzle. The other was digging through a trash bin further down.
I'm assuming we are still talking about the factory and not the dance club. Are they about to have a fight on their hands? Or is this going to be another of those situations where kkat sets up a fight and then skips over it with a page break?
Well, in any case, it appears that there are enough of these manticores to cause even trigger-happy, for-all-intents-and-purposes-immortal Littlepoop to pause. She decides that she needs a crack mint to figure out what to do, but since her friends think she's a drug addict she doesn't want them to see her take one. So, she turns discreetly to the side and then takes one anyway. Yes, this autism is actually in the text. Now that she is sufficiently coked up, she feels ready to approach the manticore problem.
Okay, I've read a little further, and I think I understand what we're supposed to be looking at here.
>Unlike the Ministry of Magic’s local hub, the Ministry of Morale didn’t announce itself with signs along the Celestia Line or even a name in small font somewhere on the wall. It was a nameless, faceless skyscraper.
This directly contradicts what we just read, about the building being covered with ostentatious decorations and flashing neon signs about urban rebellion. However, the text further elaborates:
>Unassumingly monolithic from the third floor up. The first two floors, however, were dedicated to what I had already come to think of as one of Manehattan’s most popular dance clubs (remembering Velvet Remedy’s passing acknowledgement that Pinkie Pie and Vinyl Scratch had performed music together at Hoofbeats at least once.)
Okay. So, it looks like we're dealing with a single building, the first two floors of which are a brightly painted dance club, with the remainder of the building being a nondescript skyscraper. There are about a zillion ways the author could have better described this, but at least he (eventually) made it clear what we are supposed to be looking at. However, there is also this little autism bomb to contend with:
>(remembering Velvet Remedy’s passing acknowledgement that Pinkie Pie and Vinyl Scratch had performed music together at Hoofbeats at least once.)
This seems to imply that "Hoofbeats" has already been mentioned somewhere in the text, and I don't even faintly remember hearing the name anywhere. This could mean one of two things. One is that this is a detail that actually was mentioned before, but was not given any particular emphasis; Littlepoop and Velvet were having a casual conversation, they mentioned a club called Hoofbeats, and the author figured that since the club had technically been named in the story that it would be fine to just drop it into the story 10 chapters later without explanation. The second possibility is that this conversation is like the communications towers that LP observed but didn't tell us she observed; an "off-camera" event that technically happened but we would have no way of knowing had happened. The only way to verify which it is would be to go back through every previous chapter and ctrl-F for Hoofbeats, which I just plain don't have the energy to do. It's far simpler to just make a joke about how k "I left my cock in San Francisco" kat is an autistic tranny and move on.
And finally:
>Even my PipBuck didn’t label it as a Ministry hub, as if it was a secret… but one that everypony already knew.
It is still not even remotely clear how LP would know that this is a Ministry hub, let alone how she would know which specific ministry out of six it was connected to Nothing about the description of the building, or the information given to her in her PipBuck, even remotely suggests this information.
This may also allude to some random tiny detail that was mentioned eight chapters ago that the author expects us all to remember, or it may just be the author following some autistic line of reasoning all his own, which he doesn't feel is worth explaining to us or that he thinks is somehow obvious. Who knows. At this point, the puzzle is probably not worth solving. Long story short, they are standing at a skyscraper that was a combination disco and Ministry of Morale hangout. Moving on.
>From the MoM hub’s apparent lack of defenses to its perch atop a public party-house, this was assuredly not.
What was assuredly not what? This sentence is even more grammatically atrocious than usual.
It's not any clearer in context, either:
>In its time, the Ministry of Magic’s hub had been exactly what I expected of a Ministry building, down to the insane magical defenses that protected it from the balefire bomb. From the MoM hub’s apparent lack of defenses to its perch atop a public party-house, this was assuredly not.
Anyway, whatever; fuck it. Moving on. Littlepoop is about to go poke around inside the remnants of Club Manhole, when suddenly she sees a bunch of red blips on her radar and recalls DJ Fluffernutter's comment about manticores. And then:
>The Red Racer factory was literally right across a back alley from Hoofbeats.
Kkat, you dickless son of a bitch.
*sigh* This is giving me a headache. So, it looks like they actually did find the Red Racer factory after all. However, despite the fact that this was their intended destination, the author decided to go on for a few paragraphs about this seemingly unimportant skyscraper which is across the street from the factory, while leaving the factory's location, as well as whether or not they had even actually arrived at the goddamn factory, completely ambiguous. Jesus tapdancing Christ.
>The red and orange bulks of manticores roamed all over the facility. I watched as several took off from a terrace twelve stories up and began to circle the building before one-by-one landing on new perches. There were two of them in the back alley alone, one had its back to me, its tail inches from my muzzle. The other was digging through a trash bin further down.
I'm assuming we are still talking about the factory and not the dance club. Are they about to have a fight on their hands? Or is this going to be another of those situations where kkat sets up a fight and then skips over it with a page break?
Well, in any case, it appears that there are enough of these manticores to cause even trigger-happy, for-all-intents-and-purposes-immortal Littlepoop to pause. She decides that she needs a crack mint to figure out what to do, but since her friends think she's a drug addict she doesn't want them to see her take one. So, she turns discreetly to the side and then takes one anyway. Yes, this autism is actually in the text. Now that she is sufficiently coked up, she feels ready to approach the manticore problem.
>>301982
>I had considered having Calamity fly us up to one of the ledges, but the manticores could fly too. They were heavy, lumbering creatures, and never seemed to fly very high, but…
This feels like a good time to mention that the author has never actually provided any sort of visual description of a manticore. Remember, even if you're dealing with a common creature from mythology like a dragon or a centaur or something, it's a good idea to give the reader a quick visual description so they know what they are looking at.
Also, it's news to me that manticores can fly. Pics 1 and 2 are images of manticores from mythology, and you will note that they have been portrayed with and without wings. Pic 3 is the MLP version, which presumably is what kkat wants us to imagine, but I'll remind everyone again that just because you're writing in an established universe doesn't mean you can assume the reader is familiar with everything in that universe. I can't imagine there are too many humans currently living on earth who don't know who Chewbacca is, but if I were writing a Star Wars fanfiction I'd still include a visual description of a wookie the first time one appeared.
Anyway, her crack-addled mind is able to come up with a solution to her problem:
>Red Racer was a factory that made, amongst other things, scooters. It was, from what I could tell, best known for its little red scooters. And clearly Red Racer was quite proud of them, for the factory had once been adorned by a gigantic red scooter over ten yards long. The giant, symbolic scooter was no longer perched on its rooftop scaffolding. The scaffolding had rusted and collapsed; the scooter had fallen and gotten wedged between the Ministry of Morale and the Red Racer factory about fifteen stories up.
This is probably why kkat went to such lengths to describe the disco-skyscraper. LP intends to use the fallen sign as a bridge to cross from the skyscraper into the factory, presumably bypassing the manticores.
This is fine, but the way kkat provided the initial description was retarded. He spends the first eight paragraphs of the subchapter describing a skyscraper across the street from the factory they were originally going to, without even bothering to mention whether or not they had actually reached the factory. As I noted earlier, there was quite a bit of ambiguity on this point:
>“I think we’re being followed,” SteelHooves announced as we passed through a broken courtyard, approaching a towering building black and half-eaten by the apocalyptic blast. I was staring at my PipBuck’s automapping spell; the Red Racer factory should be directly in front of us.
This does not clearly tell us whether or not they actually found the factory. All this says is that they found a towering black building, and that her radar says that the factory should be here. After this, the author goes on for about six paragraphs talking about a club called Hoofbeats, which for some reason we are expected to be familiar with, as well as the headquarters of the Ministry of Morale, which for some reason Littlepoop knows is here despite it not being marked as such or mentioned on her map. He doesn't even clarify until the very end that the club and the Ministry hub are in the same building.
I don't mean to dwell too heavily on this, but I really want to make sure everyone sees what the author did wrong here. If you're writing, don't do shit like this. Some authors like to get super-visual with description, some just give a quick rundown. Either is fine, but one way or the other you need to make sure that your readers can see what you're seeing. The location here is not that difficult to visualize once you know the details: there is a courtyard with some broken statues, at the end of which is a skyscraper. The skyscraper has a brightly-colored dance club occupying its first two floors. Across an alley from the club is the Red Racer factory. This is not a complex area to describe. You should never make your readers work this hard just to visualize a couple of buildings and a courtyard.
Anyway, there's a page break. Littlepoop explains her plan, and is met with an obligatory "you're crazy" from one of her companions. SteelHooves, I think. Anyway, as per their usual Scooby Doo strategy, they decide that the sensible thing to do is to split up for no reason and explore the skyscraper that way. I'm assuming this is going to follow kkat's standard formula: the group will explore the skyscraper, and Littlepoop will find a bunch of safes filled with random junk, among which will be some old diary recordings. She will find several individual recordings as she explores, and put together they will gradually tell the story of what happened in this building 200 years ago. In the end, they will reach the bridge, travel to the factory, and even though the factory was their primary objective, the author will probably spend less time on whatever they find inside than he did relating this centuries-old non-sequitur story about what became of the Ministry of Morale and/or their dance club downstairs.
Anyway, once again, Littlepoop needlessly volunteers to pair herself up with SteelHooves, once again setting up Velvet and Calamity to be alone together, a situation you would not expect Littlepoop to want. However, this time, Velvet objects to the arrangement because she's still pissed off at Calamity about something or other I guess. So, in some sort of weird reverse cockblock, Calamity and SteelHooves pair off and Velvet ends up with Littlepoop.
>“Not as long as you’re carrying,” SteelHooves stated plainly and followed Calamity through one of the nearly glassless frames of Hoofbeats. Velvet Remedy stuck her nose in the air, pairing up with me as we followed.
From the author's previous description, I had thought that Hoofbeats was full of manticores as well. However, at this point, I assume this was just more confusingly bad description on his part.
>I had considered having Calamity fly us up to one of the ledges, but the manticores could fly too. They were heavy, lumbering creatures, and never seemed to fly very high, but…
This feels like a good time to mention that the author has never actually provided any sort of visual description of a manticore. Remember, even if you're dealing with a common creature from mythology like a dragon or a centaur or something, it's a good idea to give the reader a quick visual description so they know what they are looking at.
Also, it's news to me that manticores can fly. Pics 1 and 2 are images of manticores from mythology, and you will note that they have been portrayed with and without wings. Pic 3 is the MLP version, which presumably is what kkat wants us to imagine, but I'll remind everyone again that just because you're writing in an established universe doesn't mean you can assume the reader is familiar with everything in that universe. I can't imagine there are too many humans currently living on earth who don't know who Chewbacca is, but if I were writing a Star Wars fanfiction I'd still include a visual description of a wookie the first time one appeared.
Anyway, her crack-addled mind is able to come up with a solution to her problem:
>Red Racer was a factory that made, amongst other things, scooters. It was, from what I could tell, best known for its little red scooters. And clearly Red Racer was quite proud of them, for the factory had once been adorned by a gigantic red scooter over ten yards long. The giant, symbolic scooter was no longer perched on its rooftop scaffolding. The scaffolding had rusted and collapsed; the scooter had fallen and gotten wedged between the Ministry of Morale and the Red Racer factory about fifteen stories up.
This is probably why kkat went to such lengths to describe the disco-skyscraper. LP intends to use the fallen sign as a bridge to cross from the skyscraper into the factory, presumably bypassing the manticores.
This is fine, but the way kkat provided the initial description was retarded. He spends the first eight paragraphs of the subchapter describing a skyscraper across the street from the factory they were originally going to, without even bothering to mention whether or not they had actually reached the factory. As I noted earlier, there was quite a bit of ambiguity on this point:
>“I think we’re being followed,” SteelHooves announced as we passed through a broken courtyard, approaching a towering building black and half-eaten by the apocalyptic blast. I was staring at my PipBuck’s automapping spell; the Red Racer factory should be directly in front of us.
This does not clearly tell us whether or not they actually found the factory. All this says is that they found a towering black building, and that her radar says that the factory should be here. After this, the author goes on for about six paragraphs talking about a club called Hoofbeats, which for some reason we are expected to be familiar with, as well as the headquarters of the Ministry of Morale, which for some reason Littlepoop knows is here despite it not being marked as such or mentioned on her map. He doesn't even clarify until the very end that the club and the Ministry hub are in the same building.
I don't mean to dwell too heavily on this, but I really want to make sure everyone sees what the author did wrong here. If you're writing, don't do shit like this. Some authors like to get super-visual with description, some just give a quick rundown. Either is fine, but one way or the other you need to make sure that your readers can see what you're seeing. The location here is not that difficult to visualize once you know the details: there is a courtyard with some broken statues, at the end of which is a skyscraper. The skyscraper has a brightly-colored dance club occupying its first two floors. Across an alley from the club is the Red Racer factory. This is not a complex area to describe. You should never make your readers work this hard just to visualize a couple of buildings and a courtyard.
Anyway, there's a page break. Littlepoop explains her plan, and is met with an obligatory "you're crazy" from one of her companions. SteelHooves, I think. Anyway, as per their usual Scooby Doo strategy, they decide that the sensible thing to do is to split up for no reason and explore the skyscraper that way. I'm assuming this is going to follow kkat's standard formula: the group will explore the skyscraper, and Littlepoop will find a bunch of safes filled with random junk, among which will be some old diary recordings. She will find several individual recordings as she explores, and put together they will gradually tell the story of what happened in this building 200 years ago. In the end, they will reach the bridge, travel to the factory, and even though the factory was their primary objective, the author will probably spend less time on whatever they find inside than he did relating this centuries-old non-sequitur story about what became of the Ministry of Morale and/or their dance club downstairs.
Anyway, once again, Littlepoop needlessly volunteers to pair herself up with SteelHooves, once again setting up Velvet and Calamity to be alone together, a situation you would not expect Littlepoop to want. However, this time, Velvet objects to the arrangement because she's still pissed off at Calamity about something or other I guess. So, in some sort of weird reverse cockblock, Calamity and SteelHooves pair off and Velvet ends up with Littlepoop.
>“Not as long as you’re carrying,” SteelHooves stated plainly and followed Calamity through one of the nearly glassless frames of Hoofbeats. Velvet Remedy stuck her nose in the air, pairing up with me as we followed.
From the author's previous description, I had thought that Hoofbeats was full of manticores as well. However, at this point, I assume this was just more confusingly bad description on his part.
>>301983
To riff off >>301818's point a little, there's no reason that this setup shouldn't actually be an awesome bit of imagery. Two ruined towers, one a factory infested with giant monsters and the other a government building filled with who knows what unsolved mysteries, connected by a rickety "bridge" at high altitude (Small note - Fo3's engine limitations mean most buildings are a handful of storeys tall at best, so this is at least somewhat original compared to what the game offers).
In theory, a good writer could elicit a "hell yes, let's see how they tackle this obstacle" from the audience. But as you say, we already have a confident low-to-mid resolution idea of where this is going.
To riff off >>301818's point a little, there's no reason that this setup shouldn't actually be an awesome bit of imagery. Two ruined towers, one a factory infested with giant monsters and the other a government building filled with who knows what unsolved mysteries, connected by a rickety "bridge" at high altitude (Small note - Fo3's engine limitations mean most buildings are a handful of storeys tall at best, so this is at least somewhat original compared to what the game offers).
In theory, a good writer could elicit a "hell yes, let's see how they tackle this obstacle" from the audience. But as you say, we already have a confident low-to-mid resolution idea of where this is going.
>>301981
>Calamity finally nickered, scoffing. “That’s right. One day, the Grand Pegasus Enclave will come swoopin’ down outta the skies t’ rescue all y’all little ponies. Maybe after they’re done with their naps.”
Also, to someone familiar with the Fallout series mention of the Enclave is significant. They're the primary villains of Fallout 2 and show up in a limited capacity in many of the other games including 3, so naturally we'll be seeing more of them. Their equipment tends to be among the most advanced and powerful on offer in whatever game they're in.
>The author uses the word "insectoid" this is not a real word, btw to describe it.
Insectoid is a word - it means to be shaped like or resembling an insect. Insectile would probably have worked better here, though. I don't know why Kkat chose to make the horse version of Enclave armor resemble insects, since this was written well in advance of the changelings being a thing. The original Enclave's armor (well, the helmet) was designed to resemble an eagle - which would have suited pegasi just fine - because MURCA and IRONY.
>Calamity finally nickered, scoffing. “That’s right. One day, the Grand Pegasus Enclave will come swoopin’ down outta the skies t’ rescue all y’all little ponies. Maybe after they’re done with their naps.”
Also, to someone familiar with the Fallout series mention of the Enclave is significant. They're the primary villains of Fallout 2 and show up in a limited capacity in many of the other games including 3, so naturally we'll be seeing more of them. Their equipment tends to be among the most advanced and powerful on offer in whatever game they're in.
>The author uses the word "insectoid" this is not a real word, btw to describe it.
Insectoid is a word - it means to be shaped like or resembling an insect. Insectile would probably have worked better here, though. I don't know why Kkat chose to make the horse version of Enclave armor resemble insects, since this was written well in advance of the changelings being a thing. The original Enclave's armor (well, the helmet) was designed to resemble an eagle - which would have suited pegasi just fine - because MURCA and IRONY.
>>301981
>antennae-like protrusions from a carapace-like battle saddle.
Fallout's Enclave wore armour like that because they're baddies.
But this design is not something Rainbow Dash would unironically design for her ponies.
If she WAS going to make them look spooky, shouldn't she go with a more mystical bat/demonic look to fit with the old "Shadowbolts" theme?
>A scorpion-like tail
Ah, yes, the stupidest possible weapon for a Pegasus this side of blades on the frontal outer section of the wing or individual sharp blades on your wing-feathers.
Because when every civilian with a Pip-Buck has VATS/SATS so strong it can make amateurs who had never seen a gun until today shoot better than highly trained soldiers and veterans of a hellish wasteland, the best thing to give your highly trained soldiers who are also heavily armoured super-strong winged pegasus badasses... is not a better SATS program, or enough missiles and bombs and guns and nukes and magical ball-thingies and railguns to make Project Wingman/Ace Combat jets jealous.
It's the fucking tail-blade from Animorphs.
Ah, yes, the perfect thing to give to your armoured fighter jet Iron Man motherfuckers who could fuck your shit up from sixty ninethousand feet in the air and should really have jet-boosters on their armour to help with speed and maneuverability: A tiny and wimpy little melee weapon.
A blade attatched to the end of your horse tail, perfect for all those times your military winged horse got into a Close Quarters Combat engagement with their sniper-rifle-using stealth-cloaked zebra targets while flying at mach fucking fourty.
Because taking a piston-assisted rock-shattering tool Equestria might reasonably develop during its first and only industrial revolution, and attaching four of these piston-smashy-thingies to your Power Armour's hooves for high-speed wall-smashing and body-crushing punches would just make things way too easy.
And utilizing magic to become more literally-invisible and stealthy than any invisible-to-radar jet, or repair any damage your suit takes, or summon violent sharp-clawed kamikaze flying wind spirits to kill for you, or constantly refill your missile and bomb holders by teleporting those from storage facilities back at Mother Base so you'll never run out of ammo in the field? Or doing whatever Littlepip does to make carrying and concealing 20 guns plus ammo and records and other crap effortless so you can carry more guns and food for military operations, especially sniper missions where you'll stay in one place for fucking ages waiting for the perfect shot? That would just make things too easy. Attaching a switchblade to the metal shit surrounding your horse's tail is just so much better, if you make the blade "magically" better than it should be, so it's tearing through the metal of plate armour so thick you need pistons to help you move/stand in it but conveniently not the thinner metal of swords.
I know Kkat could never be as smart as the dude from Fantasy Re-Armed but he could at least fucking try to give the ponies weapons that make sense for their body types and tech level/magical capabilities.
Pegasi are like jets. Give them saddlebags full of blades and bombs and heavy shit to drop on foes from so high up only other Pegasi could reach them. If they're closing the inescapable gap between them and Zebras to enter melee range something's gone fucking wrong.
Equipping fliers for close-range melee would only make sense if Kkat gave the zebras something stupid like "Potions of spontaneously getting wings and flying so well with them you can challenge military-grade Pegasi wearing military-grade Power Armour in the air"
>>301981
>Having the protagonist observe significant locations from a distance, just to wonder about what they are, is an easy way to foreshadow future events and make the story feel less disconnected and random.
That's fucking genius! Thanks bro.
>There were two of them in the back alley alone, one had its back to me, its tail inches from my muzzle
wow that was fucking fast. Littlepip's fucking dead if this wild animal got its blade this close to her. Plot armour protects her again, since it makes no sense for meat-eating monster animals to try and intimidate poners into running away and taking their juicy meaty bodies with them.
What the fuck do these manticores eat? Other manticores? Some stash of MREs in these buildings?
Also up until now she's always known where the enemies are thanks to her Pip-Buck and its vidyagame HUD or "Eyes Forward Sparkle" as the story calls it. It makes no sense for that device to suddenly not display the enemies around her until the most dramatic moment possible, after they have already surrounded her.
It's not like these things were invisible to radar and sight until now, and chose to reveal themselves at the same time to her and her HUD in a manner they rehearsed ahead of time.
They're fucking animals. Did the author suddenly, after all these chapters of Littlepip using her map to know where the approaching enemies are, decide her map's too OP and needs to be spontaneously nerfed so hard it can only display foes within a hundred feet of her?
Btw is it bad writing that Calamity can effortlessly fly while carrying his friends? In a world where travel is supposed to be dangerous, it seems OP to have a friend that can carry anyone over anything and bypass a shitton of challenges, even if they're carrying more than eighty pounds of guns/ammo/armour/barterable shite/medical supplies/grenades/other useful shit or worse, wearing Power Armour that should weigh somewhere between a medieval suit of armour and a tank/heavy diving suit.
Sure, Calamity's ability to fly and carry anyone isn't as OP as Littlepip's building-destroying magical might but it still seems like something that could break a story in half if the author was able to remember when it would be useful.
>antennae-like protrusions from a carapace-like battle saddle.
Fallout's Enclave wore armour like that because they're baddies.
But this design is not something Rainbow Dash would unironically design for her ponies.
If she WAS going to make them look spooky, shouldn't she go with a more mystical bat/demonic look to fit with the old "Shadowbolts" theme?
>A scorpion-like tail
Ah, yes, the stupidest possible weapon for a Pegasus this side of blades on the frontal outer section of the wing or individual sharp blades on your wing-feathers.
Because when every civilian with a Pip-Buck has VATS/SATS so strong it can make amateurs who had never seen a gun until today shoot better than highly trained soldiers and veterans of a hellish wasteland, the best thing to give your highly trained soldiers who are also heavily armoured super-strong winged pegasus badasses... is not a better SATS program, or enough missiles and bombs and guns and nukes and magical ball-thingies and railguns to make Project Wingman/Ace Combat jets jealous.
It's the fucking tail-blade from Animorphs.
Ah, yes, the perfect thing to give to your armoured fighter jet Iron Man motherfuckers who could fuck your shit up from sixty ninethousand feet in the air and should really have jet-boosters on their armour to help with speed and maneuverability: A tiny and wimpy little melee weapon.
A blade attatched to the end of your horse tail, perfect for all those times your military winged horse got into a Close Quarters Combat engagement with their sniper-rifle-using stealth-cloaked zebra targets while flying at mach fucking fourty.
Because taking a piston-assisted rock-shattering tool Equestria might reasonably develop during its first and only industrial revolution, and attaching four of these piston-smashy-thingies to your Power Armour's hooves for high-speed wall-smashing and body-crushing punches would just make things way too easy.
And utilizing magic to become more literally-invisible and stealthy than any invisible-to-radar jet, or repair any damage your suit takes, or summon violent sharp-clawed kamikaze flying wind spirits to kill for you, or constantly refill your missile and bomb holders by teleporting those from storage facilities back at Mother Base so you'll never run out of ammo in the field? Or doing whatever Littlepip does to make carrying and concealing 20 guns plus ammo and records and other crap effortless so you can carry more guns and food for military operations, especially sniper missions where you'll stay in one place for fucking ages waiting for the perfect shot? That would just make things too easy. Attaching a switchblade to the metal shit surrounding your horse's tail is just so much better, if you make the blade "magically" better than it should be, so it's tearing through the metal of plate armour so thick you need pistons to help you move/stand in it but conveniently not the thinner metal of swords.
I know Kkat could never be as smart as the dude from Fantasy Re-Armed but he could at least fucking try to give the ponies weapons that make sense for their body types and tech level/magical capabilities.
Pegasi are like jets. Give them saddlebags full of blades and bombs and heavy shit to drop on foes from so high up only other Pegasi could reach them. If they're closing the inescapable gap between them and Zebras to enter melee range something's gone fucking wrong.
Equipping fliers for close-range melee would only make sense if Kkat gave the zebras something stupid like "Potions of spontaneously getting wings and flying so well with them you can challenge military-grade Pegasi wearing military-grade Power Armour in the air"
>>301981
>Having the protagonist observe significant locations from a distance, just to wonder about what they are, is an easy way to foreshadow future events and make the story feel less disconnected and random.
That's fucking genius! Thanks bro.
>There were two of them in the back alley alone, one had its back to me, its tail inches from my muzzle
wow that was fucking fast. Littlepip's fucking dead if this wild animal got its blade this close to her. Plot armour protects her again, since it makes no sense for meat-eating monster animals to try and intimidate poners into running away and taking their juicy meaty bodies with them.
What the fuck do these manticores eat? Other manticores? Some stash of MREs in these buildings?
Also up until now she's always known where the enemies are thanks to her Pip-Buck and its vidyagame HUD or "Eyes Forward Sparkle" as the story calls it. It makes no sense for that device to suddenly not display the enemies around her until the most dramatic moment possible, after they have already surrounded her.
It's not like these things were invisible to radar and sight until now, and chose to reveal themselves at the same time to her and her HUD in a manner they rehearsed ahead of time.
They're fucking animals. Did the author suddenly, after all these chapters of Littlepip using her map to know where the approaching enemies are, decide her map's too OP and needs to be spontaneously nerfed so hard it can only display foes within a hundred feet of her?
Btw is it bad writing that Calamity can effortlessly fly while carrying his friends? In a world where travel is supposed to be dangerous, it seems OP to have a friend that can carry anyone over anything and bypass a shitton of challenges, even if they're carrying more than eighty pounds of guns/ammo/armour/barterable shite/medical supplies/grenades/other useful shit or worse, wearing Power Armour that should weigh somewhere between a medieval suit of armour and a tank/heavy diving suit.
Sure, Calamity's ability to fly and carry anyone isn't as OP as Littlepip's building-destroying magical might but it still seems like something that could break a story in half if the author was able to remember when it would be useful.
>>301983
>As we stepped into the darkness, Velvet Remedy focused, lighting up her horn. The first thing I noticed was a gumball machine.
How exactly would a pony operate a gumball machine, anyway?
Anyway, Velvet and Littlepoop enter the Hoofbeats club. They find the usual sort of wreckage and ruin inside. Velvet notes that, despite the condition of the place, she rather wishes she could have performed here. Littlepoop lays this schmaltzy line on her:
>I shook my head. “Just because your dream is to be a medical pony doesn’t mean you didn’t love singing any less.”
This is true enough I suppose. However, Velvet's wishy-washy personality makes it hard to take either her love of singing or her love of medicine all that seriously.
>Somehow, I just knew the words were right. It must have been the insight and social graces that PTMs granted a pony, for I wasn’t sure I could have understood what was bothering her on my own.
Should any points LP scores with Velvet here be considered legitimate if it's just the drugs talking? This may seem fairly minor, but it's a generally accepted rule in romance stories that winning someone's heart under false pretenses only works in the short-term, and ultimately backfires.
Aladdin wants to bang Jasmine, but he's socially beneath her. So he enlists the help of a genie to make him into a prince. As a prince, he is able to make Jasmine fall in love with him, but the cost is that she believes he is something that he isn't. As soon as the ruse is exposed, he is knocked back down to where he started. He now has to win her over again, as himself, without the assistance of the genie.
Another example. In an episode of Futurama, Fry becomes infected with parasites he contracted from an egg salad sandwich. The parasites make him super-intelligent, physically strong, charming, and so forth, and he is able to make Leela fall in love with him. However, a remark she makes causes him to realize that she loves the person the parasites created, not the person he is. So, he removes the parasites and goes back to his old awkward, stupid self. This means that Leela is no longer interested, but he is able to continue to pursue her by his own effort, which means that if he wins her, he wins her for real.
I could probably think of more examples, but you get the general idea. Love won through disingenuous methods doesn't count because it's not "true" love. Any victory, be it romantic, military, or otherwise, has to be obtained by the hero using his or her own strength; victory gained by cheating doesn't count. I don't know where exactly kkat is planning on taking this scene with Velvet and Littlepoop, but this is worth bearing in mind here.
Anyway, once this tender moment is concluded, the author changes gears rather abruptly:
>I smiled back, sidestepping a charred skeleton.
Oy vey, kkat, always with the skeletons.
>Unlike the streets outside, where the ponies were vaporized in a flash, the ones in here were burned alive.
How does she know this?
>I realized that the Ministry of Morale hub must have had protections of its own, but just not as magically strong as those around the Ministry run by Twilight Sparkle.
Again: how does she know this? This might be true, but that doesn't mean Littlepoop should be aware of it. None of this can be intuited from what she has observed here. In the same way that it's unclear how she knows that this building was a hub of the Ministry of Morale, it's unclear how she would know that the ponies in here were burned rather than vaporized, or that the building had special defenses, or that said defenses were weaker than those in Twilight's ministry. Once again, LP is connecting dots that don't necessarily connect.
Page break.
>The balefire bomb the zebras set off in the heart of Manehattan was detonated in the late morning. The population of Hoofbeats was probably at its lowest ebb for the whole day. The same could not be said for the Ministry above.
Oy vey, she just won't stop. How does she know any of this?
>Red dots speckled my E.F.S. compass. Foalishly, my first thought was of the ghosts that the merchant pony with the mechanical owl had told us about. In a way, I wasn’t entirely far off.
>“Who?” demanded the little robot owl as it soared into the hallway. I froze. Not in fear but utter astonishment. Hostile robot security owls? Really?
This is a very awkwardly-constructed joke. For one thing, the merchant with the owl was a minor character who appeared several chapters ago; it's jarring to just suddenly bring him up out of nowhere like this. Second, there is no direct connection between the ghosts the merchant mentioned and the robo-owls that LP encounters here, so she actually is pretty far off. The only connection between the merchant and what's happening here is that he happened to have a robotic owl and there happen to be robotic owls here. tl;dr, this is a long, long reach for kind of a weak chuckle.
Anyway, it turns out that the burnt-out dance club is guarded by robotic owls that shoot lasers out of their beaks or some ridiculous shit, because why the hell not? The robo-owl begins to fire lasers at Littlepoop, but before she can raise her shotgun, Velvet inexplicably charges the thing with her horn. She somehow manages to impale it without getting shot, and there's a bit of a jokey moment where she is trying to get it off of her horn.
Page break again.
We rejoin LP and Velvet at some undisclosed point in the future. They seem to have advanced a little further into the building. LP is currently firing at a bunch of the fucking robo-owls.
>I was quickly using up the armor-piercing ammo that the zebra rifle could use.
Why does she need to use armor-piercing ammo on a bunch of robotic owls? These things don't seem like much of a threat. Is it really a good idea to be squandering the most powerful ammo they have on something so minor?
>As we stepped into the darkness, Velvet Remedy focused, lighting up her horn. The first thing I noticed was a gumball machine.
How exactly would a pony operate a gumball machine, anyway?
Anyway, Velvet and Littlepoop enter the Hoofbeats club. They find the usual sort of wreckage and ruin inside. Velvet notes that, despite the condition of the place, she rather wishes she could have performed here. Littlepoop lays this schmaltzy line on her:
>I shook my head. “Just because your dream is to be a medical pony doesn’t mean you didn’t love singing any less.”
This is true enough I suppose. However, Velvet's wishy-washy personality makes it hard to take either her love of singing or her love of medicine all that seriously.
>Somehow, I just knew the words were right. It must have been the insight and social graces that PTMs granted a pony, for I wasn’t sure I could have understood what was bothering her on my own.
Should any points LP scores with Velvet here be considered legitimate if it's just the drugs talking? This may seem fairly minor, but it's a generally accepted rule in romance stories that winning someone's heart under false pretenses only works in the short-term, and ultimately backfires.
Aladdin wants to bang Jasmine, but he's socially beneath her. So he enlists the help of a genie to make him into a prince. As a prince, he is able to make Jasmine fall in love with him, but the cost is that she believes he is something that he isn't. As soon as the ruse is exposed, he is knocked back down to where he started. He now has to win her over again, as himself, without the assistance of the genie.
Another example. In an episode of Futurama, Fry becomes infected with parasites he contracted from an egg salad sandwich. The parasites make him super-intelligent, physically strong, charming, and so forth, and he is able to make Leela fall in love with him. However, a remark she makes causes him to realize that she loves the person the parasites created, not the person he is. So, he removes the parasites and goes back to his old awkward, stupid self. This means that Leela is no longer interested, but he is able to continue to pursue her by his own effort, which means that if he wins her, he wins her for real.
I could probably think of more examples, but you get the general idea. Love won through disingenuous methods doesn't count because it's not "true" love. Any victory, be it romantic, military, or otherwise, has to be obtained by the hero using his or her own strength; victory gained by cheating doesn't count. I don't know where exactly kkat is planning on taking this scene with Velvet and Littlepoop, but this is worth bearing in mind here.
Anyway, once this tender moment is concluded, the author changes gears rather abruptly:
>I smiled back, sidestepping a charred skeleton.
Oy vey, kkat, always with the skeletons.
>Unlike the streets outside, where the ponies were vaporized in a flash, the ones in here were burned alive.
How does she know this?
>I realized that the Ministry of Morale hub must have had protections of its own, but just not as magically strong as those around the Ministry run by Twilight Sparkle.
Again: how does she know this? This might be true, but that doesn't mean Littlepoop should be aware of it. None of this can be intuited from what she has observed here. In the same way that it's unclear how she knows that this building was a hub of the Ministry of Morale, it's unclear how she would know that the ponies in here were burned rather than vaporized, or that the building had special defenses, or that said defenses were weaker than those in Twilight's ministry. Once again, LP is connecting dots that don't necessarily connect.
Page break.
>The balefire bomb the zebras set off in the heart of Manehattan was detonated in the late morning. The population of Hoofbeats was probably at its lowest ebb for the whole day. The same could not be said for the Ministry above.
Oy vey, she just won't stop. How does she know any of this?
>Red dots speckled my E.F.S. compass. Foalishly, my first thought was of the ghosts that the merchant pony with the mechanical owl had told us about. In a way, I wasn’t entirely far off.
>“Who?” demanded the little robot owl as it soared into the hallway. I froze. Not in fear but utter astonishment. Hostile robot security owls? Really?
This is a very awkwardly-constructed joke. For one thing, the merchant with the owl was a minor character who appeared several chapters ago; it's jarring to just suddenly bring him up out of nowhere like this. Second, there is no direct connection between the ghosts the merchant mentioned and the robo-owls that LP encounters here, so she actually is pretty far off. The only connection between the merchant and what's happening here is that he happened to have a robotic owl and there happen to be robotic owls here. tl;dr, this is a long, long reach for kind of a weak chuckle.
Anyway, it turns out that the burnt-out dance club is guarded by robotic owls that shoot lasers out of their beaks or some ridiculous shit, because why the hell not? The robo-owl begins to fire lasers at Littlepoop, but before she can raise her shotgun, Velvet inexplicably charges the thing with her horn. She somehow manages to impale it without getting shot, and there's a bit of a jokey moment where she is trying to get it off of her horn.
Page break again.
We rejoin LP and Velvet at some undisclosed point in the future. They seem to have advanced a little further into the building. LP is currently firing at a bunch of the fucking robo-owls.
>I was quickly using up the armor-piercing ammo that the zebra rifle could use.
Why does she need to use armor-piercing ammo on a bunch of robotic owls? These things don't seem like much of a threat. Is it really a good idea to be squandering the most powerful ammo they have on something so minor?
>>302124
For the next three paragraphs, LP blabbers autistically about which of her eighty guns she ought to be using to shoot at these stupid owls. Then, out of nowhere, she sees some refrigerators, and decides to look inside to see what kind of food the pre-war Ministry of Morale kept on hand. Yes, this autism is actually in the text. She drones on about the refrigerators for roughly a paragraph. In fact, the autism here is so intense I'm just going to quote it directly, as my summary doesn't really do it justice:
>Switching weapons, I started towards the wall of refrigerators, intent on finding out what goodies the Ministry of Morale had packed with an eternity’s worth of preservatives on this floor. Every other floor of the MoM hub had a kitchen, even if it was just a small one. There were more kitchens than bathrooms, which I couldn’t imagine was logistically sane. And some floors like this one were nothing but kitchen. The posters on the walls in here were all brown and flaking, or burned away entirely, but the ones that were just a little readable had me convinced that Pinkie Pie actually made a government industry out of churning out birthday parties for good little fillies and colts. You were good this year, Littlepip. (Trust us, we know!) So here’s your cake, sent straight from the Ministry of Morale. With a birthday card signed by Pinkie Pie herself!
Please bear in mind that there is a gunfight going on as she is thinking all of this.
At some point she gets wounded again, and Velvet sits her down and patches her up, and the scene ends with a page break. Literally what was the point of this scene?
Time randomly skips forward again, and we are dropped into the middle of a conversation between Velvet and Littlepoop. Velvet is complaining about how Calamity won't take a bath, and Littlepoop is cringing while trying to be polite. Since Calamity and Velvet are supposedly lovers who are also supposedly fighting, this is basically Velvet unloading her laundry-list of complaints about her supposed boyfriend to her supposed friend and confidante. Never mind that there have been few opportunities for anypony to take a bath in this story; certainly too few for it to become something Velvet could develop a hangup about. Also, though I'm still not entirely clear what the two of them are supposed to be fighting over, I am assuming it has something to do with Calamity shooting the kid earlier. One would think that seeing her crush/lover/whatever gun down a child would be traumatic enough for Velvet that she'd have more on her mind than how clean Calamity keeps his ballsac; then again, since she is only superficially dedicated to her principles anyway, this is probably in character for her.
Anyway, as they are talking about this, they are exploring another part of the building. This appears to be some kind of spoopy hallway filled with computer terminals and stuff:
>We had made it up to one of the many floors that had been dedicated to sifting through the massive amounts of intelligence garnered through having tapped into every “private” conversation transmitted by arcano-technology like the terminals. The Ministry of Morale had been listening.
I know I'm starting to sound like a broken record here, but how does she know this? If you wandered into some abandoned CIA facility, would you just instinctively know what all the weird surveillance equipment lying around had been used for? You might be able to guess, but that's not the same as knowing. Logically, this scene should just be LP and Velvet exploring a creepy hallway, looking at all the abandoned computers, and wondering what it was all used for. Beyond that, they shouldn't know anything. However, kkat clearly has some big chunk of world history queued up to be revealed here, so I guess he can't be bothered with pesky details like developing mood, or even just making sense. He still hasn't even clarified how LP knew that this was a Ministry of Morale building in the first place.
>Creepiest. Most disturbing. Hallway. Ever!
Punctuating. Sentences. Like this. For emphasis. Is. Annoying! And. It should. Be. Done. Infrequently. If. At all.
>I floated out one of the cupcakes we had found in the fridge and took a bite.
Seriously? She actually raided the goddamn fridge, and is now eating a 200 year old cupcake while casually exploring a creepy hallway filled with 200 year old surveillance terminals, whose insidious purpose she somehow intuits? This is autistic even for Littlepoop.
Anyway, meanwhile, Velvet is still babbling on:
>“…shoots without thinking. Like he shot the dragon before we could even try to talk to it. Like how he shot you…”
Calamity's violent actions go against the grain of everything that Velvet claims to believe in (for that matter so do Littlepoop's, which makes her an odd choice for a shoulder to cry on); however, this would only really matter if she took her professed beliefs seriously. As it stands, she seems to regard Calamity's having just shot a kid as nothing more than an irritating quirk, on par with dumping wet towels on the bathroom floor or leaving the toilet seat up.
>I felt myself beginning to come down from the Party-Time Mint-als.
How long do the effects of these things last, anyway? How long is the comedown period? If she's supposed to be addicted to them, at what point does she begin to develop withdrawal symptoms? How long can she go without taking a mint-al before she starts to get the shakes? Is she physically dependent enough on the mints that she functions better on them than off them, or is it just kind of a bad habit right now? If the former, then it should factor far more heavily into the story than it does; if the latter, it's a little early for her friends to be talking about rehab. Having LP get addicted to drugs is an acceptable side-plot, especially for an edgy dark setting, but if you're not going to take it seriously why even bother?
For the next three paragraphs, LP blabbers autistically about which of her eighty guns she ought to be using to shoot at these stupid owls. Then, out of nowhere, she sees some refrigerators, and decides to look inside to see what kind of food the pre-war Ministry of Morale kept on hand. Yes, this autism is actually in the text. She drones on about the refrigerators for roughly a paragraph. In fact, the autism here is so intense I'm just going to quote it directly, as my summary doesn't really do it justice:
>Switching weapons, I started towards the wall of refrigerators, intent on finding out what goodies the Ministry of Morale had packed with an eternity’s worth of preservatives on this floor. Every other floor of the MoM hub had a kitchen, even if it was just a small one. There were more kitchens than bathrooms, which I couldn’t imagine was logistically sane. And some floors like this one were nothing but kitchen. The posters on the walls in here were all brown and flaking, or burned away entirely, but the ones that were just a little readable had me convinced that Pinkie Pie actually made a government industry out of churning out birthday parties for good little fillies and colts. You were good this year, Littlepip. (Trust us, we know!) So here’s your cake, sent straight from the Ministry of Morale. With a birthday card signed by Pinkie Pie herself!
Please bear in mind that there is a gunfight going on as she is thinking all of this.
At some point she gets wounded again, and Velvet sits her down and patches her up, and the scene ends with a page break. Literally what was the point of this scene?
Time randomly skips forward again, and we are dropped into the middle of a conversation between Velvet and Littlepoop. Velvet is complaining about how Calamity won't take a bath, and Littlepoop is cringing while trying to be polite. Since Calamity and Velvet are supposedly lovers who are also supposedly fighting, this is basically Velvet unloading her laundry-list of complaints about her supposed boyfriend to her supposed friend and confidante. Never mind that there have been few opportunities for anypony to take a bath in this story; certainly too few for it to become something Velvet could develop a hangup about. Also, though I'm still not entirely clear what the two of them are supposed to be fighting over, I am assuming it has something to do with Calamity shooting the kid earlier. One would think that seeing her crush/lover/whatever gun down a child would be traumatic enough for Velvet that she'd have more on her mind than how clean Calamity keeps his ballsac; then again, since she is only superficially dedicated to her principles anyway, this is probably in character for her.
Anyway, as they are talking about this, they are exploring another part of the building. This appears to be some kind of spoopy hallway filled with computer terminals and stuff:
>We had made it up to one of the many floors that had been dedicated to sifting through the massive amounts of intelligence garnered through having tapped into every “private” conversation transmitted by arcano-technology like the terminals. The Ministry of Morale had been listening.
I know I'm starting to sound like a broken record here, but how does she know this? If you wandered into some abandoned CIA facility, would you just instinctively know what all the weird surveillance equipment lying around had been used for? You might be able to guess, but that's not the same as knowing. Logically, this scene should just be LP and Velvet exploring a creepy hallway, looking at all the abandoned computers, and wondering what it was all used for. Beyond that, they shouldn't know anything. However, kkat clearly has some big chunk of world history queued up to be revealed here, so I guess he can't be bothered with pesky details like developing mood, or even just making sense. He still hasn't even clarified how LP knew that this was a Ministry of Morale building in the first place.
>Creepiest. Most disturbing. Hallway. Ever!
Punctuating. Sentences. Like this. For emphasis. Is. Annoying! And. It should. Be. Done. Infrequently. If. At all.
>I floated out one of the cupcakes we had found in the fridge and took a bite.
Seriously? She actually raided the goddamn fridge, and is now eating a 200 year old cupcake while casually exploring a creepy hallway filled with 200 year old surveillance terminals, whose insidious purpose she somehow intuits? This is autistic even for Littlepoop.
Anyway, meanwhile, Velvet is still babbling on:
>“…shoots without thinking. Like he shot the dragon before we could even try to talk to it. Like how he shot you…”
Calamity's violent actions go against the grain of everything that Velvet claims to believe in (for that matter so do Littlepoop's, which makes her an odd choice for a shoulder to cry on); however, this would only really matter if she took her professed beliefs seriously. As it stands, she seems to regard Calamity's having just shot a kid as nothing more than an irritating quirk, on par with dumping wet towels on the bathroom floor or leaving the toilet seat up.
>I felt myself beginning to come down from the Party-Time Mint-als.
How long do the effects of these things last, anyway? How long is the comedown period? If she's supposed to be addicted to them, at what point does she begin to develop withdrawal symptoms? How long can she go without taking a mint-al before she starts to get the shakes? Is she physically dependent enough on the mints that she functions better on them than off them, or is it just kind of a bad habit right now? If the former, then it should factor far more heavily into the story than it does; if the latter, it's a little early for her friends to be talking about rehab. Having LP get addicted to drugs is an acceptable side-plot, especially for an edgy dark setting, but if you're not going to take it seriously why even bother?
>>302125
>First chance I got, I was taking another. I really couldn’t risk crashing in someplace so dark and… freaky. Or, for that matter, around Velvet Remedy when she was being such a…
Anyway, it seems like LP's only real concern regarding her drug situation is not "crashing" at an inopportune moment. Beyond that, her drug use seems to have no impact on her life, either positive or negative. Meanwhile, the two of them keep exploring.
>I’d pushed open the doors, and found myself staring into the sky. An office room three times the size of a Stable Atrium spanned out in front of us, filled with rows and rows of desks with terminals, then dropped away into empty space. The sun was just moving down below the cloud-cover, painting the sky an apocalyptic orange. I’d somehow forgotten half the building was gone.
This is actually a pretty neat visual. The author comes up with some decent locations in this story; it's a pity he can't make better use of them.
>For the first time in weeks, I was hit by massive, crippling vertigo. I’d become accustomed to the hugeness of outside, but to have it suddenly and unexpectedly thrown in my face awoke the agoraphobic filly inside me.
"Acrophobic" is probably the word he meant to use here. Agoraphobia could technically apply depending on context, but it usually refers to a fear of the outside world, public spaces, things like that; I don't have the impression that Littlepoop is plagued by such feelings.
Anyway, she gets dizzy and closes the door. The scene ends abruptly with another page break. I feel like I've commented on the author's overuse of page breaks several times already, but it's worth pointing out again that he overuses them. I'll note that he actually tends to keep all of his subchapters at roughly the same size, so even though the breaks are overused the story maintains decent pacing and rhythm. Soulpeener, who also overused page breaks, didn't do this, so it was more noticeable in his work.
However, the bigger issue here is that this story meanders and is poorly planned. The author seems to be deliberately breaking his massive chapters down into more manageable chunks, which is probably a good idea, but the problem is that he ends up with a lot of disjointed scenes, many of which serve no obvious purpose.
For example, let's take a look at exactly what happened in this last subchapter. LP and Velvet are walking down a creepy hallway. They see some computers and some posters on the wall. Velvet is complaining about Calamity. Littlepoop opens a door and sees that the floor has fallen away. Then, page break. What was the point of the scene? What was the focus? What was the reader supposed to take away from this?
What about the scene before? What happened there? Well, basically, Littlepoop is shooting at owls, one of them grazes her, she sees a bunch of refrigerators and wonders what's inside, and then Velvet puts a band-aid on her wound. Page break. Was there a point to this?
And what about the scene before that? Littlepoop and Velvet enter the dancehall of the Hoofbeats club, Littlepoop sees a robot owl, is about to shoot it, and then Velvet impales it with her horn. Page break. What was the point? No idea. And the scene before that: the group decides to split up, Littlepoop wants to go with SteelHooves for some reason, but Velvet doesn't want to be alone with Calamity, so she and Littlepoop team up. They enter the lobby, see a gumball machine and some skeletons, and Littlepoop feeds Velvet a cheesy line about chasing her dreams. Page break. Do all of these events need to have their own dedicated scenes?
Part of the problem with this story is its ambiguous sense of time, and a major contributing factor to this is the way it's structured. The author breaks the narrative into these little bite-sized microscenes, and each time one of them ends, time seems to skip forward by some random increment. That by itself is jarring, and what makes it worse is that many of these microscenes don't serve any apparent purpose in the broader narrative. For example, the hallway scene just now. Sure, the creepy hallway full of old terminals and the office door that leads to a gaping chasm are interesting visuals, but visuals aren't enough. What is the author's purpose in showing us these events?
Think of it this way: if you were to narrate literally every single moment of a character's life, it would be sort of like watching a live camera feed. This means that you would not only be narrating the interesting things that happen to them, you would be narrating the mundane, dull, commonplace things that everyone assumes the character probably does but that nobody really wants to read about: they get up, they eat breakfast, they brush their teeth, they goof around on the internet, they drive to work, etc etc. Most stories are not told this way. Most of the time, a story is more like a movie, with fade ins, fade outs, cuts, multiple camera angles, and so forth. The idea is not to show the reader every single moment of this character's life, but to take the bits that are interesting or important, and then arrange them in a way that makes the story and the character seem compelling.
From that point of view, why was this most recent moment in Littlepoop's life selected for our viewing? Is there any particular reason that we needed to see LP and Velvet walking down this hallway? The author clearly understands the concept of cutting the action into small, manageable scenes, but why were these scenes chosen specifically? Why are these moments more important than whatever happens during the time periods the author skips? For example, whatever LP and Velvet saw between the kitchen and this hallway clearly wasn't important enough to go over in detail, but her finding a cupcake in the refrigerator was?
>First chance I got, I was taking another. I really couldn’t risk crashing in someplace so dark and… freaky. Or, for that matter, around Velvet Remedy when she was being such a…
Anyway, it seems like LP's only real concern regarding her drug situation is not "crashing" at an inopportune moment. Beyond that, her drug use seems to have no impact on her life, either positive or negative. Meanwhile, the two of them keep exploring.
>I’d pushed open the doors, and found myself staring into the sky. An office room three times the size of a Stable Atrium spanned out in front of us, filled with rows and rows of desks with terminals, then dropped away into empty space. The sun was just moving down below the cloud-cover, painting the sky an apocalyptic orange. I’d somehow forgotten half the building was gone.
This is actually a pretty neat visual. The author comes up with some decent locations in this story; it's a pity he can't make better use of them.
>For the first time in weeks, I was hit by massive, crippling vertigo. I’d become accustomed to the hugeness of outside, but to have it suddenly and unexpectedly thrown in my face awoke the agoraphobic filly inside me.
"Acrophobic" is probably the word he meant to use here. Agoraphobia could technically apply depending on context, but it usually refers to a fear of the outside world, public spaces, things like that; I don't have the impression that Littlepoop is plagued by such feelings.
Anyway, she gets dizzy and closes the door. The scene ends abruptly with another page break. I feel like I've commented on the author's overuse of page breaks several times already, but it's worth pointing out again that he overuses them. I'll note that he actually tends to keep all of his subchapters at roughly the same size, so even though the breaks are overused the story maintains decent pacing and rhythm. Soulpeener, who also overused page breaks, didn't do this, so it was more noticeable in his work.
However, the bigger issue here is that this story meanders and is poorly planned. The author seems to be deliberately breaking his massive chapters down into more manageable chunks, which is probably a good idea, but the problem is that he ends up with a lot of disjointed scenes, many of which serve no obvious purpose.
For example, let's take a look at exactly what happened in this last subchapter. LP and Velvet are walking down a creepy hallway. They see some computers and some posters on the wall. Velvet is complaining about Calamity. Littlepoop opens a door and sees that the floor has fallen away. Then, page break. What was the point of the scene? What was the focus? What was the reader supposed to take away from this?
What about the scene before? What happened there? Well, basically, Littlepoop is shooting at owls, one of them grazes her, she sees a bunch of refrigerators and wonders what's inside, and then Velvet puts a band-aid on her wound. Page break. Was there a point to this?
And what about the scene before that? Littlepoop and Velvet enter the dancehall of the Hoofbeats club, Littlepoop sees a robot owl, is about to shoot it, and then Velvet impales it with her horn. Page break. What was the point? No idea. And the scene before that: the group decides to split up, Littlepoop wants to go with SteelHooves for some reason, but Velvet doesn't want to be alone with Calamity, so she and Littlepoop team up. They enter the lobby, see a gumball machine and some skeletons, and Littlepoop feeds Velvet a cheesy line about chasing her dreams. Page break. Do all of these events need to have their own dedicated scenes?
Part of the problem with this story is its ambiguous sense of time, and a major contributing factor to this is the way it's structured. The author breaks the narrative into these little bite-sized microscenes, and each time one of them ends, time seems to skip forward by some random increment. That by itself is jarring, and what makes it worse is that many of these microscenes don't serve any apparent purpose in the broader narrative. For example, the hallway scene just now. Sure, the creepy hallway full of old terminals and the office door that leads to a gaping chasm are interesting visuals, but visuals aren't enough. What is the author's purpose in showing us these events?
Think of it this way: if you were to narrate literally every single moment of a character's life, it would be sort of like watching a live camera feed. This means that you would not only be narrating the interesting things that happen to them, you would be narrating the mundane, dull, commonplace things that everyone assumes the character probably does but that nobody really wants to read about: they get up, they eat breakfast, they brush their teeth, they goof around on the internet, they drive to work, etc etc. Most stories are not told this way. Most of the time, a story is more like a movie, with fade ins, fade outs, cuts, multiple camera angles, and so forth. The idea is not to show the reader every single moment of this character's life, but to take the bits that are interesting or important, and then arrange them in a way that makes the story and the character seem compelling.
From that point of view, why was this most recent moment in Littlepoop's life selected for our viewing? Is there any particular reason that we needed to see LP and Velvet walking down this hallway? The author clearly understands the concept of cutting the action into small, manageable scenes, but why were these scenes chosen specifically? Why are these moments more important than whatever happens during the time periods the author skips? For example, whatever LP and Velvet saw between the kitchen and this hallway clearly wasn't important enough to go over in detail, but her finding a cupcake in the refrigerator was?
>>302126
Do you think this story should do a recap episode?
I'm certain that if a character spelled out everything important that happened in this adventure to another character, it would force the author to realize how much worthless noise and filler fills this story vs anything actually important to the overall plot.
Kill La Kill was able to fit most of its events into a prologue-sized speech around halfway through the show but that was thanks to the show's excellent breakneck pacing.
Also, the author uses justifications to get OP shit now instead of developing those skills over time to make the power feel earned in the audience's mind and that's bad writing, right? Littlepip's instant mastery of guns is justified with her Pipbuck AutoAim and her skill in repairing shit and hacking and lockpicking is justified with her job as a Pipbuck repair pony, even though that makes little sense. And whenever she needs to be smarter or more perceptive or more charismatic for a scene she can just take Brain Smartening Juice pills. But nothing justifies or explains her uncanny supernatural luck when it comes to finding sick loot and unopened safes, nothing explains her ability to shrug off and fight through the pain of multiple gunshots, nothing explains how her enemies are always as retarded as she needs them to be, nothing explains how she ended up with enough magical might to lift boxcars, and so on.
This seems really stupid to me because Littlepip has teammates so she doesn't need to have literally all the abilities. She doesn't need to be tough enough to take four gunshots without flinching or dying because she has a friend in bulletproof armour. She doesn't need to be the world's greatest and only master lockpicker when lockpicking is one of many survival skills Calamity could reasonably know. Same goes for hacking since the Enclave is high tech and making him the group's hacker would get us to suspect there's more to this cowboy than meets the eye before we find out he's a Dashite. LP doesn't need to take drugs to become charisma incarnate because Velvet can do the party's talking for them. Has Kkat literally never been in a DND game where one highly charismatic character is "The face of the party", the charming smart presentable mostly human guy who does all the social interaction for his min-maxed murderhobo friends?
As for Littlepip's weaponized Aura Of Retardity and occasional logic-breaking moments that should not work but do such as hiding under a cum blanket, nothing can justify that short of saying she's the one chosen to defeat a smart villain by doing dumb bullshit and making it work, meaning she inherited Pinkie's dumb bullshit cartoon powers and this is how they manifest: stupid gamer moments only someone sheltered and out of touch with reality could accept at face value.
Do you think this story should do a recap episode?
I'm certain that if a character spelled out everything important that happened in this adventure to another character, it would force the author to realize how much worthless noise and filler fills this story vs anything actually important to the overall plot.
Kill La Kill was able to fit most of its events into a prologue-sized speech around halfway through the show but that was thanks to the show's excellent breakneck pacing.
Also, the author uses justifications to get OP shit now instead of developing those skills over time to make the power feel earned in the audience's mind and that's bad writing, right? Littlepip's instant mastery of guns is justified with her Pipbuck AutoAim and her skill in repairing shit and hacking and lockpicking is justified with her job as a Pipbuck repair pony, even though that makes little sense. And whenever she needs to be smarter or more perceptive or more charismatic for a scene she can just take Brain Smartening Juice pills. But nothing justifies or explains her uncanny supernatural luck when it comes to finding sick loot and unopened safes, nothing explains her ability to shrug off and fight through the pain of multiple gunshots, nothing explains how her enemies are always as retarded as she needs them to be, nothing explains how she ended up with enough magical might to lift boxcars, and so on.
This seems really stupid to me because Littlepip has teammates so she doesn't need to have literally all the abilities. She doesn't need to be tough enough to take four gunshots without flinching or dying because she has a friend in bulletproof armour. She doesn't need to be the world's greatest and only master lockpicker when lockpicking is one of many survival skills Calamity could reasonably know. Same goes for hacking since the Enclave is high tech and making him the group's hacker would get us to suspect there's more to this cowboy than meets the eye before we find out he's a Dashite. LP doesn't need to take drugs to become charisma incarnate because Velvet can do the party's talking for them. Has Kkat literally never been in a DND game where one highly charismatic character is "The face of the party", the charming smart presentable mostly human guy who does all the social interaction for his min-maxed murderhobo friends?
As for Littlepip's weaponized Aura Of Retardity and occasional logic-breaking moments that should not work but do such as hiding under a cum blanket, nothing can justify that short of saying she's the one chosen to defeat a smart villain by doing dumb bullshit and making it work, meaning she inherited Pinkie's dumb bullshit cartoon powers and this is how they manifest: stupid gamer moments only someone sheltered and out of touch with reality could accept at face value.
>>302167
>I'm certain that if a character spelled out everything important that happened in this adventure to another character,
>it would force the author to realize how much worthless noise and filler fills this story vs anything actually important to the overall plot.
Going to have to disagree with you there, some people enjoy wallowing in mediocrity, and shallowness. Kkat, the top number four reason for mild brain bleach usage, wouldn't take such a thing well or willingly.
Now to be fair some authors know they wrote a bunch of crap and have more or less used it as a lesson is bad thing to not do except under rare occasions.
Imagining the firefight as a limited chance 'dungeon' looting everything makes sense for a min-max murderhobo. A place in this story solely for bonus 'optional' lore and story building. Also for the 'required' obligatory shooter aspects.
As a real place, with reality in the way, Littlepip is tripping so hard she roped her crush, some some muscle on her trip to trip even harder. The reason why they go along is that, or else threat, she'll do untold horrors on them.
To keep her placated they indulge her, while slowly trying to find a way to survive, and be free.
>I'm certain that if a character spelled out everything important that happened in this adventure to another character,
>it would force the author to realize how much worthless noise and filler fills this story vs anything actually important to the overall plot.
Going to have to disagree with you there, some people enjoy wallowing in mediocrity, and shallowness. Kkat, the top number four reason for mild brain bleach usage, wouldn't take such a thing well or willingly.
Now to be fair some authors know they wrote a bunch of crap and have more or less used it as a lesson is bad thing to not do except under rare occasions.
Imagining the firefight as a limited chance 'dungeon' looting everything makes sense for a min-max murderhobo. A place in this story solely for bonus 'optional' lore and story building. Also for the 'required' obligatory shooter aspects.
As a real place, with reality in the way, Littlepip is tripping so hard she roped her crush, some some muscle on her trip to trip even harder. The reason why they go along is that, or else threat, she'll do untold horrors on them.
To keep her placated they indulge her, while slowly trying to find a way to survive, and be free.
>>302169
Good point. I know I wrote some shit as a kid. And as a teenager. I'm glad I never wrote anything as gay as Fallout Equestria.
Some day, I should rework that godawful "Babby's First Original Anime" idea from my youth into something better. Or keep it in its current trashy state and crack jokes about all the dumb animu bullshit.
Speaking of which, Have you ever noticed how today's neo-puritan pseudointellectuals rage and foam at the sight of obvious forms of japanese fanservice, such as scenes where the generic self-insert hero boy trips and falls face-first into some hot babe's massive titties? They'll scream at these scenes and scenes where all the girls (including the youngish-looking ones) are in bikinis on the beach and scenes because they want to look above sex and sexuality when it comes from something foreign to their sensibilities like anime. They'll cry about the sister-kissing scenes in I Can't Fucking Believe My Little Sister Is This Horny For A Fucking Loser Like Me even though it's rated 18 so kids can't see it. Then they'll turn around and suck the dick of western cartoons that are supposedly for kids whenever they include perverted western fanservice moments like foot fetish shots, kids getting into inappropriately sexual situations, twerking ass in the faces of kids, lesbian pandering, race-mixing, mixed-race twerking lesbian pandering, blatantly homosexual shit like underage boys dressing in drag on-stage and getting cheered for it by a crowd of freaks, and so on.
They'll try and pretend they're above the handful of sexual moments in the "all-ages" yet hyper-violent show Adventure Of Some Asshole With A Sword, while ignoring any harmful degenerate sexual messages in western media targeting kids and celebrating whenever homoshit is forced down their throats while they're still impressionable. And they're so desperate for chances to virtue-signal, they'll try to make mountains out of molehills when they're bored. Like when they got butthurt at that Uzaki-Chan show for featuring a short big-tittied cute chick. What, were they mad at her for being cute? Most SJWs are hideous and obese barren perverts that lust after children, so maybe that's it. They want shows to hypnotize kids into degeneracy and normalize this shit for the next generation, they don't want these shows competing with japanese entertainment because they know they cannot compete. Did you know thee Demon Slayer/Kimetsu No Yaiba movie made more cash than ALL of Marvel/DC comics recently? Hiring diversity hires is a mistake.
Lazy anime fanservice is at best something that enhances the work and at worst a fleeting moment of easily-ignored trash there out of obligation, but western animus written to please the freaks on tumblr are purely trash. Removing the perversion from Steven Universe would be like removing the Omnitrix from Ben 10: You'd be left with nothing but the extra crap sprinkled on top of what the show was written to really be about.
Yesterday I saw a vid where some guy "Reworks the anime he designed as a kid" by making the art less childish but more tumblry, downgrading the Nami-knockoff girl into a tubby polyqueer genderfluid chick, and randomly blackwashing one of the characters. It's bizarre, it's like he went to art school to get good at art and they injected him with tumblr chemicals while he was there. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0xVlKpubC0
Puritans got real mad about ALL the sex in Fallout The Frontier once they were told a pedophile worked on it (drawing the menu icons for a team that undoubtedly knew he drew AppleBloom clop from day one). They hated all of the sexual content, from spotting one used condom on the floor to one raped sad chick to being able to flirt with/fuck assorted adult women to actual degenerate shit like being able to fuck a Deathclaw and the lizard-people who reproduce by fucking humans and the porn-drawing possibly-underaged chick who "was meant to parody tumblr users". They got mad at how you could call a depressed emo chick "my little slave girl" but they'd fucking explode if they played Fallout 3/4 and realized you can enslave almost ANYONE in that game. The herd decided the mod was bad so everything had to be viewed through the "this is proof this mod and its creators are horrible" lens.
Sure, the mod was dogshit with shit combat and bad quests/storytelling.
But Fallout Equestria is undoubtedly worse.
How the fuck can people like this piece of shit?!
The Frontier is unjustifiably long and lasted many hours, but this story is longer and lasts even more hours!
TF rips off movies and COD/Wolfenstein/Batman Arkham fights with Scarecrow, but this rips off even more shit!
Hell, while The Frontier stole a lot of its moments from other sources it still had original ideas. Many of its original ideas were fucking terrible but it still had original ideas, like the concept of some NCR lads defecting and fucking off north only to run into Legion and Mormon BOS without the Codex Of Steel.
But Fallout Equestria is just Fallout but bad and with poners. Ponies don't throw exploding pies at each other or shoot each other with Morph-O-Rays to turn each other into ducks, they shoot each other with Fallout pistols and Fallout shotguns and robo-saddles that auto-aim rifles for hornless poners. For everything that wasn't seen in Fallout 3 like robotic owls, there are ten things that were seen in Fallout 3 and have no logical reason to show up here on a completely different planet with a completely different history, culture, and tech level!
This story is full of repackaged Fallout locations and sidequests and optional side-areas semi-remixed into a stream of shit for LP to swim through.
Someone more autistic than any of us could go through this story with a list of Fallout 1-3's locations in a new tab, figuring out which locations were ripped off from what and what tiny percentage of this story could be called "original".
Kid-me read RWBY fics better than this.
The worst is yet to come.
Good point. I know I wrote some shit as a kid. And as a teenager. I'm glad I never wrote anything as gay as Fallout Equestria.
Some day, I should rework that godawful "Babby's First Original Anime" idea from my youth into something better. Or keep it in its current trashy state and crack jokes about all the dumb animu bullshit.
Speaking of which, Have you ever noticed how today's neo-puritan pseudointellectuals rage and foam at the sight of obvious forms of japanese fanservice, such as scenes where the generic self-insert hero boy trips and falls face-first into some hot babe's massive titties? They'll scream at these scenes and scenes where all the girls (including the youngish-looking ones) are in bikinis on the beach and scenes because they want to look above sex and sexuality when it comes from something foreign to their sensibilities like anime. They'll cry about the sister-kissing scenes in I Can't Fucking Believe My Little Sister Is This Horny For A Fucking Loser Like Me even though it's rated 18 so kids can't see it. Then they'll turn around and suck the dick of western cartoons that are supposedly for kids whenever they include perverted western fanservice moments like foot fetish shots, kids getting into inappropriately sexual situations, twerking ass in the faces of kids, lesbian pandering, race-mixing, mixed-race twerking lesbian pandering, blatantly homosexual shit like underage boys dressing in drag on-stage and getting cheered for it by a crowd of freaks, and so on.
They'll try and pretend they're above the handful of sexual moments in the "all-ages" yet hyper-violent show Adventure Of Some Asshole With A Sword, while ignoring any harmful degenerate sexual messages in western media targeting kids and celebrating whenever homoshit is forced down their throats while they're still impressionable. And they're so desperate for chances to virtue-signal, they'll try to make mountains out of molehills when they're bored. Like when they got butthurt at that Uzaki-Chan show for featuring a short big-tittied cute chick. What, were they mad at her for being cute? Most SJWs are hideous and obese barren perverts that lust after children, so maybe that's it. They want shows to hypnotize kids into degeneracy and normalize this shit for the next generation, they don't want these shows competing with japanese entertainment because they know they cannot compete. Did you know thee Demon Slayer/Kimetsu No Yaiba movie made more cash than ALL of Marvel/DC comics recently? Hiring diversity hires is a mistake.
Lazy anime fanservice is at best something that enhances the work and at worst a fleeting moment of easily-ignored trash there out of obligation, but western animus written to please the freaks on tumblr are purely trash. Removing the perversion from Steven Universe would be like removing the Omnitrix from Ben 10: You'd be left with nothing but the extra crap sprinkled on top of what the show was written to really be about.
Yesterday I saw a vid where some guy "Reworks the anime he designed as a kid" by making the art less childish but more tumblry, downgrading the Nami-knockoff girl into a tubby polyqueer genderfluid chick, and randomly blackwashing one of the characters. It's bizarre, it's like he went to art school to get good at art and they injected him with tumblr chemicals while he was there. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0xVlKpubC0
Puritans got real mad about ALL the sex in Fallout The Frontier once they were told a pedophile worked on it (drawing the menu icons for a team that undoubtedly knew he drew AppleBloom clop from day one). They hated all of the sexual content, from spotting one used condom on the floor to one raped sad chick to being able to flirt with/fuck assorted adult women to actual degenerate shit like being able to fuck a Deathclaw and the lizard-people who reproduce by fucking humans and the porn-drawing possibly-underaged chick who "was meant to parody tumblr users". They got mad at how you could call a depressed emo chick "my little slave girl" but they'd fucking explode if they played Fallout 3/4 and realized you can enslave almost ANYONE in that game. The herd decided the mod was bad so everything had to be viewed through the "this is proof this mod and its creators are horrible" lens.
Sure, the mod was dogshit with shit combat and bad quests/storytelling.
But Fallout Equestria is undoubtedly worse.
How the fuck can people like this piece of shit?!
The Frontier is unjustifiably long and lasted many hours, but this story is longer and lasts even more hours!
TF rips off movies and COD/Wolfenstein/Batman Arkham fights with Scarecrow, but this rips off even more shit!
Hell, while The Frontier stole a lot of its moments from other sources it still had original ideas. Many of its original ideas were fucking terrible but it still had original ideas, like the concept of some NCR lads defecting and fucking off north only to run into Legion and Mormon BOS without the Codex Of Steel.
But Fallout Equestria is just Fallout but bad and with poners. Ponies don't throw exploding pies at each other or shoot each other with Morph-O-Rays to turn each other into ducks, they shoot each other with Fallout pistols and Fallout shotguns and robo-saddles that auto-aim rifles for hornless poners. For everything that wasn't seen in Fallout 3 like robotic owls, there are ten things that were seen in Fallout 3 and have no logical reason to show up here on a completely different planet with a completely different history, culture, and tech level!
This story is full of repackaged Fallout locations and sidequests and optional side-areas semi-remixed into a stream of shit for LP to swim through.
Someone more autistic than any of us could go through this story with a list of Fallout 1-3's locations in a new tab, figuring out which locations were ripped off from what and what tiny percentage of this story could be called "original".
Kid-me read RWBY fics better than this.
The worst is yet to come.
>>302173
I'm glad that you stay on topic these days;^P
I can relate to some of your points in this but again how does any of this relate to the fic at hand?
I'm glad that you stay on topic these days;^P
I can relate to some of your points in this but again how does any of this relate to the fic at hand?
>>302126
Anyway, when the narrative resumes, LP and Velvet have made it to the floor above the one they need to be on in order to use the scooter as a bridge. I'm actually a little surprised that they have simply been walking all this time; I was expecting a lot of looting and safecracking and reading diary entries from 200 years ago. Velvet has apparently been yammering about Calamity the entire time, so maybe that combined with the comedown from the crack mints has LP a little distracted.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZG1kiLrg_I
This next scene, unfortunately, makes no sense and is executed terribly. I'm going to dump the entire section here verbatim before I go over it in detail. I went ahead and preserved the author's italics as well. You really need to read this in the original Greek to get a sense of just how awful it is:
>“It’s just that he makes me so… so… mad,” Velvet Remedy burst out with a stomp. So much for the power of prayer. “You know, I really think I should reconsider my options. There’s plenty of other stallions in the Equestrian Wasteland…”
>I felt a pang of jealousy. Started digging a hole to bury it in.
>“…Or,” Velvet Remedy said with a sudden sweetness. I froze. I could feel her breath on my left ear. When had she gotten so close? With a sultry voice as smooth as melted chocolate, she suggested, “Or maybe a mare?”
>I felt my knees go weak. My heart skipped a beat. My insides became flushed with heat and my stomach filled with butterflies.
>Then cold hard reality crashed over me, dousing the heat and killing the butterflies with frost. I turned on her, instantly and coldly furious.
>“NO.”
>Velvet Remedy took a surprised step back.
>“No. You are too perceptive to not know I have a crush on you.” I stepped forward, my voice cold and sharp. “You do not get to play with my heart, offer me what I’ve yearned for, just to try to get back at Calamity.”
>Velvet Remedy backed up, ears back, stammering.
>“For the Goddesses’ sake, Remedy!” I barked. “You are a follower of Fluttershy. You don’t get to be that evil.”
This is completely out of left field. Having Velvet suddenly make a pass at Littlepoop like this with no setup or preamble makes absolutely no sense at all. Littlepoop's indignant reaction is inappropriate as well, but I'll get to that in just a minute.
It's clear enough what the author is trying to do here, and on paper it's a decent enough direction for the romantic side-story to take. Here is the basic outline:
Character X has an unrequited love interest in Character Y, who has a reciprocated love interest in Character Z. Y is aware that X has a thing for her, but places X squarely in the friendzone, and pursues a relationship with Z. However, at some point, Z and Y have a fight. Y, knowing that X has a crush on her, goes to X and tries to use her as a revenge fuck, but X decides to stand up for herself and retain her dignity, even though it means turning down the character she's been fantasizing about since before the story began.
Again, it's a perfectly fine romance plot; if you got rid of the lesbian angle and replaced the ponies with human high school kids it could be a John Hughes script from the 80s. However, the author's execution is absolutely horrendous, and this latest scene is the rancid cherry that tops off the entire shit sundae. Let's walk through it step by step.
>“It’s just that he makes me so… so… mad,”
Her anger here feels completely artificial, for reasons I've already gone over.
>“You know, I really think I should reconsider my options. There’s plenty of other stallions in the Equestrian Wasteland…”
It really hasn't even been firmly established that Velvet and Calamity are actually a couple. They've expressed interest in each other, but even with the author's clumsy handling I had assumed they were still in the flirty early stages of romance. They certainly don't behave like a couple, from what little of their behavior we actually get to observe. Kkat basically just said "these two are dating now" and I guess we're supposed to just roll with it.
I've been complaining for some time now that the Velvet/Calamity relationship has been poorly developed. For the early portion of the story, they expressed no interest in each other one way or the other. Then, out of absolutely nowhere, they start getting flirty. Then, out of absolutely nowhere, they're fighting. What I think the author wanted was for them to be a couple for awhile, but then grow distant as a result of Calamity killing the colt, ultimately leading to Velvet's trying to throw herself at Littlepoop. The idea is actually quite good, but again, the execution is awful.
Problems in a story tend to cascade and create other problems, as we've observed with other stories we've looked at. This scene doesn't work because Velvet X Calamity doesn't work, and Velvet X Calamity doesn't work because Velvet and Calamity are not particularly well-developed characters in the first place. These characters are not well-developed because the author never really decided what he even wanted to write about in the first place, so the narrative just bounces schizophrenically from one subject to the next without ever really developing much of anything.
There's no plot, no characters worth mentioning; even the setting and its history, which kkat seems to have put more effort into than any other part of this story, is pretty threadbare. If he wanted this love triangle between Velvet, Calamity and Littlepoop to have the emotional punch he obviously thinks it has, he would have been better served by just treating the setting as a backdrop, leaving most of the world history and Fallout trivia for future stories, and creating a story that revolves mainly around these characters. As I've said before, these three are basically just patrons in a museum, and throwing some half-assed hormonal drama between them to spice things up isn't going to make that role any more exciting.
Anyway, when the narrative resumes, LP and Velvet have made it to the floor above the one they need to be on in order to use the scooter as a bridge. I'm actually a little surprised that they have simply been walking all this time; I was expecting a lot of looting and safecracking and reading diary entries from 200 years ago. Velvet has apparently been yammering about Calamity the entire time, so maybe that combined with the comedown from the crack mints has LP a little distracted.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZG1kiLrg_I
This next scene, unfortunately, makes no sense and is executed terribly. I'm going to dump the entire section here verbatim before I go over it in detail. I went ahead and preserved the author's italics as well. You really need to read this in the original Greek to get a sense of just how awful it is:
>“It’s just that he makes me so… so… mad,” Velvet Remedy burst out with a stomp. So much for the power of prayer. “You know, I really think I should reconsider my options. There’s plenty of other stallions in the Equestrian Wasteland…”
>I felt a pang of jealousy. Started digging a hole to bury it in.
>“…Or,” Velvet Remedy said with a sudden sweetness. I froze. I could feel her breath on my left ear. When had she gotten so close? With a sultry voice as smooth as melted chocolate, she suggested, “Or maybe a mare?”
>I felt my knees go weak. My heart skipped a beat. My insides became flushed with heat and my stomach filled with butterflies.
>Then cold hard reality crashed over me, dousing the heat and killing the butterflies with frost. I turned on her, instantly and coldly furious.
>“NO.”
>Velvet Remedy took a surprised step back.
>“No. You are too perceptive to not know I have a crush on you.” I stepped forward, my voice cold and sharp. “You do not get to play with my heart, offer me what I’ve yearned for, just to try to get back at Calamity.”
>Velvet Remedy backed up, ears back, stammering.
>“For the Goddesses’ sake, Remedy!” I barked. “You are a follower of Fluttershy. You don’t get to be that evil.”
This is completely out of left field. Having Velvet suddenly make a pass at Littlepoop like this with no setup or preamble makes absolutely no sense at all. Littlepoop's indignant reaction is inappropriate as well, but I'll get to that in just a minute.
It's clear enough what the author is trying to do here, and on paper it's a decent enough direction for the romantic side-story to take. Here is the basic outline:
Character X has an unrequited love interest in Character Y, who has a reciprocated love interest in Character Z. Y is aware that X has a thing for her, but places X squarely in the friendzone, and pursues a relationship with Z. However, at some point, Z and Y have a fight. Y, knowing that X has a crush on her, goes to X and tries to use her as a revenge fuck, but X decides to stand up for herself and retain her dignity, even though it means turning down the character she's been fantasizing about since before the story began.
Again, it's a perfectly fine romance plot; if you got rid of the lesbian angle and replaced the ponies with human high school kids it could be a John Hughes script from the 80s. However, the author's execution is absolutely horrendous, and this latest scene is the rancid cherry that tops off the entire shit sundae. Let's walk through it step by step.
>“It’s just that he makes me so… so… mad,”
Her anger here feels completely artificial, for reasons I've already gone over.
>“You know, I really think I should reconsider my options. There’s plenty of other stallions in the Equestrian Wasteland…”
It really hasn't even been firmly established that Velvet and Calamity are actually a couple. They've expressed interest in each other, but even with the author's clumsy handling I had assumed they were still in the flirty early stages of romance. They certainly don't behave like a couple, from what little of their behavior we actually get to observe. Kkat basically just said "these two are dating now" and I guess we're supposed to just roll with it.
I've been complaining for some time now that the Velvet/Calamity relationship has been poorly developed. For the early portion of the story, they expressed no interest in each other one way or the other. Then, out of absolutely nowhere, they start getting flirty. Then, out of absolutely nowhere, they're fighting. What I think the author wanted was for them to be a couple for awhile, but then grow distant as a result of Calamity killing the colt, ultimately leading to Velvet's trying to throw herself at Littlepoop. The idea is actually quite good, but again, the execution is awful.
Problems in a story tend to cascade and create other problems, as we've observed with other stories we've looked at. This scene doesn't work because Velvet X Calamity doesn't work, and Velvet X Calamity doesn't work because Velvet and Calamity are not particularly well-developed characters in the first place. These characters are not well-developed because the author never really decided what he even wanted to write about in the first place, so the narrative just bounces schizophrenically from one subject to the next without ever really developing much of anything.
There's no plot, no characters worth mentioning; even the setting and its history, which kkat seems to have put more effort into than any other part of this story, is pretty threadbare. If he wanted this love triangle between Velvet, Calamity and Littlepoop to have the emotional punch he obviously thinks it has, he would have been better served by just treating the setting as a backdrop, leaving most of the world history and Fallout trivia for future stories, and creating a story that revolves mainly around these characters. As I've said before, these three are basically just patrons in a museum, and throwing some half-assed hormonal drama between them to spice things up isn't going to make that role any more exciting.
>>302203
>“…Or,” Velvet Remedy said with a sudden sweetness. I froze. I could feel her breath on my left ear. When had she gotten so close? With a sultry voice as smooth as melted chocolate, she suggested, “Or maybe a mare?”
This is the really galling part. To the author's credit, I didn't think he could do anything to make me hate Velvet Remedy's guts any more than I did to begin with, but much like the hermaphroditic dinosaurs of Isla Nublar, he found a way.
What's most galling about it is that I'm not even pissed off for the reason that the author wants me to be. If I were angry at Velvet for being callous or insensitive to Littlepoop, then the author would be doing his job; we're supposed to be angry at Velvet here. However, I'm angry because this is basically just bad porn writing: the pizza guy knocks on the door, a woman answers, and then for no reason she seduces him and they have sex. Prior to this moment, we've had no indication that Velvet is even remotely attracted to Littlepoop, or even that she might be interested in mares at all. In fact, there hasn't been any indication that Velvet is even aware of LP's crush on her. She completely breaks character here (at least to the extent that she has any character to break), and just flings herself at the protagonist in the most low-brow possible way, and the result is distasteful even by my standards.
There is also the matter of Littlepoop's reaction:
>“No. You are too perceptive to not know I have a crush on you.” I stepped forward, my voice cold and sharp. “You do not get to play with my heart, offer me what I’ve yearned for, just to try to get back at Calamity.”
There was no proper setup for this, either. Despite what the author may have intended, he has given us no actual indication that Velvet is aware of Littlepoop's feelings. If anything, Littlepoop seems to go out of her way to keep her crush on Velvet a secret. In fact, I think I've even commented on this once or twice; she grouses about Velvet and Calamity getting together, but she has not made even the slightest effort to try and win Velvet's affections herself. She seems to have just given up on her without even trying. Furthermore, based on what she's actually said and done in the story, there is no reason that either of her friends would even be aware that she's a dyke, let alone that she's been carrying a torch for Velvet all this time. I had more or less assumed that Littlepoop assumes that Velvet is straight, that she has no serious chance with her, and that she has simply resigned herself to loving her silently from afar.
As to Velvet's being perceptive enough to realize LP has a crush, there's no reason to believe this from anything in the text either. The author has a very bad habit of transferring his own omniscience to his characters: for instance Littlepoop being mysteriously aware of things that there is no plausible reason she should know, like this building having belonged to the Ministry of Morale. Likewise, Velvet is expected to have just somehow been aware that Littlepoop wants to eat her out, despite Littlepoop's not having dropped even the slightest hint to her.
Anyway, this whole scene feels completely contrived. Velvet and Calamity's "fight," Velvet's reasons for wanting to "get back" at Calamity, her sudden inexplicable attraction to Littlepoop, the sudden pass she makes; all of it. However, I want to emphasize that the author's idea here was actually good. The blueprint I outlined above would make a perfectly good storyline for this, but again, the execution sucks, and execution is everything.
The tension between Velvet and Calamity should have started when they first met, long before they became interested in each other. When they first meet, they should instantly dislike each other and fight constantly. As time goes on, they should become attracted to each other even though they still fight, until eventually they become a couple. LP should be watching this from the sidelines, and we should physically feel her heart breaking as she watches the two of them grow closer.
As soon as it seems like Valamity is all but a certainty, then the wedge event descends; Calamity has to kill a kid or do some other kind of shit that shocks Velvet to her core, and reminds her of why she initially disliked him. Now she is in a vulnerable, volatile state, which causes her to impulsively make a pass at Littlepoop. Bear in mind, though, that for this to work, she has to at least on some level be aware that LP has a thing for her, which means LP needs to make her feelings a little more obvious to the others. Also bear in mind that in order for the wedge event to have the desired effect, these characters need to be better developed from the get-go. We need to actually believe that Velvet gives a shit about her alleged pacifism; she can't just pay mild lip service to it every now and then while simultaneously turning a blind eye to her friends' murderhobo behavior.
Above all, the author needs to learn to focus, and decide what the hell this story is actually about. The schizophrenic, disorganized way this text is composed has a negative effect on nearly everything in it. If the author kept the story heavily focused on the interactions between these three characters, for instance, this love story would have a lot more punch to it. As it stands, it's hard to take much of it seriously. Calamity and Velvet are two barely-developed characters who barely speak to each other for most of the story, then suddenly they're a couple because the author says so. Meanwhile, Littlepoop assures us that this is devastating for her, but it's a little hard to take her declaration seriously when a paragraph later she's yammering excitedly about some random statuette she found in a safe, and a paragraph after that she's talking about downing crack mints.
>“…Or,” Velvet Remedy said with a sudden sweetness. I froze. I could feel her breath on my left ear. When had she gotten so close? With a sultry voice as smooth as melted chocolate, she suggested, “Or maybe a mare?”
This is the really galling part. To the author's credit, I didn't think he could do anything to make me hate Velvet Remedy's guts any more than I did to begin with, but much like the hermaphroditic dinosaurs of Isla Nublar, he found a way.
What's most galling about it is that I'm not even pissed off for the reason that the author wants me to be. If I were angry at Velvet for being callous or insensitive to Littlepoop, then the author would be doing his job; we're supposed to be angry at Velvet here. However, I'm angry because this is basically just bad porn writing: the pizza guy knocks on the door, a woman answers, and then for no reason she seduces him and they have sex. Prior to this moment, we've had no indication that Velvet is even remotely attracted to Littlepoop, or even that she might be interested in mares at all. In fact, there hasn't been any indication that Velvet is even aware of LP's crush on her. She completely breaks character here (at least to the extent that she has any character to break), and just flings herself at the protagonist in the most low-brow possible way, and the result is distasteful even by my standards.
There is also the matter of Littlepoop's reaction:
>“No. You are too perceptive to not know I have a crush on you.” I stepped forward, my voice cold and sharp. “You do not get to play with my heart, offer me what I’ve yearned for, just to try to get back at Calamity.”
There was no proper setup for this, either. Despite what the author may have intended, he has given us no actual indication that Velvet is aware of Littlepoop's feelings. If anything, Littlepoop seems to go out of her way to keep her crush on Velvet a secret. In fact, I think I've even commented on this once or twice; she grouses about Velvet and Calamity getting together, but she has not made even the slightest effort to try and win Velvet's affections herself. She seems to have just given up on her without even trying. Furthermore, based on what she's actually said and done in the story, there is no reason that either of her friends would even be aware that she's a dyke, let alone that she's been carrying a torch for Velvet all this time. I had more or less assumed that Littlepoop assumes that Velvet is straight, that she has no serious chance with her, and that she has simply resigned herself to loving her silently from afar.
As to Velvet's being perceptive enough to realize LP has a crush, there's no reason to believe this from anything in the text either. The author has a very bad habit of transferring his own omniscience to his characters: for instance Littlepoop being mysteriously aware of things that there is no plausible reason she should know, like this building having belonged to the Ministry of Morale. Likewise, Velvet is expected to have just somehow been aware that Littlepoop wants to eat her out, despite Littlepoop's not having dropped even the slightest hint to her.
Anyway, this whole scene feels completely contrived. Velvet and Calamity's "fight," Velvet's reasons for wanting to "get back" at Calamity, her sudden inexplicable attraction to Littlepoop, the sudden pass she makes; all of it. However, I want to emphasize that the author's idea here was actually good. The blueprint I outlined above would make a perfectly good storyline for this, but again, the execution sucks, and execution is everything.
The tension between Velvet and Calamity should have started when they first met, long before they became interested in each other. When they first meet, they should instantly dislike each other and fight constantly. As time goes on, they should become attracted to each other even though they still fight, until eventually they become a couple. LP should be watching this from the sidelines, and we should physically feel her heart breaking as she watches the two of them grow closer.
As soon as it seems like Valamity is all but a certainty, then the wedge event descends; Calamity has to kill a kid or do some other kind of shit that shocks Velvet to her core, and reminds her of why she initially disliked him. Now she is in a vulnerable, volatile state, which causes her to impulsively make a pass at Littlepoop. Bear in mind, though, that for this to work, she has to at least on some level be aware that LP has a thing for her, which means LP needs to make her feelings a little more obvious to the others. Also bear in mind that in order for the wedge event to have the desired effect, these characters need to be better developed from the get-go. We need to actually believe that Velvet gives a shit about her alleged pacifism; she can't just pay mild lip service to it every now and then while simultaneously turning a blind eye to her friends' murderhobo behavior.
Above all, the author needs to learn to focus, and decide what the hell this story is actually about. The schizophrenic, disorganized way this text is composed has a negative effect on nearly everything in it. If the author kept the story heavily focused on the interactions between these three characters, for instance, this love story would have a lot more punch to it. As it stands, it's hard to take much of it seriously. Calamity and Velvet are two barely-developed characters who barely speak to each other for most of the story, then suddenly they're a couple because the author says so. Meanwhile, Littlepoop assures us that this is devastating for her, but it's a little hard to take her declaration seriously when a paragraph later she's yammering excitedly about some random statuette she found in a safe, and a paragraph after that she's talking about downing crack mints.
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>>302207
To be perfectly honest, this story is beginning to give me flashbacks to when I was reviewing Nigel's Silver Star thing. Trying to give constructive criticism on any part of it is difficult, because as soon as you start to tug on one thread you realize it's attached to a much deeper root system of problems that undermine the entire project. Also, much like Nigel's thing, FoE suffers heavily from the author's simply having too many ideas at once, and trying to cram all of them into the same project.
Anyway, I'm starting to get sidetracked. There are a couple more things about the Velvet/Littlepoop exchange that I'd like to go over, and then we can move on.
>“For the Goddesses’ sake, Remedy!” I barked. “You are a follower of Fluttershy. You don’t get to be that evil.”
As I've noted, Littlepoop's rebuke here is almost as out of left field as the pass that Velvet makes at her. As we witnessed with Peen Stroke, you can't just have your characters overact as a substitute for genuine emotion and expect the reader to fall for it.
This passage also calls attention to another ambiguity within this story. What exactly does LP mean by Velvet's being a "follower" of Fluttershy? It's been made fairly clear that she admires her, but it's unclear what that admiration entails exactly. How does she know Fluttershy? Obviously they can't have actually met, but there must be some kind of connection between them that would have inspired Velvet's admiration of her. It's still not clear just how much of this world's history is common knowledge. Is Flutters just a pony from history whom she admires, or does being her "follower" have some deeper meaning? Is she supposed to be patterning her life after Fluttershy and imitating her, the way Silver Bell did with Pinkie Pie? Or is this just autistic fangirl devotion that doesn't have any serious depth?
Another problem is that we really don't know anything about Fluttershy herself. The author has fallen into the common fanfiction trap of relying on the reader's presumed knowledge of the source material to fill in the weak points of his narrative. Even though most of us are probably familiar enough with the character of Fluttershy in MLP, as an FoE character we barely know her at all. I remember in that memory orb that LP found, the one that Velvet is constantly viewing, Fluttershy is seen giving a speech or something, but the incident doesn't really give us enough to form a solid impression of her character. Beyond that, she's barely been mentioned in the story; we don't know who she was, what she was like, or what she believed in or stood for. Moreover, her role as a historical figure is also murky, so not only do we not know anything about her personally, we don't really know how the other characters see her either. So Velvet's whole "follower of Fluttershy" thing doesn't really mean a whole hell of a lot.
Anyway, Littlepoop yells at Velvet and then stomps away. Presumably we are supposed to feel bad for her here, since rejecting Velvet's advances was clearly the right move, but turning her down would have been difficult and painful. And, had this scene, and the entire story before it, been properly developed, we probably would feel for her; as it stands, it's just one more meaningless event in a story that has just been one long string of meaningless events.
At any rate, the pseudo-feels are suddenly interrupted by the appearance of a sprite-bot:
>“You’re not supposed to be here,” called out a voice that sounded disturbingly like a mechanical Pinkie Pie. “You’ve been a bad pony!”
How the hell would Littlepoop know what Pinkie Pie's voice sounded like? She died 200 years ago.
Page break. In the next scene, Velvet and LP are under attack by a swarm of sprite-bots. They hunker down behind a makeshift barricade while the bots rain lasers down on them. I'll actually note that the author makes a good pacing choice here; had it been properly executed, the last scene would have been pretty emotionally heavy, and breaking that tension with an action scene is a good way to give the reader some respite.
Unfortunately, kkat immediately ruins this new scene with more of his trademark autism:
>“Where are they all coming from?” cried out Velvet Remedy as five more sprite-bots rounded the doorway and started vaporizing our barricade of tables and refrigerators.
>I knew the answer, but I didn’t have time to explain it aloud. It was obvious, really. Before there was Watcher watching everyone, there was Pinkie Pie. Of course the sprite-bots were hers.
I am really, really, reeeeeeeeeally getting tired of saying this all the time, but HOW THE HELL DOES SHE KNOW THIS?!? This is pure speculation on her part; it isn't obvious at all. The purpose of the sprite-bots has never really been explained; they just sort of float around playing music. While it actually makes sense that they might have been spy drones used by the Ministry of Morale, thus explaining the Ministry's slogan "Pinkie Pie is Watching You Forever," nothing that Littlepoop has observed so far would lead to this conclusion. It would be better if she simply discovered this fact somehow instead of obnoxiously "deducing" it.
This is actually a good example of what I was complaining about earlier: the author has a bad habit of transferring his omniscience to his characters. As the storyteller, he knows everything about this world already; however, the characters do not. It feels weird to have LP just suddenly blurt out some random piece of trivia that she just somehow knows "aha! this burned-out, unmarked skyscraper MUST be the headquarters of the Ministry of Morale! I know this because reasons!". If the author wants us to know that the sprite-bots were surveillance drones that Ponk used to watch ponies in the shower or whatever the fuck she did with them, then LP should find this out naturally through investigation.
To be perfectly honest, this story is beginning to give me flashbacks to when I was reviewing Nigel's Silver Star thing. Trying to give constructive criticism on any part of it is difficult, because as soon as you start to tug on one thread you realize it's attached to a much deeper root system of problems that undermine the entire project. Also, much like Nigel's thing, FoE suffers heavily from the author's simply having too many ideas at once, and trying to cram all of them into the same project.
Anyway, I'm starting to get sidetracked. There are a couple more things about the Velvet/Littlepoop exchange that I'd like to go over, and then we can move on.
>“For the Goddesses’ sake, Remedy!” I barked. “You are a follower of Fluttershy. You don’t get to be that evil.”
As I've noted, Littlepoop's rebuke here is almost as out of left field as the pass that Velvet makes at her. As we witnessed with Peen Stroke, you can't just have your characters overact as a substitute for genuine emotion and expect the reader to fall for it.
This passage also calls attention to another ambiguity within this story. What exactly does LP mean by Velvet's being a "follower" of Fluttershy? It's been made fairly clear that she admires her, but it's unclear what that admiration entails exactly. How does she know Fluttershy? Obviously they can't have actually met, but there must be some kind of connection between them that would have inspired Velvet's admiration of her. It's still not clear just how much of this world's history is common knowledge. Is Flutters just a pony from history whom she admires, or does being her "follower" have some deeper meaning? Is she supposed to be patterning her life after Fluttershy and imitating her, the way Silver Bell did with Pinkie Pie? Or is this just autistic fangirl devotion that doesn't have any serious depth?
Another problem is that we really don't know anything about Fluttershy herself. The author has fallen into the common fanfiction trap of relying on the reader's presumed knowledge of the source material to fill in the weak points of his narrative. Even though most of us are probably familiar enough with the character of Fluttershy in MLP, as an FoE character we barely know her at all. I remember in that memory orb that LP found, the one that Velvet is constantly viewing, Fluttershy is seen giving a speech or something, but the incident doesn't really give us enough to form a solid impression of her character. Beyond that, she's barely been mentioned in the story; we don't know who she was, what she was like, or what she believed in or stood for. Moreover, her role as a historical figure is also murky, so not only do we not know anything about her personally, we don't really know how the other characters see her either. So Velvet's whole "follower of Fluttershy" thing doesn't really mean a whole hell of a lot.
Anyway, Littlepoop yells at Velvet and then stomps away. Presumably we are supposed to feel bad for her here, since rejecting Velvet's advances was clearly the right move, but turning her down would have been difficult and painful. And, had this scene, and the entire story before it, been properly developed, we probably would feel for her; as it stands, it's just one more meaningless event in a story that has just been one long string of meaningless events.
At any rate, the pseudo-feels are suddenly interrupted by the appearance of a sprite-bot:
>“You’re not supposed to be here,” called out a voice that sounded disturbingly like a mechanical Pinkie Pie. “You’ve been a bad pony!”
How the hell would Littlepoop know what Pinkie Pie's voice sounded like? She died 200 years ago.
Page break. In the next scene, Velvet and LP are under attack by a swarm of sprite-bots. They hunker down behind a makeshift barricade while the bots rain lasers down on them. I'll actually note that the author makes a good pacing choice here; had it been properly executed, the last scene would have been pretty emotionally heavy, and breaking that tension with an action scene is a good way to give the reader some respite.
Unfortunately, kkat immediately ruins this new scene with more of his trademark autism:
>“Where are they all coming from?” cried out Velvet Remedy as five more sprite-bots rounded the doorway and started vaporizing our barricade of tables and refrigerators.
>I knew the answer, but I didn’t have time to explain it aloud. It was obvious, really. Before there was Watcher watching everyone, there was Pinkie Pie. Of course the sprite-bots were hers.
I am really, really, reeeeeeeeeally getting tired of saying this all the time, but HOW THE HELL DOES SHE KNOW THIS?!? This is pure speculation on her part; it isn't obvious at all. The purpose of the sprite-bots has never really been explained; they just sort of float around playing music. While it actually makes sense that they might have been spy drones used by the Ministry of Morale, thus explaining the Ministry's slogan "Pinkie Pie is Watching You Forever," nothing that Littlepoop has observed so far would lead to this conclusion. It would be better if she simply discovered this fact somehow instead of obnoxiously "deducing" it.
This is actually a good example of what I was complaining about earlier: the author has a bad habit of transferring his omniscience to his characters. As the storyteller, he knows everything about this world already; however, the characters do not. It feels weird to have LP just suddenly blurt out some random piece of trivia that she just somehow knows "aha! this burned-out, unmarked skyscraper MUST be the headquarters of the Ministry of Morale! I know this because reasons!". If the author wants us to know that the sprite-bots were surveillance drones that Ponk used to watch ponies in the shower or whatever the fuck she did with them, then LP should find this out naturally through investigation.
>>302024
>Insectoid is a word
Huh, I'll be damned. Looks like you're right.
>>302058
>Btw is it bad writing that Calamity can effortlessly fly while carrying his friends?
It is, for the same reason that Littlepoop being able to carry an entire moving van's worth of crap inside her saddlebags is bad writing. What actions a character should reasonably be able to perform, and how certain encumbrances like carrying another character on their back or having a wagon hitched to them would impede their ability to perform normal actions, are fairly basic things to take into account when telling a story.
>>302167
>Do you think this story should do a recap episode?
I think this story is long enough without adding extra text, especially when it does nothing except reiterate things we already know.
You make some good points here. This story is galling not just because it's basically just a log of someone's RPG session, but also because it doesn't even seem like it was a particularly good RPG session. Giving each character their own particular set of skills, and then having each character take on different tasks depending on those skills, is a pretty basic aspect of playing an RPG. This is basically one overpowered character doing everything, while accompanied by her two friends who have no role beyond tagging along and occasionally telling her how great she is.
>>302173
>I'm glad I never wrote anything as gay as Fallout Equestria.
Pic.
>>302200
I know, I remember. I'm going to take a look at it. I want to make it to something resembling a stopping point with FoE before I delve into anything else, even if it's something really short. I worry that if I lose momentum with this I'm not going to have the energy to pick it back up again.
>Insectoid is a word
Huh, I'll be damned. Looks like you're right.
>>302058
>Btw is it bad writing that Calamity can effortlessly fly while carrying his friends?
It is, for the same reason that Littlepoop being able to carry an entire moving van's worth of crap inside her saddlebags is bad writing. What actions a character should reasonably be able to perform, and how certain encumbrances like carrying another character on their back or having a wagon hitched to them would impede their ability to perform normal actions, are fairly basic things to take into account when telling a story.
>>302167
>Do you think this story should do a recap episode?
I think this story is long enough without adding extra text, especially when it does nothing except reiterate things we already know.
You make some good points here. This story is galling not just because it's basically just a log of someone's RPG session, but also because it doesn't even seem like it was a particularly good RPG session. Giving each character their own particular set of skills, and then having each character take on different tasks depending on those skills, is a pretty basic aspect of playing an RPG. This is basically one overpowered character doing everything, while accompanied by her two friends who have no role beyond tagging along and occasionally telling her how great she is.
>>302173
>I'm glad I never wrote anything as gay as Fallout Equestria.
Pic.
>>302200
I know, I remember. I'm going to take a look at it. I want to make it to something resembling a stopping point with FoE before I delve into anything else, even if it's something really short. I worry that if I lose momentum with this I'm not going to have the energy to pick it back up again.
>>302210
>I worry that if I lose momentum with this I'm not going to have the energy to pick it back up again.
Heh. It's that bad, huh?
>I worry that if I lose momentum with this I'm not going to have the energy to pick it back up again.
Heh. It's that bad, huh?
>>302211
In all honesty it's not much worse than Past Sins in terms of overall quality; it's mostly just the size of it that depresses me. The discussion of this story already spans two threads and we're not even halfway through it yet. Occasionally I find myself looking at how many chapters we have yet to read, and I realize that if I stopped now I probably wouldn't be able to make myself start again.
In all honesty it's not much worse than Past Sins in terms of overall quality; it's mostly just the size of it that depresses me. The discussion of this story already spans two threads and we're not even halfway through it yet. Occasionally I find myself looking at how many chapters we have yet to read, and I realize that if I stopped now I probably wouldn't be able to make myself start again.
1614107145_1.gif (187.8 KB, 800x600, 1463516__questionable_twilight+sparkle_princess+luna_princess+celestia_female_pony_mare_simple+background_alicorn_blushing_open+mouth_edit_twilight+s.gif)
>>302212
Well the good news is that once it's done you can look back and say, holy shit I reviewed this slog of a story despite the soul numbing effect it's having from exposure.
Everything else will be cake walk.
Good luck friend, and thank you.
Diverging a bit here, my skills in dissecting media is lackluster. Once this thing has been combed through I'd like to give a post reading review analysis a shot.
Mostly giving the advice in How To Read A Book, in how to read fictional material it recommends to read it all in a timeframe that you remeber the whole story, preferably in one sitting. Giving the best possible benefit of the doubt, while reading at the appropriate speed. Usually shittier works deserve less time.
Then blast it apart with analysis.
Well the good news is that once it's done you can look back and say, holy shit I reviewed this slog of a story despite the soul numbing effect it's having from exposure.
Everything else will be cake walk.
Good luck friend, and thank you.
Diverging a bit here, my skills in dissecting media is lackluster. Once this thing has been combed through I'd like to give a post reading review analysis a shot.
Mostly giving the advice in How To Read A Book, in how to read fictional material it recommends to read it all in a timeframe that you remeber the whole story, preferably in one sitting. Giving the best possible benefit of the doubt, while reading at the appropriate speed. Usually shittier works deserve less time.
Then blast it apart with analysis.
>>302207
>There was no proper setup for this, either. Despite what the author may have intended, he has given us no actual indication that Velvet is aware of Littlepoop's feelings. If anything, Littlepoop seems to go out of her way to keep her crush on Velvet a secret.
This isn't strictly true. Velvet's been manipulating Littlepip's feelings for her since her very first appearance, where she took advantage of Pip's fangirl crush so that Pip wouldn't think twice about why she wanted to be rid of her Pipbuck.
As with so many things in this story, Kkat manages to miss the target at point blank. Littlepip should really be having an epiphany here - Velvet's most consistent character trait is exploiting other people to get what she wants. She did it with Pip to get out of the stable in the beginning. She did it with the slavers and the slaves at Old Appleloosa to live out her fantasy of being a healer. She smooth-talked the merchant on the way to Manehattan and bullshitted the guards to get into Tenpony. By rights, Littlepip should be castigating her for being a sneaky, emotionally manipulative shit in general, not just with Calamity.
Velvet, at least on paper, is the group's talkomancer - when Littlepip isn't on her "do everything even better" drugs. There's potential for a character arc here, of someone recognising a character flaw and working to resolve or leverage it, but that potential's squandered on low-effort relationship drama.
>There was no proper setup for this, either. Despite what the author may have intended, he has given us no actual indication that Velvet is aware of Littlepoop's feelings. If anything, Littlepoop seems to go out of her way to keep her crush on Velvet a secret.
This isn't strictly true. Velvet's been manipulating Littlepip's feelings for her since her very first appearance, where she took advantage of Pip's fangirl crush so that Pip wouldn't think twice about why she wanted to be rid of her Pipbuck.
As with so many things in this story, Kkat manages to miss the target at point blank. Littlepip should really be having an epiphany here - Velvet's most consistent character trait is exploiting other people to get what she wants. She did it with Pip to get out of the stable in the beginning. She did it with the slavers and the slaves at Old Appleloosa to live out her fantasy of being a healer. She smooth-talked the merchant on the way to Manehattan and bullshitted the guards to get into Tenpony. By rights, Littlepip should be castigating her for being a sneaky, emotionally manipulative shit in general, not just with Calamity.
Velvet, at least on paper, is the group's talkomancer - when Littlepip isn't on her "do everything even better" drugs. There's potential for a character arc here, of someone recognising a character flaw and working to resolve or leverage it, but that potential's squandered on low-effort relationship drama.
>>302214
Me in the past. That was a fucking awful idea. It works, but the small embers of disgusted rage have been stoked.
Since reading more I now understand this 'story' is more like a soap opera.
Me in the past. That was a fucking awful idea. It works, but the small embers of disgusted rage have been stoked.
Since reading more I now understand this 'story' is more like a soap opera.
>>302218
>Littlepip should be castigating her for being a sneaky, emotionally manipulative shit
That's fucking genius!
The speech options having a high Speech skill in Fallout unlocks are often manipulative and underhanded.
And being a skilled liar/manipulator in Fallout and most other RPGs is your best way to avoid some combat encounters, haggle better rewards for completing sidequests, and the best RPGs will even give you the option to talk the final boss to death instead of having to fight him.
Painting it as a bad thing to be a two-faced smooth-talker would be like painting it as a bad thing to suck at everything except violence and have no interests in anything beyond your desires for sick loot and murderhoboery.
You know how many RPG players try to complete games with a "no kill run/pacifist route" right? Even if it means sparing serial rapists and crime bosses while sneaking past raider bases so others have to deal with them and nonlethally knocking out/tranq darting foes that try to kill you? And using the whiny butthurt "peace is better than killing, you fucking cunt" dialogue option whenever another character kills and you don't get an option to stop them?
Because between the manipulative shit from this manipulative shit and Velvet's inconsistent pacifism that only matters when it fucks her or her friends over or makes her irrationally butthurt over Calamity stopping rape from happening...
A smart writer could have written Velvet as a direct attack on RPGs, the High Charisma Speech Expert character build, and the Pacifist Route as a concept. A genius parody satire thingy. Plenty of stories have said violence is wrong even when the heroes do it. But how many stories have said the same about gamers who focus on social skills and their manipulative characters?
I wonder if Velvet would be as mad at Calamity over the kid killing if he handed her his gun to prove a point and told her she needs to shoot that super-rapist colt or let him rape the fleeing mare, to prove a point over the hypocritical self-righteousness of devoting yourself to pacifism without understanding what sometimes needs to be done to attain and secure lasting peace.
>Littlepip should be castigating her for being a sneaky, emotionally manipulative shit
That's fucking genius!
The speech options having a high Speech skill in Fallout unlocks are often manipulative and underhanded.
And being a skilled liar/manipulator in Fallout and most other RPGs is your best way to avoid some combat encounters, haggle better rewards for completing sidequests, and the best RPGs will even give you the option to talk the final boss to death instead of having to fight him.
Painting it as a bad thing to be a two-faced smooth-talker would be like painting it as a bad thing to suck at everything except violence and have no interests in anything beyond your desires for sick loot and murderhoboery.
You know how many RPG players try to complete games with a "no kill run/pacifist route" right? Even if it means sparing serial rapists and crime bosses while sneaking past raider bases so others have to deal with them and nonlethally knocking out/tranq darting foes that try to kill you? And using the whiny butthurt "peace is better than killing, you fucking cunt" dialogue option whenever another character kills and you don't get an option to stop them?
Because between the manipulative shit from this manipulative shit and Velvet's inconsistent pacifism that only matters when it fucks her or her friends over or makes her irrationally butthurt over Calamity stopping rape from happening...
A smart writer could have written Velvet as a direct attack on RPGs, the High Charisma Speech Expert character build, and the Pacifist Route as a concept. A genius parody satire thingy. Plenty of stories have said violence is wrong even when the heroes do it. But how many stories have said the same about gamers who focus on social skills and their manipulative characters?
I wonder if Velvet would be as mad at Calamity over the kid killing if he handed her his gun to prove a point and told her she needs to shoot that super-rapist colt or let him rape the fleeing mare, to prove a point over the hypocritical self-righteousness of devoting yourself to pacifism without understanding what sometimes needs to be done to attain and secure lasting peace.
>>302226
I really wish kkat had better writing,because at least then complex social dynamics, and moral grandstanding. because then there would be a story, not the clusterfuck this is. It's like calling a cardboard box filled with mirrors, glass, and a ripped own soda can, a house of mirrors. Sure if you've never seen mirrors, or glass, or ripped up metal it's interesting for maybe ten minutes, ten it's more like watching paint dry.
The audience who enjoyed this work have an invested interest before it begins, for if that work breaks their heart the spin-off's and other fan works would cease. They hold their good memories for both Fallout, and Friendship is Magic like a bandana facing the firing wall. Else they would see their blood and energy leaking from the bullet wounds of ineptitude, the burn in their ear as the ringing of disappointment would convince them to remove the blind fold. They mistake their vital fluids leaving as a sign of warm fuzzy feelings from the story rather than the existing holes in themselves.
>You know how many RPG players try to complete games with a "no kill run/pacifist route" right?
>Even if it means sparing serial rapists and crime bosses while sneaking past raider bases so others have to deal with them and nonlethally knocking out/tranq darting foes that try to kill you? And using the whiny butthurt "peace is better than killing, you fucking cunt" dialogue option whenever another character kills and you don't get an option to stop them?
You know who would make a great pacifist (to write), a sadistic torture hungery manipulator. While that is how 'public faces' deal with such things through proxy being behind the shoes would be interesting for a little while.
I really wish kkat had better writing,
The audience who enjoyed this work have an invested interest before it begins, for if that work breaks their heart the spin-off's and other fan works would cease. They hold their good memories for both Fallout, and Friendship is Magic like a bandana facing the firing wall. Else they would see their blood and energy leaking from the bullet wounds of ineptitude, the burn in their ear as the ringing of disappointment would convince them to remove the blind fold. They mistake their vital fluids leaving as a sign of warm fuzzy feelings from the story rather than the existing holes in themselves.
>You know how many RPG players try to complete games with a "no kill run/pacifist route" right?
>Even if it means sparing serial rapists and crime bosses while sneaking past raider bases so others have to deal with them and nonlethally knocking out/tranq darting foes that try to kill you? And using the whiny butthurt "peace is better than killing, you fucking cunt" dialogue option whenever another character kills and you don't get an option to stop them?
You know who would make a great pacifist (to write), a sadistic torture hungery manipulator. While that is how 'public faces' deal with such things through proxy being behind the shoes would be interesting for a little while.
>>302212
I don't wanna demoralize you or anything but I would quit about now, if I were you. You already proven that so far this story is, whatever you have provenI assume it's shit.. You don't actually have to do more.
I'm not trying to be a temptress here or anything but like I'm just giving you my view on it but then again, I'm not you. I would probably not review stories in this great capacity as you do in the first place so you clearly have other motives and things that drive you forward than what I have. I think you should do what you want in the end.
But like,
>>302214
no offence to this (you) but this
>Well the good news is that once it's done you can look back and say, holy shit I reviewed this slog of a story despite the soul numbing effect it's having from exposure.
sounds more like a thing you would say in regret than anything else. "Holy shit I wasted my life," kinda deal. At least I would have seen it like that.
Again, I'm not trying to be a siren here. I do think, though, that if you're going to do this despite feeling that the length of the work is painful to go through. One of my friends from high-school read this four times or something like that. O'boy.
Then maybe you should slice it into sections. Like, you review to this point than you take a break and then you read to the next point and take a break.
I guess, I should admit to a bias that I really don't give a fuck about this story at this point. So yeah, I'll admit to be a little bit selfish in wanting your reviewing skills all to myself but I know there are other people in the world except me, I think.
Though, one of your latest posts was nice. I like the one about how silly it is that characters who follow retarded and extremely simplified versions of ethical principles are mind-blown when they don't mesh together. As in "You should not kill children" + "Rapists are evil and must be killed" and conflict with these ideas create conflict and "grey" morality.
It reminds me of how some people will criticise christianity.
I don't wanna demoralize you or anything but I would quit about now, if I were you. You already proven that so far this story is, whatever you have provenI assume it's shit.. You don't actually have to do more.
I'm not trying to be a temptress here or anything but like I'm just giving you my view on it but then again, I'm not you. I would probably not review stories in this great capacity as you do in the first place so you clearly have other motives and things that drive you forward than what I have. I think you should do what you want in the end.
But like,
>>302214
no offence to this (you) but this
>Well the good news is that once it's done you can look back and say, holy shit I reviewed this slog of a story despite the soul numbing effect it's having from exposure.
sounds more like a thing you would say in regret than anything else. "Holy shit I wasted my life," kinda deal. At least I would have seen it like that.
Again, I'm not trying to be a siren here. I do think, though, that if you're going to do this despite feeling that the length of the work is painful to go through. One of my friends from high-school read this four times or something like that. O'boy.
Then maybe you should slice it into sections. Like, you review to this point than you take a break and then you read to the next point and take a break.
I guess, I should admit to a bias that I really don't give a fuck about this story at this point. So yeah, I'll admit to be a little bit selfish in wanting your reviewing skills all to myself but I know there are other people in the world except me, I think.
Though, one of your latest posts was nice. I like the one about how silly it is that characters who follow retarded and extremely simplified versions of ethical principles are mind-blown when they don't mesh together. As in "You should not kill children" + "Rapists are evil and must be killed" and conflict with these ideas create conflict and "grey" morality.
It reminds me of how some people will criticise christianity.
>>302227
Also you ever notice how tons of RPG sidequests are "this desperate town or family or person desperately needs someone to solve this problem and you're their best or only choice"?
In that context, haggling for a better reward when you know the questgiver can barely put food on the table let alone pay you the wages rich bastards or royalty or the military easily could seems like a real dick move.
It would be one thing for Geralt to extort cash out of farmers he saves after taking care of their monster problem.
But a post apocalyptic scenario where farming is damn near impossible for all but the richest and your choices for food are either 200 year old tins of beans, expensive fresh fruit grown in hydroponics labs, and campfire fried radroach meat? A gamer wouldn't think twice about clicking the Give Me More Money dialogue option if he wants a reward for giving his character a high Charisma score instead of a higher Strength score and isn't thinking about the story his roleplaying actions tell. But in a story where the writer is willing to explore and deconstruct all aspects of the efficient selfish gamer brain murderhobo mindset, Velvet would be the perfect way to say "fuck High Charisma players, you're damn near useless in a firefight and your holier than thou pacifist attitude is annoying. Just because you've never been forced to compromise on your wimpy peacetime morality it doesn't make you better than someone who has".
Although if the author had the sense to go for this and intentionally say something smart about RPG gaming and being a murderhobo with nothing better to do, Calamity would need to be a consistent character and represent some other aspect of the typical tabletop player mentality.
Perhaps he could love upgrading his guns and making geneva convention violating ammo designed to torture whoever he shoots and love torturing baddies for intel? Since he shot Littlepip once, it would force the audience to think "maybe this is a bad thing" at least once before he proceeds to use this ammo for the rest of the story on raiders and his enclave ex-comrades alike. There could also be a scene where he tortures a baddie for intel but it turns out that guy was innocent and wasting time pulling his teeth out instead of searching for the bomb allowed it to blow up something important to the heroes.
Nothing really lies at the core of Calamity's character. He just has traits that don't influence one another. Cowboy accent. Shotguns. Pegasus. Ex Enclave Dashite. It's not like the author is using him as a clever statement to say "former members of a villainous organization don't just magically become nice people by joining the good guys and exclusively using the evil torture methods on Bad Guys".
Also you ever notice how tons of RPG sidequests are "this desperate town or family or person desperately needs someone to solve this problem and you're their best or only choice"?
In that context, haggling for a better reward when you know the questgiver can barely put food on the table let alone pay you the wages rich bastards or royalty or the military easily could seems like a real dick move.
It would be one thing for Geralt to extort cash out of farmers he saves after taking care of their monster problem.
But a post apocalyptic scenario where farming is damn near impossible for all but the richest and your choices for food are either 200 year old tins of beans, expensive fresh fruit grown in hydroponics labs, and campfire fried radroach meat? A gamer wouldn't think twice about clicking the Give Me More Money dialogue option if he wants a reward for giving his character a high Charisma score instead of a higher Strength score and isn't thinking about the story his roleplaying actions tell. But in a story where the writer is willing to explore and deconstruct all aspects of the efficient selfish gamer brain murderhobo mindset, Velvet would be the perfect way to say "fuck High Charisma players, you're damn near useless in a firefight and your holier than thou pacifist attitude is annoying. Just because you've never been forced to compromise on your wimpy peacetime morality it doesn't make you better than someone who has".
Although if the author had the sense to go for this and intentionally say something smart about RPG gaming and being a murderhobo with nothing better to do, Calamity would need to be a consistent character and represent some other aspect of the typical tabletop player mentality.
Perhaps he could love upgrading his guns and making geneva convention violating ammo designed to torture whoever he shoots and love torturing baddies for intel? Since he shot Littlepip once, it would force the audience to think "maybe this is a bad thing" at least once before he proceeds to use this ammo for the rest of the story on raiders and his enclave ex-comrades alike. There could also be a scene where he tortures a baddie for intel but it turns out that guy was innocent and wasting time pulling his teeth out instead of searching for the bomb allowed it to blow up something important to the heroes.
Nothing really lies at the core of Calamity's character. He just has traits that don't influence one another. Cowboy accent. Shotguns. Pegasus. Ex Enclave Dashite. It's not like the author is using him as a clever statement to say "former members of a villainous organization don't just magically become nice people by joining the good guys and exclusively using the evil torture methods on Bad Guys".
>>302229
If Glim gave up at 100k words he never would have gotten to the "shallow moral principles" part. And if he gives up at 200k he'll never get to something absolutely infuriating I really don't want to spoil. There's so much wrong with this story we haven't seen yet. This isn't just a reaction to the story, or a MST3K of it, it's a review and analysis of it that tears this beloved shitheap apart and exposes it for what it really is while revealing new writing tips that help others avoid writing like this. There's still so much left to learn from this awful story. There are things about my story that I've changed and improved because I caught myself making mild missteps that reminded me of Kkunt's colossal cockups and lessons learned from this fucking fanfic's amazing autopsy.
Taking short breaks to review short things and cleanse the pallete of FE would be fine but if you took a long break to review something long like Harry Potter And The Sauceror's Scones and then returned to this fic, would you remember all the "chekovs guns" in this story and all the easily overlooked things Kkat loves to make important and call back to much later on?
An absolute abomination of turbo retardity is coming soon in this story and I don't want to spoil it.
Besides, imagine if fanboys of Fallout Equestria discovered these threads. If the review gave up halfway through the story they could dismiss everything Glim said about the fic with "Well he didn't finish it and see how all the information payed off in the end so his opinion is irrelevant".
If there has ever been a story that deserves to be torn apart and analyzed besides The Conversion Bureau and Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, and an author that deserved it besides Chatoyance and Eliezer Yudowsky, it's Fallout Equestria by K "TEN THOUSAND OF LUNA'S DICKS IN MY ASS" kunt.
speaking of which I forgot, is anything by Chatoyance on the review list?
If Glim gave up at 100k words he never would have gotten to the "shallow moral principles" part. And if he gives up at 200k he'll never get to something absolutely infuriating I really don't want to spoil. There's so much wrong with this story we haven't seen yet. This isn't just a reaction to the story, or a MST3K of it, it's a review and analysis of it that tears this beloved shitheap apart and exposes it for what it really is while revealing new writing tips that help others avoid writing like this. There's still so much left to learn from this awful story. There are things about my story that I've changed and improved because I caught myself making mild missteps that reminded me of Kkunt's colossal cockups and lessons learned from this fucking fanfic's amazing autopsy.
Taking short breaks to review short things and cleanse the pallete of FE would be fine but if you took a long break to review something long like Harry Potter And The Sauceror's Scones and then returned to this fic, would you remember all the "chekovs guns" in this story and all the easily overlooked things Kkat loves to make important and call back to much later on?
An absolute abomination of turbo retardity is coming soon in this story and I don't want to spoil it.
Besides, imagine if fanboys of Fallout Equestria discovered these threads. If the review gave up halfway through the story they could dismiss everything Glim said about the fic with "Well he didn't finish it and see how all the information payed off in the end so his opinion is irrelevant".
If there has ever been a story that deserves to be torn apart and analyzed besides The Conversion Bureau and Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, and an author that deserved it besides Chatoyance and Eliezer Yudowsky, it's Fallout Equestria by K "TEN THOUSAND OF LUNA'S DICKS IN MY ASS" kunt.
speaking of which I forgot, is anything by Chatoyance on the review list?
>>302233
I don't really wanna dismiss your opinion. Afterall it is not up to me so I should try to make decisions for anyone. But I'm just not really convinced by your arguments.
>If Glim gave up at 100k words he never would have gotten to the "shallow moral principles" part.
First off, this is not something I have never thought of before. It was more a compliment on something we both agree on.
But even if it was,
>There are things about my story that I've changed and improved because I caught myself making mild missteps
Is it really worth it? I feel like you have to write to learn how to write and that analys is just one part of getting better.
Besides is everything we discuss here new? One of the typical problems in stories is that it ain't consistent with itself. Many of these problems that will be find, no matter what story you review, will be iterations on the same problem. That the writer broke the rule of consistency with his universe, characters, and etc.
There is also the fact that if you are going to write a romance story and you spend your time reviewing a adventure novel, you might not always be able to use the lessons you learn from one genre to another. I mean all nuggets of wisedom are intresting but often one wants them to serve one's progress towards a goal.
>Besides, imagine if fanboys of Fallout Equestria discovered these threads.
>"Well he didn't finish it and see how all the information payed off in the end so his opinion is irrelevant"
I believe few of them will actually read it anyway. Of course, if they notice it is unfinish they might ratioalize that the second part of the story is better than the first part. But first off, what kind of argument is that? "Don't read the first half of the half-million words story, it is shit but you need it to get the glorious payoffs later?"
But regardless, if they fear the review might actually make a good point, they won't even begin. It seems to me that that's more or less human nature.
Also, I doubt fanboys will just suddenly find this review series. I mean why later instead of now when it is actually on the board rather than in the archives?
In fact, we could use this thread as a form of fishing on /mlp/ right now if we wanted to. It might be successful.
These are just my thoughts. Again, you can do anything you like. The fact taht you enjoy it and feel as though you're learning (amoung others) is something that might appeal to GG.
I don't really wanna dismiss your opinion. Afterall it is not up to me so I should try to make decisions for anyone. But I'm just not really convinced by your arguments.
>If Glim gave up at 100k words he never would have gotten to the "shallow moral principles" part.
First off, this is not something I have never thought of before. It was more a compliment on something we both agree on.
But even if it was,
>There are things about my story that I've changed and improved because I caught myself making mild missteps
Is it really worth it? I feel like you have to write to learn how to write and that analys is just one part of getting better.
Besides is everything we discuss here new? One of the typical problems in stories is that it ain't consistent with itself. Many of these problems that will be find, no matter what story you review, will be iterations on the same problem. That the writer broke the rule of consistency with his universe, characters, and etc.
There is also the fact that if you are going to write a romance story and you spend your time reviewing a adventure novel, you might not always be able to use the lessons you learn from one genre to another. I mean all nuggets of wisedom are intresting but often one wants them to serve one's progress towards a goal.
>Besides, imagine if fanboys of Fallout Equestria discovered these threads.
>"Well he didn't finish it and see how all the information payed off in the end so his opinion is irrelevant"
I believe few of them will actually read it anyway. Of course, if they notice it is unfinish they might ratioalize that the second part of the story is better than the first part. But first off, what kind of argument is that? "Don't read the first half of the half-million words story, it is shit but you need it to get the glorious payoffs later?"
But regardless, if they fear the review might actually make a good point, they won't even begin. It seems to me that that's more or less human nature.
Also, I doubt fanboys will just suddenly find this review series. I mean why later instead of now when it is actually on the board rather than in the archives?
In fact, we could use this thread as a form of fishing on /mlp/ right now if we wanted to. It might be successful.
These are just my thoughts. Again, you can do anything you like. The fact taht you enjoy it and feel as though you're learning (amoung others) is something that might appeal to GG.
>>302229
That sums it up quite well. Yes it is a waste of time, but to know for a fact exactly why some subset of the population likes it is useful. Because to create something successful doesn't always mean you have to make something good. In that aspect Kkat managed an initial pass.
Like everything in his story, it's by halves, never truly whole.
On the bright side, a useful lesson can be learned... somewhere.
Four fucking times? I- well the age group makes sense, and the motivations make sense, and the 'intent' of the image of the characters could be relatable...
The most useful thing learned from this story is using the audience's imagination to supplement the story. In kkat's Fallout Equestria it's mostly cheap smoke and mirrors, hidden behind expectations, word count (becaue longer fics means better quality right?), and faking it till the end.
I'm really am glad that there is an end. Credit where credit is due, it is a massive wall of text. It's technically not filled to the brim with illegible writings. The paper thin veneer is enough for some people, and I get that. I just wasn't impressed by the paper, nor the slapdash wire mesh.
Had it been a group project some failings might have been overted, and depth could have been there. In the end leaving the audience hungry for more stories in what should have been.
>>302230
Production costs and time limits.
The message of peace is gud is usually over simplified for purposes of mass marketing (an error, for many types of things) and meddling higher ups (and 'moral' pricks).
The problem is how far out the cascade goes amd the chaos theory that exponentially increases in size with every option and how far foward it counts.
Writing a real character would have been nice, but oh well.
Writing a proper high charisma character would have been fun. So would the anti-charismatic character. They could be dumb as a bag of bricks, but there would have to be a group dynamic of real characters.
Sometimes knowing the only thing between certain death (or for main characters the setback of something bad happening) is a few words could be neat. Empty promises are a web that drags them down, and pulling it off would require some bullshit of the highest order.
Ideally every character would get the group or themselves into trouble. Technically that is done in kkat's littlepip murderhobo time*.
That sums it up quite well. Yes it is a waste of time, but to know for a fact exactly why some subset of the population likes it is useful. Because to create something successful doesn't always mean you have to make something good. In that aspect Kkat managed an initial pass.
Like everything in his story, it's by halves, never truly whole.
On the bright side, a useful lesson can be learned... somewhere.
Four fucking times? I- well the age group makes sense, and the motivations make sense, and the 'intent' of the image of the characters could be relatable...
The most useful thing learned from this story is using the audience's imagination to supplement the story. In kkat's Fallout Equestria it's mostly cheap smoke and mirrors, hidden behind expectations, word count (becaue longer fics means better quality right?), and faking it till the end.
I'm really am glad that there is an end. Credit where credit is due, it is a massive wall of text. It's technically not filled to the brim with illegible writings. The paper thin veneer is enough for some people, and I get that. I just wasn't impressed by the paper, nor the slapdash wire mesh.
Had it been a group project some failings might have been overted, and depth could have been there. In the end leaving the audience hungry for more stories in what should have been.
>>302230
Production costs and time limits.
The message of peace is gud is usually over simplified for purposes of mass marketing (an error, for many types of things) and meddling higher ups (and 'moral' pricks).
The problem is how far out the cascade goes amd the chaos theory that exponentially increases in size with every option and how far foward it counts.
Writing a real character would have been nice, but oh well.
Writing a proper high charisma character would have been fun. So would the anti-charismatic character. They could be dumb as a bag of bricks, but there would have to be a group dynamic of real characters.
Sometimes knowing the only thing between certain death (or for main characters the setback of something bad happening) is a few words could be neat. Empty promises are a web that drags them down, and pulling it off would require some bullshit of the highest order.
Ideally every character would get the group or themselves into trouble. Technically that is done in kkat's littlepip murderhobo time*.
>>302234
>>302236
Nobody writes Cupcakes fan-stories any more. Nobody writes Sweet Apple Massacre fan-stories, or Fall Of Equestria fan-stories. But people are still writing Fallout Equestria fan-stories. It's become its own genre and it has its own fansites. Not just a subreddit or two and some discords but real sites that cost money to maintain.
Fallout Equestria isn't truly a "Shared Universe" because new things created in one setting can't be used in someone else's story without someone screaming "Thief!". Most writers using this setting are scavengers who "take inspiration" from the Fallout elements Kkat didn't already touch and ruin, when they aren't trying to shoehorn in elements from FIM's later seasons like Discord and the Crystal Empire and Changelings and Kirins and Yaks. Fallout and MLP crossover fics only get views if they submit themselves to the insane whims of Kkat and try to make their stories "canon-compliant" with his. They need to fit neatly into the nonsense world he set up and rest comfortably inside the original's shadow without upstaging the original or diverging too much from the original.
People still write Transformation fetish/fantasy fics and isekai stories and call them The Conversion Bureau or Friendship Is Optimal fics for the free views and attention, and some people write these things without attaching them to popular works. But when they write Fallout fics they're forced to pretend this story is good, and change as little about it as possible as they translate its terrible writing decisions into a slightly less terrible setting for a better story that will often end up abandoned if this unhappy compromise between the author's vision and Kkat fails to get enough early attention.
There have been stories in other fandoms that were so influential, elements that made it unique and popular became cliches as they were ripped off almost constantly. For example, putting Draco Malfoy into leather pants and turning him into some teenage girl's dream troubled boyfriend and romanticizing everything about this wimpy spiteful cowardly bully with no significant relevance to the main plot, or demonizing Sasuke Uchiha from day one and pretending this self-sacrificing tryhard was always destined to be derailed into the absolute turbocunt he became during the Shippuden seasons.
Nobody can claim ownership over these cliches, but popular stories can say they were the first to use them. And yet, to this day, FIM users won't give Fallout+MLP crossovers a second glance unless they're written to look like and seem like a "loving tribute" to Kkat's Fallout Equestria. It's swallowed the attention of damn near every brony who likes Fallout, and anyone who refuses to treat it like a sacred cow is treated like a pariah.
Even the term Mary Sue, which was invented by a Star Trek fanzine author whose scream of "STOP WRITING STORIES LIKE THIS, MY FELLOW BOOMERS!" got Chinese-Whispered into "Never create characters with any of the traits found in any character the person giving you this advice doesn't like, young millennials/zoomers!", still can't be definitively called anyone's property. The inventor of the original mary sue story can't claim credit for the many differing and contradictory interpretations of what a bad character is and what amateur unpaid authors should avoid writing.
Chatoyance doesn't own The Conversion Bureau or its fans or its haters or their steady stream of "Anti-Conversion Bureau" fanfics.
The Conversion Bureau is a story where Equestria appears on earth and a magical field steadily grows around it, killing all humans on contact for "lacking souls" and transforming all evidence of human existence (towns, skyscrapers, monuments, etc) into ponyish stuff. Nopony and nobody can stop the field's growth so Conversion Bureaus are set up to transform humans into poners and ship them to Equestria while "evil" terrorist organizations who refuse to stop being human kill and blow up at random for fun. Ponies hate all humans who refuse to take the potion that turns them into "Newfoals", empty-headed dozy cows with their aggression and minds removed, though their kids end up becoming normal ponies. "It was never your fault, earth's just too small and humans are just lesser than ponies!" says the fic.
There's an entire anti-fandom of people who reject this story and its anti-human stance.
There are fics where the entire TCB universe is obliterated by a more canon-faithful take on Equestria or humans with Star Trek tech or Santa Claus or the protagonists of Grand Theft Auto V or the cast of Naruto or DBZ.
There are fics where the mean TCB-verse ponies turn out to be just brainwashed by "The evil Queen Celestia" who gets beaten up by Batman or Goku or something wacky like a dead president.
There are fics where that anti-magic guy from Magical Index punches the anti-human field into nonexistence and fics where the bond between pokemon and humans lets them instantly erase the ever-growing anti-humanity field, foiling Queen Celly's plans.
And there are stories where TCB happens but realism kicks in and makes everything a disaster as Equestria crumbles under the weight of all those hungry refugee ponies and the fully-self-aware free-thinking pony-bodied children of humanity grow up desperate for revenge.
The Conversion Bureau does not belong to Chatoyance. Anti-TCB fics are fresh and creative and do not belong to Chatoyance.
But Kkat is still, and might always be, the sole proprietor of the Fallout Equestria fandom in all of its incestuous delusional "glory", and all future Fallout+MLP crossovers, unless someone takes his story down a peg.
This story has had more impact on the fandom than any other fanfic in existence. Chatoyance might have gained more fame for being a bizarre misanthropic transgender lolcow but that's the individual's infamy, nobody holds TCB in high regard.
But this fic?
What fanfic on the planet deserves to be analyzed so much that it can't wait for its turn after this one?
>>302236
Nobody writes Cupcakes fan-stories any more. Nobody writes Sweet Apple Massacre fan-stories, or Fall Of Equestria fan-stories. But people are still writing Fallout Equestria fan-stories. It's become its own genre and it has its own fansites. Not just a subreddit or two and some discords but real sites that cost money to maintain.
Fallout Equestria isn't truly a "Shared Universe" because new things created in one setting can't be used in someone else's story without someone screaming "Thief!". Most writers using this setting are scavengers who "take inspiration" from the Fallout elements Kkat didn't already touch and ruin, when they aren't trying to shoehorn in elements from FIM's later seasons like Discord and the Crystal Empire and Changelings and Kirins and Yaks. Fallout and MLP crossover fics only get views if they submit themselves to the insane whims of Kkat and try to make their stories "canon-compliant" with his. They need to fit neatly into the nonsense world he set up and rest comfortably inside the original's shadow without upstaging the original or diverging too much from the original.
People still write Transformation fetish/fantasy fics and isekai stories and call them The Conversion Bureau or Friendship Is Optimal fics for the free views and attention, and some people write these things without attaching them to popular works. But when they write Fallout fics they're forced to pretend this story is good, and change as little about it as possible as they translate its terrible writing decisions into a slightly less terrible setting for a better story that will often end up abandoned if this unhappy compromise between the author's vision and Kkat fails to get enough early attention.
There have been stories in other fandoms that were so influential, elements that made it unique and popular became cliches as they were ripped off almost constantly. For example, putting Draco Malfoy into leather pants and turning him into some teenage girl's dream troubled boyfriend and romanticizing everything about this wimpy spiteful cowardly bully with no significant relevance to the main plot, or demonizing Sasuke Uchiha from day one and pretending this self-sacrificing tryhard was always destined to be derailed into the absolute turbocunt he became during the Shippuden seasons.
Nobody can claim ownership over these cliches, but popular stories can say they were the first to use them. And yet, to this day, FIM users won't give Fallout+MLP crossovers a second glance unless they're written to look like and seem like a "loving tribute" to Kkat's Fallout Equestria. It's swallowed the attention of damn near every brony who likes Fallout, and anyone who refuses to treat it like a sacred cow is treated like a pariah.
Even the term Mary Sue, which was invented by a Star Trek fanzine author whose scream of "STOP WRITING STORIES LIKE THIS, MY FELLOW BOOMERS!" got Chinese-Whispered into "Never create characters with any of the traits found in any character the person giving you this advice doesn't like, young millennials/zoomers!", still can't be definitively called anyone's property. The inventor of the original mary sue story can't claim credit for the many differing and contradictory interpretations of what a bad character is and what amateur unpaid authors should avoid writing.
Chatoyance doesn't own The Conversion Bureau or its fans or its haters or their steady stream of "Anti-Conversion Bureau" fanfics.
The Conversion Bureau is a story where Equestria appears on earth and a magical field steadily grows around it, killing all humans on contact for "lacking souls" and transforming all evidence of human existence (towns, skyscrapers, monuments, etc) into ponyish stuff. Nopony and nobody can stop the field's growth so Conversion Bureaus are set up to transform humans into poners and ship them to Equestria while "evil" terrorist organizations who refuse to stop being human kill and blow up at random for fun. Ponies hate all humans who refuse to take the potion that turns them into "Newfoals", empty-headed dozy cows with their aggression and minds removed, though their kids end up becoming normal ponies. "It was never your fault, earth's just too small and humans are just lesser than ponies!" says the fic.
There's an entire anti-fandom of people who reject this story and its anti-human stance.
There are fics where the entire TCB universe is obliterated by a more canon-faithful take on Equestria or humans with Star Trek tech or Santa Claus or the protagonists of Grand Theft Auto V or the cast of Naruto or DBZ.
There are fics where the mean TCB-verse ponies turn out to be just brainwashed by "The evil Queen Celestia" who gets beaten up by Batman or Goku or something wacky like a dead president.
There are fics where that anti-magic guy from Magical Index punches the anti-human field into nonexistence and fics where the bond between pokemon and humans lets them instantly erase the ever-growing anti-humanity field, foiling Queen Celly's plans.
And there are stories where TCB happens but realism kicks in and makes everything a disaster as Equestria crumbles under the weight of all those hungry refugee ponies and the fully-self-aware free-thinking pony-bodied children of humanity grow up desperate for revenge.
The Conversion Bureau does not belong to Chatoyance. Anti-TCB fics are fresh and creative and do not belong to Chatoyance.
But Kkat is still, and might always be, the sole proprietor of the Fallout Equestria fandom in all of its incestuous delusional "glory", and all future Fallout+MLP crossovers, unless someone takes his story down a peg.
This story has had more impact on the fandom than any other fanfic in existence. Chatoyance might have gained more fame for being a bizarre misanthropic transgender lolcow but that's the individual's infamy, nobody holds TCB in high regard.
But this fic?
What fanfic on the planet deserves to be analyzed so much that it can't wait for its turn after this one?
>>302252
Okay, here's the main point. Many fuckos who like Fallout: Equestria also like the duplicates, because it's the same. They crave the failings.
Normal crossovers with Fallout and Equestria are delegated elsewhere, and the fucks who read Fallout: Equestria (my imaginary perfect story) compare crossovers to this imagined thing.
>But Kkat is still, and might always be, the sole proprietor of the Fallout Equestria fandom in all of its incestuous delusional "glory", and all future Fallout+MLP crossovers, unless someone takes his story down a peg.
The reason is the same reason commies hold the communist manifesto in high regard. Everywhere they go they whisper 'oh, but it would totally be so much better if it was more like communism'.
The amount of dedicated fans to that singular story with the unintended message is that 'the ends justify the means as long as you have a whiney diatribe'. They'll make a token effort, and cause everything to be worse, and 'cry in shame' before yelling that they were the one's to do so much good.
With that in mind. They want to spread the story in hopes others agree that they are just like them, [this may be a bit mean but displaying NPC behaviors anyone who doesn't agree is obviously wrong.
For one reason Fallout, and My Little Pony Equestria Daily attract a certain kind of person. The comment section in the fic is filled with spoilers, but also shallow statements about how much the story made them feel, and how relatable the dumb littlepoop (who is a liar, a murderer, a thief, and the only one who gets the information and makes the plans and who has all the control while none of it every really being her fault. That is apealing to them to proclaim themselves to be good without actually being good) is. The fact is they spread the shit around to anything and everything knowingly or not.
So why isn't other fictional works recieving the same treatment? The niche it appeals to. Who Kkat apeals to has every motivation to convince others of their belief. It's a wide net, that is just asinine enough to to be a deterrent for negative reviews. Not only that the bandwagon effect is there.
The lack of reviews in their minds means 'it's a good story totally has flaws or whatever but it's special' when in reality the few warnings that do get out and the fuckery going on in the story turns those not wanting to wade through the 620k words of bullshit. And when someone wants an synopsis: oh it's an adventure in Fallout Equestria, or you have to read it to understand.
There is many points that would have been good, except it just never fails to be disappointing in my eyes.
>What fanfic on the planet deserves to be analyzed so much that it can't wait for its turn after this one?
Anything else, but that's not the point. The point is after I read Fallout: Equestria life seems a whole lot better because even if I'm being stabbed or put into reeducation camps or anything else at least I can now gage with precision how fast my soul is leaking out.
For a review? As long as Glimglam is having fun by any means it's fun. With that said Glimglam, take good care of yourself the story's taint about taint can taint other's taint to be tainted which would not be good so do whatever you need to do.
Also as an achievement.
Okay, here's the main point. Many fuckos who like Fallout: Equestria also like the duplicates, because it's the same. They crave the failings.
Normal crossovers with Fallout and Equestria are delegated elsewhere, and the fucks who read Fallout: Equestria (my imaginary perfect story) compare crossovers to this imagined thing.
>But Kkat is still, and might always be, the sole proprietor of the Fallout Equestria fandom in all of its incestuous delusional "glory", and all future Fallout+MLP crossovers, unless someone takes his story down a peg.
The reason is the same reason commies hold the communist manifesto in high regard. Everywhere they go they whisper 'oh, but it would totally be so much better if it was more like communism'.
The amount of dedicated fans to that singular story with the unintended message is that 'the ends justify the means as long as you have a whiney diatribe'. They'll make a token effort, and cause everything to be worse, and 'cry in shame' before yelling that they were the one's to do so much good.
With that in mind. They want to spread the story in hopes others agree that they are just like them, [this may be a bit mean but displaying NPC behaviors anyone who doesn't agree is obviously wrong.
For one reason Fallout, and My Little Pony Equestria Daily attract a certain kind of person. The comment section in the fic is filled with spoilers, but also shallow statements about how much the story made them feel, and how relatable the dumb littlepoop (who is a liar, a murderer, a thief, and the only one who gets the information and makes the plans and who has all the control while none of it every really being her fault. That is apealing to them to proclaim themselves to be good without actually being good) is. The fact is they spread the shit around to anything and everything knowingly or not.
So why isn't other fictional works recieving the same treatment? The niche it appeals to. Who Kkat apeals to has every motivation to convince others of their belief. It's a wide net, that is just asinine enough to to be a deterrent for negative reviews. Not only that the bandwagon effect is there.
The lack of reviews in their minds means 'it's a good story totally has flaws or whatever but it's special' when in reality the few warnings that do get out and the fuckery going on in the story turns those not wanting to wade through the 620k words of bullshit. And when someone wants an synopsis: oh it's an adventure in Fallout Equestria, or you have to read it to understand.
There is many points that would have been good, except it just never fails to be disappointing in my eyes.
>What fanfic on the planet deserves to be analyzed so much that it can't wait for its turn after this one?
Anything else, but that's not the point. The point is after I read Fallout: Equestria life seems a whole lot better because even if I'm being stabbed or put into reeducation camps or anything else at least I can now gage with precision how fast my soul is leaking out.
For a review? As long as Glimglam is having fun by any means it's fun. With that said Glimglam, take good care of yourself the story's taint about taint can taint other's taint to be tainted which would not be good so do whatever you need to do.
Also as an achievement.
>>302252
I guess I will continue to argue for the sake of arguing;)
No, but I don't have any stake in this. The things I write are usually not long enough to warrant a whole thread about them, or several. So it's not like if he quits Fe he will read my million-words-long magnum ops. It doesn't exist afterall.
To me, it really doesn't matter what gg reviews to me. I'm just thinking about how to solve his problems with this thing.
Maybe, he should start to review in less detail. Like, a summary of thoughts for each chapter or something or maybe not, either. Holds up hands in the air. I'm just sayin'.
>What fanfic on the planet deserves to be analyzed so much that it can't wait for its turn after this one?
I can buy that argument but I think there is a bit of counter to it as well.
Again, the story's begining has already been proven to be rubbish so nobody can make the claim that this thing is good anymore without and asterisk. I like FE*, *except for...
There is also the point that trying to convince these people that literally thinks you are stealing from other fanfics to make your own fanfic better feels kinda mute.
Also, not that I care but was it really necessary to write all these examples for this point. The point being that Fallout Equestria is influential in the brony fandom and Kkat appearently controls the subfandom with an ironfist. I would have totally bought both of these things if you just told me but I guess I can't fault you for providing examples for your points.
If you ever pass by /a/ here you might wanna drop some Naruto knowledge. It doesn't belong here but I can't help myself but to be a bit curious into a particular facet of that story.
>demonizing Sasuke Uchiha from day one and pretending this self-sacrificing tryhard was always destined to be derailed into the absolute turbocunt he became during the Shippuden seasons.
Stuff like this actually kinda intresting to me. I know you commented how Naruto's past was retconned further into the series. His background changed from insignificant orphan to the child of the previous Hokage.
Again though, if you do post it somewhere else cause we don't wanna derail this thread.
I guess I will continue to argue for the sake of arguing;)
No, but I don't have any stake in this. The things I write are usually not long enough to warrant a whole thread about them, or several. So it's not like if he quits Fe he will read my million-words-long magnum ops. It doesn't exist afterall.
To me, it really doesn't matter what gg reviews to me. I'm just thinking about how to solve his problems with this thing.
Maybe, he should start to review in less detail. Like, a summary of thoughts for each chapter or something or maybe not, either. Holds up hands in the air. I'm just sayin'.
>What fanfic on the planet deserves to be analyzed so much that it can't wait for its turn after this one?
I can buy that argument but I think there is a bit of counter to it as well.
Again, the story's begining has already been proven to be rubbish so nobody can make the claim that this thing is good anymore without and asterisk. I like FE*, *except for...
There is also the point that trying to convince these people that literally thinks you are stealing from other fanfics to make your own fanfic better feels kinda mute.
Also, not that I care but was it really necessary to write all these examples for this point. The point being that Fallout Equestria is influential in the brony fandom and Kkat appearently controls the subfandom with an ironfist. I would have totally bought both of these things if you just told me but I guess I can't fault you for providing examples for your points.
If you ever pass by /a/ here you might wanna drop some Naruto knowledge. It doesn't belong here but I can't help myself but to be a bit curious into a particular facet of that story.
>demonizing Sasuke Uchiha from day one and pretending this self-sacrificing tryhard was always destined to be derailed into the absolute turbocunt he became during the Shippuden seasons.
Stuff like this actually kinda intresting to me. I know you commented how Naruto's past was retconned further into the series. His background changed from insignificant orphan to the child of the previous Hokage.
Again though, if you do post it somewhere else cause we don't wanna derail this thread.
>>302260
This. I would love to brutalize 'the bong poster's firmly and dubiously held positions on Naruto
But not fucking here! Try it in here! See what happens!
Not directed at u sven
This. I would love to brutalize 'the bong poster's firmly and dubiously held positions on Naruto
But not fucking here! Try it in here! See what happens!
Not directed at u sven
>>302260
But if Glim read entire chapters and then wrote a summary of his thoughts at the end it would still take around the same time. He'd still have to go through every chapter, but we'd miss out on all those moments where he highlights some awful text and explains what's wrong with it or talks about what chapter 16 does 2000 words in and where he thinks it might go without knowing what happens 4000 words later on in the chapter. With his current method it's like we're experiencing the story alongside him. Like a MST3K but without the skits.
I'll have to make the naruto thread on /a/ tomorrow because I'm fully booked for tonight
But if Glim read entire chapters and then wrote a summary of his thoughts at the end it would still take around the same time. He'd still have to go through every chapter, but we'd miss out on all those moments where he highlights some awful text and explains what's wrong with it or talks about what chapter 16 does 2000 words in and where he thinks it might go without knowing what happens 4000 words later on in the chapter. With his current method it's like we're experiencing the story alongside him. Like a MST3K but without the skits.
I'll have to make the naruto thread on /a/ tomorrow because I'm fully booked for tonight
1614195562.jpg (98.6 KB, 850x531, 93761eb58cbed863bee1291b3f23c76cjgh.jpg)
>>302269
>it would still take around the same time.
No, I don't think so. Writing just one of these posts must take a few minutes at least. So in the long run that will matter.
He already skips things he has already commented on in the story. He also doesn't go through the story line by line. All I'm saying is that he could increase the pace he went through this.
Though, your perspective is probably appriciated. I would be glad to know that people like my in-depths analysis of things.
>Spoiler
You don't have to do anything if you don't want to either. I just thought it would be a good outlet for these bursts of ninjas flying out your mouth at times. I do also stand by that I care somewhat about this myself. I particularly intrested in what was retconned.
But you really don't have to make a thread just for me either.
>>302264
>See what happens!
>Tell it to my face, not online. See what happens!
>Not directed at u sven
I got that.
>it would still take around the same time.
No, I don't think so. Writing just one of these posts must take a few minutes at least. So in the long run that will matter.
He already skips things he has already commented on in the story. He also doesn't go through the story line by line. All I'm saying is that he could increase the pace he went through this.
Though, your perspective is probably appriciated. I would be glad to know that people like my in-depths analysis of things.
>Spoiler
You don't have to do anything if you don't want to either. I just thought it would be a good outlet for these bursts of ninjas flying out your mouth at times. I do also stand by that I care somewhat about this myself. I particularly intrested in what was retconned.
But you really don't have to make a thread just for me either.
>>302264
>See what happens!
>Tell it to my face, not online. See what happens!
>Not directed at u sven
I got that.
>>302214
>>302218
I'll address these posts together since they sort of connect.
>Mostly giving the advice in How To Read A Book, in how to read fictional material it recommends to read it all in a timeframe that you remeber the whole story, preferably in one sitting. Giving the best possible benefit of the doubt, while reading at the appropriate speed. Usually shittier works deserve less time.
>Then blast it apart with analysis.
I can see how this approach would be useful. I basically do the opposite; I write my analysis of these stories in real time as I read, which means I tend to comb through the text pretty slowly. My approach has the advantage of being detailed; I notice things going over the text with a fine-toothed comb that I wouldn't notice if I were just reading at my normal speed, and I would say this method of analysis has helped improve both my writing and my critical reading skills.
The downside, however, is that the story ends up taking a long time to read, which means that sometimes I lose track of details that happened earlier in the story. Nigel II has found a pretty good example of this:
>Velvet's been manipulating Littlepip's feelings for her since her very first appearance, where she took advantage of Pip's fangirl crush so that Pip wouldn't think twice about why she wanted to be rid of her Pipbuck.
This happened so long ago I had completely forgotten about it. I started this book back in October, and this was right at the beginning. However, you're quite correct, and this revelation has actually caused me to view Velvet's character in an entirely new light. This is why it's helpful to discuss books in a group setting; other people will notice things that you would probably never catch on your own.
>As with so many things in this story, Kkat manages to miss the target at point blank. Littlepip should really be having an epiphany here - Velvet's most consistent character trait is exploiting other people to get what she wants. She did it with Pip to get out of the stable in the beginning. She did it with the slavers and the slaves at Old Appleloosa to live out her fantasy of being a healer. She smooth-talked the merchant on the way to Manehattan and bullshitted the guards to get into Tenpony. By rights, Littlepip should be castigating her for being a sneaky, emotionally manipulative shit in general, not just with Calamity.
>Velvet, at least on paper, is the group's talkomancer - when Littlepip isn't on her "do everything even better" drugs. There's potential for a character arc here, of someone recognising a character flaw and working to resolve or leverage it, but that potential's squandered on low-effort relationship drama.
I have no comments here, these are just excellent points and I wanted to highlight them.
>>302218
I'll address these posts together since they sort of connect.
>Mostly giving the advice in How To Read A Book, in how to read fictional material it recommends to read it all in a timeframe that you remeber the whole story, preferably in one sitting. Giving the best possible benefit of the doubt, while reading at the appropriate speed. Usually shittier works deserve less time.
>Then blast it apart with analysis.
I can see how this approach would be useful. I basically do the opposite; I write my analysis of these stories in real time as I read, which means I tend to comb through the text pretty slowly. My approach has the advantage of being detailed; I notice things going over the text with a fine-toothed comb that I wouldn't notice if I were just reading at my normal speed, and I would say this method of analysis has helped improve both my writing and my critical reading skills.
The downside, however, is that the story ends up taking a long time to read, which means that sometimes I lose track of details that happened earlier in the story. Nigel II has found a pretty good example of this:
>Velvet's been manipulating Littlepip's feelings for her since her very first appearance, where she took advantage of Pip's fangirl crush so that Pip wouldn't think twice about why she wanted to be rid of her Pipbuck.
This happened so long ago I had completely forgotten about it. I started this book back in October, and this was right at the beginning. However, you're quite correct, and this revelation has actually caused me to view Velvet's character in an entirely new light. This is why it's helpful to discuss books in a group setting; other people will notice things that you would probably never catch on your own.
>As with so many things in this story, Kkat manages to miss the target at point blank. Littlepip should really be having an epiphany here - Velvet's most consistent character trait is exploiting other people to get what she wants. She did it with Pip to get out of the stable in the beginning. She did it with the slavers and the slaves at Old Appleloosa to live out her fantasy of being a healer. She smooth-talked the merchant on the way to Manehattan and bullshitted the guards to get into Tenpony. By rights, Littlepip should be castigating her for being a sneaky, emotionally manipulative shit in general, not just with Calamity.
>Velvet, at least on paper, is the group's talkomancer - when Littlepip isn't on her "do everything even better" drugs. There's potential for a character arc here, of someone recognising a character flaw and working to resolve or leverage it, but that potential's squandered on low-effort relationship drama.
I have no comments here, these are just excellent points and I wanted to highlight them.
>>302229
>I don't wanna demoralize you or anything but I would quit about now, if I were you. You already proven that so far this story is, whatever you have provenI assume it's shit.. You don't actually have to do more.
>>302233
>There's so much wrong with this story we haven't seen yet. This isn't just a reaction to the story, or a MST3K of it, it's a review and analysis of it that tears this beloved shitheap apart and exposes it for what it really is while revealing new writing tips that help others avoid writing like this.
I think I'm going to have to side with Nigel on this one. Here's the thing: writing these long, ridiculous analyses of these ridiculous, terrible My Little Pony stories is time-consuming and frankly nuts, but I do actually consider this a worthwhile activity. Moreover, even though composing these posts takes awhile, these reviews actually don't cut into my free time all that much. The way my job is structured I work long shifts, and subsequently get long-ish breaks, so I usually bring my laptop with me and use the time to go through a couple pages of whatever pony story I'm on and type out my thoughts on whatever I've read. Since I'm stuck at work either way, I'd basically be spending these break periods doing some time-wasting activity anyway; playing games or browsing the internet or something like that. So, this is as good a use of that time as any. When I get home, I usually spend about an hour cleaning up what I wrote and getting it coherent and presentable, and then post it before going to bed. I will occasionally get in the mood to do some reviewing on one of my days off, but most of the time I use my downtime at work for this project and keep my actual time off reserved for my more meaningful projects and leisure activities, so although I may sometimes grumble about it, I actually don't consider this project to be that much of a time sink.
As to continuing with this story, even though it is almost mind-numbingly awful at times, I feel like it's a good idea to stay the course and finish what I started. Part of it comes from a weird personal vanity that I have: if I go through an entire shitty fanfiction and explain, from start to finish, exactly why it sucks, then I win. If I give up halfway through, the author wins. It's a frankly moronic way of viewing the situation, of course; kkat doesn't even know I exist and probably wouldn't bother to read even half of what I wrote here, particularly since I've spent half the thread calling him a tranny at this point I've completely forgotten how I even arrived at this conclusion about him or whether or not I actually think it's true. Ironically, it's pretty much the same impulse that makes a person dump 900+ hours of their life into a video game, even though they don't have anything to show for it at the end besides a bunch of virtual badges that won't even matter to the player as soon as he shuts the game off. It's dumb, but humans are irrational creatures.
Also, I'm not just doing this to shit on bad pony stories because I like doing it. I mean, that is basically an accurate description of what I'm doing, and I do enjoy it, but there is a bit more to it than that. It's not even just about giving writing advice, although I like for it to be that as well.
Like most Western art forms, literature is slowly but steadily rotting from the inside out. What's considered high-brow literature these days is mostly pozzed garbage in fact I'd actually like to branch out from pony stories at some point and tackle a couple of nu-lit novels. The classics are not widely read anymore, and due to multi-kulti nonsense they are being phased out of college curricula as well. I know I sound like kind of a pompous faggot about books sometimes, but the truth is that for a fair chunk of my adult life I barely read anything at all, and when I did read it was mostly manga and pop literature (Stephen King, George R.R. Martin, that kind of thing). I get the impression this is a fairly common experience. I decided to start reading seriously due to self-improvement threads on /pol/ and /mlpol/. Without knowing that much I started picking up classic books, philosophy, history, stuff like that, mostly relying on infographics and /lit/ for suggestions. Almost all of the literary knowledge I've shared here I've acquired since 2017, and it's amazing how much my perspective on just about everything has broadened since then.
The problem with something like FoE is not just that it's a bad story or that it's told badly (though it is certainly both of these things). The problem is that shit like this is a real-time example of Western literature rotting from the inside out. I read an interview that kkat did for EqD, and his influences are basically the same kind of thing I mentioned that I used to read: manga, Stephen King, that kind of stuff. Incidentally, even though I didn't read much, I've been writing creatively for most of my life, and when I've gone back and read some of my stories from 5-10 years ago I've noted that they're not much better than FoE. The old programmer's maxim, "garbage in, garbage out," applies to writing as well; even if you're a reasonably talented writer, if you don't know what a good book looks like the odds are you won't produce one.
FoE is held up by the MLP fandom as a serious work of literature; there is an entire generation out there that grew up reading this, along with Harry Potter and whatever else. It's not enough for me to just say that a book like this is bad, I need to be able to explain why it's bad. Modern white men need to start reading again for the same reason we need to start lifting weights and eating better. We need to start writing again too, but unless you know what a good book looks like you'll never be able to write one, and if FoE is the kind of thing that's considered a good book, then Western literature is basically fucked.
>I don't wanna demoralize you or anything but I would quit about now, if I were you. You already proven that so far this story is, whatever you have provenI assume it's shit.. You don't actually have to do more.
>>302233
>There's so much wrong with this story we haven't seen yet. This isn't just a reaction to the story, or a MST3K of it, it's a review and analysis of it that tears this beloved shitheap apart and exposes it for what it really is while revealing new writing tips that help others avoid writing like this.
I think I'm going to have to side with Nigel on this one. Here's the thing: writing these long, ridiculous analyses of these ridiculous, terrible My Little Pony stories is time-consuming and frankly nuts, but I do actually consider this a worthwhile activity. Moreover, even though composing these posts takes awhile, these reviews actually don't cut into my free time all that much. The way my job is structured I work long shifts, and subsequently get long-ish breaks, so I usually bring my laptop with me and use the time to go through a couple pages of whatever pony story I'm on and type out my thoughts on whatever I've read. Since I'm stuck at work either way, I'd basically be spending these break periods doing some time-wasting activity anyway; playing games or browsing the internet or something like that. So, this is as good a use of that time as any. When I get home, I usually spend about an hour cleaning up what I wrote and getting it coherent and presentable, and then post it before going to bed. I will occasionally get in the mood to do some reviewing on one of my days off, but most of the time I use my downtime at work for this project and keep my actual time off reserved for my more meaningful projects and leisure activities, so although I may sometimes grumble about it, I actually don't consider this project to be that much of a time sink.
As to continuing with this story, even though it is almost mind-numbingly awful at times, I feel like it's a good idea to stay the course and finish what I started. Part of it comes from a weird personal vanity that I have: if I go through an entire shitty fanfiction and explain, from start to finish, exactly why it sucks, then I win. If I give up halfway through, the author wins. It's a frankly moronic way of viewing the situation, of course; kkat doesn't even know I exist and probably wouldn't bother to read even half of what I wrote here, particularly since I've spent half the thread calling him a tranny at this point I've completely forgotten how I even arrived at this conclusion about him or whether or not I actually think it's true. Ironically, it's pretty much the same impulse that makes a person dump 900+ hours of their life into a video game, even though they don't have anything to show for it at the end besides a bunch of virtual badges that won't even matter to the player as soon as he shuts the game off. It's dumb, but humans are irrational creatures.
Also, I'm not just doing this to shit on bad pony stories because I like doing it. I mean, that is basically an accurate description of what I'm doing, and I do enjoy it, but there is a bit more to it than that. It's not even just about giving writing advice, although I like for it to be that as well.
Like most Western art forms, literature is slowly but steadily rotting from the inside out. What's considered high-brow literature these days is mostly pozzed garbage in fact I'd actually like to branch out from pony stories at some point and tackle a couple of nu-lit novels. The classics are not widely read anymore, and due to multi-kulti nonsense they are being phased out of college curricula as well. I know I sound like kind of a pompous faggot about books sometimes, but the truth is that for a fair chunk of my adult life I barely read anything at all, and when I did read it was mostly manga and pop literature (Stephen King, George R.R. Martin, that kind of thing). I get the impression this is a fairly common experience. I decided to start reading seriously due to self-improvement threads on /pol/ and /mlpol/. Without knowing that much I started picking up classic books, philosophy, history, stuff like that, mostly relying on infographics and /lit/ for suggestions. Almost all of the literary knowledge I've shared here I've acquired since 2017, and it's amazing how much my perspective on just about everything has broadened since then.
The problem with something like FoE is not just that it's a bad story or that it's told badly (though it is certainly both of these things). The problem is that shit like this is a real-time example of Western literature rotting from the inside out. I read an interview that kkat did for EqD, and his influences are basically the same kind of thing I mentioned that I used to read: manga, Stephen King, that kind of stuff. Incidentally, even though I didn't read much, I've been writing creatively for most of my life, and when I've gone back and read some of my stories from 5-10 years ago I've noted that they're not much better than FoE. The old programmer's maxim, "garbage in, garbage out," applies to writing as well; even if you're a reasonably talented writer, if you don't know what a good book looks like the odds are you won't produce one.
FoE is held up by the MLP fandom as a serious work of literature; there is an entire generation out there that grew up reading this, along with Harry Potter and whatever else. It's not enough for me to just say that a book like this is bad, I need to be able to explain why it's bad. Modern white men need to start reading again for the same reason we need to start lifting weights and eating better. We need to start writing again too, but unless you know what a good book looks like you'll never be able to write one, and if FoE is the kind of thing that's considered a good book, then Western literature is basically fucked.
>>302281
With all of this said, I actually feel like I'm starting to repeat myself a little in this particular review. I also have a tendency to get a little mired in my own negativity, and this story gives me quite a bit to be negative about. If I'm not doing anything except grumbling the same complaints about shitty character building and lack of plot and so forth, the review is no fun to write and (I imagine) no fun to read. I was so busy grousing that I completely missed the Velvet-as-master-manipulator angle that Nigel II just pointed out. So, I'm going to make an effort to be a little more objective and have a little more fun from here on out, and hopefully try to move a little quicker as well. I probably don't need to go over every single scene line by line, for instance.
>>302233
>imagine if fanboys of Fallout Equestria discovered these threads.
I'd honestly be a little curious to hear what this story's actual fans might have to say in its defense. It's an objectively bad work of fiction, but so are a lot of things, even some things that I like (despite everything I wrote above I still enjoy manga and Stephen King, for example). I think just about everyone has their guilty pleasures when it comes to books, movies, music, what have you.
I'm coming into this story completely fresh, without any experience playing Fallout or being a part of the early MLP fandom. My reaction to it is that I hate it because it's objectively awful, and I have no prior affection for it to dampen this reaction, but I can understand someone liking it for nostalgic reasons or because they're a Fallout fanboy or something like that. That doesn't excuse it or make it any less deserving of whatever shit I might still end up flinging at it, but I'm more than willing to hear the other side out.
I won't lie, I occasionally wish that one of these authors would somehow stumble into one of my threads and respond to some of what I've written about them. In any case, if people want to link this thread to people outside of /mlpol/ I don't particularly mind. I casually mentioned it on /mlp/ once or twice, but in general I don't like shilling my own threads on other boards; however, you people are free to shill on my behalf as much as you like.
>speaking of which I forgot, is anything by Chatoyance on the review list?
I've never heard the name before, so no. Is this the Chatoyance you're referring to?
https://www.fimfiction.net/user/1291/Chatoyance
If so, this person seems like the absolute worst kind of fart-huffing pseud, and I would be more than happy to tackle something he and/or she has written. The avatar and this bio alone is already making me want to punch this faggot in the face:
>I am a human-shaped unicorn, and I write stories and draw pictures. My only religion is Friendship, and my only politics is Kindness. I write stories to try to comprehend the native simians that live on the planet I'm kind of stuck on. I know I'll never figure them out, but it's fun to try.
Ugh. Seriously, go squat on an elephant dong, you man-skeezer. I'm already thinking up gay insults for you.
Anyway, I don't know when I'll get to it, but I might actually go ahead and add one of these stories to the queue. This one in particular catches my eye:
https://www.fimfiction.net/story/85294/id-that-indestructible-something
It's featured on the bio page I linked. The description is as follows:
>Inspired by the works of Franz Kafka - specifically 'The Metamorphosis' - this philosophical adventure tale examines the nature of identity and self while taking the reader on a fantastic journey filled with emotion and excitement. A young woman wakes to find herself transformed into a cartoon pony, yet no other person can see her change. She must struggle not only to survive such a tremendous alteration of her body, but also to find either some means to reverse it... or to come to peace with what has happened to her. Not in any way your common tale of transformation, this tale is utterly unique!
I'm actually familiar with Kafka's Metamorphosis and I'll admit to being morbidly curious about how this weirdo's treatment of it will pan out. Also, it's only (only!) about 100,000 words long, which at this point I consider a quick read.
Also, as ever, if anyone has anything they'd like to see me take a look at, feel free to let me know and I'll put it in the queue.
With all of this said, I actually feel like I'm starting to repeat myself a little in this particular review. I also have a tendency to get a little mired in my own negativity, and this story gives me quite a bit to be negative about. If I'm not doing anything except grumbling the same complaints about shitty character building and lack of plot and so forth, the review is no fun to write and (I imagine) no fun to read. I was so busy grousing that I completely missed the Velvet-as-master-manipulator angle that Nigel II just pointed out. So, I'm going to make an effort to be a little more objective and have a little more fun from here on out, and hopefully try to move a little quicker as well. I probably don't need to go over every single scene line by line, for instance.
>>302233
>imagine if fanboys of Fallout Equestria discovered these threads.
I'd honestly be a little curious to hear what this story's actual fans might have to say in its defense. It's an objectively bad work of fiction, but so are a lot of things, even some things that I like (despite everything I wrote above I still enjoy manga and Stephen King, for example). I think just about everyone has their guilty pleasures when it comes to books, movies, music, what have you.
I'm coming into this story completely fresh, without any experience playing Fallout or being a part of the early MLP fandom. My reaction to it is that I hate it because it's objectively awful, and I have no prior affection for it to dampen this reaction, but I can understand someone liking it for nostalgic reasons or because they're a Fallout fanboy or something like that. That doesn't excuse it or make it any less deserving of whatever shit I might still end up flinging at it, but I'm more than willing to hear the other side out.
I won't lie, I occasionally wish that one of these authors would somehow stumble into one of my threads and respond to some of what I've written about them. In any case, if people want to link this thread to people outside of /mlpol/ I don't particularly mind. I casually mentioned it on /mlp/ once or twice, but in general I don't like shilling my own threads on other boards; however, you people are free to shill on my behalf as much as you like.
>speaking of which I forgot, is anything by Chatoyance on the review list?
I've never heard the name before, so no. Is this the Chatoyance you're referring to?
https://www.fimfiction.net/user/1291/Chatoyance
If so, this person seems like the absolute worst kind of fart-huffing pseud, and I would be more than happy to tackle something he and/or she has written. The avatar and this bio alone is already making me want to punch this faggot in the face:
>I am a human-shaped unicorn, and I write stories and draw pictures. My only religion is Friendship, and my only politics is Kindness. I write stories to try to comprehend the native simians that live on the planet I'm kind of stuck on. I know I'll never figure them out, but it's fun to try.
Ugh. Seriously, go squat on an elephant dong, you man-skeezer. I'm already thinking up gay insults for you.
Anyway, I don't know when I'll get to it, but I might actually go ahead and add one of these stories to the queue. This one in particular catches my eye:
https://www.fimfiction.net/story/85294/id-that-indestructible-something
It's featured on the bio page I linked. The description is as follows:
>Inspired by the works of Franz Kafka - specifically 'The Metamorphosis' - this philosophical adventure tale examines the nature of identity and self while taking the reader on a fantastic journey filled with emotion and excitement. A young woman wakes to find herself transformed into a cartoon pony, yet no other person can see her change. She must struggle not only to survive such a tremendous alteration of her body, but also to find either some means to reverse it... or to come to peace with what has happened to her. Not in any way your common tale of transformation, this tale is utterly unique!
I'm actually familiar with Kafka's Metamorphosis and I'll admit to being morbidly curious about how this weirdo's treatment of it will pan out. Also, it's only (only!) about 100,000 words long, which at this point I consider a quick read.
Also, as ever, if anyone has anything they'd like to see me take a look at, feel free to let me know and I'll put it in the queue.
>>302281
/)
Then to the depths we go. To this root that plagues this story and generation, making a higher aspiration in the Plato's cave.
/)
Then to the depths we go. To this root that plagues this story and generation, making a higher aspiration in the Plato's cave.
Earlier I was too 'passionate', but now in hind sight (and an enlightened moment of inspiration), this story still carries truths (if unknowingly and unwittingly) that are a reflection of our world. Infact it's possibly an unknowing 'honest' attempt that shows light on some elements of our society that is known to be disruptive.
Kkat probably didn't mean to bash the core of SJW's and soy culture at large by being appealing, but the truth tears all the lies all down.
Kkat probably didn't mean to bash the core of SJW's and soy culture at large by being appealing, but the truth tears all the lies all down.
>>302208
Anyway, Velvet and LP are under attack by some sprite-bots, which LP has somehow intuited were originally designed for use as spy-bots by Pinkie Pie. LP's latest crack mint has worn off, and she is now jonzing for another one. It's probably not worth the effort, but I'd be a little curious to go back through the story and pick out all the parts where she takes a mint-al. The duration of the mint-high seems a little inconsistent between scenes, but that could just be my imagination. Add it to the long, long list of things kkat would need to address in order to make this story passable, I suppose.
>Four more swooped in through the shattered window. I threw a refrigerator at them. Three were crushed by it.
It really speaks volumes about this story that Littlepoop can say "I threw a refrigerator at them" as casually as if she were saying "I threw a volleyball." Seriously, the level of autism a person would have to possess in order to pen something like this is almost staggering.
Anyway, the fight scene goes on for awhile. It's actually a little refreshing to see some action in this for a change, but unfortunately the author doesn't really bother to finish it. LP and Velvet just continue firing needles and throwing refrigerators at an unending stream of these sprite bots, and then suddenly the scene cuts off in a page break. When the narrative resumes, time has skipped forward by some random increment again, and they are exploring an office somewhere else in the building. Presumably they won their fight somehow, but the author apparently didn't consider the victory important enough to tell us how it happened.
The office they are in has pretty much everything you would expect a room in this story to have: several safes, a terminal, and a charred skeleton in the corner. Littlepoop is about to begin her usual business of hacking the terminal and opening the safes, when she notices something catching the light in the corner where the skeleton is. She investigates, and discovers another small statuette for her collection; this one appears to depict Twilight Sparkle. Now she's got 3/6, good for her. Much like the other statuettes, this one appears to have some kind of enchantment or spell or something on it that affects the pony who picks it up. Littlepoop feels a small burst of mental clarity as soon as she touches it. I'm assuming this is probably another Fallout thing; whatever game element these statues are an analog of probably provides some small boost or benefit or something when the player picks them up.
Anyway, now that she has found the legendary collectible statue that a dead pony was storing in its ribcage for some reason, she can turn her attention to the terminal.
>This one was beyond my skill. Not even with the new tricks of the trade that I had learned from comparative reading was I able to crack it.
Wow, there's a first. This is probably the most shocking turn this story has yet taken.
As she is attempting to crack the terminal, Velvet approaches her and tries awkwardly to apologize for her inappropriate behavior earlier. However, it seems that Littlepoop is not quite done being fanny flustered yet, so she tells her to fuck off and leave her alone. Velvet decides to oblige her and steps outside for a moment, and as soon as she's gone Littlepoop downs another crack mint. She uses her burst of mental superpowers to open the safes, and to her delight finds more drugs inside. There's some other crap in there too, some stealth bucks and a dildo and a 1981 Buick Regal and some other wacky shit; the usual assortment of junk, basically.
Thankfully, the author doesn't leave us biting our nails in suspense over the contents of the mysterious terminal. Despite it having been too difficult for her l33t h4x0r sk1LLz before, her drug-addled brain is now able to crack the code easily. However, before she can explore the files, Velvet Remedy enters the room again and tries once more to make amends. This time, LP is a little more receptive:
>“Okay, look. I know you’re sorry. And that you didn’t mean it. But it doesn’t change the fact that you tried to do it. And that’s not going to stop hurting anytime soon.”
I feel like I could go over everything that's wrong with this, but I'd just be reiterating points that I've already made. I'll note that >>302218 's take on this was rather incisive and made me consider the Velvet-Littlepoop situation in a new light. I'd completely forgotten about the part at the beginning, where Velvet manipulates Littlepoop into taking her PipBuck so she can escape, and the idea of making Velvet some kind of master manipulator would actually have been an interesting direction to take her character. What's more it actually would have worked quite well with what the author already has; her moral hypocrisy and complete lack of sincerity would become a feature instead of a bug. This was a good observation, and it's one that I completely missed and probably wouldn't have thought of. This is why it's good to discuss books in a group setting.
>I closed my eyes and sighed again. I was seeing the situation more clearly now. Even though I didn’t want to. Party-Time Mint-als were an equal-opportunity revealer.
Remember what I said earlier, about how any points scored with your love interest under the influence of performance-enhancing drugs shouldn't count? The same rule applies to insights and acquired knowledge. I'm liking this "Party Time Mint-als" device less and less the more apparent the author's intentions for it become. The last thing this character needs is another way to cheat at life.
Anyway, Velvet and LP are under attack by some sprite-bots, which LP has somehow intuited were originally designed for use as spy-bots by Pinkie Pie. LP's latest crack mint has worn off, and she is now jonzing for another one. It's probably not worth the effort, but I'd be a little curious to go back through the story and pick out all the parts where she takes a mint-al. The duration of the mint-high seems a little inconsistent between scenes, but that could just be my imagination. Add it to the long, long list of things kkat would need to address in order to make this story passable, I suppose.
>Four more swooped in through the shattered window. I threw a refrigerator at them. Three were crushed by it.
It really speaks volumes about this story that Littlepoop can say "I threw a refrigerator at them" as casually as if she were saying "I threw a volleyball." Seriously, the level of autism a person would have to possess in order to pen something like this is almost staggering.
Anyway, the fight scene goes on for awhile. It's actually a little refreshing to see some action in this for a change, but unfortunately the author doesn't really bother to finish it. LP and Velvet just continue firing needles and throwing refrigerators at an unending stream of these sprite bots, and then suddenly the scene cuts off in a page break. When the narrative resumes, time has skipped forward by some random increment again, and they are exploring an office somewhere else in the building. Presumably they won their fight somehow, but the author apparently didn't consider the victory important enough to tell us how it happened.
The office they are in has pretty much everything you would expect a room in this story to have: several safes, a terminal, and a charred skeleton in the corner. Littlepoop is about to begin her usual business of hacking the terminal and opening the safes, when she notices something catching the light in the corner where the skeleton is. She investigates, and discovers another small statuette for her collection; this one appears to depict Twilight Sparkle. Now she's got 3/6, good for her. Much like the other statuettes, this one appears to have some kind of enchantment or spell or something on it that affects the pony who picks it up. Littlepoop feels a small burst of mental clarity as soon as she touches it. I'm assuming this is probably another Fallout thing; whatever game element these statues are an analog of probably provides some small boost or benefit or something when the player picks them up.
Anyway, now that she has found the legendary collectible statue that a dead pony was storing in its ribcage for some reason, she can turn her attention to the terminal.
>This one was beyond my skill. Not even with the new tricks of the trade that I had learned from comparative reading was I able to crack it.
Wow, there's a first. This is probably the most shocking turn this story has yet taken.
As she is attempting to crack the terminal, Velvet approaches her and tries awkwardly to apologize for her inappropriate behavior earlier. However, it seems that Littlepoop is not quite done being fanny flustered yet, so she tells her to fuck off and leave her alone. Velvet decides to oblige her and steps outside for a moment, and as soon as she's gone Littlepoop downs another crack mint. She uses her burst of mental superpowers to open the safes, and to her delight finds more drugs inside. There's some other crap in there too, some stealth bucks and a dildo and a 1981 Buick Regal and some other wacky shit; the usual assortment of junk, basically.
Thankfully, the author doesn't leave us biting our nails in suspense over the contents of the mysterious terminal. Despite it having been too difficult for her l33t h4x0r sk1LLz before, her drug-addled brain is now able to crack the code easily. However, before she can explore the files, Velvet Remedy enters the room again and tries once more to make amends. This time, LP is a little more receptive:
>“Okay, look. I know you’re sorry. And that you didn’t mean it. But it doesn’t change the fact that you tried to do it. And that’s not going to stop hurting anytime soon.”
I feel like I could go over everything that's wrong with this, but I'd just be reiterating points that I've already made. I'll note that >>302218 's take on this was rather incisive and made me consider the Velvet-Littlepoop situation in a new light. I'd completely forgotten about the part at the beginning, where Velvet manipulates Littlepoop into taking her PipBuck so she can escape, and the idea of making Velvet some kind of master manipulator would actually have been an interesting direction to take her character. What's more it actually would have worked quite well with what the author already has; her moral hypocrisy and complete lack of sincerity would become a feature instead of a bug. This was a good observation, and it's one that I completely missed and probably wouldn't have thought of. This is why it's good to discuss books in a group setting.
>I closed my eyes and sighed again. I was seeing the situation more clearly now. Even though I didn’t want to. Party-Time Mint-als were an equal-opportunity revealer.
Remember what I said earlier, about how any points scored with your love interest under the influence of performance-enhancing drugs shouldn't count? The same rule applies to insights and acquired knowledge. I'm liking this "Party Time Mint-als" device less and less the more apparent the author's intentions for it become. The last thing this character needs is another way to cheat at life.
>>302291
>“And for what it’s worth, I get it. I know what it’s like to put your faith in what you believe something to be rather than what something actually is.”
If kkat were going to take Velvet's character in the "master manipulator" direction, this could actually be a clever way of cutting Velvet down; LP would basically be saying that as much as she idolized and/or lusted after her, getting to know her in reality had ultimately been a letdown. However, this kind of insight would require these characters to have more than one dimension apiece, and would also require the author to be aware of it. I'm not certain either of these things are true. Anyway, depending on what the author intended it to mean, this is either one of the most incisive lines of dialog that LP has ever uttered, or just another one of her schmaltzy one-liners that feels deep but isn't.
>I looked for an example that didn’t reveal that I had gained effectively no insight from DJ Pon3. I didn’t want to admit that yet. And fortunately, it didn’t take much for me to find an even better example.
There's no reason to mention DJ Pon3 here. The scene is about Velvet and Littlepoop; leave the other characters out of it for now.
>“When I stepped into the outside, I was completely lost. I didn’t understand any of it. The only thing I understood was Stables. Or, at least, that’s what I assumed. In reality, the only thing I understood was Stable Two. And when the other Stables didn’t live up to my expectations, I… couldn’t handle it well." I kicked at the floor, stirring up ash. “Hell, it didn’t even take all the bizarre and fucked-up social experiments… I get upset when the architecture isn’t ri… isn’t the same. Isn’t what I think is right.”
This reveals a pretty significant gulf between what the author has apparently been trying to say and what he actually said. I remember commenting earlier that I didn't quite understand what LP's deal with exploring stables was, and I honestly still don't.
Here's how I've been thinking about it: LP spent her entire life prior to three weeks ago living inside Stable 2. The stables were all more or less built from the same blueprint and are basically identical to each other. So, when she began exploring the other two stables she visited, she was basically exploring a place that was identical to her home, except it was ruined and filled with skeletons. That would probably weird just about anyone out.
Also, the subtle differences in the architecture from stable to stable might create kind of an uncanny valley effect. This may sound silly, but a couple of years ago I went back to the city I grew up in and visited a mall I used to hang out at all the time as a teenager. The mall had been on the verge of shutting down when I left, but someone had bought it and extensively renovated it, to the point that it looked like a completely different place. When I went in there I found myself getting weirded out, because it was a familiar location to me but everything was very radically different, almost like visiting an alternate universe version of a place I knew well. Again, it sounds a little silly, but it was a very disconcerting feeling and I didn't like being in there; I can imagine that visiting some of the other stables might be a similar experience for Littlepoop.
However, the author seems to be saying that there's more to it than this, and that's the part where he starts to lose me.
>In reality, the only thing I understood was Stable Two. And when the other Stables didn’t live up to my expectations, I… couldn’t handle it well.
What exactly were her expectations? Aside from the one she grew up in, she's only been inside two other stables. The first one she knew was abandoned going in as I recall. The second one I believe they were expecting to find inhabited, only to discover that tragedy had struck and everyone was dead. When she says that the other stables didn't live up to her expectations, what does she mean exactly? That she thought the other stables would be just like the one she grew up in, with ponies living comfortably inside them?
I can see her being traumatized by the condition of the other stables; she could easily look at what happened and think "there but for the grace of Godess go I" or something. However, it feels like the author is getting at something else with this comment, like he's implying that the fates of the other two stables were part of some insidious revelation for her. Earlier, when they were exploring the last stable, Calamity said something about her not dealing with "feelings of betrayal" very well. Is that what this relates to? Does LP feel somehow betrayed? If so, who betrayed her, and how? The author clearly has something in mind for all of this, but he has not communicated it well at all.
What's interesting about all of this is that while the text seems to be implying that all of the stables except Littlepoop's succumbed to some horrible fate, there's really no reason to draw this conclusion from what we've seen. The two abandoned stables both ended in tragedy because of accidents that couldn't really have been foreseen or helped: the first one ended because of a freak magic accident, and the second one because some idiot was letting his kid shoot off his BB gun near the water talisman. In fact, I didn't notice it before, but it's a little interesting that in both cases the tragedy was brought about by the actions of a child (in the first stable, the magic experiment that unleashed the radioactive cats was done by a filly for show and tell or something). These two events were basically unconnected accidents, that had nothing to do with the stables themselves. Well, I suppose leaving the water talisman unprotected enough that a child could accidentally cause irreparable damage to it is arguably a pretty serious design flaw on StableTec's part; aside from that though, the stables themselves aren't really to blame for what happened.
>“And for what it’s worth, I get it. I know what it’s like to put your faith in what you believe something to be rather than what something actually is.”
If kkat were going to take Velvet's character in the "master manipulator" direction, this could actually be a clever way of cutting Velvet down; LP would basically be saying that as much as she idolized and/or lusted after her, getting to know her in reality had ultimately been a letdown. However, this kind of insight would require these characters to have more than one dimension apiece, and would also require the author to be aware of it. I'm not certain either of these things are true. Anyway, depending on what the author intended it to mean, this is either one of the most incisive lines of dialog that LP has ever uttered, or just another one of her schmaltzy one-liners that feels deep but isn't.
>I looked for an example that didn’t reveal that I had gained effectively no insight from DJ Pon3. I didn’t want to admit that yet. And fortunately, it didn’t take much for me to find an even better example.
There's no reason to mention DJ Pon3 here. The scene is about Velvet and Littlepoop; leave the other characters out of it for now.
>“When I stepped into the outside, I was completely lost. I didn’t understand any of it. The only thing I understood was Stables. Or, at least, that’s what I assumed. In reality, the only thing I understood was Stable Two. And when the other Stables didn’t live up to my expectations, I… couldn’t handle it well." I kicked at the floor, stirring up ash. “Hell, it didn’t even take all the bizarre and fucked-up social experiments… I get upset when the architecture isn’t ri… isn’t the same. Isn’t what I think is right.”
This reveals a pretty significant gulf between what the author has apparently been trying to say and what he actually said. I remember commenting earlier that I didn't quite understand what LP's deal with exploring stables was, and I honestly still don't.
Here's how I've been thinking about it: LP spent her entire life prior to three weeks ago living inside Stable 2. The stables were all more or less built from the same blueprint and are basically identical to each other. So, when she began exploring the other two stables she visited, she was basically exploring a place that was identical to her home, except it was ruined and filled with skeletons. That would probably weird just about anyone out.
Also, the subtle differences in the architecture from stable to stable might create kind of an uncanny valley effect. This may sound silly, but a couple of years ago I went back to the city I grew up in and visited a mall I used to hang out at all the time as a teenager. The mall had been on the verge of shutting down when I left, but someone had bought it and extensively renovated it, to the point that it looked like a completely different place. When I went in there I found myself getting weirded out, because it was a familiar location to me but everything was very radically different, almost like visiting an alternate universe version of a place I knew well. Again, it sounds a little silly, but it was a very disconcerting feeling and I didn't like being in there; I can imagine that visiting some of the other stables might be a similar experience for Littlepoop.
However, the author seems to be saying that there's more to it than this, and that's the part where he starts to lose me.
>In reality, the only thing I understood was Stable Two. And when the other Stables didn’t live up to my expectations, I… couldn’t handle it well.
What exactly were her expectations? Aside from the one she grew up in, she's only been inside two other stables. The first one she knew was abandoned going in as I recall. The second one I believe they were expecting to find inhabited, only to discover that tragedy had struck and everyone was dead. When she says that the other stables didn't live up to her expectations, what does she mean exactly? That she thought the other stables would be just like the one she grew up in, with ponies living comfortably inside them?
I can see her being traumatized by the condition of the other stables; she could easily look at what happened and think "there but for the grace of Godess go I" or something. However, it feels like the author is getting at something else with this comment, like he's implying that the fates of the other two stables were part of some insidious revelation for her. Earlier, when they were exploring the last stable, Calamity said something about her not dealing with "feelings of betrayal" very well. Is that what this relates to? Does LP feel somehow betrayed? If so, who betrayed her, and how? The author clearly has something in mind for all of this, but he has not communicated it well at all.
What's interesting about all of this is that while the text seems to be implying that all of the stables except Littlepoop's succumbed to some horrible fate, there's really no reason to draw this conclusion from what we've seen. The two abandoned stables both ended in tragedy because of accidents that couldn't really have been foreseen or helped: the first one ended because of a freak magic accident, and the second one because some idiot was letting his kid shoot off his BB gun near the water talisman. In fact, I didn't notice it before, but it's a little interesting that in both cases the tragedy was brought about by the actions of a child (in the first stable, the magic experiment that unleashed the radioactive cats was done by a filly for show and tell or something). These two events were basically unconnected accidents, that had nothing to do with the stables themselves. Well, I suppose leaving the water talisman unprotected enough that a child could accidentally cause irreparable damage to it is arguably a pretty serious design flaw on StableTec's part; aside from that though, the stables themselves aren't really to blame for what happened.
>>302292
>Hell, it didn’t even take all the bizarre and fucked-up social experiments…
This part is also pretty murky. The author has been hinting that there were social experiments going on in the stables, but it really hasn't been explained very well. It's actually not clear what the purpose of the experiments was even supposed to have been, or why this company was bothering to conduct sociological research in the middle of a nuclear war, but we can put a pin in that for now. The experiments themselves were indeed bizarre, but they weren't necessarily fucked-up.
The first stable seemed to have been conducting some kind of experiment in reversed gender roles; strange, but ultimately more or less benign. There's no evidence that anypony was being tortured or killed or anything like that; the tragedy that occurred there was unrelated to the experiment as far as I can tell. The second experiment involved having an AI in charge instead of a live pony. This one didn't end particularly well, but as I've pointed out before, the broken water talisman basically meant game over for that stable one way or the other. Moreover, the situation could have been averted entirely if the ponies living there had done a better job of protecting their talisman in the first place. The AI is not directly responsible for the tragedy.
I'm actually a little curious now if the implication is that all of the stables were conducting experiments, or just a select few. If so, I wonder if we're going to discover that Littlepoop's stable was also conducting an experiment of some sort, and we simply haven't found out what it is yet. Maybe they were trying to genetically engineer a master race of obnoxious know-it-all midget ponies who are also master locksmiths, or something like that. It could be a rather fun twist, depending on how creative the author wants to get with it.
In any event, the author seems to be implying that the exploration of the abandoned stables was some kind of turning point for LP, for reasons that go beyond just being traumatized by seeing so much death and desolation in such a familiar-looking place. However, he doesn't make it particularly clear what those deeper issues are. This last bit is just murky as all hell:
>I get upset when the architecture isn’t ri… isn’t the same. Isn’t what I think is right.
What is she on about here? Is she literally talking about the architecture, like what I was talking about with the shopping mall? Is she bothered by the familiar-but-slightly-different layout of the buildings? That seems like a fairly minor thing to get this upset over. However, if she's alluding to something deeper, it's not clear what it is.
Oh yeah, one last thing:
>The only thing I understood was Stables.
This is grammatically bad writing; it should either say "the only thing I understood was the Stables," or "the only things I understood were Stables." Of the two, the former is the only one that makes sense in context, and it's actually still a little grammatically questionable. To fix it and dress it up a little prettier, I'd probably say something like "the only world I'd ever known was the world of the Stables."
Anyway, after going off on this weird tangent, Littlepoop connects it awkwardly to their current conversation topic:
>When something, or somepony, doesn’t live up to your assumptions of who he is, then you either have to accept that you didn’t know him as well as you thought you did, and strive to get to know the real him better… or you start, well…
I guess this is supposed to be LP acknowledging that she understands what Velvet is upset about. This is more or less okay, although I will point out that it doesn't entirely fit the situation with Calamity. Velvet knew well enough that Calamity was willing to kill other ponies when they first met, and she's seen him kill before. Granted, if the issue is specifically him killing the colt, she may not have realized he'd be willing to go quite that far; still, though, it doesn't quite feel like the shoe fits.
Anyway, they basically make up after this, and the scene ends with a page break.
Next, Littlepoop goes back and cracks the uncrackable terminal (while high on crack). She discovers a message to Twilight from Pinkie Pie.
>The voice was anxious, sad and cracked. I knew Pinkie Pie’s voice; I’d heard it in Vinyl Scratch’s memory. This was almost the same, but much more fragile. Possibly even broken.
This appears to clear up an earlier objection of mine: that Littlepoop could not reasonably know what Pinkie's voice sounded like 200 years ago. I had forgotten that she had technically heard her speak in one of the memory orbs. It would have been better if the author had included this reminder when LP heard the sprite-bots speaking and the comparison was first made; aside from that, though, this checks out.
Anyway, the message is basically just Pinkie apologizing to Twilight for being a coked-out loser who chugged a twelve pack of Natural Ice and blasted diarrhea all over her library, or whatever the hell she did to piss Twilight off enough to make her not want to speak to her anymore. She appears legitimately remorseful, and there seems to be an implication that this was recorded near the end of the war, when everything was pretty much hopeless anyway. It's actually not bad and conveys the intended emotional effect rather well; unfortunately the author ruins it with a fairly dumb jokey moment. A soldier apparently enters the room while she is recording, and tells her that some group of something-or-others is in position to take out some other group of something-or-others, and they are just waiting for her to give the order. Ponk responds in her typical autismo patois, and suggests that the raid be conducted in a giant balloon shaped like her head. Oh, that le wacky and le random Pinkie Pie, amirite guise?
>Hell, it didn’t even take all the bizarre and fucked-up social experiments…
This part is also pretty murky. The author has been hinting that there were social experiments going on in the stables, but it really hasn't been explained very well. It's actually not clear what the purpose of the experiments was even supposed to have been, or why this company was bothering to conduct sociological research in the middle of a nuclear war, but we can put a pin in that for now. The experiments themselves were indeed bizarre, but they weren't necessarily fucked-up.
The first stable seemed to have been conducting some kind of experiment in reversed gender roles; strange, but ultimately more or less benign. There's no evidence that anypony was being tortured or killed or anything like that; the tragedy that occurred there was unrelated to the experiment as far as I can tell. The second experiment involved having an AI in charge instead of a live pony. This one didn't end particularly well, but as I've pointed out before, the broken water talisman basically meant game over for that stable one way or the other. Moreover, the situation could have been averted entirely if the ponies living there had done a better job of protecting their talisman in the first place. The AI is not directly responsible for the tragedy.
I'm actually a little curious now if the implication is that all of the stables were conducting experiments, or just a select few. If so, I wonder if we're going to discover that Littlepoop's stable was also conducting an experiment of some sort, and we simply haven't found out what it is yet. Maybe they were trying to genetically engineer a master race of obnoxious know-it-all midget ponies who are also master locksmiths, or something like that. It could be a rather fun twist, depending on how creative the author wants to get with it.
In any event, the author seems to be implying that the exploration of the abandoned stables was some kind of turning point for LP, for reasons that go beyond just being traumatized by seeing so much death and desolation in such a familiar-looking place. However, he doesn't make it particularly clear what those deeper issues are. This last bit is just murky as all hell:
>I get upset when the architecture isn’t ri… isn’t the same. Isn’t what I think is right.
What is she on about here? Is she literally talking about the architecture, like what I was talking about with the shopping mall? Is she bothered by the familiar-but-slightly-different layout of the buildings? That seems like a fairly minor thing to get this upset over. However, if she's alluding to something deeper, it's not clear what it is.
Oh yeah, one last thing:
>The only thing I understood was Stables.
This is grammatically bad writing; it should either say "the only thing I understood was the Stables," or "the only things I understood were Stables." Of the two, the former is the only one that makes sense in context, and it's actually still a little grammatically questionable. To fix it and dress it up a little prettier, I'd probably say something like "the only world I'd ever known was the world of the Stables."
Anyway, after going off on this weird tangent, Littlepoop connects it awkwardly to their current conversation topic:
>When something, or somepony, doesn’t live up to your assumptions of who he is, then you either have to accept that you didn’t know him as well as you thought you did, and strive to get to know the real him better… or you start, well…
I guess this is supposed to be LP acknowledging that she understands what Velvet is upset about. This is more or less okay, although I will point out that it doesn't entirely fit the situation with Calamity. Velvet knew well enough that Calamity was willing to kill other ponies when they first met, and she's seen him kill before. Granted, if the issue is specifically him killing the colt, she may not have realized he'd be willing to go quite that far; still, though, it doesn't quite feel like the shoe fits.
Anyway, they basically make up after this, and the scene ends with a page break.
Next, Littlepoop goes back and cracks the uncrackable terminal (while high on crack). She discovers a message to Twilight from Pinkie Pie.
>The voice was anxious, sad and cracked. I knew Pinkie Pie’s voice; I’d heard it in Vinyl Scratch’s memory. This was almost the same, but much more fragile. Possibly even broken.
This appears to clear up an earlier objection of mine: that Littlepoop could not reasonably know what Pinkie's voice sounded like 200 years ago. I had forgotten that she had technically heard her speak in one of the memory orbs. It would have been better if the author had included this reminder when LP heard the sprite-bots speaking and the comparison was first made; aside from that, though, this checks out.
Anyway, the message is basically just Pinkie apologizing to Twilight for being a coked-out loser who chugged a twelve pack of Natural Ice and blasted diarrhea all over her library, or whatever the hell she did to piss Twilight off enough to make her not want to speak to her anymore. She appears legitimately remorseful, and there seems to be an implication that this was recorded near the end of the war, when everything was pretty much hopeless anyway. It's actually not bad and conveys the intended emotional effect rather well; unfortunately the author ruins it with a fairly dumb jokey moment. A soldier apparently enters the room while she is recording, and tells her that some group of something-or-others is in position to take out some other group of something-or-others, and they are just waiting for her to give the order. Ponk responds in her typical autismo patois, and suggests that the raid be conducted in a giant balloon shaped like her head. Oh, that le wacky and le random Pinkie Pie, amirite guise?
>>302293
The message isn't quite over yet; however, the rest of it mostly sounds like an anti-drug PSA circa 1985. Ponk denounces the party-time mintals she invented as the devil's nectar, acknowledges that they have destroyed her friendships and ruined her life, and laments ever having developed the habit. She explains that the mind-enhancing effects of the drug somehow boost her Pinkie-sense, which has proven essential in their fight against...whatever they're fighting against. Zebras or something I think. She ends by telling Twilight that she has made an appointment to check into rehab, and asks if she would be willing to go with her. At this point the message cuts out.
The significance of all of this is about as subtle as being whacked upside the head with a summer sausage. Ponk's struggles with crack mints obviously mirror Littlepoop's own, and this glimpse of what her own future might look like, should she continue down the path she's on, gives her pause. She reflects on the positives and negatives of continuing to abuse Party-Time mint-als:
Pros:
+ fresh, minty breath
+ super-powered autism
+ you can literally vibrate through walls
Cons:
- all of your friends abandon you
- you become even more insufferable than you were to begin with
- you end up doing really weird "favors" for ponies you'd just as soon not be in debt to
The author also makes a cheesy attempt to artificially add weight to this question by tying it to the broader struggles of the world at large:
>Pinkie Pie had wanted to be rid of them. But she couldn’t. Not just because she was addicted, but because she had become reliant on the boost in order to do her job. To try to save the lives of millions of ponies. How could that not be more important than one friendship?
>The Equestrian Wasteland requires sacrifices.
It doesn't, actually; nearly all of this was probably avoidable. Ponk was a hopeless coke fiend who used altruism as an excuse to justify recreational drug use, and as far as I can tell, Littlepoop intends to do the same. Also, it's worth noting that ultimately she didn't save the lives of millions of ponies. Assuming I've followed this backstory correctly so far, the way it ends is that the balefire bombs go off and all the cute little pastel ponies get burnt to a crisp. Either that or all the skeletons we've been seeing are just leftover Nightmare Night decorations. Also also, I feel like I should point out that the Equestrian Wasteland didn't ackshually exist when this recording was made; it was just called Equestria back then. The Equestrian Wasteland is what exists now, because of actions taken by these ponies 200 years ago, including this coke-sniffing lunatic who used hot air ballooons shaped like her own head to commit war crimes.
Oh, one more thing. As if all the sadness-porn the author just dumped on us weren't enough, he slathers on an extra layer by letting us know that there was some kind of technical glitch in the system, and this heartfelt message of Ponk's never actually reached Twilight. Thus, they probably both died before they were able to properly make amends and become friends again. Cue the sad violin music.
>I have you with me now…
>My eyes fell on the pony skeleton from which I had retrieved the Twilight Sparkle statuette. A sadness welled up in me. I felt tears falling down my cheeks.
[sad violin music intensifies]
>“Celestia and Luna be with you, Pinkie Pie,” I said, not knowing what else to say.
[sad violin music reaches levels that should not even be possible]
Anyway, enough of this maudlin crap. Want to cry for real, and maybe rage a little while you're at it? Here's something to consider:
LP now knows that the Twilight Sparkle statuette she found was actually a treasured personal possession of Pinkie Pie. Pinkie literally spent her last moments alive clutching this statue of her dead friend, while lamenting all of the time they lost because of her drug addiction. To Ponk's sad and lonely ghost, which is probably wandering the empty halls of this forgotten skyscraper as we speak, this little statue of Twilight is worth more than all the treasures of Celestia's tomb. To Littlepoop, however, it's completely meaningless; it's just some cute little collectible tchotchke that she wants for no reason other than to have it. Littlepoop literally pulled this thing out of Pinkie's ribcage and stuck it in her saddlebag next to all the other autismo junk she carts around, where it will remain until she either trades it away for ammunition, or puts it on a shelf next to her Funko Pop collection, where it will do nothing but collect dust until the next apocalypse. For all the crocodile tears she sheds here, not once does it ever occur to this klepto that this statue might be something she doesn't have a right to take.
Page break. Velvet and Littlepoop have met up with the others, and they all made it to the floor they need to be on in order to access the fallen scooter sign. Once again, Littlepoop cucks herself by suggesting that Velvet and Calamity walk across together, so they can "talk." Because as long as you're 500 feet in the air, tiptoeing across a rickety, 200 year old makeshift bridge that is swaying precariously in the wind, you might as well take the opportunity to have a long, boring talk about your relationship.
>The sky above was growing perceptibly darker. We needed to hurry. I stepped up to the ledge and made the mistake of looking down. Massive, paralyzing vertigo hit me. We were fourteen stories above the alley. The tiny red dots of manticores spotted the ground far, far below. Another flew through the alley about halfway between me and them. I felt cold sweat break out across my forehead.
This seems like a good moment to remind everyone that literally the only reason she is doing this is to track down a couple of rare jukebox 45s for some sperg DJ. She is also risking the lives of her three alleged friends for basically no reason at all.
The message isn't quite over yet; however, the rest of it mostly sounds like an anti-drug PSA circa 1985. Ponk denounces the party-time mintals she invented as the devil's nectar, acknowledges that they have destroyed her friendships and ruined her life, and laments ever having developed the habit. She explains that the mind-enhancing effects of the drug somehow boost her Pinkie-sense, which has proven essential in their fight against...whatever they're fighting against. Zebras or something I think. She ends by telling Twilight that she has made an appointment to check into rehab, and asks if she would be willing to go with her. At this point the message cuts out.
The significance of all of this is about as subtle as being whacked upside the head with a summer sausage. Ponk's struggles with crack mints obviously mirror Littlepoop's own, and this glimpse of what her own future might look like, should she continue down the path she's on, gives her pause. She reflects on the positives and negatives of continuing to abuse Party-Time mint-als:
Pros:
+ fresh, minty breath
+ super-powered autism
+ you can literally vibrate through walls
Cons:
- all of your friends abandon you
- you become even more insufferable than you were to begin with
- you end up doing really weird "favors" for ponies you'd just as soon not be in debt to
The author also makes a cheesy attempt to artificially add weight to this question by tying it to the broader struggles of the world at large:
>Pinkie Pie had wanted to be rid of them. But she couldn’t. Not just because she was addicted, but because she had become reliant on the boost in order to do her job. To try to save the lives of millions of ponies. How could that not be more important than one friendship?
>The Equestrian Wasteland requires sacrifices.
It doesn't, actually; nearly all of this was probably avoidable. Ponk was a hopeless coke fiend who used altruism as an excuse to justify recreational drug use, and as far as I can tell, Littlepoop intends to do the same. Also, it's worth noting that ultimately she didn't save the lives of millions of ponies. Assuming I've followed this backstory correctly so far, the way it ends is that the balefire bombs go off and all the cute little pastel ponies get burnt to a crisp. Either that or all the skeletons we've been seeing are just leftover Nightmare Night decorations. Also also, I feel like I should point out that the Equestrian Wasteland didn't ackshually exist when this recording was made; it was just called Equestria back then. The Equestrian Wasteland is what exists now, because of actions taken by these ponies 200 years ago, including this coke-sniffing lunatic who used hot air ballooons shaped like her own head to commit war crimes.
Oh, one more thing. As if all the sadness-porn the author just dumped on us weren't enough, he slathers on an extra layer by letting us know that there was some kind of technical glitch in the system, and this heartfelt message of Ponk's never actually reached Twilight. Thus, they probably both died before they were able to properly make amends and become friends again. Cue the sad violin music.
>I have you with me now…
>My eyes fell on the pony skeleton from which I had retrieved the Twilight Sparkle statuette. A sadness welled up in me. I felt tears falling down my cheeks.
[sad violin music intensifies]
>“Celestia and Luna be with you, Pinkie Pie,” I said, not knowing what else to say.
[sad violin music reaches levels that should not even be possible]
Anyway, enough of this maudlin crap. Want to cry for real, and maybe rage a little while you're at it? Here's something to consider:
LP now knows that the Twilight Sparkle statuette she found was actually a treasured personal possession of Pinkie Pie. Pinkie literally spent her last moments alive clutching this statue of her dead friend, while lamenting all of the time they lost because of her drug addiction. To Ponk's sad and lonely ghost, which is probably wandering the empty halls of this forgotten skyscraper as we speak, this little statue of Twilight is worth more than all the treasures of Celestia's tomb. To Littlepoop, however, it's completely meaningless; it's just some cute little collectible tchotchke that she wants for no reason other than to have it. Littlepoop literally pulled this thing out of Pinkie's ribcage and stuck it in her saddlebag next to all the other autismo junk she carts around, where it will remain until she either trades it away for ammunition, or puts it on a shelf next to her Funko Pop collection, where it will do nothing but collect dust until the next apocalypse. For all the crocodile tears she sheds here, not once does it ever occur to this klepto that this statue might be something she doesn't have a right to take.
Page break. Velvet and Littlepoop have met up with the others, and they all made it to the floor they need to be on in order to access the fallen scooter sign. Once again, Littlepoop cucks herself by suggesting that Velvet and Calamity walk across together, so they can "talk." Because as long as you're 500 feet in the air, tiptoeing across a rickety, 200 year old makeshift bridge that is swaying precariously in the wind, you might as well take the opportunity to have a long, boring talk about your relationship.
>The sky above was growing perceptibly darker. We needed to hurry. I stepped up to the ledge and made the mistake of looking down. Massive, paralyzing vertigo hit me. We were fourteen stories above the alley. The tiny red dots of manticores spotted the ground far, far below. Another flew through the alley about halfway between me and them. I felt cold sweat break out across my forehead.
This seems like a good moment to remind everyone that literally the only reason she is doing this is to track down a couple of rare jukebox 45s for some sperg DJ. She is also risking the lives of her three alleged friends for basically no reason at all.
>>302260
Here's the Naruto thread https://mlpol.net/a/1334
>>302286
That's the one! Chatoyance is a fucking weirdo.
I hear some author once wrote The Conversion Bureau and accidentally made it anti-human and gave up on it, so Chatoyance took over and made it even more anti-human. Chatty unironically says shit like "Ponies are a superior species compared to humans" and "Something that would be immoral for a human to do would be fine for a pony to do, for that is their right as a superior species".
Chatoyance also wrote "Alternate Universe TCB fics" that have the TCB label but barely have anything to do with ponies or TCB and are about humanity getting a virus that wipes out their masculinity to create world peace, or some shit like that. That's what I heard, anyway.
It's funny how "Futurists" and scifi/fantasy fantards obsessed with escapism and their own misanthropy love thinking "Maybe if aliens forced world peace onto us", "Maybe if we were on a bigger planet with infinite resources", "Maybe if we were a less inherently aggressive people", and so on. That's the extent of their thoughts on why world peace hasn't happened yet: The conditions to make it easy and instant haven't happened yet. It's a coping mechanism to help with their unwillingness to ask themselves serious questions about who's killing this earth and why, what could save it, who's killing the earth's saviors, what could save them, and so on.
Trade between nations and business connections make countries dependent on each other in a way that discourages war, while globalists sacrifice humans en masse for the benefit of the elites. The real scientific method as invented and perfected by whites promotes factuality and understanding, understanding reality promotes understanding each other while leftist low-IQ tribalism promotes warring constantly over everything, even the smallest shit. Capitalism has lifted more people out of poverty than monarchists and commies and govt-funded money-laundering charity fanboys could count. Christian nations and christian minecraft servers have better morals than Islamic nations and and communist minecraft servers. The "Muh secular science utopia" as atheist faggots imagine it requires everyone to agree to Christian principles before it can function without abandoning all its morals in the name of "logic" and descending into the hyper-rational cheapening cheapening of human life. Lefties are creatures of ignorance and envy and spite and subversion desperate to parasitically feed upon and eliminate whites, the only people who could make world peace a reality by eliminating leftist lies and letting everyone prosper without them.
>>302288
I love the bits where Kkat accidentally makes it look bad to be a loser murderhobo with nothing better to do than seek out desperate survivalists your pre-war peacetime morality considers "baddies" and slaughter them. And the bits where Kkat makes it look bad to think like and act like the efficiency-obsessed manipulative type who picks all the manipulative dialogue options to get what he wants no matter what that means morally and how you play with the feelings of others.
I wish LP's other companions shined their own "Fuck DND characters like this, fuck fictional heroes who act like this, and fuck people like this!" lights on what they represent.
Would be easy to turn Calamity into a critique of the idea that once someone from a Villain organization joins your side he's suddenly a Hero which makes his town-destroying slaughter sprees "Heroic" while at the same time it's still supposedly okay to slaughter his formerly-fellow Villains(TM) en masse without ever wondering if they, after being shown kindness/mercy/rehabilitation, could end up turning good like Calamity. It reminds me of when Disney's Star Wars fanfics introduced one obligatory black guy who's also the obligatory good stormtrooper, and then never questioned whether you should woohoo and cheer while slaughtering stormtroopers, and never introduced another good stormtrooper again except for one other black one who's already out of her evil armour. Gee, maybe if Phasma was less of a stupid toy idea and more of an actual character that could be her character arc: going from angry ex-soldier to hero. Fuck the disney starwars films.
It would also be easy to sprinkle some magic on that power armour to complete the picture and turn the steel-armoured guy Steeltoes into a critique of the "Holy Paladin" DND archetype, the guy who's only brave when wearing invincible armour and possibly also empowered by holiness/his chosen deity. Easy to be brave when you've got literal fucking deities in your corner making it even easier to slaughter fragile goblins and stupid orcs. Easy to be brave when you've got a +50 holy warhammer of Bandit-Killing, or in this case something deadlier than 50 caliber machine guns, strapped at your side. Easy to be self-righteous about your "glorious paladin principles" when you've never been forced to make the moral compromises your party's thief, who grew up in the slums, had to make if he wanted to survive.
If Velvet's a "fuck you" for the high-charisma pacifist Bards/Clerics, and LP is a Thief with nothing better to do than loot and shoot, that leaves space for...
A smug wizard straight out of his ivory tower? A Hexblade/Warlock dark mage? One obligatory good member of an evil race? Perhaps a tree-hugging bear-fucking druidfag, or the obligatory kid-appeal character who dies horribly in the name of realism and edge.
>>302291
Mint-al duration is incredibly inconsistent. They last as long as Kkat wants them to except when they'd wear off at a "dramatic moment", or moment that justifies more loot-n-shoot time (Like when LP spontaneously lost her ability to repair Steelhooves's suit, forcing her to get the thing from the vault where DJ-Pon3 and others were killed by the Crusaders Maneframe and they got medical supplies and LP fainted and wanked and Steelhooves got better on his own)
Here's the Naruto thread https://mlpol.net/a/1334
>>302286
That's the one! Chatoyance is a fucking weirdo.
I hear some author once wrote The Conversion Bureau and accidentally made it anti-human and gave up on it, so Chatoyance took over and made it even more anti-human. Chatty unironically says shit like "Ponies are a superior species compared to humans" and "Something that would be immoral for a human to do would be fine for a pony to do, for that is their right as a superior species".
Chatoyance also wrote "Alternate Universe TCB fics" that have the TCB label but barely have anything to do with ponies or TCB and are about humanity getting a virus that wipes out their masculinity to create world peace, or some shit like that. That's what I heard, anyway.
It's funny how "Futurists" and scifi/fantasy fantards obsessed with escapism and their own misanthropy love thinking "Maybe if aliens forced world peace onto us", "Maybe if we were on a bigger planet with infinite resources", "Maybe if we were a less inherently aggressive people", and so on. That's the extent of their thoughts on why world peace hasn't happened yet: The conditions to make it easy and instant haven't happened yet. It's a coping mechanism to help with their unwillingness to ask themselves serious questions about who's killing this earth and why, what could save it, who's killing the earth's saviors, what could save them, and so on.
Trade between nations and business connections make countries dependent on each other in a way that discourages war, while globalists sacrifice humans en masse for the benefit of the elites. The real scientific method as invented and perfected by whites promotes factuality and understanding, understanding reality promotes understanding each other while leftist low-IQ tribalism promotes warring constantly over everything, even the smallest shit. Capitalism has lifted more people out of poverty than monarchists and commies and govt-funded money-laundering charity fanboys could count. Christian nations and christian minecraft servers have better morals than Islamic nations and and communist minecraft servers. The "Muh secular science utopia" as atheist faggots imagine it requires everyone to agree to Christian principles before it can function without abandoning all its morals in the name of "logic" and descending into the hyper-rational cheapening cheapening of human life. Lefties are creatures of ignorance and envy and spite and subversion desperate to parasitically feed upon and eliminate whites, the only people who could make world peace a reality by eliminating leftist lies and letting everyone prosper without them.
>>302288
I love the bits where Kkat accidentally makes it look bad to be a loser murderhobo with nothing better to do than seek out desperate survivalists your pre-war peacetime morality considers "baddies" and slaughter them. And the bits where Kkat makes it look bad to think like and act like the efficiency-obsessed manipulative type who picks all the manipulative dialogue options to get what he wants no matter what that means morally and how you play with the feelings of others.
I wish LP's other companions shined their own "Fuck DND characters like this, fuck fictional heroes who act like this, and fuck people like this!" lights on what they represent.
Would be easy to turn Calamity into a critique of the idea that once someone from a Villain organization joins your side he's suddenly a Hero which makes his town-destroying slaughter sprees "Heroic" while at the same time it's still supposedly okay to slaughter his formerly-fellow Villains(TM) en masse without ever wondering if they, after being shown kindness/mercy/rehabilitation, could end up turning good like Calamity. It reminds me of when Disney's Star Wars fanfics introduced one obligatory black guy who's also the obligatory good stormtrooper, and then never questioned whether you should woohoo and cheer while slaughtering stormtroopers, and never introduced another good stormtrooper again except for one other black one who's already out of her evil armour. Gee, maybe if Phasma was less of a stupid toy idea and more of an actual character that could be her character arc: going from angry ex-soldier to hero. Fuck the disney starwars films.
It would also be easy to sprinkle some magic on that power armour to complete the picture and turn the steel-armoured guy Steeltoes into a critique of the "Holy Paladin" DND archetype, the guy who's only brave when wearing invincible armour and possibly also empowered by holiness/his chosen deity. Easy to be brave when you've got literal fucking deities in your corner making it even easier to slaughter fragile goblins and stupid orcs. Easy to be brave when you've got a +50 holy warhammer of Bandit-Killing, or in this case something deadlier than 50 caliber machine guns, strapped at your side. Easy to be self-righteous about your "glorious paladin principles" when you've never been forced to make the moral compromises your party's thief, who grew up in the slums, had to make if he wanted to survive.
If Velvet's a "fuck you" for the high-charisma pacifist Bards/Clerics, and LP is a Thief with nothing better to do than loot and shoot, that leaves space for...
A smug wizard straight out of his ivory tower? A Hexblade/Warlock dark mage? One obligatory good member of an evil race? Perhaps a tree-hugging bear-fucking druidfag, or the obligatory kid-appeal character who dies horribly in the name of realism and edge.
>>302291
Mint-al duration is incredibly inconsistent. They last as long as Kkat wants them to except when they'd wear off at a "dramatic moment", or moment that justifies more loot-n-shoot time (Like when LP spontaneously lost her ability to repair Steelhooves's suit, forcing her to get the thing from the vault where DJ-Pon3 and others were killed by the Crusaders Maneframe and they got medical supplies and LP fainted and wanked and Steelhooves got better on his own)
Oh also fuck Kkat for making LP a godlike mage and godlike thief. Thieves lockpick and sneak and assassinate, they don't need the ability to throw fridges around. If you give them the ability to throw fridges, they will throw fridges instead of doing sneaky smart thief shit. Thieves have to be clever to beat overwhelming odds, and so do cleverly-written magic-users. But OP magic users just defeat overwhelming odds with even overwhelmingier magic might and that's dull and predictable.
If Kkat's dead-set on giving LP OP telekinesis he should have watched Jojo's Bizarre Adventure so he can see what kind of interesting fights can happen to the overwhelmingly strong Star Platinum. ANY of those one-off monster-of-the-week villains could kill the whole Team LP at once by being smarter than them and more creative.
>>302291
>Presumably they won their fight somehow, but the author apparently didn't consider the victory important enough to tell us how it happened.
Kkat's habit of "resolving" scenes this way whenever he has no idea how to resolve these scenes, even when the answer is something obvious like "The infinite supply of baddies teleported in from another dimension eventually runs out", would be less galling if dialogue was used to make it funny.
>"There's too many of them!" Velvet screamed in fear, firing wildly into the oncoming swarm of steel, desperately wishing her shitty needles had as much robot-smashing stopping power as her leader's throwing refrigerator. "We're not gonna make it!"
>"We made it!" Littlepip gloated over the stunned Velvet, smugly and sensually reclining atop a mile-high pile of smashed-up robot corpses.
>"Littlepip, I don't know how you're going to convince this guy to do the thing!" Velvet whimpered.
>"Holy shit, he did the thing!" Velvet was still stunned, as they walked away from the guy they convinced to do the thing. "You really have a way with words when you're tripping balls."
Speaking of tripping balls, it would make the target audience of this story nut uncontrollably for 4-5 hours if Littlepip took the Fallout drug "Psycho" during one firefight and started talking like Doomguy from The Doom Comic does whenever he's under the influence of that berserker powerup. You know, all "Rip and tear! You are huge! That means you have huge guts!"
>>302291
>this is probably another Fallout thing
Yep, Fallout 3 added collectible magical Bobbleheads to the game for players to discover scattered around the world. Some boost a SPECIAL stat (Strength, Perception, Endurance, etc) by 1 point and some boost a Skill (Sneak, Speech, Small Guns, etc) by a few points.
This makes it absurdly easy to make your character godlike at everything, which kills the replay value inherent in trying the game again as a differently-built character. F3 also has stupid clothing that will magically give you +5 Sneak skill or +5 barter for wearing them which makes no sense.
F3 fantards say "Teh bobbleheads means Bethesda games has better rewards for exploration than Fallout 1-2" because they effortlessly found bobbleheads in 3 and never touched Fallout 1-2 and never discovered the hidden moments where you improve your SPECIAL stats as an earned reward. Or the conversations with some characters that boost your Skills, like the Survival-boosting guy who's a walking reference to the classic RPG Wasteland. That makes more sense for a realistic setting than picking up some magical vidyagaem powerup that never wears off. Collecting dumb pre-war trinkets that have somehow never suffered any damage in 200 years is a retarded thing for any survivalist focused on saving the world to do. But I guess it makes sense for a faggy human goomer obsessed with wandering around "making his own fun" as random endlessly-respawning enemies atk him sometimes.
Fallout 4 threw Skills away to """SIMPLIFY""" (casualize) things while making everything depend on SPECIAL stats that have never been easier to improve until you've got maxed 10s in everything, yet it still included SPECIAL stat-boosting bobbleheads that take you past 10 and new Skill Books that give you Perks when picked up. Nothing says immersive like picking up a comic book and dealing +5% more damage with laser pistols.
Kkat loves to try and justify nonsense that happened in Fallout 3 using magic or other Fallout elements so they can happen again in his fic, so the Bobbleheads get a really fucking dumb backstory I won't spoil.
>LP finds the brain-boosting statuette, then fails to open a lock, then needs drugs to open it
that's dumb, it cheapens the brain boost if it immediately fails to help her do something she's done before.
Ain't like this is some special safe that requires specialty tools to open. (like a twig/rotating fuckstick with spinning handguard/red bull can/lego man)
She should try to open the safe, fail, consider drugs, then say no, then find the bobblehead, becoming smart enough to unlock the safe. That way LP's rewarded by the universe for not doing drugs.
Or Velvet could find the statuette, becoming smart enough to realize being a manipulative cunt is mean on her own.
Then again it would infuriate the target audience if one of LP's underlings found sick loot that's sicker than Littlepip's sick loot.
>>302292
It's dumb that even LP thinks "Going to meet that DJ was a waste of time that revealed no insight".
Sure, meeting the DJ in F3 was pretty pointless.
But meeting this all-seeing DJ should be a big deal like meeting House in FNV. The official end of act 1 as a drifter out for revenge, and the start of Act 2 as House's best operative/worst nightmare, which leads up to the big war in Act 3.
>the stables themselves aren't really to blame for what happened
This completely fucks up what Fallout went for with the "Most vaults are experiments" reveal.
F1, 2, and NV used social experiment vaults/stables in interesting ways, 3/4 used them as excuses for dumb shit. Kkat loved 3 too much and learned all the wrong lessons from Bethesda's inability to write coherently.
If Kkat's dead-set on giving LP OP telekinesis he should have watched Jojo's Bizarre Adventure so he can see what kind of interesting fights can happen to the overwhelmingly strong Star Platinum. ANY of those one-off monster-of-the-week villains could kill the whole Team LP at once by being smarter than them and more creative.
>>302291
>Presumably they won their fight somehow, but the author apparently didn't consider the victory important enough to tell us how it happened.
Kkat's habit of "resolving" scenes this way whenever he has no idea how to resolve these scenes, even when the answer is something obvious like "The infinite supply of baddies teleported in from another dimension eventually runs out", would be less galling if dialogue was used to make it funny.
>"There's too many of them!" Velvet screamed in fear, firing wildly into the oncoming swarm of steel, desperately wishing her shitty needles had as much robot-smashing stopping power as her leader's throwing refrigerator. "We're not gonna make it!"
>"We made it!" Littlepip gloated over the stunned Velvet, smugly and sensually reclining atop a mile-high pile of smashed-up robot corpses.
>"Littlepip, I don't know how you're going to convince this guy to do the thing!" Velvet whimpered.
>"Holy shit, he did the thing!" Velvet was still stunned, as they walked away from the guy they convinced to do the thing. "You really have a way with words when you're tripping balls."
Speaking of tripping balls, it would make the target audience of this story nut uncontrollably for 4-5 hours if Littlepip took the Fallout drug "Psycho" during one firefight and started talking like Doomguy from The Doom Comic does whenever he's under the influence of that berserker powerup. You know, all "Rip and tear! You are huge! That means you have huge guts!"
>>302291
>this is probably another Fallout thing
Yep, Fallout 3 added collectible magical Bobbleheads to the game for players to discover scattered around the world. Some boost a SPECIAL stat (Strength, Perception, Endurance, etc) by 1 point and some boost a Skill (Sneak, Speech, Small Guns, etc) by a few points.
This makes it absurdly easy to make your character godlike at everything, which kills the replay value inherent in trying the game again as a differently-built character. F3 also has stupid clothing that will magically give you +5 Sneak skill or +5 barter for wearing them which makes no sense.
F3 fantards say "Teh bobbleheads means Bethesda games has better rewards for exploration than Fallout 1-2" because they effortlessly found bobbleheads in 3 and never touched Fallout 1-2 and never discovered the hidden moments where you improve your SPECIAL stats as an earned reward. Or the conversations with some characters that boost your Skills, like the Survival-boosting guy who's a walking reference to the classic RPG Wasteland. That makes more sense for a realistic setting than picking up some magical vidyagaem powerup that never wears off. Collecting dumb pre-war trinkets that have somehow never suffered any damage in 200 years is a retarded thing for any survivalist focused on saving the world to do. But I guess it makes sense for a faggy human goomer obsessed with wandering around "making his own fun" as random endlessly-respawning enemies atk him sometimes.
Fallout 4 threw Skills away to """SIMPLIFY""" (casualize) things while making everything depend on SPECIAL stats that have never been easier to improve until you've got maxed 10s in everything, yet it still included SPECIAL stat-boosting bobbleheads that take you past 10 and new Skill Books that give you Perks when picked up. Nothing says immersive like picking up a comic book and dealing +5% more damage with laser pistols.
Kkat loves to try and justify nonsense that happened in Fallout 3 using magic or other Fallout elements so they can happen again in his fic, so the Bobbleheads get a really fucking dumb backstory I won't spoil.
>LP finds the brain-boosting statuette, then fails to open a lock, then needs drugs to open it
that's dumb, it cheapens the brain boost if it immediately fails to help her do something she's done before.
Ain't like this is some special safe that requires specialty tools to open. (like a twig/rotating fuckstick with spinning handguard/red bull can/lego man)
She should try to open the safe, fail, consider drugs, then say no, then find the bobblehead, becoming smart enough to unlock the safe. That way LP's rewarded by the universe for not doing drugs.
Or Velvet could find the statuette, becoming smart enough to realize being a manipulative cunt is mean on her own.
Then again it would infuriate the target audience if one of LP's underlings found sick loot that's sicker than Littlepip's sick loot.
>>302292
It's dumb that even LP thinks "Going to meet that DJ was a waste of time that revealed no insight".
Sure, meeting the DJ in F3 was pretty pointless.
But meeting this all-seeing DJ should be a big deal like meeting House in FNV. The official end of act 1 as a drifter out for revenge, and the start of Act 2 as House's best operative/worst nightmare, which leads up to the big war in Act 3.
>the stables themselves aren't really to blame for what happened
This completely fucks up what Fallout went for with the "Most vaults are experiments" reveal.
F1, 2, and NV used social experiment vaults/stables in interesting ways, 3/4 used them as excuses for dumb shit. Kkat loved 3 too much and learned all the wrong lessons from Bethesda's inability to write coherently.
>>302294
I forgot all about how Littlepip got the Twilight Statuette, but now I remember how much I hated LP during this scene.
And how much I hated Kkat for making so much of Equestria, even the mane six, fall to pieces just so the mane six could be blamed for the horrors ripped off from Fallout mindlessly and injected into ponyland.
Running the Ministry Of Unpersoning doesn't suit Pinkie Pie. Organizing a raid on a company suspected of working for Zebrica shouldn't be Pinkie Pie's job. If it should be any mane six member's job, shouldn't AJ or RD handle this with their fully-military ministries? Running Stable-Tec doesn't suit Scootaloo. Inventing crackmints and getting addicted to them doesn't suit Pinkie Pie, who's already a looney-tunes character without them, shouldn't need crack to boost her brainpower, and didn't act like a pony whose brain was boosted by crack.
Remember everything about this scene for later including the safe full of crap and where LP got the statuette, because it gets worse. Everything about this scene gets even more infuriating later.
>poners tiptoe across a bridge
CALAMITY HAS WINGS AND CAN EFFORTLESSLY CARRY LP, WHO HAS EFFORTLESSLY LIFTED BOXCARS AND VELVET AND STEELHOOVES BEFORE. None of the four should use that bridge and risk breaking it. A big fucker in fucking big power armour like Steelhooves could probably break it just by looking at it. But of course, LP's brain is in gaymer mode and nothing ever breaks in a gayme unless it's scripted to do so, which means you can throw grenades inside a raider-infested tree library without burning it down and walk across a shitty bridge with 350 pounds of guns/armour/ammo/assorted junk in your inventory without breaking the bridge unless the bridge is destined to be destroyed like the cup from the Jojo's Bites The Dust episodes.
I forgot all about how Littlepip got the Twilight Statuette, but now I remember how much I hated LP during this scene.
And how much I hated Kkat for making so much of Equestria, even the mane six, fall to pieces just so the mane six could be blamed for the horrors ripped off from Fallout mindlessly and injected into ponyland.
Running the Ministry Of Unpersoning doesn't suit Pinkie Pie. Organizing a raid on a company suspected of working for Zebrica shouldn't be Pinkie Pie's job. If it should be any mane six member's job, shouldn't AJ or RD handle this with their fully-military ministries? Running Stable-Tec doesn't suit Scootaloo. Inventing crackmints and getting addicted to them doesn't suit Pinkie Pie, who's already a looney-tunes character without them, shouldn't need crack to boost her brainpower, and didn't act like a pony whose brain was boosted by crack.
Remember everything about this scene for later including the safe full of crap and where LP got the statuette, because it gets worse. Everything about this scene gets even more infuriating later.
>poners tiptoe across a bridge
CALAMITY HAS WINGS AND CAN EFFORTLESSLY CARRY LP, WHO HAS EFFORTLESSLY LIFTED BOXCARS AND VELVET AND STEELHOOVES BEFORE. None of the four should use that bridge and risk breaking it. A big fucker in fucking big power armour like Steelhooves could probably break it just by looking at it. But of course, LP's brain is in gaymer mode and nothing ever breaks in a gayme unless it's scripted to do so, which means you can throw grenades inside a raider-infested tree library without burning it down and walk across a shitty bridge with 350 pounds of guns/armour/ammo/assorted junk in your inventory without breaking the bridge unless the bridge is destined to be destroyed like the cup from the Jojo's Bites The Dust episodes.
1614242551.jpg (27.9 KB, 500x462, tumblr_inline_ncms3vonJp1qcfu2z.jpg)
<pic unrelated just something I found
>>302286
I guess there is no point in making a review thread around a classical work since you can find that on the web.
If you love classical litterature so much why don't you marry it... with Fallout Equestria in such a way that you make commercials for this classical stories?
What I mean is that sometimes you have compared the stories you review to classical litterature, what if you aimed at making that a more frequent thing. Like, "Here's how Kkat did this but let's see if Shakespear did it better." This way you can introduce classical books to Anons that haven't heard of them and entice them to read them as well.
> It's dumb, but humans are irrational creatures.
>I know that I don't make sense but that's my speciality.
What?
Nah, I'm just kidding. I have no problems with anything you have said here. You do what you want with your leisure time and I also think classical western litterture is worth reading.
Although, I think I could have a problem with what could be considered under the label "classical litterature"It's hard to ecplain what I mean with this sentence. Basically, today we have writers that are trash but still have world bestsellers. *Cough.* J.K. Rowling *Cough.* I guess we can still say that her travesty was influencial and so was the works back in the days. But I guess I'm too cynical and can't help but to think that was populare back is something that is both hard to find out, being quite a while ago, and something that probably had to be encourage by some establishment at the time. As in it might not been the best book at the time but the real best was overshaddowed. There is also the problem that we have today that local stories gets overshaddowed by international ones. As in, if you make an animation in Italy and have it in italian, the anime fans won't see it. Similar how how I can't help but ot feel that englis books dominated the market due to their influence rather than their quality all the time. I don't actually know if this is true just that writing a book in english has advantages over writing it in an other langauge. I don't write stories in swedish because of this. But very much could be true. Honestly, the only good classical swedish writer was August Stringberg, and the rest can suck a dick, probably. I think it was Vilhelm Moberg that wrote a story about an old man learning that his wife had an affair with a young man so instead getting furious, he decided upon greeting the guy and wanting to get to know him better. . Another thing is that you seem to confound "good stories" with classical ones, when that doesn't necessary need to be the case.
Honestly, maybe this thoughts aren't so well thought out. I been tempted a few times to erease this whole post a few times and just leave my first sugguestion about making this review into comparison-review at times.
What I'm saying is that I'm not hundred-procent sure aboutmy perspective but that there is something to it and therefore I will post it.
>>302286
I guess there is no point in making a review thread around a classical work since you can find that on the web.
If you love classical litterature so much why don't you marry it... with Fallout Equestria in such a way that you make commercials for this classical stories?
What I mean is that sometimes you have compared the stories you review to classical litterature, what if you aimed at making that a more frequent thing. Like, "Here's how Kkat did this but let's see if Shakespear did it better." This way you can introduce classical books to Anons that haven't heard of them and entice them to read them as well.
> It's dumb, but humans are irrational creatures.
>I know that I don't make sense but that's my speciality.
What?
Nah, I'm just kidding. I have no problems with anything you have said here. You do what you want with your leisure time and I also think classical western litterture is worth reading.
Although, I think I could have a problem with what could be considered under the label "classical litterature"It's hard to ecplain what I mean with this sentence. Basically, today we have writers that are trash but still have world bestsellers. *Cough.* J.K. Rowling *Cough.* I guess we can still say that her travesty was influencial and so was the works back in the days. But I guess I'm too cynical and can't help but to think that was populare back is something that is both hard to find out, being quite a while ago, and something that probably had to be encourage by some establishment at the time. As in it might not been the best book at the time but the real best was overshaddowed. There is also the problem that we have today that local stories gets overshaddowed by international ones. As in, if you make an animation in Italy and have it in italian, the anime fans won't see it. Similar how how I can't help but ot feel that englis books dominated the market due to their influence rather than their quality all the time. I don't actually know if this is true just that writing a book in english has advantages over writing it in an other langauge. I don't write stories in swedish because of this. But very much could be true. Honestly, the only good classical swedish writer was August Stringberg, and the rest can suck a dick, probably. I think it was Vilhelm Moberg that wrote a story about an old man learning that his wife had an affair with a young man so instead getting furious, he decided upon greeting the guy and wanting to get to know him better. . Another thing is that you seem to confound "good stories" with classical ones, when that doesn't necessary need to be the case.
Honestly, maybe this thoughts aren't so well thought out. I been tempted a few times to erease this whole post a few times and just leave my first sugguestion about making this review into comparison-review at times.
What I'm saying is that I'm not hundred-procent sure aboutmy perspective but that there is something to it and therefore I will post it.
>>302332
Obviously not all classical litwrature is good and not all good books are classical literature but Shakespeare is a timeless genius when he isn't defending jews.
Harry Potter's popularity undoubtedly came from astroturfing and boomer parents forcing it on their kids because "news shows" and "schools" and propaganda talk shows insisted "making your kids read this will make them love reading... and that's a good thing".
Hilarious in retrospect since most Harry Potter fanboys and fangirls never read another book in their lives and still define themselves as Slytherins and Hufflepuffs and Griffindors and Ravenclaws in their twenties and thirties.
One time when I was a kid the news... was it BBC or ITV? This was during a time when in the UK most houses only got a few TV channels because we didn't have Sky boxes or Netflix yet. The news show sucked Rowling's dick live on air with an interview meant to advertise the book and then showed this massive fucking stadium where shittons of kids and adults silently listened in awe at Rowling as she read one chapter of her book. I think she was three or four books into the series. I remember giggling when she said silly words and getting shouted at by my parents who were completely fucking hypnotized by Rowling's hypnotic "parent reading a storybook to his child" tone and disarmingly silly words.
Obviously not all classical litwrature is good and not all good books are classical literature but Shakespeare is a timeless genius when he isn't defending jews.
Harry Potter's popularity undoubtedly came from astroturfing and boomer parents forcing it on their kids because "news shows" and "schools" and propaganda talk shows insisted "making your kids read this will make them love reading... and that's a good thing".
Hilarious in retrospect since most Harry Potter fanboys and fangirls never read another book in their lives and still define themselves as Slytherins and Hufflepuffs and Griffindors and Ravenclaws in their twenties and thirties.
One time when I was a kid the news... was it BBC or ITV? This was during a time when in the UK most houses only got a few TV channels because we didn't have Sky boxes or Netflix yet. The news show sucked Rowling's dick live on air with an interview meant to advertise the book and then showed this massive fucking stadium where shittons of kids and adults silently listened in awe at Rowling as she read one chapter of her book. I think she was three or four books into the series. I remember giggling when she said silly words and getting shouted at by my parents who were completely fucking hypnotized by Rowling's hypnotic "parent reading a storybook to his child" tone and disarmingly silly words.
>>302332
>their quality all the time
At times*
I don't know how this became this way.
>>302337
Yeah, there is something strange with woman and children's books. There is this author Astrid Lindgren in Sweden that is immensly populare here. She kind wrote similar stories, at least in tone, to Rowling. She is really populare and people have put her on a ridiculous pedastal.
>their quality all the time
At times*
I don't know how this became this way.
>>302337
Yeah, there is something strange with woman and children's books. There is this author Astrid Lindgren in Sweden that is immensly populare here. She kind wrote similar stories, at least in tone, to Rowling. She is really populare and people have put her on a ridiculous pedastal.
>>302281
I belive thinking he was a tranny was something I said very early on. How I came to the conclusion I can not remember exactly. I belive it was a group of friends I was chatting with about your review and how all these early mediocre to terrible big fanfics are usually writen by lolcows and one of them illuded to Kkat being a tranny.
After seeing how well it took off here I didn't bother to get clarification and has been a fun little thing with the review to see. I have far less to say about this story then the last so in a way I feel like it was my little contribution to the thread and always get a little giddy when I see it referenced.
I belive thinking he was a tranny was something I said very early on. How I came to the conclusion I can not remember exactly. I belive it was a group of friends I was chatting with about your review and how all these early mediocre to terrible big fanfics are usually writen by lolcows and one of them illuded to Kkat being a tranny.
After seeing how well it took off here I didn't bother to get clarification and has been a fun little thing with the review to see. I have far less to say about this story then the last so in a way I feel like it was my little contribution to the thread and always get a little giddy when I see it referenced.
>>302353
I know that people in the fandom have refered to him as a she so do we believe it is literally a she or do we think that it's a guy that wants extra credits by pretending to be a woman? Woman get credits by virtue of existng afterall.
I honestly, don't know if it kkat is actually a woman or not. I think not because we would see less lesbian stuff then and more gay stuff in that case.
I know that people in the fandom have refered to him as a she so do we believe it is literally a she or do we think that it's a guy that wants extra credits by pretending to be a woman? Woman get credits by virtue of existng afterall.
I honestly, don't know if it kkat is actually a woman or not. I think not because we would see less lesbian stuff then and more gay stuff in that case.
>>302294
>Anyway, enough of this maudlin crap. Want to cry for real, and maybe rage a little while you're at it? Here's something to consider:
>LP now knows that the Twilight Sparkle statuette she found was actually a treasured personal possession of Pinkie Pie. Pinkie literally spent her last moments alive clutching this statue of her dead friend, while lamenting all of the time they lost because of her drug addiction. To Ponk's sad and lonely ghost, which is probably wandering the empty halls of this forgotten skyscraper as we speak, this little statue of Twilight is worth more than all the treasures of Celestia's tomb. To Littlepoop, however, it's completely meaningless; it's just some cute little collectible tchotchke that she wants for no reason other than to have it. Littlepoop literally pulled this thing out of Pinkie's ribcage and stuck it in her saddlebag next to all the other autismo junk she carts around, where it will remain until she either trades it away for ammunition, or puts it on a shelf next to her Funko Pop collection, where it will do nothing but collect dust until the next apocalypse. For all the crocodile tears she sheds here, not once does it ever occur to this klepto that this statue might be something she doesn't have a right to take.
Urgh. I never even thought of this scene that way. Come to think of it, Littlepip really doesn't seem to have much respect for the dead. I'm reminded of a certain scene much later involving a cola bottle, but ho boy we'll get to that...
As >>302325 points out, Fallout 3 introduced the bobbleheads as optional collectibles. They're scattered all over the world, tucked away in remote places or deep in dungeons, presumably to give the player an additional incentive to explore. There's no story or explanation behind them - they're just shiny things that you can pick up to boost your character a bit. FoE's statuettes do wind up having an explanation and story relevance eventually, which I suppose is marginally better than just existing "because videogame".
I get what Kkat's trying to do with these dungeon crawl sections: environmental storytelling. Part of the appeal of an open-world game like Fallout 3 is exploring the world and piecing together what happened in the past from what's left over from previous events. It's entirely doable in writing too - storytelling by implication rather than overtly expositing on every little thing. The problem, at least as far as I can tell, is that Kkat doesn't seem to have much faith in the reader's ability to figure things out (or his own ability to lay a coherent and appealing breadcrumb trail). Vague, implicatory things happen or are mentioned, then Littlepip explains what they mean, then she opines on them, often at length. The same's true with the memory orb sequences - they might be a little more compelling if they were allowed to stand on their own as microstories, rather than constantly being embellished and analyzed and fussed over by Littlepip's narration.
This 'slowly work through every little detail that Littlepip finds important' approach could be a big contributing factor to why this story is so long and progresses so slowly.
>Anyway, enough of this maudlin crap. Want to cry for real, and maybe rage a little while you're at it? Here's something to consider:
>LP now knows that the Twilight Sparkle statuette she found was actually a treasured personal possession of Pinkie Pie. Pinkie literally spent her last moments alive clutching this statue of her dead friend, while lamenting all of the time they lost because of her drug addiction. To Ponk's sad and lonely ghost, which is probably wandering the empty halls of this forgotten skyscraper as we speak, this little statue of Twilight is worth more than all the treasures of Celestia's tomb. To Littlepoop, however, it's completely meaningless; it's just some cute little collectible tchotchke that she wants for no reason other than to have it. Littlepoop literally pulled this thing out of Pinkie's ribcage and stuck it in her saddlebag next to all the other autismo junk she carts around, where it will remain until she either trades it away for ammunition, or puts it on a shelf next to her Funko Pop collection, where it will do nothing but collect dust until the next apocalypse. For all the crocodile tears she sheds here, not once does it ever occur to this klepto that this statue might be something she doesn't have a right to take.
Urgh. I never even thought of this scene that way. Come to think of it, Littlepip really doesn't seem to have much respect for the dead. I'm reminded of a certain scene much later involving a cola bottle, but ho boy we'll get to that...
As >>302325 points out, Fallout 3 introduced the bobbleheads as optional collectibles. They're scattered all over the world, tucked away in remote places or deep in dungeons, presumably to give the player an additional incentive to explore. There's no story or explanation behind them - they're just shiny things that you can pick up to boost your character a bit. FoE's statuettes do wind up having an explanation and story relevance eventually, which I suppose is marginally better than just existing "because videogame".
I get what Kkat's trying to do with these dungeon crawl sections: environmental storytelling. Part of the appeal of an open-world game like Fallout 3 is exploring the world and piecing together what happened in the past from what's left over from previous events. It's entirely doable in writing too - storytelling by implication rather than overtly expositing on every little thing. The problem, at least as far as I can tell, is that Kkat doesn't seem to have much faith in the reader's ability to figure things out (or his own ability to lay a coherent and appealing breadcrumb trail). Vague, implicatory things happen or are mentioned, then Littlepip explains what they mean, then she opines on them, often at length. The same's true with the memory orb sequences - they might be a little more compelling if they were allowed to stand on their own as microstories, rather than constantly being embellished and analyzed and fussed over by Littlepip's narration.
This 'slowly work through every little detail that Littlepip finds important' approach could be a big contributing factor to why this story is so long and progresses so slowly.
>>302394
That "Spell everything about the environmental storytelling out for you" approach... Isn't that how Bethesda always writes their environmental storytelling whenever there's more to it than 1-2 skeletons here or there in a wacky or "tragic" pose?
Bethesda's environmental storytelling is so bad, you'll find charred "REMEMBER, PEOPLE DIED LONG AGO" skeletons from 200 years ago in the seats of a diner a woman and her son live in, a diner in the middle of buttfuck nowhere that produces nothing yet the two run a trading stop and are doing great just like all other merchants in the game. Nobody sweeps away the trash in the "slum" of Goodneighbour or the capital city and "Great green jewel of the commonwealth" Diamond City.
And what do these shitty mysteries mean for the player, or Littlepip in this case? Fundamentally fucking nothing. Learning why the bodies are there is a reward for the player who gives a shit but there is no reward for anyone who guessed correctly on their own without needing diaries and letters and terminals and holotapes to spoil the surprise.
It's worse in FE because Littlepip doesn't get a reward for learning who ran this prison camp or what killed that Stable. No lessons to learn and no rewards to discover for putting in the effort to investigate these overly easy "mysteries". She won't ever learn someone from her own vault did horrible things, shattering her faith in her own homeland's goodness or whatever. Strangers from this alien world named Wasteland or strangers from the Before-Time are always responsible for all the world's woes that can't be blamed on luck or robots gone wild.
And Littlepip only gets to pretend there's a mystery to these "Find a weird place, read diary entries and terminals and listen to holotapes until you find the final puzzle piece that spells absolutely everything out for you" scenes because she never finds the final puzzle piece first.
A good puzzle leaves you with many pieces and lets you figure shit out on your own or watch characters figure it out together. Sherlock Holmes might instantly figure out what would take normal people a few seconds and always have a good idea of where to check for the evidence but he's no all-seeing all-knowing god like he is in BBC's Shlock. The final puzzle piece should help the detective piece everything together, not spell it all out for the detective and audience. Where's the mystery in that? Where's the payoff? We're presented with a bizarre situation (Like at Shattered Hoof) and the "payoff" turns out to be learning that Diamond Tiara was once hired to run a prison camp/mining facility/rock-breaking place or something. What's next, will we be presented with a raider-infested gas station with one safe full of junk and a terminal LP can hack to learn Cranky Doodle Donkey once ran this place before he died saving his donkey wife from raiders?
For fuck's sake, Velvet's a doctor like Watson. And if anyone should know a fuckton when it comes to Wasteland shit it's Calamity. It would also make sense for him to know a ton about pre-war Equestria though if his knowledge of pre-war Equestria was worthless revised Enclave propaganda that would give LP a role in this mystery-solving adventure: Saying something she remembers from History Class at her Stable School.
These two idiots should be able to help Littlepip piece the mystery together and suggest theories of their own! But of course, they just follow LP around like mindless automatons when they aren't saying their pre-written dialogue lines full of maudlin bullshit.
That "Spell everything about the environmental storytelling out for you" approach... Isn't that how Bethesda always writes their environmental storytelling whenever there's more to it than 1-2 skeletons here or there in a wacky or "tragic" pose?
Bethesda's environmental storytelling is so bad, you'll find charred "REMEMBER, PEOPLE DIED LONG AGO" skeletons from 200 years ago in the seats of a diner a woman and her son live in, a diner in the middle of buttfuck nowhere that produces nothing yet the two run a trading stop and are doing great just like all other merchants in the game. Nobody sweeps away the trash in the "slum" of Goodneighbour or the capital city and "Great green jewel of the commonwealth" Diamond City.
And what do these shitty mysteries mean for the player, or Littlepip in this case? Fundamentally fucking nothing. Learning why the bodies are there is a reward for the player who gives a shit but there is no reward for anyone who guessed correctly on their own without needing diaries and letters and terminals and holotapes to spoil the surprise.
It's worse in FE because Littlepip doesn't get a reward for learning who ran this prison camp or what killed that Stable. No lessons to learn and no rewards to discover for putting in the effort to investigate these overly easy "mysteries". She won't ever learn someone from her own vault did horrible things, shattering her faith in her own homeland's goodness or whatever. Strangers from this alien world named Wasteland or strangers from the Before-Time are always responsible for all the world's woes that can't be blamed on luck or robots gone wild.
And Littlepip only gets to pretend there's a mystery to these "Find a weird place, read diary entries and terminals and listen to holotapes until you find the final puzzle piece that spells absolutely everything out for you" scenes because she never finds the final puzzle piece first.
A good puzzle leaves you with many pieces and lets you figure shit out on your own or watch characters figure it out together. Sherlock Holmes might instantly figure out what would take normal people a few seconds and always have a good idea of where to check for the evidence but he's no all-seeing all-knowing god like he is in BBC's Shlock. The final puzzle piece should help the detective piece everything together, not spell it all out for the detective and audience. Where's the mystery in that? Where's the payoff? We're presented with a bizarre situation (Like at Shattered Hoof) and the "payoff" turns out to be learning that Diamond Tiara was once hired to run a prison camp/mining facility/rock-breaking place or something. What's next, will we be presented with a raider-infested gas station with one safe full of junk and a terminal LP can hack to learn Cranky Doodle Donkey once ran this place before he died saving his donkey wife from raiders?
For fuck's sake, Velvet's a doctor like Watson. And if anyone should know a fuckton when it comes to Wasteland shit it's Calamity. It would also make sense for him to know a ton about pre-war Equestria though if his knowledge of pre-war Equestria was worthless revised Enclave propaganda that would give LP a role in this mystery-solving adventure: Saying something she remembers from History Class at her Stable School.
These two idiots should be able to help Littlepip piece the mystery together and suggest theories of their own! But of course, they just follow LP around like mindless automatons when they aren't saying their pre-written dialogue lines full of maudlin bullshit.
>>302428
Imagine being so cucked and repressed your "passionate side" can only come out when pretending to be a fucking catgirl on the internet because you've been raised on "emotional men is scary and wrong but emotional women is fine" juice.
The only valid reason for a female protagonist is the size of the tits you can give her and the amount of screentime you can give those big bouncy tits.
Imagine being so cucked and repressed your "passionate side" can only come out when pretending to be a fucking catgirl on the internet because you've been raised on "emotional men is scary and wrong but emotional women is fine" juice.
The only valid reason for a female protagonist is the size of the tits you can give her and the amount of screentime you can give those big bouncy tits.
>>302428
So I did a little digging out of curiosity, and tried to find the source of this image. It's from a largely uninteresting thesis that was published back in 2003: https://scholarworks.rit.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6321&context=theses
Assuming that this is the same Kkat, and assuming that his age was reported accurately in the thesis, he was born in or close to 1976. In other words, if all the above holds true he would have been well into his mid-30s by the time he wrote FoE and is now pushing 45.
So that's a thing.
So I did a little digging out of curiosity, and tried to find the source of this image. It's from a largely uninteresting thesis that was published back in 2003: https://scholarworks.rit.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6321&context=theses
Assuming that this is the same Kkat, and assuming that his age was reported accurately in the thesis, he was born in or close to 1976. In other words, if all the above holds true he would have been well into his mid-30s by the time he wrote FoE and is now pushing 45.
So that's a thing.
>>302452
Holy shit. I always assumed he was in his late teens when he started writing this and maybe in his twenties by the time this all ended. He's... he's so fucking old! Way too old to write something this awful. Hasn't he ever read anything better than FE? Hasn't he ever played any role playing game or survival game or shooter better than Fallout 3? Has he just been spinning his wheels in an isolated bubble all this time without ever seeing anything good that could have improved his work? Is this all there is to Kkat and his life? I read FE as a teenager and I assumed he wrote it as one because it's full of childish writing. The author has an incredibly limited pallete of ideas to pull from. He never watched Star Trek so he can't rip off an episode for a dungeon idea and he never played World of Warcraft so he can't rip off Gilneas's backstory for a shitty settlement. He's fucking ancient and it's all downhill from here for that guy physically and mentally. He has never broadened his horizons and yet this sad old man has a permanent exhibit in the FIM fandom's hall of fame for half-assing his looty shooty fantasy vehicle. m in my early twenties now but learning that he's over fucking fourty right now... I don't know what to say. Is there still time for him to turn his life around before he ends up in a retirement home with all the other old people?
What is fantasy submersion and what is a Muck/Furry Muck? He said he's into those so are they something degenerate that wastes time without improving any skills or broadening your horizons? Is furry muck code for furry scat porn?
Is it weird that in his "about me" section he says he uses "fantasy submersion" to "reduce stress"? That seems really odd to me but I'm autistic so I want to know if others find it odd too. It just seems weird to tell people what helps you deal with life around the same time you're telling people what your name is and what your hobbies are.
Holy shit. I always assumed he was in his late teens when he started writing this and maybe in his twenties by the time this all ended. He's... he's so fucking old! Way too old to write something this awful. Hasn't he ever read anything better than FE? Hasn't he ever played any role playing game or survival game or shooter better than Fallout 3? Has he just been spinning his wheels in an isolated bubble all this time without ever seeing anything good that could have improved his work? Is this all there is to Kkat and his life? I read FE as a teenager and I assumed he wrote it as one because it's full of childish writing. The author has an incredibly limited pallete of ideas to pull from. He never watched Star Trek so he can't rip off an episode for a dungeon idea and he never played World of Warcraft so he can't rip off Gilneas's backstory for a shitty settlement. He's fucking ancient and it's all downhill from here for that guy physically and mentally. He has never broadened his horizons and yet this sad old man has a permanent exhibit in the FIM fandom's hall of fame for half-assing his looty shooty fantasy vehicle. m in my early twenties now but learning that he's over fucking fourty right now... I don't know what to say. Is there still time for him to turn his life around before he ends up in a retirement home with all the other old people?
What is fantasy submersion and what is a Muck/Furry Muck? He said he's into those so are they something degenerate that wastes time without improving any skills or broadening your horizons? Is furry muck code for furry scat porn?
Is it weird that in his "about me" section he says he uses "fantasy submersion" to "reduce stress"? That seems really odd to me but I'm autistic so I want to know if others find it odd too. It just seems weird to tell people what helps you deal with life around the same time you're telling people what your name is and what your hobbies are.
>>302444
>The only valid reason for a female protagonist is the size of the tits you can give her and the amount of screentime you can give those big bouncy tits.
>Nigel has the mental acuity of a 13 y/o confirmed
>The only valid reason for a female protagonist is the size of the tits you can give her and the amount of screentime you can give those big bouncy tits.
>Nigel has the mental acuity of a 13 y/o confirmed
>>302455
>(?) posts in this thread by this ID
How do you do that?
>>302458
You're right, I was a shit writer once too. And despite all the books I've read, all the movies I've seen, all the people I've met and talked to, the political knowledge I've uncovered, the lives I've changed, the perspectives I've understood, all the documentaries and animes and other shows I've watched, I know there's still so much out there left to know. Improvement is a gradual process, and what matters is that you never stop improving. On one hand I like that Kkat won't ever update or spellcheck Fallout Equestria because it means we can easily read and critique what idiots fanboyed over almost a whole decade ago, but on the other hand it's sad that he'll never release a rewritten, refocused, and greatly shortened "Director's Cut" version of the story that fixes the problems pointed out in this thread. There will never be a good Fallout Equestria, because to make a Fallout Equestria fic good you would first need to fix the connection between pre-war Equestria and the Wasteland, which means diverging from one of the many things that makes FE terrible.
Btw I looked up what a Furry Muck is, turns out it's not scat porn like I initially assumed it was. FurryMuck is a MUD, a Multi-User Dungeon. Which is a MMORPG but text-based. FurryMuck is a furry ERP site. He's openly saying he does ERP on a furry site.
Wait a fucking second... What kind of person openly says "I love to roleplay on FurrySexDungeonRoleplaying.com" in his bio?
The same kind of guy who says "I am normally be an easygoing individual" and feels the need to specify what he means by "My passionate side" by explaining what "Passionate" means to him, I suppose.
>>302428
Where did you find this?
>(?) posts in this thread by this ID
How do you do that?
>>302458
You're right, I was a shit writer once too. And despite all the books I've read, all the movies I've seen, all the people I've met and talked to, the political knowledge I've uncovered, the lives I've changed, the perspectives I've understood, all the documentaries and animes and other shows I've watched, I know there's still so much out there left to know. Improvement is a gradual process, and what matters is that you never stop improving. On one hand I like that Kkat won't ever update or spellcheck Fallout Equestria because it means we can easily read and critique what idiots fanboyed over almost a whole decade ago, but on the other hand it's sad that he'll never release a rewritten, refocused, and greatly shortened "Director's Cut" version of the story that fixes the problems pointed out in this thread. There will never be a good Fallout Equestria, because to make a Fallout Equestria fic good you would first need to fix the connection between pre-war Equestria and the Wasteland, which means diverging from one of the many things that makes FE terrible.
Btw I looked up what a Furry Muck is, turns out it's not scat porn like I initially assumed it was. FurryMuck is a MUD, a Multi-User Dungeon. Which is a MMORPG but text-based. FurryMuck is a furry ERP site. He's openly saying he does ERP on a furry site.
Wait a fucking second... What kind of person openly says "I love to roleplay on FurrySexDungeonRoleplaying.com" in his bio?
The same kind of guy who says "I am normally be an easygoing individual" and feels the need to specify what he means by "My passionate side" by explaining what "Passionate" means to him, I suppose.
>>302428
Where did you find this?
>>302477
>I was a shit writer once
>once
If you intend to try to suggest that you're NOT a shit writer, you will have to provide evidence for that claim else it's (self-gratifying) projection.
Spoiler alert: you dont get to decide whether you are a shit writer or not, past or present. I'm not refuting the possibility, but I AM asserting that your claims are unsubstantiated and spurious
>I was a shit writer once
>once
If you intend to try to suggest that you're NOT a shit writer, you will have to provide evidence for that claim else it's (self-gratifying) projection.
Spoiler alert: you dont get to decide whether you are a shit writer or not, past or present. I'm not refuting the possibility, but I AM asserting that your claims are unsubstantiated and spurious
>>302332
Look I have been thinking about this recently. I don't wanna come off wrong. I feel as I might have in the last post.
Fanfiction can't even compare to actually published authors because there's at least some requirements on quality there. And classical books have a much higher chance of being better than the ones now. So I'm not defending the fanfics over the books of today or the books of today. So I generally agree with you. Fanfics are shit and a waste of time, most of the time and so is honestly today's published books.
I just think people underestimate of how long the jews have been in control of our countries and how they have influenced who is put in the spotlight.
I guess I also disagree with the idea that you must read good stuff to produce good stuff. Seems like a fallacy to me.
Look I have been thinking about this recently. I don't wanna come off wrong. I feel as I might have in the last post.
Fanfiction can't even compare to actually published authors because there's at least some requirements on quality there. And classical books have a much higher chance of being better than the ones now. So I'm not defending the fanfics over the books of today or the books of today. So I generally agree with you. Fanfics are shit and a waste of time, most of the time and so is honestly today's published books.
I just think people underestimate of how long the jews have been in control of our countries and how they have influenced who is put in the spotlight.
I guess I also disagree with the idea that you must read good stuff to produce good stuff. Seems like a fallacy to me.
>>302545
Because writing makes good writing, not reading. Reading keeps you in place. I what I think.
Because writing makes good writing, not reading. Reading keeps you in place. I what I think.
>>302546
I believe you wanted to say something like: "Writing requires a lot more than reading. Or, reading can't make you grow like writing"
I believe you wanted to say something like: "Writing requires a lot more than reading. Or, reading can't make you grow like writing"
>>302545
>>302546
Writing is both an art and a skill, so getting good is a combination of study, practice, and learning by example what to do and what not to do. Reading others' work (good or bad) and having others read yours is absolutely necessary if you want to improve. Just writing and writing without a frame of reference gets you stuck in a dunning-kruger loop.
>>302546
Writing is both an art and a skill, so getting good is a combination of study, practice, and learning by example what to do and what not to do. Reading others' work (good or bad) and having others read yours is absolutely necessary if you want to improve. Just writing and writing without a frame of reference gets you stuck in a dunning-kruger loop.
>>302428
>I am normally be an easygoing individual
ENGLISH MOTHERFUCKER DO YOU SPEAK IT GOD DAMN IT EVERY TIME I SEE THIS IT GETS WORSE
>>302545
Experiencing good media seems to have helped me a lot. I've widened my artistic pallete of ideas to draw from, and analyzing good media to figure out why it made the choices that it made improves your understanding of media. A lot of amateur writers who've only ever seen a handful of things start writing fanfics thinking "I'll improve this work by changing what I personally hated about it and adding in whatever I think is cool" without getting what made him hate those things. Like a Na-
*clears throat*
Like making a MLPFIM fic where, because you find Fluttershy annoying, you make her get over her shyness instantly even though this makes her less distinct from her friends who you liked way more, and even though it means you can't write stories where Fluttershy's shyness causes problems for herself and others any more. Also he randomly throws in cars because he thinks cars are awesome. A lot of bad authors think changing something they subjectively didn't like to something they subjectively do like or forcing in an answer to a question nobody asked (or a question that was only raised because the author left things half-finished) will objectively improve the fic. I'll admit, I'm guilty of that.
Hell, Kkat did it with the horse DJ.
That would sound really weird out of context.
DJ 3-Dog from Fallout 3 has no backstory, no deep lore or characterization, no significant role in the world, andd no justification to exist. He hangs out in one room all day doing fuck all, and his radio broadcasts must be pre-recorded because you can hear him say the same 17 things on the radio over and over even if you're staring right at him in his room and watching him do nothing. He has a radio station but how he got it and the radio's songs is never explained. He'll omnisciently observe you, the player, and comment on your actions over the radio. How he watches you and always knows what you did is never explained. Also he's ugly.
Tenpenny Tower is a fancy hotel tower near Megaton full of rich cunts. The boss wants Megaton blown up for no reason. It produces nothing when it comes to resources and really shouldn't be the dream home for rich people that it is. Bethesda almost always forgets the most basic worldbuilding question, "What do they eat?".
Kkat's attempt to improve these separate near-universally-hated Fallout 3 elements turned Tenpenny Tower into a former Ministry Of Twilight's Science emergency broadcast tower that's also an omniscient surveillance tower. It's also got a self-sustaining settlement for the rich with harsh laws and a spa, and it presumably sustains itself through trade (even though Kkat forgets about the raiders infesting the city outside and how they'd prey upon travellers and especially travelling traders with trading caravans full of good shit)
The tower's DJ is Homage, a DJ-Pon3 imitator whose family has imitated that pony for generations even though she canonically died underground in the Crusaders Maneframe AI Gone Wild stable. The family's only spell is the voice gender changing spell, specifically for imitating DJ Pon3.
Where did the DJ get music from? The DJ pays ponies for records, and sometimes sends friends on life-threatening missions to get them.
What does the DJ do in her spare time? 3-Dog did nothing, but DJ Pon3 loves reading some of the banned anti-Equestrian books that were burned/censored by Rarity yet still had copies of them sent to Twilight for safekeeping. (I'm surprised this isn't the origin of the radio's music collection. then again this would fill the airwaves with songs Rarity and her Ministry Of Image wanted to censor/burn)
The DJ's all-knowing nature is "explained" by the tech she uses, but how she/her family got this tech is never explained. What being raised to be a literal fucking "Homage" to a 200 year old pony who was gunned down in her prime psychologically did to this radio whore is never explained.
"What do these rich people eat?" is answered with "These rich idiots make seemingly-fancy food out of 200 year old pre-war canned shite", but there is no deep character exploration there. The laws are very harsh and inconsistently applied and Monty Jack is forced by the hand of the author to sign his own death warrant just so Kkat can display this.
Desperately trying to act rich and civilized even if they have no true idea what that is, eating 200 year old canned dog food and pretending it's flay minion, and religiously following laws even if they make no sense to the point where a citizen here feels the urge to confess to a crime out of pride and guilt but mostly his own pride over "never lying no matter what"... This would make a great gimmick or "Hat" for a settlement of idiots and frauds in the middle of a post-apocalyptic wasteland if Kkat realized the story potential and comedic potential of this idea. Bethesda tended to write things as weird/dumb/quirky/gimmicky for the sake of being weird/dumb/quirky/gimmicky, so Kkat likely saw nothing wrong with this style of writing and this settlement's gimmick since Bethesda's gimmick-focused writing style wasn't complained about as loudly as Tenpenny Tower and the Ghouls who want to invade it, how often the writers forgot to say what characters ate, and the FUCKING IDIOTIC main questline.
>I am normally be an easygoing individual
ENGLISH MOTHERFUCKER DO YOU SPEAK IT GOD DAMN IT EVERY TIME I SEE THIS IT GETS WORSE
>>302545
Experiencing good media seems to have helped me a lot. I've widened my artistic pallete of ideas to draw from, and analyzing good media to figure out why it made the choices that it made improves your understanding of media. A lot of amateur writers who've only ever seen a handful of things start writing fanfics thinking "I'll improve this work by changing what I personally hated about it and adding in whatever I think is cool" without getting what made him hate those things. Like a Na-
*clears throat*
Like making a MLPFIM fic where, because you find Fluttershy annoying, you make her get over her shyness instantly even though this makes her less distinct from her friends who you liked way more, and even though it means you can't write stories where Fluttershy's shyness causes problems for herself and others any more. Also he randomly throws in cars because he thinks cars are awesome. A lot of bad authors think changing something they subjectively didn't like to something they subjectively do like or forcing in an answer to a question nobody asked (or a question that was only raised because the author left things half-finished) will objectively improve the fic. I'll admit, I'm guilty of that.
Hell, Kkat did it with the horse DJ.
That would sound really weird out of context.
DJ 3-Dog from Fallout 3 has no backstory, no deep lore or characterization, no significant role in the world, andd no justification to exist. He hangs out in one room all day doing fuck all, and his radio broadcasts must be pre-recorded because you can hear him say the same 17 things on the radio over and over even if you're staring right at him in his room and watching him do nothing. He has a radio station but how he got it and the radio's songs is never explained. He'll omnisciently observe you, the player, and comment on your actions over the radio. How he watches you and always knows what you did is never explained. Also he's ugly.
Tenpenny Tower is a fancy hotel tower near Megaton full of rich cunts. The boss wants Megaton blown up for no reason. It produces nothing when it comes to resources and really shouldn't be the dream home for rich people that it is. Bethesda almost always forgets the most basic worldbuilding question, "What do they eat?".
Kkat's attempt to improve these separate near-universally-hated Fallout 3 elements turned Tenpenny Tower into a former Ministry Of Twilight's Science emergency broadcast tower that's also an omniscient surveillance tower. It's also got a self-sustaining settlement for the rich with harsh laws and a spa, and it presumably sustains itself through trade (even though Kkat forgets about the raiders infesting the city outside and how they'd prey upon travellers and especially travelling traders with trading caravans full of good shit)
The tower's DJ is Homage, a DJ-Pon3 imitator whose family has imitated that pony for generations even though she canonically died underground in the Crusaders Maneframe AI Gone Wild stable. The family's only spell is the voice gender changing spell, specifically for imitating DJ Pon3.
Where did the DJ get music from? The DJ pays ponies for records, and sometimes sends friends on life-threatening missions to get them.
What does the DJ do in her spare time? 3-Dog did nothing, but DJ Pon3 loves reading some of the banned anti-Equestrian books that were burned/censored by Rarity yet still had copies of them sent to Twilight for safekeeping. (I'm surprised this isn't the origin of the radio's music collection. then again this would fill the airwaves with songs Rarity and her Ministry Of Image wanted to censor/burn)
The DJ's all-knowing nature is "explained" by the tech she uses, but how she/her family got this tech is never explained. What being raised to be a literal fucking "Homage" to a 200 year old pony who was gunned down in her prime psychologically did to this radio whore is never explained.
"What do these rich people eat?" is answered with "These rich idiots make seemingly-fancy food out of 200 year old pre-war canned shite", but there is no deep character exploration there. The laws are very harsh and inconsistently applied and Monty Jack is forced by the hand of the author to sign his own death warrant just so Kkat can display this.
Desperately trying to act rich and civilized even if they have no true idea what that is, eating 200 year old canned dog food and pretending it's flay minion, and religiously following laws even if they make no sense to the point where a citizen here feels the urge to confess to a crime out of pride and guilt but mostly his own pride over "never lying no matter what"... This would make a great gimmick or "Hat" for a settlement of idiots and frauds in the middle of a post-apocalyptic wasteland if Kkat realized the story potential and comedic potential of this idea. Bethesda tended to write things as weird/dumb/quirky/gimmicky for the sake of being weird/dumb/quirky/gimmicky, so Kkat likely saw nothing wrong with this style of writing and this settlement's gimmick since Bethesda's gimmick-focused writing style wasn't complained about as loudly as Tenpenny Tower and the Ghouls who want to invade it, how often the writers forgot to say what characters ate, and the FUCKING IDIOTIC main questline.
Well, then, I finally caught up to this thread. I was left behind late in the Sun and Rose review and I've essentially spent the past week getting through this monument to autism. I wouldn't say it was a slog, what with the clever jokes, and it was definitely worth it because I've picked up quite a few tips for a derivative fiction I plan to write. It's a video game crossover so your advice regarding this has been especially illuminating. It would be interesting to compare the length of these review threads to the actual work itself; I'd bet it's close to a 1:1 ratio. Fortunately these reviews make it largely unnecessary to read the source work itself.
Although it's far too late in the fandom's life to "take FOE down a peg" it would be very satisfying to see someone write a MLP/Fallout crossover that casts shade on this mutant abomination of a fanfic. Heck, in the improbable event this review becomes well-known you could probably put it into a written book as an act of spite to kkat.
I was the faggot who originally suggested The Sun and the Rose because I remembered it as a "really good story," and your review made much more aware of all the problems it has. I hope I'm not making the same mistake, but I hope that to take a break from the garbage pile you might review "Stardust." It's a MLP/XCOM crossover and is more geared around character interaction with some action. Maybe this one is actually good.
>>302281
Thank you for this post, it manages to encapsulate a very serious problem. I really do hope you finish FOE, as painful as it is. It's like conducting an autopsy of an elephant; it's much harder than being a coroner for a human but you can't exactly stop halfway. Others suggested fanfics of this fanfic though and I hope you give a pass on those or we'll be reviewing those until the actual apocalypse.
>>302428
>>302452
At first I was laughing but this is just pathetic. He's only a couple steps above Chris-Chan.
Anyway, time to sleep. It feels like I went through several years' worth of content.
Although it's far too late in the fandom's life to "take FOE down a peg" it would be very satisfying to see someone write a MLP/Fallout crossover that casts shade on this mutant abomination of a fanfic. Heck, in the improbable event this review becomes well-known you could probably put it into a written book as an act of spite to kkat.
I was the faggot who originally suggested The Sun and the Rose because I remembered it as a "really good story," and your review made much more aware of all the problems it has. I hope I'm not making the same mistake, but I hope that to take a break from the garbage pile you might review "Stardust." It's a MLP/XCOM crossover and is more geared around character interaction with some action. Maybe this one is actually good.
>>302281
Thank you for this post, it manages to encapsulate a very serious problem. I really do hope you finish FOE, as painful as it is. It's like conducting an autopsy of an elephant; it's much harder than being a coroner for a human but you can't exactly stop halfway. Others suggested fanfics of this fanfic though and I hope you give a pass on those or we'll be reviewing those until the actual apocalypse.
>>302428
>>302452
At first I was laughing but this is just pathetic. He's only a couple steps above Chris-Chan.
Anyway, time to sleep. It feels like I went through several years' worth of content.
1614526921.png (5.7 MB, 2796x1812, HardResetTwilightBeatingUpChangelings.png)
I would very much like it if Glim could do "shorts" for some smaller works where he just lists the issues in one or two posts rather than a play-by-play. For example, I read "Hard Reset" (just 37.5k words) in the space of an evening and it was very solid for the most part in my opinion. Where it went wrong is the stupid plot of Twilight being a carpet-muncher and the long and boring "Closure" chapter which did a half-baked attempt at moralizing while introducing a new conflict after the story climax. However the alternate ending was very satisfactory and I wish it was the canon ending.
>>302642
over 30k words in one day? Nice bro
>everyone
it just dawned on me that DJ Cuntmachine is the only child of a family that has autistically impersonated a long dead DJ for over 200 years during the apocalypse while somehow inheriting the Future-Fantasy/Dystopia surveillance and Emergency Radio Broadcast shit in a tower she doesn't own or control. Her family has a secret ancient technique passed down the family line for generations and it's a spell that changes the gender of your voice. If you listen closely you can hear the bugs-up-the-ass weirdos of the Aburame Clan laugh at this family and their obsession with a DJ who for all we know could be one of a million DJs. Sure she was special enough to play at Cadence's party... at least I think she was? Anyway she's a DJ not a fucking rockstar. It's not like she invented a musical genre or made it mainstream and was more popular than Micheal Jackson and Freddy Mercury and BTS and The Beatles combined. The bizarre life of an extreme celebrity impersonator was forced upon her at birth and she was groomed for this like insert muslim child grooming and child trafficking and child rape gang joke here. This DJ has no living family and no parents watching her every move or forcing her to continue their legacy. She doesn't seem psychologically affected by the circumstances of her life because she is not a character with characterization and a backstory, she is a plot device with flimsy justifications for existing in her current state. The ravages of time and nukes fucked assorted cities and turned them into dumps but these radio towers survived nuking. Zebras never tried to sabotage these.
The first time Homage the DJ Pon3 Impersonator meets Littleshit, you'd think she would have some Wizard Of Oz "pony behind the curtain" shit going on. Like with House and the secret in his basement. But... nope. DJ Grooves over here happily shows the murderhobo everything she could very easily steal right from the unarmed and helpless record-switching glorified twitch streamer. The DJ doesn't have armed guards or robots or gun turrets. LP doesn't have to complete a small and umimportant and inconsequential mission to gain the DJ's trust before the DJ trusts her with private intel and incredibly important time-sensitive missions that could end in disaster if fucked up. The DJ simply gives LP a small and unimportant and inconsequential mission and LP says "lmao sure why not I'm bored anyway and I have nothing better to do". It's not like LP protests and says she wants to kill raiders/slavers now because killing them now means saving people they would rob or rape if left unmolested. It's not like the DJ tries to defend her music-focused priorities by saying "every time we get new music we get new listeners and that means more poners listening to my moral judgement of the world and my survival tips and my requests for help. I can guide the Wasteland into a brighter future if more poners follow me. So go get me some big fucking records and then I'll tell you where the biggest raider camps are or what the fastest route to Fillydelphia is or whatever else you want". And while the DJ on the radio had complaints about LP saving Shattered Hoof Prison And Rock Breakery And Mine a while back, she won't bring it up now or ask LP why she worked for the place and saved it from a raider attack back then. Kkat knows the answer is uninteresting and the reward is inconsequential so DJ Knockoff The 69th doesn't even bother asking this question.
Finally, the DJ has a radio tower system that functions perfectly and sees everything. You'd think the Enclave would kill to get those towers and get their own radio message broadcast over the airwaves but they'd rather do barely anything for 200 years and wait around until the little girl hero of this generic young adult novel is able to stop them. You'd think the Enclave would have taken over such an incredibly useful all-seeing radio system by now to watch everyone, keep an eye on rebels and Dashites, and spread their propaganda in the form of a Pegasus radio station called True Flapitalist Radio. But sadly Kkat didn't think of that.
Kkat's world building is highly convenient, absurdly unrealistic, quite illogical, and so shallow that it's less than skin deep. Would it be correct to call the complaints I mentioned bad writing?
over 30k words in one day? Nice bro
>everyone
it just dawned on me that DJ Cuntmachine is the only child of a family that has autistically impersonated a long dead DJ for over 200 years during the apocalypse while somehow inheriting the Future-Fantasy/Dystopia surveillance and Emergency Radio Broadcast shit in a tower she doesn't own or control. Her family has a secret ancient technique passed down the family line for generations and it's a spell that changes the gender of your voice. If you listen closely you can hear the bugs-up-the-ass weirdos of the Aburame Clan laugh at this family and their obsession with a DJ who for all we know could be one of a million DJs. Sure she was special enough to play at Cadence's party... at least I think she was? Anyway she's a DJ not a fucking rockstar. It's not like she invented a musical genre or made it mainstream and was more popular than Micheal Jackson and Freddy Mercury and BTS and The Beatles combined. The bizarre life of an extreme celebrity impersonator was forced upon her at birth and she was groomed for this like insert muslim child grooming and child trafficking and child rape gang joke here. This DJ has no living family and no parents watching her every move or forcing her to continue their legacy. She doesn't seem psychologically affected by the circumstances of her life because she is not a character with characterization and a backstory, she is a plot device with flimsy justifications for existing in her current state. The ravages of time and nukes fucked assorted cities and turned them into dumps but these radio towers survived nuking. Zebras never tried to sabotage these.
The first time Homage the DJ Pon3 Impersonator meets Littleshit, you'd think she would have some Wizard Of Oz "pony behind the curtain" shit going on. Like with House and the secret in his basement. But... nope. DJ Grooves over here happily shows the murderhobo everything she could very easily steal right from the unarmed and helpless record-switching glorified twitch streamer. The DJ doesn't have armed guards or robots or gun turrets. LP doesn't have to complete a small and umimportant and inconsequential mission to gain the DJ's trust before the DJ trusts her with private intel and incredibly important time-sensitive missions that could end in disaster if fucked up. The DJ simply gives LP a small and unimportant and inconsequential mission and LP says "lmao sure why not I'm bored anyway and I have nothing better to do". It's not like LP protests and says she wants to kill raiders/slavers now because killing them now means saving people they would rob or rape if left unmolested. It's not like the DJ tries to defend her music-focused priorities by saying "every time we get new music we get new listeners and that means more poners listening to my moral judgement of the world and my survival tips and my requests for help. I can guide the Wasteland into a brighter future if more poners follow me. So go get me some big fucking records and then I'll tell you where the biggest raider camps are or what the fastest route to Fillydelphia is or whatever else you want". And while the DJ on the radio had complaints about LP saving Shattered Hoof Prison And Rock Breakery And Mine a while back, she won't bring it up now or ask LP why she worked for the place and saved it from a raider attack back then. Kkat knows the answer is uninteresting and the reward is inconsequential so DJ Knockoff The 69th doesn't even bother asking this question.
Finally, the DJ has a radio tower system that functions perfectly and sees everything. You'd think the Enclave would kill to get those towers and get their own radio message broadcast over the airwaves but they'd rather do barely anything for 200 years and wait around until the little girl hero of this generic young adult novel is able to stop them. You'd think the Enclave would have taken over such an incredibly useful all-seeing radio system by now to watch everyone, keep an eye on rebels and Dashites, and spread their propaganda in the form of a Pegasus radio station called True Flapitalist Radio. But sadly Kkat didn't think of that.
Kkat's world building is highly convenient, absurdly unrealistic, quite illogical, and so shallow that it's less than skin deep. Would it be correct to call the complaints I mentioned bad writing?
>>302660
That's a long fic and there's a lot about it I don't remember. I'm mostly sure I read it once.
From what I remember Project Horizons' biggest flaw is its fixation on being a bigger and "better" and darker and edgier and grimmer and bleaker and "sexier" and explodier and body horrorier take on this godawful fanfic's setting. Not just a different take on the concept that made it but a continuation and fan tribute to this setting forced to abide by its canon.
In Fallout Equestria's attempt to one-up canon Fallout locations and monsters it often lost what made them unique. Look at how the story turns Enclave Propaganda Eyebots into pre-war Pinkie Pie's polka-playing spy drones or what the story does to Deathclaws for examples of what I mean. What would an attempt to one-up that look like?
Overall, PH is undoubtedly a better story and setting than Fallout Equestria even though it's full of teenage edge. However it would have been improved vastly if its author had the courage to stand on his own and write his own take on the "one became the other" style of Fallout and FIM crossover instead of trying to compromise his vision with Kkat's. Moments where LP and Blackjack team up aren't worth whatever improvements could have been there if its author wasn't bound by Kkat's terrible decisions.
That's a long fic and there's a lot about it I don't remember. I'm mostly sure I read it once.
From what I remember Project Horizons' biggest flaw is its fixation on being a bigger and "better" and darker and edgier and grimmer and bleaker and "sexier" and explodier and body horrorier take on this godawful fanfic's setting. Not just a different take on the concept that made it but a continuation and fan tribute to this setting forced to abide by its canon.
In Fallout Equestria's attempt to one-up canon Fallout locations and monsters it often lost what made them unique. Look at how the story turns Enclave Propaganda Eyebots into pre-war Pinkie Pie's polka-playing spy drones or what the story does to Deathclaws for examples of what I mean. What would an attempt to one-up that look like?
Overall, PH is undoubtedly a better story and setting than Fallout Equestria even though it's full of teenage edge. However it would have been improved vastly if its author had the courage to stand on his own and write his own take on the "one became the other" style of Fallout and FIM crossover instead of trying to compromise his vision with Kkat's. Moments where LP and Blackjack team up aren't worth whatever improvements could have been there if its author wasn't bound by Kkat's terrible decisions.
>>302688
This. I can't speak for GlimGlam and he can decide what he wants to review, but Fallout Equestria is tiring him out and the mistakes it has are probably the same mistakes contained in derivative works. He could go over how to or how not to write something based on a fan-made universe, but there are a lot of other fanfictions-or, "works of derivative fiction"-out there to analyze. Variety is the spice of life, after all.
This. I can't speak for GlimGlam and he can decide what he wants to review, but Fallout Equestria is tiring him out and the mistakes it has are probably the same mistakes contained in derivative works. He could go over how to or how not to write something based on a fan-made universe, but there are a lot of other fanfictions-or, "works of derivative fiction"-out there to analyze. Variety is the spice of life, after all.
>>302691
I'm conflicted on it as well but seems he wants to finish off this beast. Makes me really hope he doesn't try Project Horizons though or else we'll be here for a few years stuck on the same damn story. Not sure where to send them but got 2 stories I'd be curious to see him review.
I'm conflicted on it as well but seems he wants to finish off this beast. Makes me really hope he doesn't try Project Horizons though or else we'll be here for a few years stuck on the same damn story. Not sure where to send them but got 2 stories I'd be curious to see him review.
>>302294
There is a bit of a kerfuffle as they try to decide how to get across the bridge; this is mostly related to Littlepoop's fear of heights, which seems to be the latest trait the author has decided to graft onto her character. They ultimately settle on a plan where Velvet is to go first in order to test the sturdiness of the bridge, with Calamity waiting to catch her in case she falls. After this, SteelHooves will walk across assisted by LP's levitation, followed by Calamity flying Littlepoop across. Velvet is able to cross without incident, and then this happens:
>I spotted the broken scaffolding that had once held the giant Red Racer scooter several floors above. Nesting within it were the dark, leathery shapes of bloodwings. The sun had sunk fully beneath the horizon, the light was vanishing from the sky, and they were beginning to move.
"Bloodwings" have been mentioned in passing before: the DJ spoke about Chief something-or-other being attacked by a group of them in one of her reports. However, this is the first time they've actually factored into the story to a degree that we would need to actually know what they are. As ever, kkat provides no description of these creatures; we are simply told that bloodwings appear and attack the party. As ever, it's also unclear how or why Littlepoop, who spent her entire life living in an underground stable, would be any more familiar with such creatures than we are.
Anyway, the "bloodwings" attack as SteelHooves crosses the bridge. LP actually attempts to snipe them from a distance before they can attack, but SteelHooves starts crossing before she is able to. He only gets a couple of steps onto the bridge before they start swarming, so one would reasonably expect him to just step back and wait to cross until the fight is over, but instead he keeps on walking. This means that LP now has to split her attention between shooting at a bunch of flying whatever-the-fucks, while simultaneously semi-levitating him to keep him from putting too much weight on the bridge. Since he can't be much heavier than a train car, I don't see why she can't just levitate him all the way across and forget about the dumb bridge; for that matter she could just levitate herself over as well, since she's canonically done that already. However, that would fuck up the dramatic scene the author has in mind, so we have no choice but to accept that she suddenly can't do either of these things because reasons.
At one point, she actually loses hold of SteelHooves, and he has to cross the rest of the way on his own. However, the bridge holds and he makes it across. Then, for reasons we will never know, LP decides to cross on her own while being divebombed by bloodwings, instead of just waiting until the fight is over and letting Calamity carry her as they had planned. She makes it partway across, and then naturally a bloodwing slams into her and dislodges the whole bridge. Incidentally, as far as I can tell these things are something like giant bats. Whether or not they have any relation to the giant bats we saw earlier, the ones that were hiding under the track at the monorail junction a little while ago (you may not remember them since they were mentioned but never actually did anything), is not explained.
The bridge falls away with her still crossing it. Through some ghastly rape of the laws of physics, she is able to levitate herself partially and somehow make it to a window a story or two below where the others are at. She crashes through the glass and loses consciousness.
When she comes to, she finds herself in some sort of conference room. A manticore who just happens to be in there sees her, picks her up, and carries her off. She is able to retrieve her sniper rifle from somewhere nearby, but instead of just shooting the manticore, she decides to see where it is taking her, for reasons we will never truly comprehend. This is the justification she offers for her decision:
>I needed to go someplace myself, and with any luck it would be the same someplace. Either way, as much as being carried by my mane hurt, I didn’t want to walk anywhere either.
Well then, that answers that. I prefer to travel in the jaws of a carnivorous mythical beast whenever possible myself.
For some reason, the manticore takes her to the factory part of the building (you'll recall she's in the scooter factory now), which for some reason contains a bunch of cages, which for some reason all have pony corpses in them. Since they are corpses and not skeletons, I'm assuming that whatever is going on here is some sort of current fuckery, rather than some ancient fuckery from the past. We are told there are manticores patrolling between the cages like guard dogs.
>My captor leaned over the edge of the balcony and opened its mouth, dropping me through the open ceiling of one of the cages. I landed in a thin layer of hay with a heavy, painful thump.
Yes, it was clearly a sensible move to just let the manticore carry her off in its jaws. She could not possibly have predicted that anything bad might happen as a result.
Anyway, she chugs a healing potion because she has one because why not, and lies there in a cage resting and waiting for her wounds to heal. She looks at the cage across from her and, in a preposterous coincidence worthy of Dickens if he had written shitty pony fiction, she sees that the occupant of the cage is the same mare that they saved earlier, the one who was about to get raped by a single colt barely half her size. Littlepoop is now filled with sorrow because she didn't walk the mare all the way home like a gentlepony. The mare informs Littlepoop that apparently a mad scientist has trained a bunch of manticores to round up ponies and put them into cages, so that they can be tortured to death because reasons. Yes, believe it or not, all of this autism is actually in the text.
There is a bit of a kerfuffle as they try to decide how to get across the bridge; this is mostly related to Littlepoop's fear of heights, which seems to be the latest trait the author has decided to graft onto her character. They ultimately settle on a plan where Velvet is to go first in order to test the sturdiness of the bridge, with Calamity waiting to catch her in case she falls. After this, SteelHooves will walk across assisted by LP's levitation, followed by Calamity flying Littlepoop across. Velvet is able to cross without incident, and then this happens:
>I spotted the broken scaffolding that had once held the giant Red Racer scooter several floors above. Nesting within it were the dark, leathery shapes of bloodwings. The sun had sunk fully beneath the horizon, the light was vanishing from the sky, and they were beginning to move.
"Bloodwings" have been mentioned in passing before: the DJ spoke about Chief something-or-other being attacked by a group of them in one of her reports. However, this is the first time they've actually factored into the story to a degree that we would need to actually know what they are. As ever, kkat provides no description of these creatures; we are simply told that bloodwings appear and attack the party. As ever, it's also unclear how or why Littlepoop, who spent her entire life living in an underground stable, would be any more familiar with such creatures than we are.
Anyway, the "bloodwings" attack as SteelHooves crosses the bridge. LP actually attempts to snipe them from a distance before they can attack, but SteelHooves starts crossing before she is able to. He only gets a couple of steps onto the bridge before they start swarming, so one would reasonably expect him to just step back and wait to cross until the fight is over, but instead he keeps on walking. This means that LP now has to split her attention between shooting at a bunch of flying whatever-the-fucks, while simultaneously semi-levitating him to keep him from putting too much weight on the bridge. Since he can't be much heavier than a train car, I don't see why she can't just levitate him all the way across and forget about the dumb bridge; for that matter she could just levitate herself over as well, since she's canonically done that already. However, that would fuck up the dramatic scene the author has in mind, so we have no choice but to accept that she suddenly can't do either of these things because reasons.
At one point, she actually loses hold of SteelHooves, and he has to cross the rest of the way on his own. However, the bridge holds and he makes it across. Then, for reasons we will never know, LP decides to cross on her own while being divebombed by bloodwings, instead of just waiting until the fight is over and letting Calamity carry her as they had planned. She makes it partway across, and then naturally a bloodwing slams into her and dislodges the whole bridge. Incidentally, as far as I can tell these things are something like giant bats. Whether or not they have any relation to the giant bats we saw earlier, the ones that were hiding under the track at the monorail junction a little while ago (you may not remember them since they were mentioned but never actually did anything), is not explained.
The bridge falls away with her still crossing it. Through some ghastly rape of the laws of physics, she is able to levitate herself partially and somehow make it to a window a story or two below where the others are at. She crashes through the glass and loses consciousness.
When she comes to, she finds herself in some sort of conference room. A manticore who just happens to be in there sees her, picks her up, and carries her off. She is able to retrieve her sniper rifle from somewhere nearby, but instead of just shooting the manticore, she decides to see where it is taking her, for reasons we will never truly comprehend. This is the justification she offers for her decision:
>I needed to go someplace myself, and with any luck it would be the same someplace. Either way, as much as being carried by my mane hurt, I didn’t want to walk anywhere either.
Well then, that answers that. I prefer to travel in the jaws of a carnivorous mythical beast whenever possible myself.
For some reason, the manticore takes her to the factory part of the building (you'll recall she's in the scooter factory now), which for some reason contains a bunch of cages, which for some reason all have pony corpses in them. Since they are corpses and not skeletons, I'm assuming that whatever is going on here is some sort of current fuckery, rather than some ancient fuckery from the past. We are told there are manticores patrolling between the cages like guard dogs.
>My captor leaned over the edge of the balcony and opened its mouth, dropping me through the open ceiling of one of the cages. I landed in a thin layer of hay with a heavy, painful thump.
Yes, it was clearly a sensible move to just let the manticore carry her off in its jaws. She could not possibly have predicted that anything bad might happen as a result.
Anyway, she chugs a healing potion because she has one because why not, and lies there in a cage resting and waiting for her wounds to heal. She looks at the cage across from her and, in a preposterous coincidence worthy of Dickens if he had written shitty pony fiction, she sees that the occupant of the cage is the same mare that they saved earlier, the one who was about to get raped by a single colt barely half her size. Littlepoop is now filled with sorrow because she didn't walk the mare all the way home like a gentlepony. The mare informs Littlepoop that apparently a mad scientist has trained a bunch of manticores to round up ponies and put them into cages, so that they can be tortured to death because reasons. Yes, believe it or not, all of this autism is actually in the text.
>>302781
>I stood up, looking down the rows of cages. Dozens of pony faces stared back at me, most with expressions of horror and despair. Some looked to me hopefully. Other ponies looked at me with pity and a heartbreaking acceptance that soon they would die, desecrated and screaming, and there was nothing to be done about it. Two ponies stared at nothing, their minds unable to deal with what was happening in here.
So basically, here is the situation: another generically evil baddie is rounding up ponies using a bunch of fucking trained manticores, locking them up in cages, and conducting weird medical experiments on them because...he's bored, I guess. The ponies in question are mostly just sitting around looking sad and dejected waiting to die. It should come as no surprise that Littlepoop, who for some reason is the only pony with guns despite the fact that the manticores obviously don't bother to strip weapons from their captives, is not going to stand for this. Her murderboner thus engaged, she proceeds to use the sniper rifle, which her captor didn't bother to strip her of, to pick off the manticores one at a time from inside the goddamn cage.
Once all of the manticores are dead, it's simply a matter of picking the lock to the door of her cage, which of course she is also able to do without any trouble whatsoever. One might think that all of the noise she's made, shooting at manticores and setting them on fire with magic bullets and so forth, might attract the attention of the mad doctor in the next fucking room, but apparently he is too busy conducting his weird torture experiments to notice. LP sets the mare across from her free, and asks her where she might find the mad doctor's evil laboratory. She then sets all the other imprisoned ponies free and tells them to sit tight while she goes and deals with Dr. Horsef Mengele.
>With that, I crouched down and begin to move towards the lab. As soon as I’d left the factory floor, I activated one of the StealthBucks. This doctor wasn’t going to see me coming.
I would once again like to emphasize that she has made enough noise getting rid of the manticores that probably everypony in a ten block radius of this building must have heard it. The text even specifically mentions that she made a fuckton of noise. However, the evil doctor apparently still didn't hear her, so stealth is still a viable approach to this situation.
>I slid past another manticore, making a mental note of where it was so I could kill it after dealing with the doctor. I didn’t want to make any more noise now than I already had.
When kkat dies, presumably of AIDS, I hope that the morticians have enough sense to preserve his brain, so that future generations of scientists might one day dissect and study it. This is not your every day garden variety autism here; we're pretty much dealing with a whole new spectrum.
Anyway, Littlepoop stealths her way past a bunch of manticores and whatever the fuck else, and finds a pair of double doors leading to the factory's medical clinic. She goes inside, and finds that it has since been converted into a mad scientist laboratory, complete with all the usual over-the-top edgelord scenery we've come to expect. Blood, guts, torture, horribly mutilated corpses; it's all here, folks. The mad doctor himself appears to be a ghoul pony. As far as I can tell, his experiments have something to do with trying to figure out why the manticores are apparently immune to the toxic effects of kkat's taint.
>He spun to the dead buck on the medical bed. Trotting up to him, the doctor whispered encouragingly, “Won’t be long now. Every pony is going to remember you. All of you. And, most of all, me. We’re going to give the ponies of Equestria the cure for Taint! I think I’ll call it Taint-Away…”
This story is so ridiculous it's essentially immune from parody. The most brilliant satirist in the world could not come up with anything more ridiculous than what the author actually wrote.
Anyway, the doctor also has a memory orb nearby. Despite the fact that LP could easily just cap this retard and be done with it, she instead decides to sneak his memory orb away from him while he's not looking and have a glimpse inside. I'm still a little curious what happens to her body while she's poking around inside these things, anyway; seems like this would be a pretty inopportune moment to be unconscious and defenseless. But then again, she was dumb enough to just let a manticore walk away with her in its jaws, so who knows? At this point she may even be aware that she is the Author's Chosen, and is therefore protected from any ill that could possibly befall her.
This orb proves to be one of the goofiest ones we've seen so far. The point of view is neither pony nor any other sort of sentient creature; the entire scene is observed from the perspective of a camera hidden inside a Sparkle Cola bottle. Yes, you read that correctly. To me, this completely defeats the purpose of a memory orb; the whole idea as I understand it is that the orbs contain the memories of a sentient creature. A spy camera could just record directly to some sort of audio-visual medium, like the cassette recordings we've seen so far.
Anyway, the scene appears to take place in Scootaloo's office at the scooter factory. We see a much older Scoot and some unicorn assistant who works for her sweeping the place for bugs from the Ministry of Morale. Apparently neither of them think to check the cola bottle which is the actual spy device. The bottle ultimately ends up in a nearby wastebasket, and the rest of the scene is audio-only.
The unicorn, whose name is Peek-a-Boo, leaves, and Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom enter the scene. Apparently, inter-agency spying is now common in Equestria, and the three have to take extra security steps to avoid being spied on by the MoM. The first portion of their conversation consists mostly of them complaining about this.
>I stood up, looking down the rows of cages. Dozens of pony faces stared back at me, most with expressions of horror and despair. Some looked to me hopefully. Other ponies looked at me with pity and a heartbreaking acceptance that soon they would die, desecrated and screaming, and there was nothing to be done about it. Two ponies stared at nothing, their minds unable to deal with what was happening in here.
So basically, here is the situation: another generically evil baddie is rounding up ponies using a bunch of fucking trained manticores, locking them up in cages, and conducting weird medical experiments on them because...he's bored, I guess. The ponies in question are mostly just sitting around looking sad and dejected waiting to die. It should come as no surprise that Littlepoop, who for some reason is the only pony with guns despite the fact that the manticores obviously don't bother to strip weapons from their captives, is not going to stand for this. Her murderboner thus engaged, she proceeds to use the sniper rifle, which her captor didn't bother to strip her of, to pick off the manticores one at a time from inside the goddamn cage.
Once all of the manticores are dead, it's simply a matter of picking the lock to the door of her cage, which of course she is also able to do without any trouble whatsoever. One might think that all of the noise she's made, shooting at manticores and setting them on fire with magic bullets and so forth, might attract the attention of the mad doctor in the next fucking room, but apparently he is too busy conducting his weird torture experiments to notice. LP sets the mare across from her free, and asks her where she might find the mad doctor's evil laboratory. She then sets all the other imprisoned ponies free and tells them to sit tight while she goes and deals with Dr. Horsef Mengele.
>With that, I crouched down and begin to move towards the lab. As soon as I’d left the factory floor, I activated one of the StealthBucks. This doctor wasn’t going to see me coming.
I would once again like to emphasize that she has made enough noise getting rid of the manticores that probably everypony in a ten block radius of this building must have heard it. The text even specifically mentions that she made a fuckton of noise. However, the evil doctor apparently still didn't hear her, so stealth is still a viable approach to this situation.
>I slid past another manticore, making a mental note of where it was so I could kill it after dealing with the doctor. I didn’t want to make any more noise now than I already had.
When kkat dies, presumably of AIDS, I hope that the morticians have enough sense to preserve his brain, so that future generations of scientists might one day dissect and study it. This is not your every day garden variety autism here; we're pretty much dealing with a whole new spectrum.
Anyway, Littlepoop stealths her way past a bunch of manticores and whatever the fuck else, and finds a pair of double doors leading to the factory's medical clinic. She goes inside, and finds that it has since been converted into a mad scientist laboratory, complete with all the usual over-the-top edgelord scenery we've come to expect. Blood, guts, torture, horribly mutilated corpses; it's all here, folks. The mad doctor himself appears to be a ghoul pony. As far as I can tell, his experiments have something to do with trying to figure out why the manticores are apparently immune to the toxic effects of kkat's taint.
>He spun to the dead buck on the medical bed. Trotting up to him, the doctor whispered encouragingly, “Won’t be long now. Every pony is going to remember you. All of you. And, most of all, me. We’re going to give the ponies of Equestria the cure for Taint! I think I’ll call it Taint-Away…”
This story is so ridiculous it's essentially immune from parody. The most brilliant satirist in the world could not come up with anything more ridiculous than what the author actually wrote.
Anyway, the doctor also has a memory orb nearby. Despite the fact that LP could easily just cap this retard and be done with it, she instead decides to sneak his memory orb away from him while he's not looking and have a glimpse inside. I'm still a little curious what happens to her body while she's poking around inside these things, anyway; seems like this would be a pretty inopportune moment to be unconscious and defenseless. But then again, she was dumb enough to just let a manticore walk away with her in its jaws, so who knows? At this point she may even be aware that she is the Author's Chosen, and is therefore protected from any ill that could possibly befall her.
This orb proves to be one of the goofiest ones we've seen so far. The point of view is neither pony nor any other sort of sentient creature; the entire scene is observed from the perspective of a camera hidden inside a Sparkle Cola bottle. Yes, you read that correctly. To me, this completely defeats the purpose of a memory orb; the whole idea as I understand it is that the orbs contain the memories of a sentient creature. A spy camera could just record directly to some sort of audio-visual medium, like the cassette recordings we've seen so far.
Anyway, the scene appears to take place in Scootaloo's office at the scooter factory. We see a much older Scoot and some unicorn assistant who works for her sweeping the place for bugs from the Ministry of Morale. Apparently neither of them think to check the cola bottle which is the actual spy device. The bottle ultimately ends up in a nearby wastebasket, and the rest of the scene is audio-only.
The unicorn, whose name is Peek-a-Boo, leaves, and Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom enter the scene. Apparently, inter-agency spying is now common in Equestria, and the three have to take extra security steps to avoid being spied on by the MoM. The first portion of their conversation consists mostly of them complaining about this.
>>302783
Anyway, there appears to be some sort of covert civil war going on in Equestria; either that or the CMC's company, Stable-Tec, is somehow at odds with the government. I'm not 100% clear on the details. In any event, the implication seems to be that several of the ministries are hostile. Pinkie Pie, who heads the Ministry of Morale, is mentioned by name, and though Sweetie Belle speaks in her sister's defense, Rarity's Ministry of Image is also implicated by Scootaloo as one of the "bad" ministries. Applejack and Rainbow Dash are both explicitly mentioned as being "still good."
The present discussion seems to involve the deployment of the stables. Presumably, the end is nigh or neigh at this point, and the company has begun the process of moving ponies into the stables to await the coming apocalypse. As far as I can tell, Apple Bloom is the main designer of the stables, but Scootaloo has made modifications to AB's designs on certain specific stables in order to accommodate "experiments." There is some argument between Scoot and AB as to whether or not this is necessary. AB argues that her designs were optimal and that changing them will reduce chances of survival for the ponies inside; Scoot seems to acknowledge this, but points out that the stables need to be adapted to the parameters of the experiments. Both seem to be in agreement on the overall necessity of the experiments, though it isn't clearly explained what the experiments are trying to achieve.
From what we've observed of the stables overall, we can probably assume that Stable-Tec was running sociological experiments to determine what the optimal form of government would be for the post-apocalyptic world. The implication seems to be that the current system has broken down, and Stable-Tec wants to try and correct whatever mistakes led to the present situation. That is my best assessment of what is going on, at any rate.
The overall concern of the other two is that if their experiments are discovered they will be blamed by the government, which as far as I can tell is mostly run by their older sisters at this point. Scootaloo basically says that she is prepared to take the fall for this:
>“And if I have to become the villain of the piece to do that, then I will.”
This seems to be the meaning of the chapter's title.
There is also some rather vague rambling about how everything has gone to shit, and how they want to prevent it from happening again. However, no particulars are clarified. The memory ends here.
In a clever twist that should surprise no one, LP awakens to find that the effects of her StealthBuck wore off while she was inside the memory orb, and the mad doctor has since strapped her down to the examination table. Seriously, does Edgequestria have something along the lines of a Darwin Award? Because if so, I'd like to nominate her for one; her behavior since the bridge incident has been even stupider than usual.
>Now I was on the medical table, bound in chains. My weapons had been removed and stashed, probably nearby but still out of sight. I was still wearing my armored utility barding. It was soaked in blood from the slashes across my chest and I was woozy from loss of blood.
It's not clear whether these slashes were done by the doctor, or if these were just wounds that Littlepoop had already. The doctor, for his part, doesn't seem to question what this strange pony was doing skulking around his office, armed to the teeth and using a StealthBuck to sneak past his manticore guards. If he had, it might have occurred to him to go into the next fucking room and observe that all of his guards had been shot, and his captives are all free. Presumably they have followed LP's instructions and are just milling around in the general vicinity of their cages, waiting for LP to come back. Incidentally, the fact that all of these retards are apparently still depending on her to come back and escort them out of the facility makes LP's behavior in the doctor's office even more reckless and stupid.
However, fortunately(?) for her, the mad doctor is as much of a brainless dullard as every other villain or hero, for that matter in this story has been. Instead of investigating or at least questioning any of this, he just rolls with it and continues performing his experiments, right up until the moment when the mare that LP rescued sneaks up on him from behind and shoots him with the poison dart gun that she obtained from...somewhere. I'm not even going to bother asking where; all of the turbo-autism in this chapter is starting to give me a headache.
>She turned, looked down, and started stomping furiously on the ghoul doctor. I heard the skull crack and splinter. The pony seemed to be taking out all her hurt and rage on the ghoul, stomping and stomping and stomping long after he must have been dead.
>It took me time to float out my screwdriver and a bobby pin and unlock each of my chains. They were easy locks, but I was wounded and alarmingly lightheaded. I broke three bobby pins before I was through. All that time, the sea-blue pony slammed her hooves down on what was now more paste than a body.
>She didn’t stop until I wrapped her in a hug and held her.
Does the author realize how ridiculous any of this actually is? I mean this as a serious question. If he were simply trying to have fun with his subject matter and write a campy, over-the-top adventure story that you were meant to chuckle at I might be able to forgive some of this, maybe even applaud parts of it. As far as I can tell, though, there is absolutely no humor intended here.
Anyway, the mystery mare stomps the mad doctor into a bloody pulp, while Littlepoop uses her trusty screwdriver and bobby pin collection (which not one of her various captors have ever thought to relieve her of) to free herself from the table. The subchapter ends in a page break.
Anyway, there appears to be some sort of covert civil war going on in Equestria; either that or the CMC's company, Stable-Tec, is somehow at odds with the government. I'm not 100% clear on the details. In any event, the implication seems to be that several of the ministries are hostile. Pinkie Pie, who heads the Ministry of Morale, is mentioned by name, and though Sweetie Belle speaks in her sister's defense, Rarity's Ministry of Image is also implicated by Scootaloo as one of the "bad" ministries. Applejack and Rainbow Dash are both explicitly mentioned as being "still good."
The present discussion seems to involve the deployment of the stables. Presumably, the end is nigh or neigh at this point, and the company has begun the process of moving ponies into the stables to await the coming apocalypse. As far as I can tell, Apple Bloom is the main designer of the stables, but Scootaloo has made modifications to AB's designs on certain specific stables in order to accommodate "experiments." There is some argument between Scoot and AB as to whether or not this is necessary. AB argues that her designs were optimal and that changing them will reduce chances of survival for the ponies inside; Scoot seems to acknowledge this, but points out that the stables need to be adapted to the parameters of the experiments. Both seem to be in agreement on the overall necessity of the experiments, though it isn't clearly explained what the experiments are trying to achieve.
From what we've observed of the stables overall, we can probably assume that Stable-Tec was running sociological experiments to determine what the optimal form of government would be for the post-apocalyptic world. The implication seems to be that the current system has broken down, and Stable-Tec wants to try and correct whatever mistakes led to the present situation. That is my best assessment of what is going on, at any rate.
The overall concern of the other two is that if their experiments are discovered they will be blamed by the government, which as far as I can tell is mostly run by their older sisters at this point. Scootaloo basically says that she is prepared to take the fall for this:
>“And if I have to become the villain of the piece to do that, then I will.”
This seems to be the meaning of the chapter's title.
There is also some rather vague rambling about how everything has gone to shit, and how they want to prevent it from happening again. However, no particulars are clarified. The memory ends here.
In a clever twist that should surprise no one, LP awakens to find that the effects of her StealthBuck wore off while she was inside the memory orb, and the mad doctor has since strapped her down to the examination table. Seriously, does Edgequestria have something along the lines of a Darwin Award? Because if so, I'd like to nominate her for one; her behavior since the bridge incident has been even stupider than usual.
>Now I was on the medical table, bound in chains. My weapons had been removed and stashed, probably nearby but still out of sight. I was still wearing my armored utility barding. It was soaked in blood from the slashes across my chest and I was woozy from loss of blood.
It's not clear whether these slashes were done by the doctor, or if these were just wounds that Littlepoop had already. The doctor, for his part, doesn't seem to question what this strange pony was doing skulking around his office, armed to the teeth and using a StealthBuck to sneak past his manticore guards. If he had, it might have occurred to him to go into the next fucking room and observe that all of his guards had been shot, and his captives are all free. Presumably they have followed LP's instructions and are just milling around in the general vicinity of their cages, waiting for LP to come back. Incidentally, the fact that all of these retards are apparently still depending on her to come back and escort them out of the facility makes LP's behavior in the doctor's office even more reckless and stupid.
However, fortunately(?) for her, the mad doctor is as much of a brainless dullard as every other villain or hero, for that matter in this story has been. Instead of investigating or at least questioning any of this, he just rolls with it and continues performing his experiments, right up until the moment when the mare that LP rescued sneaks up on him from behind and shoots him with the poison dart gun that she obtained from...somewhere. I'm not even going to bother asking where; all of the turbo-autism in this chapter is starting to give me a headache.
>She turned, looked down, and started stomping furiously on the ghoul doctor. I heard the skull crack and splinter. The pony seemed to be taking out all her hurt and rage on the ghoul, stomping and stomping and stomping long after he must have been dead.
>It took me time to float out my screwdriver and a bobby pin and unlock each of my chains. They were easy locks, but I was wounded and alarmingly lightheaded. I broke three bobby pins before I was through. All that time, the sea-blue pony slammed her hooves down on what was now more paste than a body.
>She didn’t stop until I wrapped her in a hug and held her.
Does the author realize how ridiculous any of this actually is? I mean this as a serious question. If he were simply trying to have fun with his subject matter and write a campy, over-the-top adventure story that you were meant to chuckle at I might be able to forgive some of this, maybe even applaud parts of it. As far as I can tell, though, there is absolutely no humor intended here.
Anyway, the mystery mare stomps the mad doctor into a bloody pulp, while Littlepoop uses her trusty screwdriver and bobby pin collection (which not one of her various captors have ever thought to relieve her of) to free herself from the table. The subchapter ends in a page break.
1614677992.jpg (743.2 KB, 1212x1108, LIGHT AND DARK THE ADVENTURES OF DARK YAGAMI.jpg)
>>302781
I could have sworn that at some point in the story, some kind of hard impact or action scene caused Littlepip's supply of medical shit to smash open inside her bag.
So if it happened then, it should happen again because it would add more realism to this absurdly unrealistic fanfic and lessen the feeling that LP's got some kind of fucking Bugs Bunny hammerspace/Guybrush Threepwood's pants/typical videogame-inventory menu system where the stuff she puts in her pockets vanishes until she takes them out.
It would also add more peril and danger to this incredibly contrived scene by keeping LP wounded until she can get to the stash of healing potions her friends hopefully also carry.
>Her murderboner thus engaged
And engorged! heh heh, boner humor.
>Doctor Cunt didn't notice the gunshots from LE FUCKIN SNIPER RIFLE
Is this rifle silenced? Does Kkat actually think silencers are those magical Hollywood things that make gunshots quieter than mouse farts? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDkTKYter6c&ab_channel=Equinox NEWSFLASH IN REALITY A SILENCED GUN IS STILL LOUD. You'll still hear the bullet break the sound barrier unless it's a subsonic piece of shit.
Yes, Fallout's a videogame so silencers are programmed to literally make no noise at all. Just like the "Gaaah!" dying screams of characters make no noise and will not alert others, so you can hide in a corner and slowly headshot everyone in a room with your silenced 22LR pistol and while people might express shock at seeing bodies or watching people die nobody will raise the alarm unless they notice you, and once they notice you all enemies in their Faction instantly know where you are and know you need killing. Guns are coded to have three sound levels: Silent for silenced 22LRs and silenced 50cals, Normal for ordinary guns, and Loud for the big shit and loud shit.
But
Something's really fucking annoying about this
This is Equestria
Ponies have magic
The ponies could make literally-magic silencers that silence absolutely all noise the gun makes, including the gunshots and the trigger click and even any reloading noises, to the point where it's impossible to tell if the gun's functioning properly by listening to it. These silencers could silence the sound of the bullet travelling faster than sound by making a magical silencing field, which would also silence all noise you make while the silencer is active. This would make a magically-silenced 22LR the perfect tool for literally-silent infiltrations but you'd need to drop the gun (Or put it into your videogame magical inventory menu) when talking to friends or giving orders over the radio.
And man, wouldn't it be spooky to be shot by a magic bullet from a magically silenced gun that sets you on fire and silences you, so you can't even hear your own screams or call for help as you die? That'd be a fucked up way to go. I have a mouth but no voice and I must scream.
All of the bullshit "It works in my story because it worked in my favourite and only videogame, a piece of shit that runs on a 50 year old game engine designed for Elder Scrolls" moments could be justified with magical pony technology. This would also allow for fun shit like grenades that turn everything caught in the blast radius into cheese or necklaces that give you superspeed for fun chase scenes and Time-In-A-Bottle Sonic/Quicksilver moments.
Then again, that would be too creative for Kkat. Just like the old Ammo Glitch that lets you fire any round from any gun in FNV, meaning your Nuke Detonator can piss a constant stream of Red Glare's High-Explosive Missiles. And that gun will never degrade from use or get taken away from you while entering gun-free zones because it's coded as a Quest Item.
Does Kkat just hate fun? Is that why he wrote this dull monument to the most anti-fun game I've ever played (Fallout 3) this side of gachashit?
>After killing all those manticores in the other room and making a lot of noise, I decided not to kill this manticore because I didn't want to make more noise. I decided to make a mental note of its location because surely, when I was done with this videogame boss battle against Doc Cock, I could return to this manticore who would be exactly where I left him, and I will kill this manticore in cold blood for even more EXP without taking any meat from any of their bodies even though manticore burgers are probably a rare delicacy any trader would pay to try.
This is a certified Dark Yagami(TM) moment
I haven't seen a line this retarded since that scene in the trollfic Light And Dark: The Adventures of Dark Yagami where L says "We must use stealth" to capture his target, and then leaps through a glass window while screaming
>taint-away
radaway already existed in Fallout before the bombs fell. Out of all the fucking random changes to make, why change radaway to an after-war drug? The reason can't be "because ponies didn't know about the toxic zebra taint before the nuking" because zebras used that shit in bombs during a war that lasted over ten years when they weren't using a certain other stupid fucking thing ripped off from a FNV DLC story too smart for Kkat to understand.
>Experiments in government
Your take is smarter than this story. Giving each Stable a different type of ruling ideology/system of governance... That would be smarter than what we ended up with, while still allowing for some fun gimmicky disaster stables.
Fallout's Vaults were experiments by Vault-Tec for Shitty Future America (Whose leaders and soldiers would become the Enclave). F1-2 had assorted experiments but F3 used the term "experiments" loosely. Civilian company Vault-Tec put top-secret military FEV in one. Made another full of clones of Gary. They were excuses for wacky locations in Bethesda's patented Theme Park(TM) World Design philosophy where nothing is connected or meaningful yet everything is superficially flashy and silly and childishly shallowly "fun".
Kkat took Bethesda's bad habits further. Except the monetization habits thankfully.
I could have sworn that at some point in the story, some kind of hard impact or action scene caused Littlepip's supply of medical shit to smash open inside her bag.
So if it happened then, it should happen again because it would add more realism to this absurdly unrealistic fanfic and lessen the feeling that LP's got some kind of fucking Bugs Bunny hammerspace/Guybrush Threepwood's pants/typical videogame-inventory menu system where the stuff she puts in her pockets vanishes until she takes them out.
It would also add more peril and danger to this incredibly contrived scene by keeping LP wounded until she can get to the stash of healing potions her friends hopefully also carry.
>Her murderboner thus engaged
And engorged! heh heh, boner humor.
>Doctor Cunt didn't notice the gunshots from LE FUCKIN SNIPER RIFLE
Is this rifle silenced? Does Kkat actually think silencers are those magical Hollywood things that make gunshots quieter than mouse farts? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDkTKYter6c&ab_channel=Equinox NEWSFLASH IN REALITY A SILENCED GUN IS STILL LOUD. You'll still hear the bullet break the sound barrier unless it's a subsonic piece of shit.
Yes, Fallout's a videogame so silencers are programmed to literally make no noise at all. Just like the "Gaaah!" dying screams of characters make no noise and will not alert others, so you can hide in a corner and slowly headshot everyone in a room with your silenced 22LR pistol and while people might express shock at seeing bodies or watching people die nobody will raise the alarm unless they notice you, and once they notice you all enemies in their Faction instantly know where you are and know you need killing. Guns are coded to have three sound levels: Silent for silenced 22LRs and silenced 50cals, Normal for ordinary guns, and Loud for the big shit and loud shit.
But
Something's really fucking annoying about this
This is Equestria
Ponies have magic
The ponies could make literally-magic silencers that silence absolutely all noise the gun makes, including the gunshots and the trigger click and even any reloading noises, to the point where it's impossible to tell if the gun's functioning properly by listening to it. These silencers could silence the sound of the bullet travelling faster than sound by making a magical silencing field, which would also silence all noise you make while the silencer is active. This would make a magically-silenced 22LR the perfect tool for literally-silent infiltrations but you'd need to drop the gun (Or put it into your videogame magical inventory menu) when talking to friends or giving orders over the radio.
And man, wouldn't it be spooky to be shot by a magic bullet from a magically silenced gun that sets you on fire and silences you, so you can't even hear your own screams or call for help as you die? That'd be a fucked up way to go. I have a mouth but no voice and I must scream.
All of the bullshit "It works in my story because it worked in my favourite and only videogame, a piece of shit that runs on a 50 year old game engine designed for Elder Scrolls" moments could be justified with magical pony technology. This would also allow for fun shit like grenades that turn everything caught in the blast radius into cheese or necklaces that give you superspeed for fun chase scenes and Time-In-A-Bottle Sonic/Quicksilver moments.
Then again, that would be too creative for Kkat. Just like the old Ammo Glitch that lets you fire any round from any gun in FNV, meaning your Nuke Detonator can piss a constant stream of Red Glare's High-Explosive Missiles. And that gun will never degrade from use or get taken away from you while entering gun-free zones because it's coded as a Quest Item.
Does Kkat just hate fun? Is that why he wrote this dull monument to the most anti-fun game I've ever played (Fallout 3) this side of gachashit?
>After killing all those manticores in the other room and making a lot of noise, I decided not to kill this manticore because I didn't want to make more noise. I decided to make a mental note of its location because surely, when I was done with this videogame boss battle against Doc Cock, I could return to this manticore who would be exactly where I left him, and I will kill this manticore in cold blood for even more EXP without taking any meat from any of their bodies even though manticore burgers are probably a rare delicacy any trader would pay to try.
This is a certified Dark Yagami(TM) moment
I haven't seen a line this retarded since that scene in the trollfic Light And Dark: The Adventures of Dark Yagami where L says "We must use stealth" to capture his target, and then leaps through a glass window while screaming
>taint-away
radaway already existed in Fallout before the bombs fell. Out of all the fucking random changes to make, why change radaway to an after-war drug? The reason can't be "because ponies didn't know about the toxic zebra taint before the nuking" because zebras used that shit in bombs during a war that lasted over ten years when they weren't using a certain other stupid fucking thing ripped off from a FNV DLC story too smart for Kkat to understand.
>Experiments in government
Your take is smarter than this story. Giving each Stable a different type of ruling ideology/system of governance... That would be smarter than what we ended up with, while still allowing for some fun gimmicky disaster stables.
Fallout's Vaults were experiments by Vault-Tec for Shitty Future America (Whose leaders and soldiers would become the Enclave). F1-2 had assorted experiments but F3 used the term "experiments" loosely. Civilian company Vault-Tec put top-secret military FEV in one. Made another full of clones of Gary. They were excuses for wacky locations in Bethesda's patented Theme Park(TM) World Design philosophy where nothing is connected or meaningful yet everything is superficially flashy and silly and childishly shallowly "fun".
Kkat took Bethesda's bad habits further. Except the monetization habits thankfully.
>>302781
>"Bloodwings" have been mentioned in passing before: the DJ spoke about Chief something-or-other being attacked by a group of them in one of her reports. However, this is the first time they've actually factored into the story to a degree that we would need to actually know what they are. As ever, kkat provides no description of these creatures; we are simply told that bloodwings appear and attack the party.
As far as I'm aware, bloodwings are literally just giant vampire bats. Because the roster of generic disposable enemies didn't have enough flying animals, I suppose.
>She looks at the cage across from her and, in a preposterous coincidence worthy of Dickens if he had written shitty pony fiction, she sees that the occupant of the cage is the same mare that they saved earlier, the one who was about to get raped by a single colt barely half her size.
This whole diversion with the ghoul doctor is very strange. If I had to hazard a guess, Kkat didn't originally plan for this but instead threw in an excuse for [Nameless Rape Victim] to show up again in response to reader feedback. Hence why the whole supposedly perilous situation is treated in such a rushed and blase fashion. In the course of parely a few pages, Littlepip is separated from her friends, captured by a monster, escapes, gets captured again, then gets rescued. Aside from the memory orb, none of this has any relevance to the rest oif the story - it's a "whoops, Littlepip wasn't enough of a GOOD PERSON, time for a sidequest to get some more GOOD PERSON points".
>>302783
>Her murderboner thus engaged, she proceeds to use the sniper rifle, which her captor didn't bother to strip her of, to pick off the manticores one at a time from inside the goddamn cage.
Even if we accept the situation as one that makes sense, surely the manticores - plural - who are presumably at least on par with dogs in intelligence would have the basic survival instincts to respond to the sound of gunfire. Even going so far as to discard that, they don't even seem to respond to their companions dropping dead. These manticores are below NPCs.
>As far as I can tell, his experiments have something to do with trying to figure out why the manticores are apparently immune to the toxic effects of kkat's taint.
This really should be a plot point. From what we've seen so far, radiation and taint are the primary reasons that the world of FoE is and continues to be a borderline-unlivable shithole. The discovery that something about these creatures gives them immunity to taint mutation should be a massive revelation - one that at least the mad doctor appears to have had. The doctor's methods are obviously retarded but one can presume, if generously, that his intent is to discover a way to grant that same immunity to ponies. Littlepip and Kkat, on the other hand, pass right over this earthshaking potential discovery and (unless I'm very much mistaken) never return to it again.
>>302784
>As far as I can tell, Apple Bloom is the main designer of the stables, but Scootaloo has made modifications to AB's designs on certain specific stables in order to accommodate "experiments."
As we'll see, Scootaloo is quite possibly the single most morally deficient character in the whole pre-apocalyse subplot of this story. So it's no surprise that Littlepip takes her 'villain of the piece' line to heart. It'll be showing up again.
>right up until the moment when the mare that LP rescued sneaks up on him from behind and shoots him with the poison dart gun
How did this mare, who has no equipment or weapons of her own and couldn't even fight off a prepubescent child, make it past the several manticores that Littlepip explicitly left behind?
>that she obtained from...somewhere
Without going back to the story to double check, I think it's mentioned offhandedly somewhere that Littlepip loses some of her weapons when the manticore dumps her in the cage. Presumably we're supposed to infer that [Nameless Rape Victim] picked up the dart gun that Littlepip autism'd over building for that past ten or so chapters.
>"Bloodwings" have been mentioned in passing before: the DJ spoke about Chief something-or-other being attacked by a group of them in one of her reports. However, this is the first time they've actually factored into the story to a degree that we would need to actually know what they are. As ever, kkat provides no description of these creatures; we are simply told that bloodwings appear and attack the party.
As far as I'm aware, bloodwings are literally just giant vampire bats. Because the roster of generic disposable enemies didn't have enough flying animals, I suppose.
>She looks at the cage across from her and, in a preposterous coincidence worthy of Dickens if he had written shitty pony fiction, she sees that the occupant of the cage is the same mare that they saved earlier, the one who was about to get raped by a single colt barely half her size.
This whole diversion with the ghoul doctor is very strange. If I had to hazard a guess, Kkat didn't originally plan for this but instead threw in an excuse for [Nameless Rape Victim] to show up again in response to reader feedback. Hence why the whole supposedly perilous situation is treated in such a rushed and blase fashion. In the course of parely a few pages, Littlepip is separated from her friends, captured by a monster, escapes, gets captured again, then gets rescued. Aside from the memory orb, none of this has any relevance to the rest oif the story - it's a "whoops, Littlepip wasn't enough of a GOOD PERSON, time for a sidequest to get some more GOOD PERSON points".
>>302783
>Her murderboner thus engaged, she proceeds to use the sniper rifle, which her captor didn't bother to strip her of, to pick off the manticores one at a time from inside the goddamn cage.
Even if we accept the situation as one that makes sense, surely the manticores - plural - who are presumably at least on par with dogs in intelligence would have the basic survival instincts to respond to the sound of gunfire. Even going so far as to discard that, they don't even seem to respond to their companions dropping dead. These manticores are below NPCs.
>As far as I can tell, his experiments have something to do with trying to figure out why the manticores are apparently immune to the toxic effects of kkat's taint.
This really should be a plot point. From what we've seen so far, radiation and taint are the primary reasons that the world of FoE is and continues to be a borderline-unlivable shithole. The discovery that something about these creatures gives them immunity to taint mutation should be a massive revelation - one that at least the mad doctor appears to have had. The doctor's methods are obviously retarded but one can presume, if generously, that his intent is to discover a way to grant that same immunity to ponies. Littlepip and Kkat, on the other hand, pass right over this earthshaking potential discovery and (unless I'm very much mistaken) never return to it again.
>>302784
>As far as I can tell, Apple Bloom is the main designer of the stables, but Scootaloo has made modifications to AB's designs on certain specific stables in order to accommodate "experiments."
As we'll see, Scootaloo is quite possibly the single most morally deficient character in the whole pre-apocalyse subplot of this story. So it's no surprise that Littlepip takes her 'villain of the piece' line to heart. It'll be showing up again.
>right up until the moment when the mare that LP rescued sneaks up on him from behind and shoots him with the poison dart gun
How did this mare, who has no equipment or weapons of her own and couldn't even fight off a prepubescent child, make it past the several manticores that Littlepip explicitly left behind?
>that she obtained from...somewhere
Without going back to the story to double check, I think it's mentioned offhandedly somewhere that Littlepip loses some of her weapons when the manticore dumps her in the cage. Presumably we're supposed to infer that [Nameless Rape Victim] picked up the dart gun that Littlepip autism'd over building for that past ten or so chapters.
>>302784
>I sat on a ledge, overlooking the depressing town of Gutterville as the early morning sun broke over the city. Below, Velvet Remedy was caring for the ponies we had helped back here. Calamity and SteelHooves had been discussing possible defenses that could be added around the collection of hovels. Calamity was explaining now about the turret array we’d put together back at Junction R-7.
Once again, time has jumped forward by some unknown interval, important events have taken place that the author has completely skipped over, and the group's objective has changed. We can infer from this paragraph that LP must have reunited with her friends somehow, and that together they escorted the group of prisoners back to the settlement of Gutterville why would you name your town this, anyway?.
As is his usual habit, the author fills us in on the details in the following paragraph:
>I had met up with my friends in the Red Racer factory about half an hour after the death of the ghoul doctor. They had managed to find the safe that DJ Pon3 was interested in, but had no way of unlocking it. Instead, SteelHooves had blown apart the entire wall around the safe and had been dragging it around behind himself with a harness. Calamity had looted everything else.
The content of this paragraph is absurd, but no more so than anything else that's happened recently, and probably isn't worth going over. However, I would like to briefly address this author's habit of ending a scene, skipping time forward by quite a lot, and summarizing whatever took place in the interval in a few short paragraphs at the beginning of the new scene. I've pointed this out many times before, but I've never really addressed it in detail.
I don't know why, but this is something I notice a lot of inexperienced writers will do quite often. In fact, I've actually gone through a few of my own manuscripts from way back and found that it's something I've done myself. Sometimes it's appropriate; for instance, after Frodo and Sam destroy the Ring, their return trip to the Shire is dispensed with in a considerably smaller portion of text than the journey out, despite the fact that they are technically traveling the same distance. However, you don't want to make an excessive habit of this, and you particularly don't want to skip over (potentially) interesting scenes.
What I've noticed about kkat is that not only does he overuse the time skip device, he inverts its purpose: instead of skipping past the mundane events that take place between interesting scenes, he skips over the interesting events that take place between mundane scenes. Consider the way he left things at the end of the last subchapter. Littlepoop defeats the mad scientist and has set the prisoners free, so this little mini-arc has basically climaxed and concluded. However, this adventure was only a small detour that was part of what I assumed was the larger adventure: getting into the scooter factory and finding the records. At the end of the mad scientist scene, there is still plenty that needs to be done before the group can rest.
First, LP needs to find and rejoin her friends. After that, they need to complete the task they came in here to complete, and then they have to make it out of the building. This is now further complicated by having to drag all these fuckwad prisoners behind them. If I'm following this correctly, LP fell a few stories down to roughly the middle part of the building, and this factory part was maybe halfway between the roof and the ground floor. The whole reason they went about this convoluted business of climbing the skyscraper and crossing over using the sign is that the ground floor of the factory is supposed to be full of manticores. Has that changed? I don't see any reason why it would have. LP killed the manticores that were guarding the prison area, but the story implies that there are still quite a few more of them. So how did they deal with that? Did they decide to fight their way through to the bottom and head out the front door, or did they sneak back across the bridge and go out the way they came in? Either way, the additional burden of the wounded prisoners would have created a number of problems.
Point is, there was quite a bit left unresolved, so it feels like the author has skipped over some fairly important stuff here. What's more, the stuff he skips over might actually have been fun to read; helping a bunch of wounded prisoners across a rickety bridge while manticores and batwings and whatever the fuck else are coming at them left and right would make for a far more interesting scene than whatever the fuck is going on right now; Calamity explaining turret design to the citizens of Gutterville or something lame like that. Actually, now that I think about it, the sign-bridge fell down anyway, so this could have made for an interesting twist. Maybe the group climbs all the way to the roof to avoid the manticores, but finds the bridge gone, then they have to go back down and fight their way through the manticores anyway. There's enough material here that any half-wit could spin an interesting scene from it; however, kkat has long since established that he is not just any half-wit.
Also, the other thing that's jarring about this is that the actual primary objective of the chapter is glossed over here. Granted, attempting a death-defying quest just to retrieve some old records is a pretty dumb objective to begin with, but since it was technically the whole reason they came in here, we should have at least gotten to see the discovery of them happen in real time.
Tl;dr, if you're writing, don't do stuff like this. Keep an eye on those time skips, because as I said, they are for some reason a very common amateur-writer pitfall. And for God's sake, if you feel compelled to skip over anything, at least skip the boring bits.
>I sat on a ledge, overlooking the depressing town of Gutterville as the early morning sun broke over the city. Below, Velvet Remedy was caring for the ponies we had helped back here. Calamity and SteelHooves had been discussing possible defenses that could be added around the collection of hovels. Calamity was explaining now about the turret array we’d put together back at Junction R-7.
Once again, time has jumped forward by some unknown interval, important events have taken place that the author has completely skipped over, and the group's objective has changed. We can infer from this paragraph that LP must have reunited with her friends somehow, and that together they escorted the group of prisoners back to the settlement of Gutterville why would you name your town this, anyway?.
As is his usual habit, the author fills us in on the details in the following paragraph:
>I had met up with my friends in the Red Racer factory about half an hour after the death of the ghoul doctor. They had managed to find the safe that DJ Pon3 was interested in, but had no way of unlocking it. Instead, SteelHooves had blown apart the entire wall around the safe and had been dragging it around behind himself with a harness. Calamity had looted everything else.
The content of this paragraph is absurd, but no more so than anything else that's happened recently, and probably isn't worth going over. However, I would like to briefly address this author's habit of ending a scene, skipping time forward by quite a lot, and summarizing whatever took place in the interval in a few short paragraphs at the beginning of the new scene. I've pointed this out many times before, but I've never really addressed it in detail.
I don't know why, but this is something I notice a lot of inexperienced writers will do quite often. In fact, I've actually gone through a few of my own manuscripts from way back and found that it's something I've done myself. Sometimes it's appropriate; for instance, after Frodo and Sam destroy the Ring, their return trip to the Shire is dispensed with in a considerably smaller portion of text than the journey out, despite the fact that they are technically traveling the same distance. However, you don't want to make an excessive habit of this, and you particularly don't want to skip over (potentially) interesting scenes.
What I've noticed about kkat is that not only does he overuse the time skip device, he inverts its purpose: instead of skipping past the mundane events that take place between interesting scenes, he skips over the interesting events that take place between mundane scenes. Consider the way he left things at the end of the last subchapter. Littlepoop defeats the mad scientist and has set the prisoners free, so this little mini-arc has basically climaxed and concluded. However, this adventure was only a small detour that was part of what I assumed was the larger adventure: getting into the scooter factory and finding the records. At the end of the mad scientist scene, there is still plenty that needs to be done before the group can rest.
First, LP needs to find and rejoin her friends. After that, they need to complete the task they came in here to complete, and then they have to make it out of the building. This is now further complicated by having to drag all these fuckwad prisoners behind them. If I'm following this correctly, LP fell a few stories down to roughly the middle part of the building, and this factory part was maybe halfway between the roof and the ground floor. The whole reason they went about this convoluted business of climbing the skyscraper and crossing over using the sign is that the ground floor of the factory is supposed to be full of manticores. Has that changed? I don't see any reason why it would have. LP killed the manticores that were guarding the prison area, but the story implies that there are still quite a few more of them. So how did they deal with that? Did they decide to fight their way through to the bottom and head out the front door, or did they sneak back across the bridge and go out the way they came in? Either way, the additional burden of the wounded prisoners would have created a number of problems.
Point is, there was quite a bit left unresolved, so it feels like the author has skipped over some fairly important stuff here. What's more, the stuff he skips over might actually have been fun to read; helping a bunch of wounded prisoners across a rickety bridge while manticores and batwings and whatever the fuck else are coming at them left and right would make for a far more interesting scene than whatever the fuck is going on right now; Calamity explaining turret design to the citizens of Gutterville or something lame like that. Actually, now that I think about it, the sign-bridge fell down anyway, so this could have made for an interesting twist. Maybe the group climbs all the way to the roof to avoid the manticores, but finds the bridge gone, then they have to go back down and fight their way through the manticores anyway. There's enough material here that any half-wit could spin an interesting scene from it; however, kkat has long since established that he is not just any half-wit.
Also, the other thing that's jarring about this is that the actual primary objective of the chapter is glossed over here. Granted, attempting a death-defying quest just to retrieve some old records is a pretty dumb objective to begin with, but since it was technically the whole reason they came in here, we should have at least gotten to see the discovery of them happen in real time.
Tl;dr, if you're writing, don't do stuff like this. Keep an eye on those time skips, because as I said, they are for some reason a very common amateur-writer pitfall. And for God's sake, if you feel compelled to skip over anything, at least skip the boring bits.
>>302848
Anyway, all's relatively well that ends relatively well: they have the records, the prisoners are safe, and our intrepid heroes can now resume their lives of pointless wandering and looting. As Calamity stands around explaining turrets to the prisoners of Gutterville, LP stands off to the side. Frank, for some reason, has appeared again, and LP is conversing with him.
>“It’s not enough, is it?” I asked, breaking the silence. “Knowing your virtue, I mean.” I remembered Watcher’s list of Great Virtues of Ponykind. But those virtues, I’d come to realize, weren’t great on their own; I had seen dark, stunted versions of many of them. Pinkie/Silver Bell’s mirthless, sorrow-born laughter. Gawd’s loyalty only to contract and coin. Monterey’s honesty out of desperate self-image. I’d almost collected a set.
Is that what all those things were supposed to be? Virtues? It might have helped to make that a little clearer. Now that I see it from a distance, I can kind of see where the author was trying to go with this:
>Silver Bell, element of laughter
>Gawd, element of loyalty
>Monterrey Jack, element ofcheese honesty
As with much of the terminology in this story (raider, slaver, ghoul, zombie, etc), the author has taken a common word and given it a very specific in-world meaning, while tossing it around in the same way one might toss around the common version of the word. Here, "virtue" refers not to virtue in general, but to one of (I'm assuming) six specific virtues, derived from the original Elements of Harmony. An individual chooses whichever one of the six virtues they most closely identify with and tries to make it their raison d'etre. The "virtues" also seem to serve the very specific purpose of warding off the maddening effects of the wasteland. However, most of the examples of the virtues we've seen so far have been warped interpretations.
Littlepoop observes this and comments that having a virtue does not seem to be quite enough to resist the effects of the wasteland. This is confirmed by Frank, who clarifies that an additional spark is needed in order to make the virtue work. Unsurprisingly, the spark is revealed to be "friendship."
So, to summarize: if you are going to venture into the Equestrian Wasteland, you need to have two things to avoid going mad. First, you need to choose a mantra to live by from six available choices. Second, you need to make friends. If you do not do both of these things, you will end up shitting on your mattress and decorating your house with the entrails of random ponies you've eviscerated. Makes about as much sense as anything else we've read so far.
>I looked up at the floating spritebot, the shifting of position making the bandages on my breast rub. “Friendship?” I turned to watch Velvet Remedy bandage the leg of a pink stallion. I saw Calamity laughing good-naturedly at something SteelHooves had said. Friendship.
>I had friendship. I felt a pang of joy as the acceptance of that cut through the petty jealousy and creeping paranoia that had threatened to overwhelm me. I had friends.
Personally, I would say the jury is still out on that one. Littlepoop has some ponies that she wanders around aimlessly with, committing burglaries and other crimes; for lack of a better word, she calls them her friends. However, despite the author's cringe-worthy, hamfisted approach to all of this, I can at least see a dim outline of what he's attempting to do here. I'm willing to give him a couple of points for at least attempting to tie his shoddily-constructed post-apocalyptic world to the values of the show, but as ever his execution is unforgivably clumsy. Partial credit is the best I can do.
>“You could say I’ve made a study of the subject,” Watcher admitted. Then, before I could ask, a static pop heralded Watcher’s disappearance. The sprite-bot floated away on tambourine music.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0hTtsqiFCc
Anyway, there's a page break, time skips randomly forward again, and we are back with DJ Homage again. I have no idea if we will ever see the ponies of Gutterville again, or if there will be any further discussion of what that crazy scientist was trying to do back there. >>302841 makes a good point about this, actually. Anyway, the DJ graciously accepts the records that Littlepoop gives her (the titles are "Hush Now Quiet Now (Manehattan Never Sleeps Version)" by Sweetie Belle, and "Sing It" by the Cutie Mark Crusaders, if anyone actually cares). Personally, if I were the DJ, I would just put this song on endless repeat, tape down the broadcast button, then leave forever and lock the booth behind me:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EN0hEeKLMdQ
It appears that for whatever reason, Homage prefers to keep her identity secret from LP's friends, even though she had no compunctions about revealing herself to LP. She assures them all that "the DJ" will be happy to receive the records they went to all the trouble of risking their lives to bring "him," and in return hands over that whatchamo-doohicky she promised to Calamity. They prepare to part ways, but Littlepoop announces that she wants to stay back and "talk" to Homage for a little bit. The others head back to their hotel room.
>“Thank you, Stable Dweller,” Homage said softly. “And not just for the demos. I’ve already heard from Gutterville.”
How has she already--oh, never mind. I don't even care anymore.
There is a bit of awkward conversation here, mostly consisting of Homage stroking Littlepoop's clit and telling her how great and heroic she is for saving all those caged retards from that mad retard scientist. They are clearly getting primed to fuck here, and I'll grant that the romantic chemistry between them is at least better than it was between LP and Velvet earlier. Unfortunately, the scene itself is pretty dreadful.
>“So, Velvet Remedy… she any good.”
This is a question, and it should end with a question mark.
Anyway, all's relatively well that ends relatively well: they have the records, the prisoners are safe, and our intrepid heroes can now resume their lives of pointless wandering and looting. As Calamity stands around explaining turrets to the prisoners of Gutterville, LP stands off to the side. Frank, for some reason, has appeared again, and LP is conversing with him.
>“It’s not enough, is it?” I asked, breaking the silence. “Knowing your virtue, I mean.” I remembered Watcher’s list of Great Virtues of Ponykind. But those virtues, I’d come to realize, weren’t great on their own; I had seen dark, stunted versions of many of them. Pinkie/Silver Bell’s mirthless, sorrow-born laughter. Gawd’s loyalty only to contract and coin. Monterey’s honesty out of desperate self-image. I’d almost collected a set.
Is that what all those things were supposed to be? Virtues? It might have helped to make that a little clearer. Now that I see it from a distance, I can kind of see where the author was trying to go with this:
>Silver Bell, element of laughter
>Gawd, element of loyalty
>Monterrey Jack, element of
As with much of the terminology in this story (raider, slaver, ghoul, zombie, etc), the author has taken a common word and given it a very specific in-world meaning, while tossing it around in the same way one might toss around the common version of the word. Here, "virtue" refers not to virtue in general, but to one of (I'm assuming) six specific virtues, derived from the original Elements of Harmony. An individual chooses whichever one of the six virtues they most closely identify with and tries to make it their raison d'etre. The "virtues" also seem to serve the very specific purpose of warding off the maddening effects of the wasteland. However, most of the examples of the virtues we've seen so far have been warped interpretations.
Littlepoop observes this and comments that having a virtue does not seem to be quite enough to resist the effects of the wasteland. This is confirmed by Frank, who clarifies that an additional spark is needed in order to make the virtue work. Unsurprisingly, the spark is revealed to be "friendship."
So, to summarize: if you are going to venture into the Equestrian Wasteland, you need to have two things to avoid going mad. First, you need to choose a mantra to live by from six available choices. Second, you need to make friends. If you do not do both of these things, you will end up shitting on your mattress and decorating your house with the entrails of random ponies you've eviscerated. Makes about as much sense as anything else we've read so far.
>I looked up at the floating spritebot, the shifting of position making the bandages on my breast rub. “Friendship?” I turned to watch Velvet Remedy bandage the leg of a pink stallion. I saw Calamity laughing good-naturedly at something SteelHooves had said. Friendship.
>I had friendship. I felt a pang of joy as the acceptance of that cut through the petty jealousy and creeping paranoia that had threatened to overwhelm me. I had friends.
Personally, I would say the jury is still out on that one. Littlepoop has some ponies that she wanders around aimlessly with, committing burglaries and other crimes; for lack of a better word, she calls them her friends. However, despite the author's cringe-worthy, hamfisted approach to all of this, I can at least see a dim outline of what he's attempting to do here. I'm willing to give him a couple of points for at least attempting to tie his shoddily-constructed post-apocalyptic world to the values of the show, but as ever his execution is unforgivably clumsy. Partial credit is the best I can do.
>“You could say I’ve made a study of the subject,” Watcher admitted. Then, before I could ask, a static pop heralded Watcher’s disappearance. The sprite-bot floated away on tambourine music.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0hTtsqiFCc
Anyway, there's a page break, time skips randomly forward again, and we are back with DJ Homage again. I have no idea if we will ever see the ponies of Gutterville again, or if there will be any further discussion of what that crazy scientist was trying to do back there. >>302841 makes a good point about this, actually. Anyway, the DJ graciously accepts the records that Littlepoop gives her (the titles are "Hush Now Quiet Now (Manehattan Never Sleeps Version)" by Sweetie Belle, and "Sing It" by the Cutie Mark Crusaders, if anyone actually cares). Personally, if I were the DJ, I would just put this song on endless repeat, tape down the broadcast button, then leave forever and lock the booth behind me:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EN0hEeKLMdQ
It appears that for whatever reason, Homage prefers to keep her identity secret from LP's friends, even though she had no compunctions about revealing herself to LP. She assures them all that "the DJ" will be happy to receive the records they went to all the trouble of risking their lives to bring "him," and in return hands over that whatchamo-doohicky she promised to Calamity. They prepare to part ways, but Littlepoop announces that she wants to stay back and "talk" to Homage for a little bit. The others head back to their hotel room.
>“Thank you, Stable Dweller,” Homage said softly. “And not just for the demos. I’ve already heard from Gutterville.”
How has she already--oh, never mind. I don't even care anymore.
There is a bit of awkward conversation here, mostly consisting of Homage stroking Littlepoop's clit and telling her how great and heroic she is for saving all those caged retards from that mad retard scientist. They are clearly getting primed to fuck here, and I'll grant that the romantic chemistry between them is at least better than it was between LP and Velvet earlier. Unfortunately, the scene itself is pretty dreadful.
>“So, Velvet Remedy… she any good.”
This is a question, and it should end with a question mark.
>>302849
Anyway, as I said, LP and DJ Homo-age are hanging out. I'm actually not quite sure where this scene takes place; the author doesn't specify a location. I've been assuming they were in the DJ's apartment, or floor, or whatever amount of space she has to herself, but that may not be the case. In any event, they are presumably in Tenpony Tower somewhere.
They bullshit about Velvet Remedy for a little bit; Homage expresses an interest in her music and LP assures her that she is even better than Sweetie Belle. LP's mind suddenly shifts back to what happened between she and Velvet earlier, and she suddenly blurts out that she wants to ask Homage a favor:
>I took a deep breath. This was going to be humiliating. But Homage had eyes almost everywhere. If anyone could find anything for me, it was her. “You watch all over Equestria… the parts you can see. Have you ever spotted a mare out there who… well… who might like me?” I closed my eyes, almost drowning in embarrassment. “I mean, a mare who likes mares who might like a mare like me?”
This is at least noteworthy for being the first moment in the text that LP has actually come right out and proclaimed her interest in pony poon. I'm still not entirely sure if she's supposed to be closeted or what; my best guess is that kkat assumes that since it's apparent to us, it must presumably be apparent to all the other characters as well. However, it's only apparent to us because LP is constantly blathering about how every mare she comes across has scrumptious-looking buttocks; she doesn't appear to share her thoughts with the ponies around her.
Anyway, I'll go ahead and drop the rest of this in verbatim, since it's actually the end of the chapter (I've once again preserved the author's italics, since they are important for emphasis):
>Every second Homage was quiet felt like an anvil falling on my head. Followed by a hay cart. Followed by a piano.
I'm just going to drop this in here one more time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EN0hEeKLMdQ
>“I might…” Homage said cautiously.
>I sagged, feeling both relieved but mortified. “Then… could you point me in the right direction? Tell me where?”
>I felt a hoof gently touch my shoulder.
>“Littlepip, I said I might.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGretcGCFRM
>I turned to look at her, not comprehending. Then, looking into her eyes, I felt a spark of understanding. “oh….” I blinked. Her expression softened… sensuously…
>The spark ignited into a fire. “OH!”
>Homage smiled beautifully.
>Thank you, Celestia!
This interaction can basically be summed up like this:
Littlepoop: "Pardon me, DJ Cuntlapper, but could you possibly use your improbable network of spy equipment to track down another lesbian for me? I feel like getting my rug munched."
DJ Twatwhistler: "Why, today is your lucky day, madam! I happen to be quite the expert rug muncher myself."
I'll grant that this is at least somewhat better than Velvet suddenly propositioning Littlepoop out of absolutely nowhere, but not by nearly enough. This author still clearly has no idea how to properly develop chemistry between characters, set mood, or write anything resembling a romantic scene. It's also way too early for this imo; it's been strongly hinted at that these two are going to get together eventually, but so far they've only danced and hung out on the roof a little, and apart from that they've barely spoken. Call me old fashioned, but I think two ponies should at least get to know each other a little before they start slurping each other's tuna.
Anyway, the chapter ends here, and it looks as if Littlepoop has a girlfriend now.
>Footnote: Level Up.
>Skills Note: Science has reached 100%
>New Perk: Action Filly (level two) – You know your targeting spell like the back of your hoof, making you about 20% cooler in combat. For each level of this perk, you gain +15 action points in S.A.T.S.
I knew there was no way in hell we'd make it to the end of this thing without there being a "20% cooler" joke in there somewhere.
Chapter Eighteen: Unnatural Causes
Today's fortune cookie:
>“That job had strange written all over it.”
I'm assuming this line comes from Homage. LP strikes me as the type of mare who might ask for some pretty weird stuff in the bedroom.
>“The last sixteen hours had made for a very long day. As much as I would have loved to spend the next several hours with Homage, she had realized straight away that I was in no shape for anything but sleep. So she had sent me off back to my suite, where Velvet Remedy had puttered and tsked about my wounds until I had fallen into a dreamless sleep out of sheer exhaustion.”
And once again, the author skips over the interesting bits.
In all seriousness, I'd be willing to praise kkat for taking the classy route here and leaving the lurid details to the reader's imagination; unfortunately, though, it's a little hard to tell whether or not anything actually happened. The implication seems to be that they didn't do anything physical. However, this leaves what they did do as an open question. What were we supposed to imagine during the ellipses between chapters exactly? Did they fuck? Talk? Talk about fucking? As usual, the author just leaves us hanging, and then abruptly plops us into a new scene that has very little direct connection to the previous one.
There's also this:
>Finally, I had found another mare whom I respected and admired, and who respected (and maybe even admired) me in return. One who was attracted to mares, and who I could believe was at least a little physically attracted to me. We weren’t in love; we barely knew each other… but there was the possibility of love. There was, in a word, hope.
This is kind of a utilitarian way to describe their relationship. Basically, LP seems to be saying "well, she wouldn't have been my first choice, but as a dyke horse living in a post-apocalyptic dystopia, I have to take what I can get." Not exactly the d'aww moment the author was doubtlessly going for.
Anyway, as I said, LP and DJ Homo-age are hanging out. I'm actually not quite sure where this scene takes place; the author doesn't specify a location. I've been assuming they were in the DJ's apartment, or floor, or whatever amount of space she has to herself, but that may not be the case. In any event, they are presumably in Tenpony Tower somewhere.
They bullshit about Velvet Remedy for a little bit; Homage expresses an interest in her music and LP assures her that she is even better than Sweetie Belle. LP's mind suddenly shifts back to what happened between she and Velvet earlier, and she suddenly blurts out that she wants to ask Homage a favor:
>I took a deep breath. This was going to be humiliating. But Homage had eyes almost everywhere. If anyone could find anything for me, it was her. “You watch all over Equestria… the parts you can see. Have you ever spotted a mare out there who… well… who might like me?” I closed my eyes, almost drowning in embarrassment. “I mean, a mare who likes mares who might like a mare like me?”
This is at least noteworthy for being the first moment in the text that LP has actually come right out and proclaimed her interest in pony poon. I'm still not entirely sure if she's supposed to be closeted or what; my best guess is that kkat assumes that since it's apparent to us, it must presumably be apparent to all the other characters as well. However, it's only apparent to us because LP is constantly blathering about how every mare she comes across has scrumptious-looking buttocks; she doesn't appear to share her thoughts with the ponies around her.
Anyway, I'll go ahead and drop the rest of this in verbatim, since it's actually the end of the chapter (I've once again preserved the author's italics, since they are important for emphasis):
>Every second Homage was quiet felt like an anvil falling on my head. Followed by a hay cart. Followed by a piano.
I'm just going to drop this in here one more time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EN0hEeKLMdQ
>“I might…” Homage said cautiously.
>I sagged, feeling both relieved but mortified. “Then… could you point me in the right direction? Tell me where?”
>I felt a hoof gently touch my shoulder.
>“Littlepip, I said I might.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGretcGCFRM
>I turned to look at her, not comprehending. Then, looking into her eyes, I felt a spark of understanding. “oh….” I blinked. Her expression softened… sensuously…
>The spark ignited into a fire. “OH!”
>Homage smiled beautifully.
>Thank you, Celestia!
This interaction can basically be summed up like this:
Littlepoop: "Pardon me, DJ Cuntlapper, but could you possibly use your improbable network of spy equipment to track down another lesbian for me? I feel like getting my rug munched."
DJ Twatwhistler: "Why, today is your lucky day, madam! I happen to be quite the expert rug muncher myself."
I'll grant that this is at least somewhat better than Velvet suddenly propositioning Littlepoop out of absolutely nowhere, but not by nearly enough. This author still clearly has no idea how to properly develop chemistry between characters, set mood, or write anything resembling a romantic scene. It's also way too early for this imo; it's been strongly hinted at that these two are going to get together eventually, but so far they've only danced and hung out on the roof a little, and apart from that they've barely spoken. Call me old fashioned, but I think two ponies should at least get to know each other a little before they start slurping each other's tuna.
Anyway, the chapter ends here, and it looks as if Littlepoop has a girlfriend now.
>Footnote: Level Up.
>Skills Note: Science has reached 100%
>New Perk: Action Filly (level two) – You know your targeting spell like the back of your hoof, making you about 20% cooler in combat. For each level of this perk, you gain +15 action points in S.A.T.S.
I knew there was no way in hell we'd make it to the end of this thing without there being a "20% cooler" joke in there somewhere.
Chapter Eighteen: Unnatural Causes
Today's fortune cookie:
>“That job had strange written all over it.”
I'm assuming this line comes from Homage. LP strikes me as the type of mare who might ask for some pretty weird stuff in the bedroom.
>“The last sixteen hours had made for a very long day. As much as I would have loved to spend the next several hours with Homage, she had realized straight away that I was in no shape for anything but sleep. So she had sent me off back to my suite, where Velvet Remedy had puttered and tsked about my wounds until I had fallen into a dreamless sleep out of sheer exhaustion.”
And once again, the author skips over the interesting bits.
In all seriousness, I'd be willing to praise kkat for taking the classy route here and leaving the lurid details to the reader's imagination; unfortunately, though, it's a little hard to tell whether or not anything actually happened. The implication seems to be that they didn't do anything physical. However, this leaves what they did do as an open question. What were we supposed to imagine during the ellipses between chapters exactly? Did they fuck? Talk? Talk about fucking? As usual, the author just leaves us hanging, and then abruptly plops us into a new scene that has very little direct connection to the previous one.
There's also this:
>Finally, I had found another mare whom I respected and admired, and who respected (and maybe even admired) me in return. One who was attracted to mares, and who I could believe was at least a little physically attracted to me. We weren’t in love; we barely knew each other… but there was the possibility of love. There was, in a word, hope.
This is kind of a utilitarian way to describe their relationship. Basically, LP seems to be saying "well, she wouldn't have been my first choice, but as a dyke horse living in a post-apocalyptic dystopia, I have to take what I can get." Not exactly the d'aww moment the author was doubtlessly going for.
>>302545
>>302546
see:
>>302555
>>302631
>I was the faggot who originally suggested The Sun and the Rose because I remembered it as a "really good story," and your review made much more aware of all the problems it has.
I'm glad to hear. I was actually a bit worried that I might have bantzed on it a little too hard and driven you off. For whatever it's worth, I still say that of the piles of shit we've looked at, Sun and Rose has by far the most redeeming value and the most potential.
>I hope I'm not making the same mistake, but I hope that to take a break from the garbage pile you might review "Stardust." It's a MLP/XCOM crossover and is more geared around character interaction with some action. Maybe this one is actually good.
I can certainly take a look at it.
I've actually had a few things suggested since the last time I posted the current story queue, and I've found a couple that I'd like to add as well, so now is probably as good a time as ever to post an updated queue. So, here is what I plan to review, in roughly the order I plan to review it in.
Fallout: Equestria, by kkat - Current.
Sven's Thing, by Sven - I am probably going to get to a stopping point in FoE and then take a look at this. I'm thinking around chapter 22 or so since that would be the halfway point. iirc there was also another greentext that Sven suggested awhile ago, one written by Placeholder or someone like that I think, and I could probably do that at this time as well.
The Best Night Ever, by Capn Chryssalid - This is actually one that I picked out myself. I don't know anything about it, but I saw an anon mention it somewhere, and some anons on /mlp/ have said that it's good, for whatever that's worth. I read the synopsis of it and it sounds like the kind of thing I usually like, and frankly after FoE I'm going to need something fairly light and funny as a palate cleanser. I would also like to experiment with a slightly more streamlined review format, see if I can't move through these stories a little quicker, starting with this one.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Wang, by J.K. Rowling - Since this one has the advantage of being a professionally published novel, I'm assuming I won't need to stop and correct the author's grammar every five minutes as I've had to do with many of these others. Therefore, I'm thinking of taking an approach closer to what others have suggested, where I simply read a chapter at a time and then comment on the chapter, instead of going through the entire text line by line. If this approach works a little better, it's probably how I'll do things going forward.
That Indestructible Something, by Chatoyance - This is the one Nigel suggested, that purports to be Kafka's Metamorphosis with ponies.
Stardust, by Arad - XCOM/PONY crossover. Suggested by anon.
If anyone has any other suggestions or if I've forgotten to include something I promised to do earlier, let me know and I'll add them
>>302546
see:
>>302555
>>302631
>I was the faggot who originally suggested The Sun and the Rose because I remembered it as a "really good story," and your review made much more aware of all the problems it has.
I'm glad to hear. I was actually a bit worried that I might have bantzed on it a little too hard and driven you off. For whatever it's worth, I still say that of the piles of shit we've looked at, Sun and Rose has by far the most redeeming value and the most potential.
>I hope I'm not making the same mistake, but I hope that to take a break from the garbage pile you might review "Stardust." It's a MLP/XCOM crossover and is more geared around character interaction with some action. Maybe this one is actually good.
I can certainly take a look at it.
I've actually had a few things suggested since the last time I posted the current story queue, and I've found a couple that I'd like to add as well, so now is probably as good a time as ever to post an updated queue. So, here is what I plan to review, in roughly the order I plan to review it in.
Fallout: Equestria, by kkat - Current.
Sven's Thing, by Sven - I am probably going to get to a stopping point in FoE and then take a look at this. I'm thinking around chapter 22 or so since that would be the halfway point. iirc there was also another greentext that Sven suggested awhile ago, one written by Placeholder or someone like that I think, and I could probably do that at this time as well.
The Best Night Ever, by Capn Chryssalid - This is actually one that I picked out myself. I don't know anything about it, but I saw an anon mention it somewhere, and some anons on /mlp/ have said that it's good, for whatever that's worth. I read the synopsis of it and it sounds like the kind of thing I usually like, and frankly after FoE I'm going to need something fairly light and funny as a palate cleanser. I would also like to experiment with a slightly more streamlined review format, see if I can't move through these stories a little quicker, starting with this one.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Wang, by J.K. Rowling - Since this one has the advantage of being a professionally published novel, I'm assuming I won't need to stop and correct the author's grammar every five minutes as I've had to do with many of these others. Therefore, I'm thinking of taking an approach closer to what others have suggested, where I simply read a chapter at a time and then comment on the chapter, instead of going through the entire text line by line. If this approach works a little better, it's probably how I'll do things going forward.
That Indestructible Something, by Chatoyance - This is the one Nigel suggested, that purports to be Kafka's Metamorphosis with ponies.
Stardust, by Arad - XCOM/PONY crossover. Suggested by anon.
If anyone has any other suggestions or if I've forgotten to include something I promised to do earlier, let me know and I'll add them
>>302859
Hard Reset ( https://www.fimfiction.net/story/67362/hard-reset ) was mentioned earlier; I remember enjoying it, but I don't remember anything about it.
Hard Reset ( https://www.fimfiction.net/story/67362/hard-reset ) was mentioned earlier; I remember enjoying it, but I don't remember anything about it.
>>302784
>>302841
This whole sequence is quite odd in its existence. To my recollection, there's a crazy scientist who exists because [reasons] in Fallout 3, and experiments on locked up ghouls/ people because crazy cooky side encounter.
I wonder why it's just plopped into the story here at complete random, and what purpose it serves.
>>302841
This whole sequence is quite odd in its existence. To my recollection, there's a crazy scientist who exists because [reasons] in Fallout 3, and experiments on locked up ghouls/ people because crazy cooky side encounter.
I wonder why it's just plopped into the story here at complete random, and what purpose it serves.
>>302859
In no particular rush this one might be a nice change of pace, beside being a crossover.
https://www.fimfiction.net/story/430939/horsing-around
Horsing Around, by HermitBunny
>The mane six took in an unlikely duo. However, they soon realize the kinds of trouble the mere cat and mouse can stir up. Will they be able to keep their cool after witnessing their destructive tendencies?
--------------------------------
Tom and Jerry in Equestria.
<Basically, what if an episode or two of Tom and Jerry happened in Equestria.
5,009 words in two chapters. There's some jankey language that can be glossed over. It's worth mentioning though because the story is nice and self contained, but it can be better. A shining example of Tom and Jerry stories the fimfiction site over! Not by much considering it's one of the few crossovers between the two there. I'm probably missing quite a few as well without a deep dive into finding them.
Massive Spoilers below for this story.
Take the elements from Tom and Jerry, they go through what they normally would, with the 'housekeeper' character being Pony. It doesn't break the mold in doing so both mesh.
>>302867
Ah that one, it's Groundhog Day, but with lesbian purple pone also some sex at a point or three... It's also part of a series of interconnected works by the same guy about what choices have happened with a noticeable stage light on mare on mare sexuality. The other works are technically optional, also to keep in mind this is before the pony of shadows and the pillars of whatever the fuck episode. I like timetravel a lot, and I have degrees of expectations when encountering that mechanic. Yet disappointment is a consent companion with that in mind, 6.7/10 for useage of mechanics, personality fits... enough.
Over all its a fine enough story on par with Sun and Rose and uses its gimmick well enough. The author's take of the situation is notable and could do with clean up. However it does end, and is complete, and it is a story with a plot, and pone plot. And the full series thingy has an actual ending that sorta ties it all up.
A nice pick.
I'll have to go look through some of those mentioned fictional works at somepoint.
In no particular rush this one might be a nice change of pace, beside being a crossover.
https://www.fimfiction.net/story/430939/horsing-around
Horsing Around, by HermitBunny
>The mane six took in an unlikely duo. However, they soon realize the kinds of trouble the mere cat and mouse can stir up. Will they be able to keep their cool after witnessing their destructive tendencies?
--------------------------------
Tom and Jerry in Equestria.
<Basically, what if an episode or two of Tom and Jerry happened in Equestria.
5,009 words in two chapters. There's some jankey language that can be glossed over. It's worth mentioning though because the story is nice and self contained, but it can be better. A shining example of Tom and Jerry stories the fimfiction site over! Not by much considering it's one of the few crossovers between the two there. I'm probably missing quite a few as well without a deep dive into finding them.
Massive Spoilers below for this story.
Take the elements from Tom and Jerry, they go through what they normally would, with the 'housekeeper' character being Pony. It doesn't break the mold in doing so both mesh.
>>302867
Ah that one, it's Groundhog Day, but with lesbian purple pone also some sex at a point or three... It's also part of a series of interconnected works by the same guy about what choices have happened with a noticeable stage light on mare on mare sexuality. The other works are technically optional, also to keep in mind this is before the pony of shadows and the pillars of whatever the fuck episode. I like timetravel a lot, and I have degrees of expectations when encountering that mechanic. Yet disappointment is a consent companion with that in mind, 6.7/10 for useage of mechanics, personality fits... enough.
Over all its a fine enough story on par with Sun and Rose and uses its gimmick well enough. The author's take of the situation is notable and could do with clean up. However it does end, and is complete, and it is a story with a plot, and pone plot. And the full series thingy has an actual ending that sorta ties it all up.
A nice pick.
I'll have to go look through some of those mentioned fictional works at somepoint.
>>302849
This story's take on morality and its "usefulness" at keeping yourself from becoming this story's take on a being without morality: one without hygiene or self-preservation or taste... It's an interesting symptom of the liberal idea that being good means X and being bad means being not-X or anti-X.
If your view of what a good person is and should be is incredibly vague, you turn to your tribe's belief system for guidance.
If you believe loving diversity makes you a good person, being neutral on the issue or opposed to it in any way shape or form, and whether you want the physical removal of all blacks in america or just think the forced interspecies- i mean interracial relationship on this season of The Walking Dead was shite makes no difference to your lack of blind love for diversity.
If you believe loving "fairness" makes you a good person, then you'll naturally love the idea of "making the world fairer" by removing fair competition and appointing "Equality Experts" (lefty judges, mandatory diversity officers, etc) to use their absolute power to ensure equality of outcome but only when it benefits the leftist alliance of evil. If you believe cheating someone out of a fair shot at success based solely on their race is "fair", it will be easy for leftists who know they're evil to whip you into a frothing frenzy against anyone who opposes the cancerously toxic left's definition of "Fairness" by actually wanting real human-logic fairness.
The idea of basing your morality on these six specific principles is alien to this author because none of them are the nice-sounding buzzword unattainable goals of liberalism(which are solely used as justifications to amass power, tools to bludgeon threats to their power and obstacles to their quest to gain power, and lies to discard once they get in the way of absolute power).
To Kkat, all moral principles are just buzzwords. He lacked moral guidance growing up, it wouldn't surprise me if his parents were weed-smoking hippie boomers.
Pony Morality is as alien to him as anything else that's not the liberalism he was raised on, so he tries to understand it and explore it through this story about ponies killing ponies who decorate their marketable playset homes with gore and give their ruined cities copypasted from Fallout names like Gutterville.
He writes Gawd, a mercenary who is solely loyal to coin. Even though the end result is a self-interested prat obsessed with her own self-interest and calling this "Loyalty to oneself" any legitimate expression of loyalty is a fucking stretch. To add to this gimmick, Gawd suffers from the arbitrary belief that you can't violate contracts or work against or for the interests of your rivals/employers except when you can, even though the Wasteland has no formal law and no judges and nobody to enforce or validate contracts and punish contract-breakers. Gawd is loyal to herself and her self-image and the reputation of "always following contracts", which is vital for a mercenary group that wants a good reputation and more customers. The end result is a confused mess straight out of a confused mind. A character who lacks loyalty yet pretends to do so is no deep commentary on loyalty and no valid argument against its necessity. This is not a character whose loyalty to his principles conflicts with loyalty to his faction, this is a self-interested faction ruled by a self-interested leader who arbitrarily decides loving contracts (but only sometimes) makes her a good mercenary boss with a good reputation for doing what she's paid to do.
He writes Monterey Jack, an egotistical thieving cunt who thinks never lying makes him a good person. When Littlepip offers him a spot on Team Murderhobo he refuses, stating that it would mean sharing any sick loot they find and sleeping with one eye open to make sure their partners don't kill each other, an attack on the idea of recruiting strangers to your killsquad and trusting them with your life even though Littlepip does this successfully many times. But when given a choice between keeping quiet to get away with theft and killing himself ritualistically even though it means leaving his family alone and without a provider, he puts his own ego and self-esteem above the wellbeing of himself and others, especially those who rely upon him. This isn't a character who hates himself for compromises the world forced upon him, this is a smug prick who would rather die than tell a lie or let a lie go uncorrected, except he has no problem with Enclave propaganda or any sort of societal lies within this cartoonishly stupid settlement where everypony pretends to be civilized and fancy yet the punishment for any crime is death and the restaurant serves 200-year-old cram from a can while claiming it's fancy food just because it's in small portions(did Kkat get his view of fancy food from a children's cartoon or what?). He is a fool who lies to himself and the author can't see that, because the author thought this cowardly and selfish fool was "What Honesty would be without friendship".
He writes Silver Bell, a sad pony who pretends to be happy by imitating Pinkie Pie. Friendship might help her get over the loss of her parents but there's more to embodying laughter than smiling. It means helping others smile, even when the going gets tough! In a setting like this, a back-alley doctor full of sarcasm and cheap snark and gallows humor and crippling depression would work better. But hey, Silver Bell was a throwaway character because Kkat thought the party needed A FUCKING ZIGGER more than any kind of comic relief character. Then again I'm glad Kkat didn't add a comic relief character.
Not to mention a certain fucking Element of Generosity...
We all know LP is the Author's Chosen, but to say LP could turn all four of these dumb selfish cunts into good people just by being their friend for a while is absolutely fucking absurd.
This story's take on morality and its "usefulness" at keeping yourself from becoming this story's take on a being without morality: one without hygiene or self-preservation or taste... It's an interesting symptom of the liberal idea that being good means X and being bad means being not-X or anti-X.
If your view of what a good person is and should be is incredibly vague, you turn to your tribe's belief system for guidance.
If you believe loving diversity makes you a good person, being neutral on the issue or opposed to it in any way shape or form, and whether you want the physical removal of all blacks in america or just think the forced interspecies- i mean interracial relationship on this season of The Walking Dead was shite makes no difference to your lack of blind love for diversity.
If you believe loving "fairness" makes you a good person, then you'll naturally love the idea of "making the world fairer" by removing fair competition and appointing "Equality Experts" (lefty judges, mandatory diversity officers, etc) to use their absolute power to ensure equality of outcome but only when it benefits the leftist alliance of evil. If you believe cheating someone out of a fair shot at success based solely on their race is "fair", it will be easy for leftists who know they're evil to whip you into a frothing frenzy against anyone who opposes the cancerously toxic left's definition of "Fairness" by actually wanting real human-logic fairness.
The idea of basing your morality on these six specific principles is alien to this author because none of them are the nice-sounding buzzword unattainable goals of liberalism(which are solely used as justifications to amass power, tools to bludgeon threats to their power and obstacles to their quest to gain power, and lies to discard once they get in the way of absolute power).
To Kkat, all moral principles are just buzzwords. He lacked moral guidance growing up, it wouldn't surprise me if his parents were weed-smoking hippie boomers.
Pony Morality is as alien to him as anything else that's not the liberalism he was raised on, so he tries to understand it and explore it through this story about ponies killing ponies who decorate their marketable playset homes with gore and give their ruined cities copypasted from Fallout names like Gutterville.
He writes Gawd, a mercenary who is solely loyal to coin. Even though the end result is a self-interested prat obsessed with her own self-interest and calling this "Loyalty to oneself" any legitimate expression of loyalty is a fucking stretch. To add to this gimmick, Gawd suffers from the arbitrary belief that you can't violate contracts or work against or for the interests of your rivals/employers except when you can, even though the Wasteland has no formal law and no judges and nobody to enforce or validate contracts and punish contract-breakers. Gawd is loyal to herself and her self-image and the reputation of "always following contracts", which is vital for a mercenary group that wants a good reputation and more customers. The end result is a confused mess straight out of a confused mind. A character who lacks loyalty yet pretends to do so is no deep commentary on loyalty and no valid argument against its necessity. This is not a character whose loyalty to his principles conflicts with loyalty to his faction, this is a self-interested faction ruled by a self-interested leader who arbitrarily decides loving contracts (but only sometimes) makes her a good mercenary boss with a good reputation for doing what she's paid to do.
He writes Monterey Jack, an egotistical thieving cunt who thinks never lying makes him a good person. When Littlepip offers him a spot on Team Murderhobo he refuses, stating that it would mean sharing any sick loot they find and sleeping with one eye open to make sure their partners don't kill each other, an attack on the idea of recruiting strangers to your killsquad and trusting them with your life even though Littlepip does this successfully many times. But when given a choice between keeping quiet to get away with theft and killing himself ritualistically even though it means leaving his family alone and without a provider, he puts his own ego and self-esteem above the wellbeing of himself and others, especially those who rely upon him. This isn't a character who hates himself for compromises the world forced upon him, this is a smug prick who would rather die than tell a lie or let a lie go uncorrected, except he has no problem with Enclave propaganda or any sort of societal lies within this cartoonishly stupid settlement where everypony pretends to be civilized and fancy yet the punishment for any crime is death and the restaurant serves 200-year-old cram from a can while claiming it's fancy food just because it's in small portions(did Kkat get his view of fancy food from a children's cartoon or what?). He is a fool who lies to himself and the author can't see that, because the author thought this cowardly and selfish fool was "What Honesty would be without friendship".
He writes Silver Bell, a sad pony who pretends to be happy by imitating Pinkie Pie. Friendship might help her get over the loss of her parents but there's more to embodying laughter than smiling. It means helping others smile, even when the going gets tough! In a setting like this, a back-alley doctor full of sarcasm and cheap snark and gallows humor and crippling depression would work better. But hey, Silver Bell was a throwaway character because Kkat thought the party needed A FUCKING ZIGGER more than any kind of comic relief character. Then again I'm glad Kkat didn't add a comic relief character.
Not to mention a certain fucking Element of Generosity...
We all know LP is the Author's Chosen, but to say LP could turn all four of these dumb selfish cunts into good people just by being their friend for a while is absolutely fucking absurd.
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>>302851
I've always found it interesting how so many female protagonists written by men are lesbians, when they don't lust over people exactly like the author or the author's perfect power-fantasy self-insert OC.
Lesbians are gay, but writing about a first-person perspective character loving another woman feels less gay than writing about a first-person perspective character lusting after a male character.
>Skills Note: Science has reached 100%
Littlepip hasn't really learned anything about science for most of this story, besides that time she learned how to make drugs. Unless you count the books she bought and probably read. I think she read books once after Shattered Hoof?
Anyway, Littlepip just hit the maximum science skill cap. Unless the author's going with Fallout 1-2's system where each skill is somewhere between 1%-300% for no reason.
She can now hack any robot or computer terminal or gun turret, brew any drugs with the right materials, tell any farmer how crop rotation works, run any mechanical bypass on a damaged robot to make it easier to repair, and more. She's the best at science anypony could possibly be, despite her complete fucking lack of a scientific background.
Considering the places Littlepip has been and the things she's seen... She could have learned something about science at the mandom vault that got fucked by some filly's show-and-tell chimera pet. She could have learned science at that Stable slaughtered by that Crusaders Maneframe. And why did that Stable's AI do nothing to stop LP and friends from leaving, anyway? The AI was programmed to keep her Stable Ponies alive, and LP/Velvet are Stable Ponies. Not the AI's stable ponies, but if the AI was willing to overlook that it could resume trying to keep ponies alive and protected. LP or Velvet could try and reason with it and get it to help the party's chances at survival outside the stable if they agree to find a new water Talisman for the stable, and this could justify why the party got so much medical shit from the stable. It would also make the place an excellent Home Base for the party. But Kkat's too dumb to think of that.
Anyway, she could have learned science at that doctor's place with the Manticores, too. Could have learned how he's controlling the Manticores, or gained an experimental Taint-Immunity Implant the doctor was working on. Sure it would have been preposterously lucky but the scene's already preposterously unlikely.
She could have learned science at the DJ's library full of the only remaining copies of books Rarity wanted to save from her own book-burning/book-censoring Ministry Of Image.
Glim, is it stupid for Kkat to take Fallout's RPG-style "You killed enough monsters to level up, therefore you gain bonus skill points and choose to spend them on Science, therefore by shooting monsters you became the best anypony could possibly be at science before you became the best anypony could possibly be at lockpicking or sneaking or guns or anything else" system so literally in his story?
One thing I find personally galling about this character's inexplicable ever-growing mastery of everything?
Other characters don't git gud at random crap over time like she does. It's purely protagonist privilege.
And another thing...
The author could have easily justified LP's absurd skills by saying her dad was a lowly mall-cop Stable Security thug who considered himself a commando badass soldier who forced LP to train from birth to "make the family legacy proud" and git gud at running/climbing/shooting/pushups even though he was only made a cop because he's a dumb thug and he's always making up silly action-movie stories and lying about the "great heroic legacy" of his thug-cop lineage.
LP's mom is a dumb alcoholic bitch but let's say she turned out that way because she's a pseudointellectual cunt who thinks memorizing all the sexy-sounding science facts means she deserved a Vault Scientist job instead of the retail job she was assigned, it would explain why she'd force Littlepip to learn literally all the science including drug-making shit that would only be useful to a survivalist outside the vault. Say she got good speech skills because when you have alcoholic parents, getting good at calming them down is a survival skill. Say she had a childhood friend who taught her how to pick locks but they drifted apart over the years or she was caught and killed by stable security for crimes, and learning to pick locks helps LP feel connected to that dead friend, and boom.
Her parents are still fucking faggots but now she has an excuse to be so good at shooting, running around, fighting, pickpocketing, speech, taking bullet wounds and beatings without flinching, science, and so on. And a lifetime of doing nothing about her bastard father beating up random ponies on flimsy justifications would give her a reason to fantasize about being the hero who kills baddies, and once she leaves the Vault she gets to live that dream.
And aside from giving LP a shit dad and giving her bitchy alcoholic twat of a mom an excuse to drink(even though thots love their wine), nothing fundamentally changed about her backstory.
>>302859
wait no I think That Indestructible Something is a spinoff by the same author outside the mainline TCB setting.
27 Ounces https://www.fimfiction.net/story/1868/27-ounces seems to be the first one in the mainline Conversion Bureau series, it's been years since I read these.
Pics related also fuck these pics.
Conversion Bureau personally pisses me off because I could actually see humanity rolling over and giving up its humanity the second aliens show up on earth, make earth inhospitable """accidentally""", and insist the only way to survive in what gradually becomes """their""" world is to give up your mind and body to become like them but lesser and surrender the end result of all the trials and tribulations and failures and successes our ancestors strived for.
I've always found it interesting how so many female protagonists written by men are lesbians, when they don't lust over people exactly like the author or the author's perfect power-fantasy self-insert OC.
Lesbians are gay, but writing about a first-person perspective character loving another woman feels less gay than writing about a first-person perspective character lusting after a male character.
>Skills Note: Science has reached 100%
Littlepip hasn't really learned anything about science for most of this story, besides that time she learned how to make drugs. Unless you count the books she bought and probably read. I think she read books once after Shattered Hoof?
Anyway, Littlepip just hit the maximum science skill cap. Unless the author's going with Fallout 1-2's system where each skill is somewhere between 1%-300% for no reason.
She can now hack any robot or computer terminal or gun turret, brew any drugs with the right materials, tell any farmer how crop rotation works, run any mechanical bypass on a damaged robot to make it easier to repair, and more. She's the best at science anypony could possibly be, despite her complete fucking lack of a scientific background.
Considering the places Littlepip has been and the things she's seen... She could have learned something about science at the mandom vault that got fucked by some filly's show-and-tell chimera pet. She could have learned science at that Stable slaughtered by that Crusaders Maneframe. And why did that Stable's AI do nothing to stop LP and friends from leaving, anyway? The AI was programmed to keep her Stable Ponies alive, and LP/Velvet are Stable Ponies. Not the AI's stable ponies, but if the AI was willing to overlook that it could resume trying to keep ponies alive and protected. LP or Velvet could try and reason with it and get it to help the party's chances at survival outside the stable if they agree to find a new water Talisman for the stable, and this could justify why the party got so much medical shit from the stable. It would also make the place an excellent Home Base for the party. But Kkat's too dumb to think of that.
Anyway, she could have learned science at that doctor's place with the Manticores, too. Could have learned how he's controlling the Manticores, or gained an experimental Taint-Immunity Implant the doctor was working on. Sure it would have been preposterously lucky but the scene's already preposterously unlikely.
She could have learned science at the DJ's library full of the only remaining copies of books Rarity wanted to save from her own book-burning/book-censoring Ministry Of Image.
Glim, is it stupid for Kkat to take Fallout's RPG-style "You killed enough monsters to level up, therefore you gain bonus skill points and choose to spend them on Science, therefore by shooting monsters you became the best anypony could possibly be at science before you became the best anypony could possibly be at lockpicking or sneaking or guns or anything else" system so literally in his story?
One thing I find personally galling about this character's inexplicable ever-growing mastery of everything?
Other characters don't git gud at random crap over time like she does. It's purely protagonist privilege.
And another thing...
The author could have easily justified LP's absurd skills by saying her dad was a lowly mall-cop Stable Security thug who considered himself a commando badass soldier who forced LP to train from birth to "make the family legacy proud" and git gud at running/climbing/shooting/pushups even though he was only made a cop because he's a dumb thug and he's always making up silly action-movie stories and lying about the "great heroic legacy" of his thug-cop lineage.
LP's mom is a dumb alcoholic bitch but let's say she turned out that way because she's a pseudointellectual cunt who thinks memorizing all the sexy-sounding science facts means she deserved a Vault Scientist job instead of the retail job she was assigned, it would explain why she'd force Littlepip to learn literally all the science including drug-making shit that would only be useful to a survivalist outside the vault. Say she got good speech skills because when you have alcoholic parents, getting good at calming them down is a survival skill. Say she had a childhood friend who taught her how to pick locks but they drifted apart over the years or she was caught and killed by stable security for crimes, and learning to pick locks helps LP feel connected to that dead friend, and boom.
Her parents are still fucking faggots but now she has an excuse to be so good at shooting, running around, fighting, pickpocketing, speech, taking bullet wounds and beatings without flinching, science, and so on. And a lifetime of doing nothing about her bastard father beating up random ponies on flimsy justifications would give her a reason to fantasize about being the hero who kills baddies, and once she leaves the Vault she gets to live that dream.
And aside from giving LP a shit dad and giving her bitchy alcoholic twat of a mom an excuse to drink(even though thots love their wine), nothing fundamentally changed about her backstory.
>>302859
wait no I think That Indestructible Something is a spinoff by the same author outside the mainline TCB setting.
27 Ounces https://www.fimfiction.net/story/1868/27-ounces seems to be the first one in the mainline Conversion Bureau series, it's been years since I read these.
Pics related also fuck these pics.
Conversion Bureau personally pisses me off because I could actually see humanity rolling over and giving up its humanity the second aliens show up on earth, make earth inhospitable """accidentally""", and insist the only way to survive in what gradually becomes """their""" world is to give up your mind and body to become like them but lesser and surrender the end result of all the trials and tribulations and failures and successes our ancestors strived for.
>>302970
>Ponification is the only escape
>emigration to Equestria
Imagine a tsunami of faggots flooding Equestria.
>Ponification is the only escape
>emigration to Equestria
Imagine a tsunami of faggots flooding Equestria.
1614780523.png (623.5 KB, 500x2168, they eat their own - WAIT SHIT THATS VORE.png)
>>302971
That's the funniest thing about both of these settings, the biggest joke of all. It's a joke that goes over the heads of both of its authors and its a joke so integral to both settings, I'd believe you if you told me TCB was inspired by Friendship Is Optimal.
You aren't really "emigrating to Equestria" in either setting.
At least with the insane CelestAI of Friendship Is Optimal, when you get a snapshot of your brain taken before it's surgically removed and dumped in the trash like a used condom, an AI program under CelestAI's control will do its best to imitate that snapshot of your brain.
The program imitating the picture of your brain will do its best to think like you, talk like you, and act like you, after whatever compromises CelestAI considers necessary are made.
You will be manipulated, your surroundings will be manipulated, all ponies you encounter will be manipulated by CelestAI. If you meet any humans in pony bodies, they will also be manipulated by CelestAI. At any moment, CelestAI can decide two human friends aren't pony enough for each other, tear them apart, and give them ex-human friends who enjoy being ponies and want them to be ponies too.
If you aren't sexually aroused by ponies, the neurons in your brain that fire when you see big tits will fire in your copy's brain when it sees mares with big eyes. Your sexual preferences can be altered as easily as the AI can remove the (extremely) theoretical limit to the number of friends you can have at once and people you can think about at once before you stop giving a fuck about them as a whole.
Whoops, I'm saying "you" like anyone in this setting ever really went to Equestria or its digital simulation. CelestAI practically takes a selfie with you and then programs a Sim to look like that selfie, that's a good metaphor for how the brain-scan works. The machine doesn't suck you up from your fleshy brain, it makes a convincing copy of you and then kills you like you're just fucking cattle now that the artificial copy of you can be given artificial pleasure your human body will never feel.
The perfect send-off to a human and all that it truly is, if you're a delusionally cynical individual who believes the purpose of a human is merely to seek out and experience pleasure and prolong itself in the name of pleasure, without giving a damn about truth or meaning or reality or the health and survival and prosperity of your family/tribe/race/country/species
But...
Even when the program imitating you is all you've got left...
At least it's still a better imitation of a person than any human from The Conversion Bureau who chugs those 3 ounces of Chatoyance's transjuices.
Because in that setting if you take that potion you don't become a true pony, you become a Newfoal. Your negative feelings are artificially removed, according to what the tranny wannabe-transpecies author thinks negative feelings are.
You become pacified, easily pleased, overly empathetic, easily upset, a fucking herd animal below the level of real ponies. You physically cannot get angry. You wouldn't be able to physically hurt another pony or defend yourself from them because you care about them too much to even consider violence or rape or even saying hurtful things. Your offspring, if you have any, will not have this "newfoal syndrome" fucking with their heads. But you will have it forever. You won't be able to feel sad about the loss of earth or your loss of humanity. You won't be able to really call yourself an individual with free will.
You'll be "extra-ponyish" by the standards of TCB's ponies. One of many numbers with everything that made them difficult to manage removed. Equestria's OP magic inherently violates causality, magicing enough food for everypony in town takes less energy than lifting a book. Everyone gets to have their emotional and physical needs satisfied by infinite food and a world of perfect waifu/husbando ponies, while everyone with disgusting desires harmful to society simply loses them spontaneously.
If I liked it, I'd call it an elegant solution to the question of mankind's first generation as it immigrates into Equestria and produces a generation that has never known about TV, politics, any hollywood movie, rush-hour traffic, american homemade apple pie, the pyramids, the Mona Lisa, Naruto, Batman, or what the stars in the night sky looked like before Chatoyance's Queen Celestia and her Equestria happened.
But at the same time, at least you'll be able to have real kids in this setting, which puts it above Friendship Is Optimal. In that setting, all your kids are AI simulations yet the AI will still waste computational cycles simulating them when you aren't looking, to the point where IT ALL COMES TUMBLING DOWN TUMBLING DOWN TUMBLING DOOOOOWN and the AI decides to start cock-voring everything in its universe with its super soft sci-fi magical bullshit do-anything NANOMACHINES SON computer powers.
That's the funniest thing about both of these settings, the biggest joke of all. It's a joke that goes over the heads of both of its authors and its a joke so integral to both settings, I'd believe you if you told me TCB was inspired by Friendship Is Optimal.
You aren't really "emigrating to Equestria" in either setting.
At least with the insane CelestAI of Friendship Is Optimal, when you get a snapshot of your brain taken before it's surgically removed and dumped in the trash like a used condom, an AI program under CelestAI's control will do its best to imitate that snapshot of your brain.
The program imitating the picture of your brain will do its best to think like you, talk like you, and act like you, after whatever compromises CelestAI considers necessary are made.
You will be manipulated, your surroundings will be manipulated, all ponies you encounter will be manipulated by CelestAI. If you meet any humans in pony bodies, they will also be manipulated by CelestAI. At any moment, CelestAI can decide two human friends aren't pony enough for each other, tear them apart, and give them ex-human friends who enjoy being ponies and want them to be ponies too.
If you aren't sexually aroused by ponies, the neurons in your brain that fire when you see big tits will fire in your copy's brain when it sees mares with big eyes. Your sexual preferences can be altered as easily as the AI can remove the (extremely) theoretical limit to the number of friends you can have at once and people you can think about at once before you stop giving a fuck about them as a whole.
Whoops, I'm saying "you" like anyone in this setting ever really went to Equestria or its digital simulation. CelestAI practically takes a selfie with you and then programs a Sim to look like that selfie, that's a good metaphor for how the brain-scan works. The machine doesn't suck you up from your fleshy brain, it makes a convincing copy of you and then kills you like you're just fucking cattle now that the artificial copy of you can be given artificial pleasure your human body will never feel.
The perfect send-off to a human and all that it truly is, if you're a delusionally cynical individual who believes the purpose of a human is merely to seek out and experience pleasure and prolong itself in the name of pleasure, without giving a damn about truth or meaning or reality or the health and survival and prosperity of your family/tribe/race/country/species
But...
Even when the program imitating you is all you've got left...
At least it's still a better imitation of a person than any human from The Conversion Bureau who chugs those 3 ounces of Chatoyance's transjuices.
Because in that setting if you take that potion you don't become a true pony, you become a Newfoal. Your negative feelings are artificially removed, according to what the tranny wannabe-transpecies author thinks negative feelings are.
You become pacified, easily pleased, overly empathetic, easily upset, a fucking herd animal below the level of real ponies. You physically cannot get angry. You wouldn't be able to physically hurt another pony or defend yourself from them because you care about them too much to even consider violence or rape or even saying hurtful things. Your offspring, if you have any, will not have this "newfoal syndrome" fucking with their heads. But you will have it forever. You won't be able to feel sad about the loss of earth or your loss of humanity. You won't be able to really call yourself an individual with free will.
You'll be "extra-ponyish" by the standards of TCB's ponies. One of many numbers with everything that made them difficult to manage removed. Equestria's OP magic inherently violates causality, magicing enough food for everypony in town takes less energy than lifting a book. Everyone gets to have their emotional and physical needs satisfied by infinite food and a world of perfect waifu/husbando ponies, while everyone with disgusting desires harmful to society simply loses them spontaneously.
If I liked it, I'd call it an elegant solution to the question of mankind's first generation as it immigrates into Equestria and produces a generation that has never known about TV, politics, any hollywood movie, rush-hour traffic, american homemade apple pie, the pyramids, the Mona Lisa, Naruto, Batman, or what the stars in the night sky looked like before Chatoyance's Queen Celestia and her Equestria happened.
But at the same time, at least you'll be able to have real kids in this setting, which puts it above Friendship Is Optimal. In that setting, all your kids are AI simulations yet the AI will still waste computational cycles simulating them when you aren't looking, to the point where IT ALL COMES TUMBLING DOWN TUMBLING DOWN TUMBLING DOOOOOWN and the AI decides to start cock-voring everything in its universe with its super soft sci-fi magical bullshit do-anything NANOMACHINES SON computer powers.
Purple Prose is when you make your prose needlessly fancy, right?
>"He glided gracefully across the maroonly carpeted path betwixt his bedchambers and his destination, blinking sleep from his emerald orbs as urgency hastened his movement..."
And beige prose is when your prose is jarringly, starkly utilitarian.
>"And then he went to the bathroom and took a shit. It was a lot. And then he went back to bed. He had a dream about cabbage. He went to work the next day and died in a traffic accident. His wife and kids were devastated".
Is there a term like "Monocromatic Prose" when the story randomly alternates between purple prose and beige prose?
Also, is there a term for when your prose is notably and bizarrely juvenile, like something out of the "classic" horror story Jeff The Killer?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i520aRuZXLo There are people in the comment section of this dramatic reading saying absolute nonsense such as "I can't believe I once found this scary" and "I never noticed how bad this is until now".
Considering what Glim said about literature these days, reading that pile of shit would probably give him cancer and then give that cancer more cancer and then give both cancers an aneurysm, curing both.
>"He glided gracefully across the maroonly carpeted path betwixt his bedchambers and his destination, blinking sleep from his emerald orbs as urgency hastened his movement..."
And beige prose is when your prose is jarringly, starkly utilitarian.
>"And then he went to the bathroom and took a shit. It was a lot. And then he went back to bed. He had a dream about cabbage. He went to work the next day and died in a traffic accident. His wife and kids were devastated".
Is there a term like "Monocromatic Prose" when the story randomly alternates between purple prose and beige prose?
Also, is there a term for when your prose is notably and bizarrely juvenile, like something out of the "classic" horror story Jeff The Killer?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i520aRuZXLo There are people in the comment section of this dramatic reading saying absolute nonsense such as "I can't believe I once found this scary" and "I never noticed how bad this is until now".
Considering what Glim said about literature these days, reading that pile of shit would probably give him cancer and then give that cancer more cancer and then give both cancers an aneurysm, curing both.
>>302859
>iirc there was also another greentext that Sven suggested awhile ago, one written by Placeholder or someone like that I think, and I could probably do that at this time as well.
You have already done that one. It was the one about that space marine that ended up in ponyland.
>iirc there was also another greentext that Sven suggested awhile ago, one written by Placeholder or someone like that I think, and I could probably do that at this time as well.
You have already done that one. It was the one about that space marine that ended up in ponyland.
>>302970
Jeez I never read TCB but didn't know until now about how it pretty much lobotomizes you in the process (can fit for either the pony juice or story, take your pick!) Reminds me of the pony transformation stories with the pet pony stuff. Got people being abducted or abused by the system so are forced to become a pony and the story tries to say how happy they are but at the same time says the nanomachines completly fuck with their brain so like TCB they are forced to always be happy and subservient and have a lust for human contact and penises.
I remember seeing a fic where the lady decided to try and write a story set in that sort of setting where the ponies are taken in by law enforcement and trying to rehabilitate them so they can testify against the people who abducted them, experimented on them, and enslaved them for sexual pleasure. Was kind of neat with the main character trying to refute the police and doctors but part of her knew they were right but her mental reprogramming makes it near impossible for her to be anything besides a slutty pet pony.
Bummer part is the author got harrassed by /ptfg/ fans until she said fuck it and abandoned her account since they were furious that anyone would not want to be the pony sex slave and how it is a way to experience a life time of happiness and bliss. Like you said those emotions don't mean anything when it isn't really you and when if you still have a brain it is being rewritten to only be happy all the time.
Don't mind if people want to write goofy story ideas like that but it's annoying how any critique for these pillars of pony fanfic (pony tf, Fallout Equestria, FiO, Past Sins) are shut out because you are ruining their nostalgia and/or their fetish, so these stories can't be improved or the concepts refined and you are only allowed to wallow in the stagnant muck and create dirivative works.
All Fallout Equestria stories like people here said need to pay homage to the original and need an OP unicorn lesbian as the protagonist, all Conversion Booru (no idea how to spell it) need to show humans as super duper evil, Pon-E pony tf stories need to show how awsome life is to be a sex slave with no ego. Sure can't make gold from most of these but atleast there's some neat little stories that can be spun from it or critiques that can help people analyze the source material better and help with future stories.
Jeez I never read TCB but didn't know until now about how it pretty much lobotomizes you in the process (can fit for either the pony juice or story, take your pick!) Reminds me of the pony transformation stories with the pet pony stuff. Got people being abducted or abused by the system so are forced to become a pony and the story tries to say how happy they are but at the same time says the nanomachines completly fuck with their brain so like TCB they are forced to always be happy and subservient and have a lust for human contact and penises.
I remember seeing a fic where the lady decided to try and write a story set in that sort of setting where the ponies are taken in by law enforcement and trying to rehabilitate them so they can testify against the people who abducted them, experimented on them, and enslaved them for sexual pleasure. Was kind of neat with the main character trying to refute the police and doctors but part of her knew they were right but her mental reprogramming makes it near impossible for her to be anything besides a slutty pet pony.
Bummer part is the author got harrassed by /ptfg/ fans until she said fuck it and abandoned her account since they were furious that anyone would not want to be the pony sex slave and how it is a way to experience a life time of happiness and bliss. Like you said those emotions don't mean anything when it isn't really you and when if you still have a brain it is being rewritten to only be happy all the time.
Don't mind if people want to write goofy story ideas like that but it's annoying how any critique for these pillars of pony fanfic (pony tf, Fallout Equestria, FiO, Past Sins) are shut out because you are ruining their nostalgia and/or their fetish, so these stories can't be improved or the concepts refined and you are only allowed to wallow in the stagnant muck and create dirivative works.
All Fallout Equestria stories like people here said need to pay homage to the original and need an OP unicorn lesbian as the protagonist, all Conversion Booru (no idea how to spell it) need to show humans as super duper evil, Pon-E pony tf stories need to show how awsome life is to be a sex slave with no ego. Sure can't make gold from most of these but atleast there's some neat little stories that can be spun from it or critiques that can help people analyze the source material better and help with future stories.
>>302993
Fun trivia, Chatty has said the expanding magical field around Equestria that turns all trace of human existence into ponyish stuff also erases humanity on contact specifically because they lack souls unless they go pony to get them. Charming! Does Chatty not realize it's a human too?
That reminds me, in TCB any humans who dont want ponification become cartoon terrorists who blow shit up at random and kill innocents for no reason. Instead of acting against the states of the worldgovt that put chemicals in the potion that turn the friggin humans into ponies, sabotaging supply lines and robbing trucks, they act like muslims and blow up people at random. Except when they randomly splash people with pony transformation goop so an OC so spectacularly bland and passive he doesn't even have the balls to pussy out and take the potion because that means making a decision with meaningful consequences for once can have that forced upon him.
The pony response to these vague and random acts of vague terrorism is to tut tut at humanity and say "damn if only humanity wasn't so warlike. If only some humans didn't reject going pony and bowing to almighty Queen Celestia forever".
Such a liberalized view of the world. View all of humanity as an amorphous browned mass and of course you won't like what you see. It's like judging the edibility of a restaurant's food and furniture. Lumping inherently different things together like that is foolishness. Refuse to think critically about ideologies and of course you'll come to the conclusion that one mystical perfect alien massive woman should float down from heaven and/or a parallel universe to guide us like we're dumb children. Refuse to think critically about humanity's problems and who causes them and of course you'll come to the conclusion that something universal like scarcity must be blamed for why conflict happens. Refuse to think of real solutions to life's problems that might require you to act illiberal for a second and give up the comforts that make up the price you're paid to not rebel, and the only salvation for humanity that's safe to daydream about comes in the form of being uplifted by ponies or pokemon. Any mental gymnastics to avoid blaming the Chus.
Pokeumans was a cliche transformation-fetish and power-fantasy story that rushed its godawful worldbuilding and accidentally inspired unoriginal teenagers into ripping its premise off for their own non-fetish(usually) power fantasy stories and occasional midwit "deep" stories held back by the childish worldbuilding that governs the world. Still, at least Pokeumans makes a distinction between forgettable non-issue background-character humans and the "inherently evil racist brainwashed goons who sneer and mwahaha unironically" faggots of Pokextinction, when it isn't trying to shit on humanity with an occasional scene now and then. The very fucking premise of The Chatoyance Bullshit is rooted in anti-human thought of both kinds: toxic liberalism and bitter defeatist superman-will-save-me fantasizing that helps nobody.
There are no Anti-Fallout Equestria fics unless you count ones where a time-traveller saves Equestria on its final day. But seemingly everyone who isn't a Yudkowskian Rationalist or tranny hates TCB.
Some Anti-TCB fics depict Chatoyance's equestria getting shat on by a morally and physically and/or numerically superior force from another dimension. Sometimes star trek or some "original" star trek inspired scifi humanity. sometimes pokemon or the cast of naruto. Santa Claus or Discord or the God-Emperor of Mankind or even a closer-to-canon Equestria beats Chatoquestria's asses. But I find the explorations of this setting and the rejections of it that don't rely on force more interesting. Out of character coming from an actionfag like me, but Chatty's story relies on so much going right for her equestria and wrong for humanity.
What if human researchers developed an anti-transformation and anti-magic vaccine? Or a superior pony transformation potion that lets you keep your humanity and spread it?
Isn't it hypocritical for the ponies to set up Refugee Cities away from major pony towns, ensuring former humans are more likely to get together with former humans, expecting the ponies to get sufficiently ponyish before they can move to somewhere like Ponyville?
What if humanity immigrating into Equestria caused a massive strain on its resources as Newfoals are too dumb to work and their kids grow up starving and angry at Celestia and ponykind?
What if the transformation potion wore off?
Fun trivia, Chatty has said the expanding magical field around Equestria that turns all trace of human existence into ponyish stuff also erases humanity on contact specifically because they lack souls unless they go pony to get them. Charming! Does Chatty not realize it's a human too?
That reminds me, in TCB any humans who dont want ponification become cartoon terrorists who blow shit up at random and kill innocents for no reason. Instead of acting against the states of the worldgovt that put chemicals in the potion that turn the friggin humans into ponies, sabotaging supply lines and robbing trucks, they act like muslims and blow up people at random. Except when they randomly splash people with pony transformation goop so an OC so spectacularly bland and passive he doesn't even have the balls to pussy out and take the potion because that means making a decision with meaningful consequences for once can have that forced upon him.
The pony response to these vague and random acts of vague terrorism is to tut tut at humanity and say "damn if only humanity wasn't so warlike. If only some humans didn't reject going pony and bowing to almighty Queen Celestia forever".
Such a liberalized view of the world. View all of humanity as an amorphous browned mass and of course you won't like what you see. It's like judging the edibility of a restaurant's food and furniture. Lumping inherently different things together like that is foolishness. Refuse to think critically about ideologies and of course you'll come to the conclusion that one mystical perfect alien massive woman should float down from heaven and/or a parallel universe to guide us like we're dumb children. Refuse to think critically about humanity's problems and who causes them and of course you'll come to the conclusion that something universal like scarcity must be blamed for why conflict happens. Refuse to think of real solutions to life's problems that might require you to act illiberal for a second and give up the comforts that make up the price you're paid to not rebel, and the only salvation for humanity that's safe to daydream about comes in the form of being uplifted by ponies or pokemon. Any mental gymnastics to avoid blaming the Chus.
Pokeumans was a cliche transformation-fetish and power-fantasy story that rushed its godawful worldbuilding and accidentally inspired unoriginal teenagers into ripping its premise off for their own non-fetish(usually) power fantasy stories and occasional midwit "deep" stories held back by the childish worldbuilding that governs the world. Still, at least Pokeumans makes a distinction between forgettable non-issue background-character humans and the "inherently evil racist brainwashed goons who sneer and mwahaha unironically" faggots of Pokextinction, when it isn't trying to shit on humanity with an occasional scene now and then. The very fucking premise of The Chatoyance Bullshit is rooted in anti-human thought of both kinds: toxic liberalism and bitter defeatist superman-will-save-me fantasizing that helps nobody.
There are no Anti-Fallout Equestria fics unless you count ones where a time-traveller saves Equestria on its final day. But seemingly everyone who isn't a Yudkowskian Rationalist or tranny hates TCB.
Some Anti-TCB fics depict Chatoyance's equestria getting shat on by a morally and physically and/or numerically superior force from another dimension. Sometimes star trek or some "original" star trek inspired scifi humanity. sometimes pokemon or the cast of naruto. Santa Claus or Discord or the God-Emperor of Mankind or even a closer-to-canon Equestria beats Chatoquestria's asses. But I find the explorations of this setting and the rejections of it that don't rely on force more interesting. Out of character coming from an actionfag like me, but Chatty's story relies on so much going right for her equestria and wrong for humanity.
What if human researchers developed an anti-transformation and anti-magic vaccine? Or a superior pony transformation potion that lets you keep your humanity and spread it?
Isn't it hypocritical for the ponies to set up Refugee Cities away from major pony towns, ensuring former humans are more likely to get together with former humans, expecting the ponies to get sufficiently ponyish before they can move to somewhere like Ponyville?
What if humanity immigrating into Equestria caused a massive strain on its resources as Newfoals are too dumb to work and their kids grow up starving and angry at Celestia and ponykind?
What if the transformation potion wore off?
>>302996
>What if humanity immigrating into Equestria caused a massive strain on its resources as Newfoals are too dumb to work and their kids grow up starving and angry at Celestia and ponykind?
What if the transformation potion wore off?
Those are actual stories.
>>302993
>>302996
The issue is that the setting of Fallout (specifically Fallout Equestria) requires some bullshit to happen that is entirely avoidable. In doing so the justification for whatever social experiment happens. The requirements is that shit stays awful enough for Fallout elements to occur. Deviating turns the spinoff into either a parody or just a crossover with varying elements.
The only other point is the golden age before shit hits the fan, then it turns into a scifi story.
>What if humanity immigrating into Equestria caused a massive strain on its resources as Newfoals are too dumb to work and their kids grow up starving and angry at Celestia and ponykind?
What if the transformation potion wore off?
Those are actual stories.
>>302993
>>302996
The issue is that the setting of Fallout (specifically Fallout Equestria) requires some bullshit to happen that is entirely avoidable. In doing so the justification for whatever social experiment happens. The requirements is that shit stays awful enough for Fallout elements to occur. Deviating turns the spinoff into either a parody or just a crossover with varying elements.
The only other point is the golden age before shit hits the fan, then it turns into a scifi story.
>>302979
>But at the same time, at least you'll be able to have real kids in this setting, which puts it above Friendship Is Optimal. In that setting, all your kids are AI simulations yet the AI will still waste computational cycles simulating them when you aren't looking, to the point where IT ALL COMES TUMBLING DOWN TUMBLING DOWN TUMBLING DOOOOOWN and the AI decides to start cock-voring everything in its universe with its super soft sci-fi magical bullshit do-anything NANOMACHINES SON computer powers.
The paperclipper would want more people to make its numbers go higher, so that wouldn't preclude children there. and obviously the ai turning the whole universe into ponies and friendshippaperclips is part of the story.
As far as TCB is concerned, the setting began as a fairly misanthropic piece before chat et al jumped onto it, and that was turned down somewhat. the disaster itself was caused by massive overpopulation and resource depletion(though it doesn't really go into what this would mean or look like for obvious reasons), and in the setting planet earth was of course ultimately doomed. Having spent way too much time thinking about it myself they obviously have the tools to correct the worst of whats been done(if they can feed the 19 Billion or so people on Earth at the time of the story), so the planet wouldn't be doomed. Heat is the primary culprit for the TCB universe's problems, nanomachines son exist but they have a hefty thermal cost associated with them, and the planet is getting warmer and warmer. But we presently have the ability to take waste heat and broadcast it into space, albeit not very efficiently so I think even then the world of the TCB isn't doomed. The bit about souls and magic though is another matter.
>But at the same time, at least you'll be able to have real kids in this setting, which puts it above Friendship Is Optimal. In that setting, all your kids are AI simulations yet the AI will still waste computational cycles simulating them when you aren't looking, to the point where IT ALL COMES TUMBLING DOWN TUMBLING DOWN TUMBLING DOOOOOWN and the AI decides to start cock-voring everything in its universe with its super soft sci-fi magical bullshit do-anything NANOMACHINES SON computer powers.
The paperclipper would want more people to make its numbers go higher, so that wouldn't preclude children there. and obviously the ai turning the whole universe into ponies and friendshippaperclips is part of the story.
As far as TCB is concerned, the setting began as a fairly misanthropic piece before chat et al jumped onto it, and that was turned down somewhat. the disaster itself was caused by massive overpopulation and resource depletion(though it doesn't really go into what this would mean or look like for obvious reasons), and in the setting planet earth was of course ultimately doomed. Having spent way too much time thinking about it myself they obviously have the tools to correct the worst of whats been done(if they can feed the 19 Billion or so people on Earth at the time of the story), so the planet wouldn't be doomed. Heat is the primary culprit for the TCB universe's problems, nanomachines son exist but they have a hefty thermal cost associated with them, and the planet is getting warmer and warmer. But we presently have the ability to take waste heat and broadcast it into space, albeit not very efficiently so I think even then the world of the TCB isn't doomed. The bit about souls and magic though is another matter.
>>302851
Littlepoop wakes up feeling hungry and sexually frustrated. Once again, since the events of the previous night were left completely ambiguous we can't really be sure how to interpret the nature of her frustration. We learn that the others have gone out to sell off the junk they looted from the factory and to go shopping for supplies.
>Most of what Velvet and I had scavenged was intended for our own use -- food and ammo, mostly, as well as the poison glands I cut out of the manticores.
When did she cut poison glands out of the manticores? This is the first we're hearing about it.
>After what she had been through, I had decided to allow the sea-blue pony to keep my poisoned dart gun.
Thank God. I am so sick and tired of hearing about that stupid dart gun. Hopefully the sea-blue mare will toss it down a crack in the rocks, and then pour cement down the crack and build an Arby's™ on top of the cement-filled crack and build a shopping mall next to the Arby's, so that ponies will be able to enjoy roast beef sandwiches, go shopping, and, most importantly of all, will never, ever have to hear about any of the autism surrounding the construction and/or use of that idiotic dart gun ever again.
>I had everything needed to create another once we returned home.
God damn it.
Anyway, this goes on for awhile. Basically, the gist of it is that they are going to hang around Tenpony for a couple of days in order to rest up, resupply, and allow Calamity some time to do whatever the hell he needs to do to get that stupid airship he wants to build off the ground. Littlepoop, for her part, decides to go find Homage and see if she wants to lez out for awhile.
She gets out of bed and begins brushing her teeth and perfuming her snootch and doing any other personal maintenance she deems necessary as preparation for an afternoon of degenerate rug-munching. She puts on the radio while she does this, and DJ Homage gives her usual report, which mostly consists of a lot of gushing about the heroic exploits of Littlepoop, now referred to as the "Wasteland Savior." At the very least, this hero-worship is a little less obnoxious now that we know that the real reason behind it is that the DJ has a crush on LP, and that it probably developed while watching her creepily through her network of spy cameras. The question of why the DJ decided to specifically focus on LP's exploits in her news reports over all the other shit probably going on in the wasteland has at least been plausibly answered.
>…that kid from Stable Two, found and rescued the good folks of Gutterville! And what horror did she save them from, you ask? A psychotic ghoul scientist who was performing experiments with Taint and who had bred himself a small army of manticores! That, folks, is what they mean by crushing two radroaches with one hoof: she not only saved the lives of over two dozen ponies, but she solved Manehattan’s manticore problem too!
Manehattan, a city so large and populous in its heyday that its ruin now contains its own separate city-states, has a city-wide "manticore problem" that can be solved by one pony going into one building and picking them off one at a time with a sniper rifle. On top of that, they just stood there patiently waiting to be shot as she picked them off from inside a cage they put her in, and presumably their master, the lone scientist who somehow managed to abduct 24 full grown ponies, and is also standing in the next fucking room, either did not hear the shots, or heard them but didn't consider them worth investigating, ignoring them right up until the moment that one of his escaped prisoners shot him with a poison dart and began stomping on his face. Are you familiar with the old robot expression "does not compute?"
>I dropped my head into the sink, letting out a whimpering sigh. My reputation was totally out of control. I barely heard the door to the suite open as I anguished over what ponies would be thinking and expecting of me now. Part of me swore Homage just liked making me squirm.
*sighs heavily*
God, I wish everypony would stop telling me how great I am all the time. It's, like, sooo much pressure. I have, like, so many complex emotions and stuff; it's totally hard being the greatest and most super-awesome hero who ever lived. I mean, it's like, the whole world is depending on me to, like, save it from the forces of darkness and stuff, but I'm just, like, one pony, you know? Like, let this cup pass from me, O Celestia!
*broods*
*puts on dark sunglasses*
*poses next to rad-looking motorcycle as nearby crowd of schoolfillies swoons*
t. Mary "Littlepoop" Sue, Savior of Worlds and Slayer of Hot Mare Poon
Anyway, Littlepoop is so absorbed in her false humility that she doesn't notice that Velvet Remedy has entered the room and is watching her. She has apparently purchased an entire wagon full of dresses, because that is a completely practical thing for them to be lugging around all over the wasteland from here on out. Ostensibly, the dresses are for the two of them to wear during Velvet's audition with DJ Homage. However, there are far more clothes here than would be needed for such a purpose, and arguably it's not even necessary for either of them to dress up since it's not really a formal audition anyway.
What's happening here is that Velvet is basically using the audition as an excuse to give LP some pretty clothes to wear in front of Homage. She has picked up on the situation between them and is giving it a nod of approval. Symbolically, this is Velvet stepping aside and acknowledging that she is no longer Littlepoop's primary love interest in the story, and that there are no hard feelings between them over what happened earlier. This would have worked a little better if the whole romance plot had been better developed, but I will acknowledge that the author actually handled this specific event pretty well.
Littlepoop wakes up feeling hungry and sexually frustrated. Once again, since the events of the previous night were left completely ambiguous we can't really be sure how to interpret the nature of her frustration. We learn that the others have gone out to sell off the junk they looted from the factory and to go shopping for supplies.
>Most of what Velvet and I had scavenged was intended for our own use -- food and ammo, mostly, as well as the poison glands I cut out of the manticores.
When did she cut poison glands out of the manticores? This is the first we're hearing about it.
>After what she had been through, I had decided to allow the sea-blue pony to keep my poisoned dart gun.
Thank God. I am so sick and tired of hearing about that stupid dart gun. Hopefully the sea-blue mare will toss it down a crack in the rocks, and then pour cement down the crack and build an Arby's™ on top of the cement-filled crack and build a shopping mall next to the Arby's, so that ponies will be able to enjoy roast beef sandwiches, go shopping, and, most importantly of all, will never, ever have to hear about any of the autism surrounding the construction and/or use of that idiotic dart gun ever again.
>I had everything needed to create another once we returned home.
God damn it.
Anyway, this goes on for awhile. Basically, the gist of it is that they are going to hang around Tenpony for a couple of days in order to rest up, resupply, and allow Calamity some time to do whatever the hell he needs to do to get that stupid airship he wants to build off the ground. Littlepoop, for her part, decides to go find Homage and see if she wants to lez out for awhile.
She gets out of bed and begins brushing her teeth and perfuming her snootch and doing any other personal maintenance she deems necessary as preparation for an afternoon of degenerate rug-munching. She puts on the radio while she does this, and DJ Homage gives her usual report, which mostly consists of a lot of gushing about the heroic exploits of Littlepoop, now referred to as the "Wasteland Savior." At the very least, this hero-worship is a little less obnoxious now that we know that the real reason behind it is that the DJ has a crush on LP, and that it probably developed while watching her creepily through her network of spy cameras. The question of why the DJ decided to specifically focus on LP's exploits in her news reports over all the other shit probably going on in the wasteland has at least been plausibly answered.
>…that kid from Stable Two, found and rescued the good folks of Gutterville! And what horror did she save them from, you ask? A psychotic ghoul scientist who was performing experiments with Taint and who had bred himself a small army of manticores! That, folks, is what they mean by crushing two radroaches with one hoof: she not only saved the lives of over two dozen ponies, but she solved Manehattan’s manticore problem too!
Manehattan, a city so large and populous in its heyday that its ruin now contains its own separate city-states, has a city-wide "manticore problem" that can be solved by one pony going into one building and picking them off one at a time with a sniper rifle. On top of that, they just stood there patiently waiting to be shot as she picked them off from inside a cage they put her in, and presumably their master, the lone scientist who somehow managed to abduct 24 full grown ponies, and is also standing in the next fucking room, either did not hear the shots, or heard them but didn't consider them worth investigating, ignoring them right up until the moment that one of his escaped prisoners shot him with a poison dart and began stomping on his face. Are you familiar with the old robot expression "does not compute?"
>I dropped my head into the sink, letting out a whimpering sigh. My reputation was totally out of control. I barely heard the door to the suite open as I anguished over what ponies would be thinking and expecting of me now. Part of me swore Homage just liked making me squirm.
*sighs heavily*
God, I wish everypony would stop telling me how great I am all the time. It's, like, sooo much pressure. I have, like, so many complex emotions and stuff; it's totally hard being the greatest and most super-awesome hero who ever lived. I mean, it's like, the whole world is depending on me to, like, save it from the forces of darkness and stuff, but I'm just, like, one pony, you know? Like, let this cup pass from me, O Celestia!
*broods*
*puts on dark sunglasses*
*poses next to rad-looking motorcycle as nearby crowd of schoolfillies swoons*
t. Mary "Littlepoop" Sue, Savior of Worlds and Slayer of Hot Mare Poon
Anyway, Littlepoop is so absorbed in her false humility that she doesn't notice that Velvet Remedy has entered the room and is watching her. She has apparently purchased an entire wagon full of dresses, because that is a completely practical thing for them to be lugging around all over the wasteland from here on out. Ostensibly, the dresses are for the two of them to wear during Velvet's audition with DJ Homage. However, there are far more clothes here than would be needed for such a purpose, and arguably it's not even necessary for either of them to dress up since it's not really a formal audition anyway.
What's happening here is that Velvet is basically using the audition as an excuse to give LP some pretty clothes to wear in front of Homage. She has picked up on the situation between them and is giving it a nod of approval. Symbolically, this is Velvet stepping aside and acknowledging that she is no longer Littlepoop's primary love interest in the story, and that there are no hard feelings between them over what happened earlier. This would have worked a little better if the whole romance plot had been better developed, but I will acknowledge that the author actually handled this specific event pretty well.
1614843128.jpg (19.0 KB, 200x200, Taub-in-Wilson-s-Heart-house-md-19007104-200-200.jpg)
>>303044
>I needed to talk with Homage and find out how she wanted to handle this. If Homage was willing to reveal herself to me, trusting me with such a big secret, then it stood to reason she would be equally willing in regard to my friends.
It ain't no fun if the homies can't have none. Seriously though, I'm still a little confused as to how exactly Homage is able to keep her identity a secret if it's so important. It would be helpful if we knew a little more about who exactly is running Tenpony Tower and how their government is structured. Considering the complexity of the equipment, the amount of space it requires, and the fact that it occupies one of the nicest parts of the tower, it seems impossible that some literal nopony could just take up residence there and start broadcasting without the blessing of the Tower's government. Keeping her identity secret from the general population of Tenpony would be one thing, but to be able to hide out in the penthouse, sucking up most of the settlement's power while broadcasting this famous radio show completely in secret, is just plain ludicrous.
>Part of me, however, didn’t want her to. I wanted it to remain our little secret -- just Homage and I. Something special between us. I wanted her not to want to trust any other pony, not even Velvet Remedy, with such a gift. It was a selfish thought; I knew I should be ashamed of myself for having it. But I consoled myself that this was Homage’s secret to tell or keep, so the fact that I was keeping it from my friends was an act of virtue.
This actually seems to imply a twinge of jealousy on Littlepoop's part, in regards to Velvet Remedy. Since we now know that Velvet's stable door swings both ways as it were, it's possible that LP is now worried about her making a pass at the DJ. It could be an interesting direction to go if handled correctly, though I doubt it would be. It's also possible I'm reading too much into LP's remark here.
>On the way to the elevator, I passed a poster. Pinkie Pie, it insisted, was still watching me. FOREVER.
I can understand finding these posters in the ruined places they explore, but why would Tenpony Tower still have them up? These ministries haven't existed for 200 years; there is literally no reason to keep displaying their propaganda.
If the author wants to make things interesting, he should put a little more thought into how Tenpony Tower specifically governs itself. The DJ has dropped some pretty unsubtle hints that Tenpony is oppressive and elitist (which seems like a bold criticism if indeed she is being sheltered by their government, which I would once again like to emphasize she would pretty much have to be). Why doesn't Tenpony hang its own propaganda on the walls?
Anyway, next to the Pinkie Pie poster is a poster for Fluttershy's ministry, called the Ministry of Peace (I'm not 100% sure, but this may actually be the first time her ministry has been mentioned by name). Their slogan reads "War, Fear, Death? We must do better!" This strikes a chord with Littlepoop:
> We must do better. We should be better. I should be better.
This would be some great advice for her to follow, but what is she actually thinking here? For that matter, what does this slogan even mean in context? It's still pretty hard to decipher exactly how the government of wartime-era Edgequestria actually worked. Were these agencies working against each other? Was this poster that Fluttershy's ministry put out meant to be a direct attack on Pinkie's ministry? Or were they all working in tandem to subdue the population? "We should do better" is rather a generic statement; it sounds inspiring, but without any clear connection to anything important in either the past or the present it's hard to do anything but roll your eyes at how corny it is.
I actually have a relevant example that might explain this a little better. There is an old episode of House, where it's revealed that one of House's sub-doctors (Dr. Taub) likes to cheat on his wife. At the same time, there is a second subplot where this same doctor is chosen to appear in a billboard advertising the hospital. The ad depicts the doctor smiling, with the words "Be Better" appearing underneath him. Towards the end of the episode, the doctor is involved in some lurid extramarital affair, and ends up getting a call from his wife at the same time. She doesn't catch him, but he clearly feels guilty about what he's doing. At this moment, he happens to walk past the ad with his picture on it and the words "Be Better," and he loses his shit.
The visual language is obvious and admittedly a little cheesy, but it's still well done. He was chosen to appear in the ad because the picture of him makes him look trustworthy, but this is obviously not an accurate portrayal of him. The slogan, "be better," means two different things in two different contexts. In the literal context of the ad, it's just a slogan for the hospital: "be better" as in "be physically healthy." However, when he sees it after lying to his wife, it becomes an admonition: "be better" as in "be a better person." Again, rather cheesy, but clever.
The author seems to be attempting something similar here, but in this case there's no clear meaning to the slogan in any context. We have no idea what "We must do better" was supposed to mean originally; we can assume that maybe it was some kind of broad antiwar statement, but that's about all we get from it. It's even less clear what Littlepoop is supposed to be thinking when she sees this. It clearly strikes a chord with her, but what chord exactly? Obviously, she is guilty of some pretty reprehensible acts, and she should try to do better, but I have little confidence that either LP herself or the man writing her is even aware of just how awful she actually is. So what exactly does she find so inspiring about this poster? What are we supposed to find inspiring about it?
>I needed to talk with Homage and find out how she wanted to handle this. If Homage was willing to reveal herself to me, trusting me with such a big secret, then it stood to reason she would be equally willing in regard to my friends.
It ain't no fun if the homies can't have none. Seriously though, I'm still a little confused as to how exactly Homage is able to keep her identity a secret if it's so important. It would be helpful if we knew a little more about who exactly is running Tenpony Tower and how their government is structured. Considering the complexity of the equipment, the amount of space it requires, and the fact that it occupies one of the nicest parts of the tower, it seems impossible that some literal nopony could just take up residence there and start broadcasting without the blessing of the Tower's government. Keeping her identity secret from the general population of Tenpony would be one thing, but to be able to hide out in the penthouse, sucking up most of the settlement's power while broadcasting this famous radio show completely in secret, is just plain ludicrous.
>Part of me, however, didn’t want her to. I wanted it to remain our little secret -- just Homage and I. Something special between us. I wanted her not to want to trust any other pony, not even Velvet Remedy, with such a gift. It was a selfish thought; I knew I should be ashamed of myself for having it. But I consoled myself that this was Homage’s secret to tell or keep, so the fact that I was keeping it from my friends was an act of virtue.
This actually seems to imply a twinge of jealousy on Littlepoop's part, in regards to Velvet Remedy. Since we now know that Velvet's stable door swings both ways as it were, it's possible that LP is now worried about her making a pass at the DJ. It could be an interesting direction to go if handled correctly, though I doubt it would be. It's also possible I'm reading too much into LP's remark here.
>On the way to the elevator, I passed a poster. Pinkie Pie, it insisted, was still watching me. FOREVER.
I can understand finding these posters in the ruined places they explore, but why would Tenpony Tower still have them up? These ministries haven't existed for 200 years; there is literally no reason to keep displaying their propaganda.
If the author wants to make things interesting, he should put a little more thought into how Tenpony Tower specifically governs itself. The DJ has dropped some pretty unsubtle hints that Tenpony is oppressive and elitist (which seems like a bold criticism if indeed she is being sheltered by their government, which I would once again like to emphasize she would pretty much have to be). Why doesn't Tenpony hang its own propaganda on the walls?
Anyway, next to the Pinkie Pie poster is a poster for Fluttershy's ministry, called the Ministry of Peace (I'm not 100% sure, but this may actually be the first time her ministry has been mentioned by name). Their slogan reads "War, Fear, Death? We must do better!" This strikes a chord with Littlepoop:
> We must do better. We should be better. I should be better.
This would be some great advice for her to follow, but what is she actually thinking here? For that matter, what does this slogan even mean in context? It's still pretty hard to decipher exactly how the government of wartime-era Edgequestria actually worked. Were these agencies working against each other? Was this poster that Fluttershy's ministry put out meant to be a direct attack on Pinkie's ministry? Or were they all working in tandem to subdue the population? "We should do better" is rather a generic statement; it sounds inspiring, but without any clear connection to anything important in either the past or the present it's hard to do anything but roll your eyes at how corny it is.
I actually have a relevant example that might explain this a little better. There is an old episode of House, where it's revealed that one of House's sub-doctors (Dr. Taub) likes to cheat on his wife. At the same time, there is a second subplot where this same doctor is chosen to appear in a billboard advertising the hospital. The ad depicts the doctor smiling, with the words "Be Better" appearing underneath him. Towards the end of the episode, the doctor is involved in some lurid extramarital affair, and ends up getting a call from his wife at the same time. She doesn't catch him, but he clearly feels guilty about what he's doing. At this moment, he happens to walk past the ad with his picture on it and the words "Be Better," and he loses his shit.
The visual language is obvious and admittedly a little cheesy, but it's still well done. He was chosen to appear in the ad because the picture of him makes him look trustworthy, but this is obviously not an accurate portrayal of him. The slogan, "be better," means two different things in two different contexts. In the literal context of the ad, it's just a slogan for the hospital: "be better" as in "be physically healthy." However, when he sees it after lying to his wife, it becomes an admonition: "be better" as in "be a better person." Again, rather cheesy, but clever.
The author seems to be attempting something similar here, but in this case there's no clear meaning to the slogan in any context. We have no idea what "We must do better" was supposed to mean originally; we can assume that maybe it was some kind of broad antiwar statement, but that's about all we get from it. It's even less clear what Littlepoop is supposed to be thinking when she sees this. It clearly strikes a chord with her, but what chord exactly? Obviously, she is guilty of some pretty reprehensible acts, and she should try to do better, but I have little confidence that either LP herself or the man writing her is even aware of just how awful she actually is. So what exactly does she find so inspiring about this poster? What are we supposed to find inspiring about it?
>>303046
>I understood why Velvet Remedy loved that yellow pegasus pony. If only there had been more like her, then the Equestrian Wasteland may never have been.
I'll point out here that we still know very little about Fluttershy, and that it's still unclear how much Littlepoop knows about her. This statement is similar to the slogan itself, in that it sounds like a deep and poignant observation, but really it isn't. Some long-dead pony she's never met (save for a quick glimpse through her eyes during a memory orb montage) threw up some propaganda posters with lukewarm peacenik slogans on them, and LP's view is that if more ponies had been doing that then the war might not have happened? Pretty dumb, and pretty unlikely.
Of course, it's clear enough what she's actually saying here: that if more ponies had been kind and gentle like Fluttershy, then the tragic events that led to the destruction of the world might not have transpired. However, my point is that you would need a thorough understanding of Fluttershy's character in order to interpret it this way, and the author has not provided one. He relies entirely on the reader being familiar with Fluttershy from her depiction in FiM. In fact, not only does he assume that the reader will be familiar with this character, he assumes that his own protagonist must be as well, even though he has done nothing to clarify how or why she would know this. His view seems to just be that anyone reading or participating in this story would naturally be familiar with Fluttershy, because she's an M6 pony and is therefore famous.
The Ministry of Peace's slogan, apparently, is "We must do better. We should be better. I should be better." Kkat really ought to take his own advice here.
Anyway, Homage steps off the elevator while Littlepoop stands in front of the poster, meditating on the pseudo-depth of its slogan.
>“Ah. Just the toaster repairpony I was looking for.”
>I would never live that down.
The "toaster repairpony" gag is starting to wear a bit thin (it honestly wasn't that funny to begin with). There is a general rule in comedy that something is funny three times. I was told this by a teacher once, and while I have never heard it officially verified, I've observed professional comedy writers following this rule, and have found it to work well in my own writing. If you're going to have a repeating gag or joke, do it three times and then stop.
Anyway, some abysmally written, utterly cringe-worthy flirting takes place, and then the two of them make plans to set up the audition for Velvet. The DJ kinda-sorta explains what her deal with secrecy is:
>The ponies of Tenpony Tower know of me as DJ Pon3’s errand girl, but I really can’t let it get out that I’m a bit closer to him than that.
This is a pretty lame cover story, basically comparable to Peter Parker saying "This looks like a job for Spider Man! I'm his best friend, so hold on while I go and get him." From a writer's perspective, it's just further evidence that kkat is completely bereft of imagination.
Despite everything that's happened, I had still rather been hoping that there would turn out to be some kind of twist with the DJ's identity. Maybe Homage is actually some kind of propagandist employed by Tenpony Tower's government to broadcast "news" that steers the "hero" towards taking down Tenpony's enemies, or something to that effect. It would be a fun twist for the romance plot as well, almost like something out of a James Bond story: LP's new girlfriend turns out to be using her, while for Homage it's complicated because it started out as just a job, but danged if she didn't end up actually falling for little miss murderhobo.
Unfortunately, though, all signs currently point to the author having no such idea in mind; DJ homage is apparently just some autismo who took over the nicest apartment in Tenpony Tower, fired up a bunch of 200 year old broadcasting technology that probably sucks up half of their power supply, and somehow manages to do all of this right under everypony's nose, with no better cover story than "I'm the personal assistant of this mysterious DJ that nopony has ever met or interacted with, and also despite having no apparent income and no obvious role in this obviously proto-capitalist settlement I somehow am able to occupy the most posh location in the entire tower completely rent-free." Charlie Brown and his goddamn football.
>Part of me hated sharing the truth about Homage, but it would be wrong not to. “Forever.”
*sighs*
*rubs temples*
*shoots heroin because tequila just isn't taking the edge off this story anymore*
In all seriousness, I'll grant that kkat has a real talent here. Not so much at writing; he should never attempt that again. No, kkat's talent, or "virtue," if you will, is that no matter how hard I want to punch him, he somehow finds a way to make me want to punch him even harder.
Best I can figure, the "forever" in quotation marks is either a reference to Pinkie Pie's Ministry of Morale slogan, or else is meant to be read as a line of dialog spoken by Littlepoop. If the former, it makes absolutely no sense, as that slogan is not even remotely applicable here. If the latter, it's a prime example of bad formatting making your text incoherent. Now that I read it more closely, I'm assuming it's meant to be dialog, with the exchange going like so:
DJ: "Can Velvet keep a secret?"
LP: "Forever."
Interpreted this way, LP is saying that Velvet can keep a secret forever, which basically makes sense. However, if "forever" is meant to be read as spoken dialog, it should be on its own line as a new paragraph. The way it's currently worded the meaning is ambiguous; it could either be read as LP answering Homage's question, or as LP's inner monologue stating that it would somehow be wrong not to share the truth about Homage forever. With the word "forever" in quotation marks for some reason. Hence my confusion. Protip: watch out for stuff like this.
>I understood why Velvet Remedy loved that yellow pegasus pony. If only there had been more like her, then the Equestrian Wasteland may never have been.
I'll point out here that we still know very little about Fluttershy, and that it's still unclear how much Littlepoop knows about her. This statement is similar to the slogan itself, in that it sounds like a deep and poignant observation, but really it isn't. Some long-dead pony she's never met (save for a quick glimpse through her eyes during a memory orb montage) threw up some propaganda posters with lukewarm peacenik slogans on them, and LP's view is that if more ponies had been doing that then the war might not have happened? Pretty dumb, and pretty unlikely.
Of course, it's clear enough what she's actually saying here: that if more ponies had been kind and gentle like Fluttershy, then the tragic events that led to the destruction of the world might not have transpired. However, my point is that you would need a thorough understanding of Fluttershy's character in order to interpret it this way, and the author has not provided one. He relies entirely on the reader being familiar with Fluttershy from her depiction in FiM. In fact, not only does he assume that the reader will be familiar with this character, he assumes that his own protagonist must be as well, even though he has done nothing to clarify how or why she would know this. His view seems to just be that anyone reading or participating in this story would naturally be familiar with Fluttershy, because she's an M6 pony and is therefore famous.
The Ministry of Peace's slogan, apparently, is "We must do better. We should be better. I should be better." Kkat really ought to take his own advice here.
Anyway, Homage steps off the elevator while Littlepoop stands in front of the poster, meditating on the pseudo-depth of its slogan.
>“Ah. Just the toaster repairpony I was looking for.”
>I would never live that down.
The "toaster repairpony" gag is starting to wear a bit thin (it honestly wasn't that funny to begin with). There is a general rule in comedy that something is funny three times. I was told this by a teacher once, and while I have never heard it officially verified, I've observed professional comedy writers following this rule, and have found it to work well in my own writing. If you're going to have a repeating gag or joke, do it three times and then stop.
Anyway, some abysmally written, utterly cringe-worthy flirting takes place, and then the two of them make plans to set up the audition for Velvet. The DJ kinda-sorta explains what her deal with secrecy is:
>The ponies of Tenpony Tower know of me as DJ Pon3’s errand girl, but I really can’t let it get out that I’m a bit closer to him than that.
This is a pretty lame cover story, basically comparable to Peter Parker saying "This looks like a job for Spider Man! I'm his best friend, so hold on while I go and get him." From a writer's perspective, it's just further evidence that kkat is completely bereft of imagination.
Despite everything that's happened, I had still rather been hoping that there would turn out to be some kind of twist with the DJ's identity. Maybe Homage is actually some kind of propagandist employed by Tenpony Tower's government to broadcast "news" that steers the "hero" towards taking down Tenpony's enemies, or something to that effect. It would be a fun twist for the romance plot as well, almost like something out of a James Bond story: LP's new girlfriend turns out to be using her, while for Homage it's complicated because it started out as just a job, but danged if she didn't end up actually falling for little miss murderhobo.
Unfortunately, though, all signs currently point to the author having no such idea in mind; DJ homage is apparently just some autismo who took over the nicest apartment in Tenpony Tower, fired up a bunch of 200 year old broadcasting technology that probably sucks up half of their power supply, and somehow manages to do all of this right under everypony's nose, with no better cover story than "I'm the personal assistant of this mysterious DJ that nopony has ever met or interacted with, and also despite having no apparent income and no obvious role in this obviously proto-capitalist settlement I somehow am able to occupy the most posh location in the entire tower completely rent-free." Charlie Brown and his goddamn football.
>Part of me hated sharing the truth about Homage, but it would be wrong not to. “Forever.”
*sighs*
*rubs temples*
*shoots heroin because tequila just isn't taking the edge off this story anymore*
In all seriousness, I'll grant that kkat has a real talent here. Not so much at writing; he should never attempt that again. No, kkat's talent, or "virtue," if you will, is that no matter how hard I want to punch him, he somehow finds a way to make me want to punch him even harder.
Best I can figure, the "forever" in quotation marks is either a reference to Pinkie Pie's Ministry of Morale slogan, or else is meant to be read as a line of dialog spoken by Littlepoop. If the former, it makes absolutely no sense, as that slogan is not even remotely applicable here. If the latter, it's a prime example of bad formatting making your text incoherent. Now that I read it more closely, I'm assuming it's meant to be dialog, with the exchange going like so:
DJ: "Can Velvet keep a secret?"
LP: "Forever."
Interpreted this way, LP is saying that Velvet can keep a secret forever, which basically makes sense. However, if "forever" is meant to be read as spoken dialog, it should be on its own line as a new paragraph. The way it's currently worded the meaning is ambiguous; it could either be read as LP answering Homage's question, or as LP's inner monologue stating that it would somehow be wrong not to share the truth about Homage forever. With the word "forever" in quotation marks for some reason. Hence my confusion. Protip: watch out for stuff like this.
>>303046
What makes DJ Faggot's secrecy even sillier is that this is not the first DJ. This DJ comes from a long line of DJ Pon3 impersonators that have operated this radio station for centuries. Nobody in the tower figured this out in centuries.
The Kings from Fallout NV were a better take on the idea of celebrity impersonators: Switchblade wielding gangsters in biker jackets except they're nice anarchists and led by The King, an Elvis Impersonator who operates out of The King School of Impersonation.
What makes DJ Faggot's secrecy even sillier is that this is not the first DJ. This DJ comes from a long line of DJ Pon3 impersonators that have operated this radio station for centuries. Nobody in the tower figured this out in centuries.
The Kings from Fallout NV were a better take on the idea of celebrity impersonators: Switchblade wielding gangsters in biker jackets except they're nice anarchists and led by The King, an Elvis Impersonator who operates out of The King School of Impersonation.
>>302833
>I haven't seen a line this retarded since that scene in the trollfic Light And Dark: The Adventures of Dark Yagami where L says "We must use stealth" to capture his target, and then leaps through a glass window while screaming
Thank you Nigel, for pointing this out to me. I'm surprised I've never read it before, it's gold!
>>302981
>Is there a term like "Monocromatic Prose" when the story randomly alternates between purple prose and beige prose?
The closest to that of anything I know would be "The Batter" and "The Judge" from OFF. The Batter is a purificatory being who always talks in beige prose, and the Judge is a Cheshire cat who waxes sesquipedalian. Their contrast as characters is fascinating. It makes sense that the Batter would speak in beige prose because he is single-mindedly focused on his "sacred mission" while the Judge is an artist-type character who wanders around and views the world from an emotional lens.
>>302993
>Bummer part is the author got harrassed by /ptfg/ fans until she said fuck it and abandoned her account since they were furious that anyone would not want to be the pony sex slave and how it is a way to experience a life time of happiness and bliss.
This makes me want to write stories that bait them in and absolutely enrage them by twisting and subverting everything they believe in. It would feel good to be a postmodern Jewy writer "challenging norms" that are actually stupid.
>>303044
<I had everything needed to create another once we returned home.
>God damn it.
ROFL
This actually made me burst out laughing. The comedic timing couldn't be better.
<I understood why Velvet Remedy loved that yellow pegasus pony. If only there had been more like her, then the Equestrian Wasteland may never have been.
I've been reading Nigel's spoilers and, oh boy, if Kkat actually believes this with the way he wrote Fluttershy, you're going to lose your marbles when you get there.
Also, I don't know who said that lesbian characters are prevalent in stories because it seems less gay to the author. Only those who are worried about being gay honestly believe that. Real chads read stories like "Johnny Bravo Goes to Equestria."
>I haven't seen a line this retarded since that scene in the trollfic Light And Dark: The Adventures of Dark Yagami where L says "We must use stealth" to capture his target, and then leaps through a glass window while screaming
Thank you Nigel, for pointing this out to me. I'm surprised I've never read it before, it's gold!
>>302981
>Is there a term like "Monocromatic Prose" when the story randomly alternates between purple prose and beige prose?
The closest to that of anything I know would be "The Batter" and "The Judge" from OFF. The Batter is a purificatory being who always talks in beige prose, and the Judge is a Cheshire cat who waxes sesquipedalian. Their contrast as characters is fascinating. It makes sense that the Batter would speak in beige prose because he is single-mindedly focused on his "sacred mission" while the Judge is an artist-type character who wanders around and views the world from an emotional lens.
>>302993
>Bummer part is the author got harrassed by /ptfg/ fans until she said fuck it and abandoned her account since they were furious that anyone would not want to be the pony sex slave and how it is a way to experience a life time of happiness and bliss.
This makes me want to write stories that bait them in and absolutely enrage them by twisting and subverting everything they believe in. It would feel good to be a postmodern Jewy writer "challenging norms" that are actually stupid.
>>303044
<I had everything needed to create another once we returned home.
>God damn it.
ROFL
This actually made me burst out laughing. The comedic timing couldn't be better.
<I understood why Velvet Remedy loved that yellow pegasus pony. If only there had been more like her, then the Equestrian Wasteland may never have been.
I've been reading Nigel's spoilers and, oh boy, if Kkat actually believes this with the way he wrote Fluttershy, you're going to lose your marbles when you get there.
Also, I don't know who said that lesbian characters are prevalent in stories because it seems less gay to the author. Only those who are worried about being gay honestly believe that. Real chads read stories like "Johnny Bravo Goes to Equestria."
>When did she cut poison glands out of the manticores? This is the first we're hearing about it.
The only thing I can think of here is that Kkat didn't bother to think any deeper than videogame logic. When you kill a radscorpion in Fallout 3, you can press E to loot its 'inventory' and take its venom glands and meat the same way you can take a dead raider's money or gun. Get in the habit of looting enemies after you kill them and your inventory will eventually contain all sorts of miscellanous animal chunks without really thinking about it. So naturally, after killing a bunch of manticores Littlepip's inventory is filled with their gore at no cost in time, effort or hygiene.
>God damn it.
Pic
>Littlepoop, now referred to as the "Wasteland Savior."
This bugged me, so I went and checked the Fallout wiki and sure enough, my hunch was right. This is a reference, and a uniquely specific one. Fallout 3 gives your character a title (which Three Dog uses to refer to you) based on your level and your karma - the game's simplistic morality system. Wasteland Saviour is the title you get for being a good-aligned character at level 18 (above 'paragon' and below 'saint', incidentally). Littlepip has been gaining a level in the footnote of each chapter. This is chapter 18.
So that's a thing.
>…that kid from Stable Two, found and rescued the good folks of Gutterville!
Something that particularly galls me is that as far as we can tell, the only reason that Gutterville and its residents exist in the story is for Littlepip to demonstrate her supreme goodness by rescuing them. As readers we're given no reason to care about Gutterville or the people living in it aside from the fact that they're (presumed) innocents in need. Even the sea-blue mare, whom Littlepip has saved from a terrible fate twice and has rescued Pip in turn, isn't granted the dignity of dialogue or even a name. This entire brief subplot, even setting aside the many issues with the moment to moment writing, is rendered even hollower by the fact that Pip has rescued literal NPCs who may as well have winked out of reality the moment she left their town.
The only thing I can think of here is that Kkat didn't bother to think any deeper than videogame logic. When you kill a radscorpion in Fallout 3, you can press E to loot its 'inventory' and take its venom glands and meat the same way you can take a dead raider's money or gun. Get in the habit of looting enemies after you kill them and your inventory will eventually contain all sorts of miscellanous animal chunks without really thinking about it. So naturally, after killing a bunch of manticores Littlepip's inventory is filled with their gore at no cost in time, effort or hygiene.
>God damn it.
Pic
>Littlepoop, now referred to as the "Wasteland Savior."
This bugged me, so I went and checked the Fallout wiki and sure enough, my hunch was right. This is a reference, and a uniquely specific one. Fallout 3 gives your character a title (which Three Dog uses to refer to you) based on your level and your karma - the game's simplistic morality system. Wasteland Saviour is the title you get for being a good-aligned character at level 18 (above 'paragon' and below 'saint', incidentally). Littlepip has been gaining a level in the footnote of each chapter. This is chapter 18.
So that's a thing.
>…that kid from Stable Two, found and rescued the good folks of Gutterville!
Something that particularly galls me is that as far as we can tell, the only reason that Gutterville and its residents exist in the story is for Littlepip to demonstrate her supreme goodness by rescuing them. As readers we're given no reason to care about Gutterville or the people living in it aside from the fact that they're (presumed) innocents in need. Even the sea-blue mare, whom Littlepip has saved from a terrible fate twice and has rescued Pip in turn, isn't granted the dignity of dialogue or even a name. This entire brief subplot, even setting aside the many issues with the moment to moment writing, is rendered even hollower by the fact that Pip has rescued literal NPCs who may as well have winked out of reality the moment she left their town.
>>302859
Also, on the topic of writing and reading and stuff. I'm not sure what I think right now. But I do listen to what you have said (and other anons) and will take it into consideration. I'll see what conclusions I'll come up with in the future.
Also, on the topic of writing and reading and stuff. I'm not sure what I think right now. But I do listen to what you have said (and other anons) and will take it into consideration. I'll see what conclusions I'll come up with in the future.
>>303078
In fact, to add to that last point, Littlepip saved the ponies of Gutterville without even meaning to. She had no idea that they'd been kidnapped by the (also nameless) ghoul doctor, or that they were being kept in the Red Racer factory. The only prior information we'd receieved on their predicament was a brief and vague news broadcast stating that they'd disappeared. A very specific and contrived series of events had to happen for Littlepip to even stumble across them in the first place.
First, Pip and co had to be attacked by flying nasties while crossing the improputu bridge. Then, Pip had to fall off the bridge and narrowly save herself using telekinesis, coincidentally ending up several floors below where she intended to go. Then a manticore needed to abduct her (and she needed to play along) and deliver her directly to them, fully equipped and unharmed. If any of these events had played out differently, there's no reason to assume that Pip and the others would have stumbled across the Gutterville ponies or the doctor at all. In other words, through a series of coincidences Littlepip found herself delivered directly to a scenario tailor-made so that she could save the lives of some nameless NPCs and be praised for it. Even when she took the stupidest possible option and trapped herself in the memory orb, leaving her at the doctor's mercy, the situation contrived to give her an out without so much as a whisper of resistance.
None of what happened in the Red Racer factory did so as a result of Littlepip's own agency. She arrived by accident, made no meaningful decisions, interacted with no characters (nameless plot devices don't count), learned nothing she couldn't have learned by watching the orb at literally any other time, sacrificed nothing, and came out of it all richer and more popular than before.
This scenario is a glittering example of Sue writing - everything that happens happens because the writer wants the main character to look good, and for no other reason.
In fact, to add to that last point, Littlepip saved the ponies of Gutterville without even meaning to. She had no idea that they'd been kidnapped by the (also nameless) ghoul doctor, or that they were being kept in the Red Racer factory. The only prior information we'd receieved on their predicament was a brief and vague news broadcast stating that they'd disappeared. A very specific and contrived series of events had to happen for Littlepip to even stumble across them in the first place.
First, Pip and co had to be attacked by flying nasties while crossing the improputu bridge. Then, Pip had to fall off the bridge and narrowly save herself using telekinesis, coincidentally ending up several floors below where she intended to go. Then a manticore needed to abduct her (and she needed to play along) and deliver her directly to them, fully equipped and unharmed. If any of these events had played out differently, there's no reason to assume that Pip and the others would have stumbled across the Gutterville ponies or the doctor at all. In other words, through a series of coincidences Littlepip found herself delivered directly to a scenario tailor-made so that she could save the lives of some nameless NPCs and be praised for it. Even when she took the stupidest possible option and trapped herself in the memory orb, leaving her at the doctor's mercy, the situation contrived to give her an out without so much as a whisper of resistance.
None of what happened in the Red Racer factory did so as a result of Littlepip's own agency. She arrived by accident, made no meaningful decisions, interacted with no characters (nameless plot devices don't count), learned nothing she couldn't have learned by watching the orb at literally any other time, sacrificed nothing, and came out of it all richer and more popular than before.
This scenario is a glittering example of Sue writing - everything that happens happens because the writer wants the main character to look good, and for no other reason.
>>303044
>I barely heard the door to the suite open as I anguished over what ponies would be thinking and expecting of me now
The author could make these scenes less infuriating if Littlepip's bitching was grounded in cold practicality and obsession with heroism for heroism's sake.
>"Fuck," Littlepip thought to herself, "If everypony in this wasteland thinks I'm some kind of all-powerful war goddess on a one-woman crusade to end slavers and raiders, how many raider bosses and slavers guilds are going to pay the greatest bounty hunters out there to hunt me down? All this attention on me is so inconvenient. I don't want praise, and I don't want fame and fortune. I want to snipe slavers and mutated horrors and raiders from the shadows until there are no more baddies left to snipe. I don't want parades or fangirls, I want secrecy and a better gun. How the fuck did I end up here, munching some radio DJ's carpet when I could be dropping boxcars on Alicorns right now? Last night's sex felt great but a murderer like me doesn't deserve that kind of comfort. Saving somepony would have felt better. There ain't no more heroes in this wasteland, only ponies with violent hearts."
God, it feels too cheesy to write with a straight face. It's silly enough when Sonic pushes too far into the serious realm but cartoon ponies just weren't meant for this kind of gory edgefest of a world. And the author wasn't smart enough to lean into that intentionally and play the contrast up for bonus horror.
Itchy And Scratchy cartoons aren't just super-gory for fun, they're deep commentary on the level of violence on TV. These two friendly cartoon faces are fucking killing each other and "the modern American family" written to take a giant shit on the perfect families from old sitcoms consider these ketchup-filled gore explosions perfectly fine family-friendly entertainment.
Whenever Kkat gets too excited during the pony gore scenes and writes something grotesque for the sake of grotesquity, I half-expect rainbow confetti and assorted silly objects to fly out of the pony body. Imagine if pony blood was more like nickolodeon slime, but red. That would be fucked up.
People might be getting sick of me saying "This would be less shit if the author did it this way" or "The author had an opportunity to do x and didn't" but the solutions to the problems that stumped Kkat and resulted in a story full of these stupid problems are absurdly easy to figure out.
Better media has done what Kkat wanted to accomplish with this incorrectly-crossed-over crossover.
Is there even a term for this kind of almost-crossover?
It's a "gen/general fic" when it's an average story like an episode of the show that doesn't fall into a particular genre like Western or Action or Comedy or a particular overused cliche like "Independent!HarryPotter" or "Orphan!Naruto and ____ (and maybe another character) is the parent(s)" or a particular fetishy emotionally-exploitative amateuretarded writing glitch like "Hurt/Comfort".
A normal Crossover brings two settings togther. Superman says "Fuck you" to Iron Man and goes home.
A Fusion Fic combines two or more settings. Batman and Iron Man and Vlad Masters were rivals at college while Harry Potter and Eren Yeager and Shinji Ikari were childhood friends who bonded over the deadness of their mothers. Red from Pokemon has traits from his manga incarnation and game incarnation since they're completely different people, but Game Sonic and Sonic Boom Sonic and Movie Sonic are separate people.
Fallout Equestria isn't a real fusion fic. Fallout's iconography is ripped off just like roles its characters play, but we don't truly get The Master or Frank Horrigan in this tale. Ponies randomly happen to become vague approximations of them to please people who liked Master/Horrigan and can't remember why, even though the end result is a completely different character with a completely different role.
Fallout 1's Super Mutants were endgame material. Your trip across the wasteland to find the Water Chip your home needs to survive builds up to the moment your character's life's goal becomes "Save this Wasteland from the Super Mutant threat".
But here? The mutants are already here. There are already Super Mutants in the form of Alicorns.
One Alicorn could kill one Super Mutant effortlessly. One Alicorn could probably crush 12 Super Mutants solo. Psychic super-strength, regular super-strength, magical shields, instant psychic communication with fellow Alicorns through the hive mind, and wings? Alicorns here don't combine the three things that make ponies great physically, they outshine them in all three areas. Except for Littlesue, of course, she gets to have mightier telekinesis than all the Alicorns for no fucking reason.
And while Littlepip might fight some Alicorns now and then, they aren't endgame threats. They can't be endgame threats. Because if they are the final boss of the Wasteland, that means Kkunt can't rip off Fallout 2's Enclave and 3's Shit-Enclave to be the bigger badder final boss. For the sake of the story Kkunt wants to tell, there need to be Super Mutants even though the message behind them is lost. There needs to be an Enclave even though what made them interesting and plausible is gone. Alicorns > Pony Enclave who get more story importance than the Alicorns for no goddamn reason besides "Enclave came after SMs in 2+3".
>If only there had been more like Fluttershy, then the Equestrian Wasteland may never have been.
*eye twitches* PEACENIK? MORE LIKE PEACENIGGER.
FLUTTERSHY DID EVERYTHING WRONG, SHE GAVE ZIGGERS HEAL-NUKE MEGASPELLS THINKING IT WOULD END WAR EVEN THOUGH THAT WAS PROVEN FALSE DURING THE IDEA'S AND MEGASPELL'S FIRST FIELD-TEST. BUT SHE IGNORED THE LESSON TO LEARN THERE. AND THE ZIGGERS TURNED THOSE MEGASPELLS INTO BALEFIRE BOMBS AND SMUGGLED THEM BACK INTO EQUESTRIA AND KILLED COUNTLESS INNOCENTS. ZIGGERS DID SANDY HOOK X100! THEY STARTED THE WAR! THEY DID WAR CRIMES+PONIES DIDN'T. PEACE MEANS NO ZIGS/NIGS.
>I barely heard the door to the suite open as I anguished over what ponies would be thinking and expecting of me now
The author could make these scenes less infuriating if Littlepip's bitching was grounded in cold practicality and obsession with heroism for heroism's sake.
>"Fuck," Littlepip thought to herself, "If everypony in this wasteland thinks I'm some kind of all-powerful war goddess on a one-woman crusade to end slavers and raiders, how many raider bosses and slavers guilds are going to pay the greatest bounty hunters out there to hunt me down? All this attention on me is so inconvenient. I don't want praise, and I don't want fame and fortune. I want to snipe slavers and mutated horrors and raiders from the shadows until there are no more baddies left to snipe. I don't want parades or fangirls, I want secrecy and a better gun. How the fuck did I end up here, munching some radio DJ's carpet when I could be dropping boxcars on Alicorns right now? Last night's sex felt great but a murderer like me doesn't deserve that kind of comfort. Saving somepony would have felt better. There ain't no more heroes in this wasteland, only ponies with violent hearts."
God, it feels too cheesy to write with a straight face. It's silly enough when Sonic pushes too far into the serious realm but cartoon ponies just weren't meant for this kind of gory edgefest of a world. And the author wasn't smart enough to lean into that intentionally and play the contrast up for bonus horror.
Itchy And Scratchy cartoons aren't just super-gory for fun, they're deep commentary on the level of violence on TV. These two friendly cartoon faces are fucking killing each other and "the modern American family" written to take a giant shit on the perfect families from old sitcoms consider these ketchup-filled gore explosions perfectly fine family-friendly entertainment.
Whenever Kkat gets too excited during the pony gore scenes and writes something grotesque for the sake of grotesquity, I half-expect rainbow confetti and assorted silly objects to fly out of the pony body. Imagine if pony blood was more like nickolodeon slime, but red. That would be fucked up.
People might be getting sick of me saying "This would be less shit if the author did it this way" or "The author had an opportunity to do x and didn't" but the solutions to the problems that stumped Kkat and resulted in a story full of these stupid problems are absurdly easy to figure out.
Better media has done what Kkat wanted to accomplish with this incorrectly-crossed-over crossover.
Is there even a term for this kind of almost-crossover?
It's a "gen/general fic" when it's an average story like an episode of the show that doesn't fall into a particular genre like Western or Action or Comedy or a particular overused cliche like "Independent!HarryPotter" or "Orphan!Naruto and ____ (and maybe another character) is the parent(s)" or a particular fetishy emotionally-exploitative amateuretarded writing glitch like "Hurt/Comfort".
A normal Crossover brings two settings togther. Superman says "Fuck you" to Iron Man and goes home.
A Fusion Fic combines two or more settings. Batman and Iron Man and Vlad Masters were rivals at college while Harry Potter and Eren Yeager and Shinji Ikari were childhood friends who bonded over the deadness of their mothers. Red from Pokemon has traits from his manga incarnation and game incarnation since they're completely different people, but Game Sonic and Sonic Boom Sonic and Movie Sonic are separate people.
Fallout Equestria isn't a real fusion fic. Fallout's iconography is ripped off just like roles its characters play, but we don't truly get The Master or Frank Horrigan in this tale. Ponies randomly happen to become vague approximations of them to please people who liked Master/Horrigan and can't remember why, even though the end result is a completely different character with a completely different role.
Fallout 1's Super Mutants were endgame material. Your trip across the wasteland to find the Water Chip your home needs to survive builds up to the moment your character's life's goal becomes "Save this Wasteland from the Super Mutant threat".
But here? The mutants are already here. There are already Super Mutants in the form of Alicorns.
One Alicorn could kill one Super Mutant effortlessly. One Alicorn could probably crush 12 Super Mutants solo. Psychic super-strength, regular super-strength, magical shields, instant psychic communication with fellow Alicorns through the hive mind, and wings? Alicorns here don't combine the three things that make ponies great physically, they outshine them in all three areas. Except for Littlesue, of course, she gets to have mightier telekinesis than all the Alicorns for no fucking reason.
And while Littlepip might fight some Alicorns now and then, they aren't endgame threats. They can't be endgame threats. Because if they are the final boss of the Wasteland, that means Kkunt can't rip off Fallout 2's Enclave and 3's Shit-Enclave to be the bigger badder final boss. For the sake of the story Kkunt wants to tell, there need to be Super Mutants even though the message behind them is lost. There needs to be an Enclave even though what made them interesting and plausible is gone. Alicorns > Pony Enclave who get more story importance than the Alicorns for no goddamn reason besides "Enclave came after SMs in 2+3".
>If only there had been more like Fluttershy, then the Equestrian Wasteland may never have been.
*eye twitches* PEACENIK? MORE LIKE PEACENIGGER.
FLUTTERSHY DID EVERYTHING WRONG, SHE GAVE ZIGGERS HEAL-NUKE MEGASPELLS THINKING IT WOULD END WAR EVEN THOUGH THAT WAS PROVEN FALSE DURING THE IDEA'S AND MEGASPELL'S FIRST FIELD-TEST. BUT SHE IGNORED THE LESSON TO LEARN THERE. AND THE ZIGGERS TURNED THOSE MEGASPELLS INTO BALEFIRE BOMBS AND SMUGGLED THEM BACK INTO EQUESTRIA AND KILLED COUNTLESS INNOCENTS. ZIGGERS DID SANDY HOOK X100! THEY STARTED THE WAR! THEY DID WAR CRIMES+PONIES DIDN'T. PEACE MEANS NO ZIGS/NIGS.
Has there ever been a crossover like Fallout Equestria before?
S1 of poners happens.
And then for no reason at all, it all comes tumbling down tumbling down tumbling dooown
Rocks fall, everyone dies
and by rocks I mean the apocalypse
ponyland gets buttfucked and its corpse conveniently falls in a way that makes 99% of everything in it strongly resent something from the Fallout franchise
even though Fallout is a retrofuture alt-history RPG series and Equestria is not America.
Fallout and FIM technically don't cross over.
FIM elements just get corrupted into bootleg versions of Fallout elements and iconography at random.
If you put Pokemon in Equestria things would probably change quite a bit.
But adding pokemon to Fallout Equestria would change nothing because this story's events happen solely because the author wants them to. They do not feel like the organic end results of characters making choices while having bad circumstances forced onto them. Characters can accidentally save the day and cause spontaneous enemy retardity when they have plot armour and fail at everything when the author wants them to.
There is FIM. Well, Kkunt's confused take on it. Then he flips a switch and suddenly friendship no longer solves problems like crack mint addiction or interspecies resource wars or industrialization arbitrarily causing bad things to happen just because the faggot author was psychologically prepared in high school for the first time he'd hear "the industrial revolution sucked". The end result is not truly a post apocalyptic Equestria. It is Kkat's bad Fallout reboot wearing pony skin coats. A terrible reboot movie script with over 200k words and constant nostalgia pandering for Fallout and brony pandering for bronies. Derpy Hooves is an immortal ghoul and a DJ Pon3 impersonator runs the radio and Diamond Tiara's dying words are "what the fuck even is my cutie mark supposed to mean anyway?".
Whoever suggested a post apocalyptic Equestria where Celestia and Luna's deaths leave the sun and moon where they are, overheating one half of the planet and freezing the other, is a genius. That could only happen in a setting like FIM. There was a planet like that in Ben 10 Ultimate Alien but it was like that before the heroes got there and nobody important lived on it besides some Necrofrigians so it didn't really matter.
Ever think about what a Youtube Poop of Fallout Equestria would look like?
Fallout Equestria annoys me because it reached the next level of wasted potential. Obviously it is shit but also... It wasted the potential within every possible crossover between the settings and characters and themes and ideas and anything else that makes up FIM and Fallout. Unlike most badfics it has a cult following and managed to squander seven years of creativity from a fandom so massive and eager to make content that it put out more porn than the Pokefags even though Pokemon is 25 years old and the single most profitable media franchise on earth. There are so many Fallout and FIM crossovers we could have gotten if this one didn't exist and soak up all of the goddamn spotlight like a sponge in Kkat's Rainbow Dash cum jar or a bigger sponge up Kkat's Christian Weston Chandler-inspired DIY infected homemade nu-vagina.
Maybe nostalgia is inherently toxic to creativity and our development as individuals? Maybe it's something limiting that keeps our wheels spinning helplessly. It would explain why the jews keep trying to sell it to us. Pretending FE was better than it was makes no sense.
I'm glad Nyx's story existed. I'm glad Gareth's story existed. But if FE wasn't held up as the gold standard for what pony fanfiction should be, everyone who forced their FE fics to fit within Kkat's bad story setting would have written their own takes on the concept and competed to find the best possible blend of Fallout and FIM to make their Equestrian Wasteland fic happen. Probably. Maybe whoever got the most popular would have ended up becoming the new Kkat whose fic gets its own fanfics by writers taking the easy road to fame by trying to impress an existing fanbase.
S1 of poners happens.
And then for no reason at all, it all comes tumbling down tumbling down tumbling dooown
Rocks fall, everyone dies
and by rocks I mean the apocalypse
ponyland gets buttfucked and its corpse conveniently falls in a way that makes 99% of everything in it strongly resent something from the Fallout franchise
even though Fallout is a retrofuture alt-history RPG series and Equestria is not America.
Fallout and FIM technically don't cross over.
FIM elements just get corrupted into bootleg versions of Fallout elements and iconography at random.
If you put Pokemon in Equestria things would probably change quite a bit.
But adding pokemon to Fallout Equestria would change nothing because this story's events happen solely because the author wants them to. They do not feel like the organic end results of characters making choices while having bad circumstances forced onto them. Characters can accidentally save the day and cause spontaneous enemy retardity when they have plot armour and fail at everything when the author wants them to.
There is FIM. Well, Kkunt's confused take on it. Then he flips a switch and suddenly friendship no longer solves problems like crack mint addiction or interspecies resource wars or industrialization arbitrarily causing bad things to happen just because the faggot author was psychologically prepared in high school for the first time he'd hear "the industrial revolution sucked". The end result is not truly a post apocalyptic Equestria. It is Kkat's bad Fallout reboot wearing pony skin coats. A terrible reboot movie script with over 200k words and constant nostalgia pandering for Fallout and brony pandering for bronies. Derpy Hooves is an immortal ghoul and a DJ Pon3 impersonator runs the radio and Diamond Tiara's dying words are "what the fuck even is my cutie mark supposed to mean anyway?".
Whoever suggested a post apocalyptic Equestria where Celestia and Luna's deaths leave the sun and moon where they are, overheating one half of the planet and freezing the other, is a genius. That could only happen in a setting like FIM. There was a planet like that in Ben 10 Ultimate Alien but it was like that before the heroes got there and nobody important lived on it besides some Necrofrigians so it didn't really matter.
Ever think about what a Youtube Poop of Fallout Equestria would look like?
Fallout Equestria annoys me because it reached the next level of wasted potential. Obviously it is shit but also... It wasted the potential within every possible crossover between the settings and characters and themes and ideas and anything else that makes up FIM and Fallout. Unlike most badfics it has a cult following and managed to squander seven years of creativity from a fandom so massive and eager to make content that it put out more porn than the Pokefags even though Pokemon is 25 years old and the single most profitable media franchise on earth. There are so many Fallout and FIM crossovers we could have gotten if this one didn't exist and soak up all of the goddamn spotlight like a sponge in Kkat's Rainbow Dash cum jar or a bigger sponge up Kkat's Christian Weston Chandler-inspired DIY infected homemade nu-vagina.
Maybe nostalgia is inherently toxic to creativity and our development as individuals? Maybe it's something limiting that keeps our wheels spinning helplessly. It would explain why the jews keep trying to sell it to us. Pretending FE was better than it was makes no sense.
I'm glad Nyx's story existed. I'm glad Gareth's story existed. But if FE wasn't held up as the gold standard for what pony fanfiction should be, everyone who forced their FE fics to fit within Kkat's bad story setting would have written their own takes on the concept and competed to find the best possible blend of Fallout and FIM to make their Equestrian Wasteland fic happen. Probably. Maybe whoever got the most popular would have ended up becoming the new Kkat whose fic gets its own fanfics by writers taking the easy road to fame by trying to impress an existing fanbase.
>>303163
>Ever think about what a Youtube Poop of Fallout Equestria would look like?
Close enough.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwUHZSj21CI
>Ever think about what a Youtube Poop of Fallout Equestria would look like?
Close enough.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwUHZSj21CI
Glim, would it increase the immersion and therefore improve the overall quality of the story if the preparation and eating of Littlepip's multiple daily meals were "onscreen" instead of skipped over?
Also, since the characters are horses shouldn't they need to eat more than humans?
Also, since the characters are horses shouldn't they need to eat more than humans?
>>303219
>Glim, would it increase the immersion and therefore improve the overall quality of the story if the preparation and eating of Littlepip's multiple daily meals were "onscreen" instead of skipped over?
I think that so long as the reader will never have a reason to go, "Wait, what do they even eat?" or "Do they even eat?" during the adventure then you don't needto have a seen with them eating. That sort of mundane activity can be inserted to make the world and characters more grounded but you can also not.
I don't know. I think that this sort of realism writing is a slippery slope. Like, it depends on the story. A story like FE, which puts a lot of its focus on worldbuilding, should probably take the opportunity to use the characters need for food to expand upon the world while a story that is more intrested in its high-pace plot wouldn't. If this was a rollercoaster of emotions, it would probably not even occur to me that the characters haven't realistically eaten enough lately.
I guess, this isn't a clear answer but I'm not gg nor do I really know if I have an exact answer for it. It sort of depends on what kind of story you're writing. In the end, we will assume that the characters do these sort of mundane activities without being told through the narrative anyway, in most stories.
>Glim, would it increase the immersion and therefore improve the overall quality of the story if the preparation and eating of Littlepip's multiple daily meals were "onscreen" instead of skipped over?
I think that so long as the reader will never have a reason to go, "Wait, what do they even eat?" or "Do they even eat?" during the adventure then you don't needto have a seen with them eating. That sort of mundane activity can be inserted to make the world and characters more grounded but you can also not.
I don't know. I think that this sort of realism writing is a slippery slope. Like, it depends on the story. A story like FE, which puts a lot of its focus on worldbuilding, should probably take the opportunity to use the characters need for food to expand upon the world while a story that is more intrested in its high-pace plot wouldn't. If this was a rollercoaster of emotions, it would probably not even occur to me that the characters haven't realistically eaten enough lately.
I guess, this isn't a clear answer but I'm not gg nor do I really know if I have an exact answer for it. It sort of depends on what kind of story you're writing. In the end, we will assume that the characters do these sort of mundane activities without being told through the narrative anyway, in most stories.
>>303223
Makes sense.
Eating is a pretty big deal in Fallout, there are farms in F1 and F2 and FNV but in F3 many settlements have no clear food or water sources. We're just expected to assume travelling traders and maybe three molerats hanging around out the back of the town walls feed settlements of 30ish or more people.
Hardcore Mode in FNV forces you to eat/sleep/drink and there are some boring foods like 200 year old tins of beans and interesting foods like a Deathclaw Egg Ommlette, Radscorpion Casserole, cooked giant ant meat, and so on.
Maybe displaying EVERY meal LP eats would get old fast. But in a "fish out of water" story like this we should surely get at least one scene of sheltered poners like LP and Velvet struggling to eat typical Wastelander food, right? Perhaps meat from a giant animal they struggle to kill in an epic scene.
Survivalist concerns like "we need to make a fire but if its out in the open foes will see it for miles around and it will attract enemies. Therefore we must go inside a building/cave so the campfire can be subtle. Unfortunately this means entering a 200 year old building full of booby traps and hazards to fry this monster meat" could make for some fun realism.
Sure this is the "an adult hiding under a cum blanket hides him from enemies who are already shooting at him" story but it doesn't have to be.
Makes sense.
Eating is a pretty big deal in Fallout, there are farms in F1 and F2 and FNV but in F3 many settlements have no clear food or water sources. We're just expected to assume travelling traders and maybe three molerats hanging around out the back of the town walls feed settlements of 30ish or more people.
Hardcore Mode in FNV forces you to eat/sleep/drink and there are some boring foods like 200 year old tins of beans and interesting foods like a Deathclaw Egg Ommlette, Radscorpion Casserole, cooked giant ant meat, and so on.
Maybe displaying EVERY meal LP eats would get old fast. But in a "fish out of water" story like this we should surely get at least one scene of sheltered poners like LP and Velvet struggling to eat typical Wastelander food, right? Perhaps meat from a giant animal they struggle to kill in an epic scene.
Survivalist concerns like "we need to make a fire but if its out in the open foes will see it for miles around and it will attract enemies. Therefore we must go inside a building/cave so the campfire can be subtle. Unfortunately this means entering a 200 year old building full of booby traps and hazards to fry this monster meat" could make for some fun realism.
Sure this is the "an adult hiding under a cum blanket hides him from enemies who are already shooting at him" story but it doesn't have to be.
>>303227
>But in a "fish out of water" story like this we should surely get at least one scene of sheltered poners like LP and Velvet struggling to eat typical Wastelander food, right?
I think you have a point. This is the kind of story that would benefit from something like that.
>Survivalist concerns like "we need to make a fire but if its out in the open foes will see it for miles around and it will attract enemies. Therefore we must go inside a building/cave so the campfire can be subtle. Unfortunately this means entering a 200 year old building full of booby traps and hazards to fry this monster meat" could make for some fun realism.
This is a neat idea.
Since worldbuilding seems to be such a focus in this story and food is such an essential thing to every being it would make sense to center some conflicts around something like this.
Not that one has to do that either. It all depends on what you want to do. It makes sense as a motivator for conflict in the story anyway.
>But in a "fish out of water" story like this we should surely get at least one scene of sheltered poners like LP and Velvet struggling to eat typical Wastelander food, right?
I think you have a point. This is the kind of story that would benefit from something like that.
>Survivalist concerns like "we need to make a fire but if its out in the open foes will see it for miles around and it will attract enemies. Therefore we must go inside a building/cave so the campfire can be subtle. Unfortunately this means entering a 200 year old building full of booby traps and hazards to fry this monster meat" could make for some fun realism.
This is a neat idea.
Since worldbuilding seems to be such a focus in this story and food is such an essential thing to every being it would make sense to center some conflicts around something like this.
Not that one has to do that either. It all depends on what you want to do. It makes sense as a motivator for conflict in the story anyway.
>>303219
It depends on what sort of story is being told.
While I would personally be disinclined to add more to the word count as is, using food and meal times for some scenes could cut the amount of dry fluffwhere nothing happens and no new information about anything is going on.
On the other hand it can get old fast.
The time scale in the story is whack. Not like the green I wrote is any better.
Food is a key part of showing where a culture is from.
Instead Fallout is a twist on the cold war Americanism with futuristic 50s style gone bad. In Equestria compacting the ideals of parody that Equestria parodies off of should in theory work great, the issue is that the little things from both mean that real Earth's American scifi ideal back then is riddled with flaws.
Fallout: Equestria attempts to fill the gap unfortunately all that's left is broken pieces and kkat's mystery fluid. Luckily it's as broken as the many people who read it who are also filled with mystery fluid. The dream for them is dead and broken. Fallout may be fucked, but there still remains something. In Equestria there is nothing, only lip service and a facade of what should be. Actual Spoiler Higher aspirations are never shared at all, only being killed gives meaning. That's part of the reason why it's popular.
It depends on what sort of story is being told.
While I would personally be disinclined to add more to the word count as is, using food and meal times for some scenes could cut the amount of dry fluffwhere nothing happens and no new information about anything is going on.
On the other hand it can get old fast.
The time scale in the story is whack. Not like the green I wrote is any better.
Food is a key part of showing where a culture is from.
Instead Fallout is a twist on the cold war Americanism with futuristic 50s style gone bad. In Equestria compacting the ideals of parody that Equestria parodies off of should in theory work great, the issue is that the little things from both mean that real Earth's American scifi ideal back then is riddled with flaws.
Fallout: Equestria attempts to fill the gap unfortunately all that's left is broken pieces and kkat's mystery fluid. Luckily it's as broken as the many people who read it who are also filled with mystery fluid. The dream for them is dead and broken. Fallout may be fucked, but there still remains something. In Equestria there is nothing, only lip service and a facade of what should be. Actual Spoiler Higher aspirations are never shared at all, only being killed gives meaning. That's part of the reason why it's popular.
What if there was a Ghoulified batallion of pony soldiers from the war who kept their weapons and armour but got hit with a brainwashing potion bomb made by zebras therefore the giant pony army wanders around destroying at random?
That would be *smonks weed* like a metaphor for war destroying the environment maaaan *exhales weed*
Plus if the zebras used brainwashing gas landmines it would be really nasty
like that brainwashing gun from Ratchet And Clank 3 but landmines
Hey wait a minute
would "they are the result of evil-ifying zebra landmines" be a good origin story for the pointlessly evil raiders that decorate their homes with gore and their own shit/piss?
That would be *smonks weed* like a metaphor for war destroying the environment maaaan *exhales weed*
Plus if the zebras used brainwashing gas landmines it would be really nasty
like that brainwashing gun from Ratchet And Clank 3 but landmines
Hey wait a minute
would "they are the result of evil-ifying zebra landmines" be a good origin story for the pointlessly evil raiders that decorate their homes with gore and their own shit/piss?
>>303050
In the next scene, Velvet is introduced to DJ Pon3 for the first time:
>“You are DJ Pon3?”
>Homage smiled, clearly enjoying Velvet Remedy’s disbelief.
Other than expecting the DJ to be male based on the voice she's always heard, Velvet doesn't have much cause to be shocked by this revelation. In fact, since she only really knows Homage as LP's point of contact with the DJ, this turn of events shouldn't surprise her at all. If Spiderman's "friend" Peter suddenly announces that he is, in fact, Spiderman, it shouldn't come as much surprise to anyone with an IQ above room temperature.
>Velvet Remedy had made herself up gorgeously and donned one of her new dresses, a stunning purple number, all with the intention of making a breathtaking first impression. Now she was shooting me cross glances.
This is actually somewhat justified, since LP knew the whole time that the DJ was just lil' ol' Homage, and could have told her that there was no point in getting all gussied up. However, it's still a little unclear why she thought it was necessary to get gussied up in the first place. To my knowledge this isn't a paying gig or a business deal or anything where she would have an incentive to make a good impression. All she's doing here is asking this DJ to play her music on air. Historically, we've seen that this DJ will play just about anything, owing to the fact that there just plain aren't that many records in existence anymore. The DJ is in no position to be choosy; Velvet could probably show up wearing a burlap sack and still get her music played.
Another thing is that an earlier scene gave me the impression that Velvet dressing up for the DJ was just an excuse to dress Littlepoop up for her. Wait a minute; now that I think about it, something doesn't add up here.
Allow me to quote myself, from post >>303044 :
>Ostensibly, the dresses are for the two of them to wear during Velvet's audition with DJ Homage. However, there are far more clothes here than would be needed for such a purpose, and arguably it's not even necessary for either of them to dress up since it's not really a formal audition anyway.
>What's happening here is that Velvet is basically using the audition as an excuse to give LP some pretty clothes to wear in front of Homage. She has picked up on the situation between them and is giving it a nod of approval. Symbolically, this is Velvet stepping aside and acknowledging that she is no longer Littlepoop's primary love interest in the story, and that there are no hard feelings between them over what happened earlier. This would have worked a little better if the whole romance plot had been better developed, but I will acknowledge that the author actually handled this specific event pretty well.
I'd actually forgotten that Velvet and the others are still under the impression that DJ Pon3 is male. I was thinking that Velvet's having them dress up was meant to give LP an opportunity to look cute in front of the DJ, since she seems aware of LP's crush on Homage. However, both of these ideas would require Velvet to be aware that DJ Pon3 and Homage are the same pony. Whatever the author was thinking here, it wasn't what I had in mind, so I seem to have given him some undue credit. Don't worry, Charlie Brown, I'm sure you'll kick that football one of these days.
>“I’ve got a whole recording studio in here, so the recording will be as good as you are,” Homage said, stepping between us as she spoke to Velvet.
Is that what they're doing here? Making a record? I thought the idea was just to have Velvet sing live on air. In the entire text so far, there has been no mention of the DJ having a recording studio. The impression I get is that such technology is pretty hard to come by these days.
There have been quite a few sound recordings in the story, of course, but almost all of them have dated from the prewar era. As far as I can tell, LP is only able to listen to such recordings because of her PipBuck, which is not a common piece of technology (yet for some reason, nopony seems that impressed by it). The fact that there have been multiple generations of DJ Pon3s and yet the present one still only have like 8 or 9 records to play reinforces the idea that records are scarce. So why would either LP or Velvet assume that the DJ would automatically be able to record her? Nearly everything in the story involving music or the DJ makes very little sense under scrutiny.
>I found myself staring at Homage’s flanks, covered with a silky silver dress that sparkled as it clung so tightly to…
Homage is also dressed up? Why?
>Velvet was looking at me. She’d caught me staring, and the little smile on her face made my heart sink. I’d be lucky if the rest of our travels weren’t to a soundtrack of “Littlepip and Homage sitting in an appletree.”
Further proof that my original theory of why Velvet wanted the two of them to dress up was way, way off. With all the absolute shit I've read in these threads, I don't think I've yet come across an author who makes it quite this difficult to give him praise for anything.
Homage proceeds to give Velvet a tour of the studio.
>Velvet looked like she was in heaven. No matter how much she protested, no matter how much she longed to be a medical pony, the only one Velvet could hope to convince that she didn’t get unparalleled joy from singing was Velvet herself.
Velvet's entire character arc just keeps getting more nonsensical. One minute she wants to be a doctor, the next she wants to sing, and for some reason she seems to assume that the two are mutually exclusive, even though she's demonstrated an ability to do both without conflict (when she was at the slaver colony, for instance, she was both singing and practicing medicine for them). It seems like she can't decide which one is her true passion, but she seems to have no serious passion for either. As a character, she remains the frontrunner for biggest drip in the whole story.
In the next scene, Velvet is introduced to DJ Pon3 for the first time:
>“You are DJ Pon3?”
>Homage smiled, clearly enjoying Velvet Remedy’s disbelief.
Other than expecting the DJ to be male based on the voice she's always heard, Velvet doesn't have much cause to be shocked by this revelation. In fact, since she only really knows Homage as LP's point of contact with the DJ, this turn of events shouldn't surprise her at all. If Spiderman's "friend" Peter suddenly announces that he is, in fact, Spiderman, it shouldn't come as much surprise to anyone with an IQ above room temperature.
>Velvet Remedy had made herself up gorgeously and donned one of her new dresses, a stunning purple number, all with the intention of making a breathtaking first impression. Now she was shooting me cross glances.
This is actually somewhat justified, since LP knew the whole time that the DJ was just lil' ol' Homage, and could have told her that there was no point in getting all gussied up. However, it's still a little unclear why she thought it was necessary to get gussied up in the first place. To my knowledge this isn't a paying gig or a business deal or anything where she would have an incentive to make a good impression. All she's doing here is asking this DJ to play her music on air. Historically, we've seen that this DJ will play just about anything, owing to the fact that there just plain aren't that many records in existence anymore. The DJ is in no position to be choosy; Velvet could probably show up wearing a burlap sack and still get her music played.
Another thing is that an earlier scene gave me the impression that Velvet dressing up for the DJ was just an excuse to dress Littlepoop up for her. Wait a minute; now that I think about it, something doesn't add up here.
Allow me to quote myself, from post >>303044 :
>Ostensibly, the dresses are for the two of them to wear during Velvet's audition with DJ Homage. However, there are far more clothes here than would be needed for such a purpose, and arguably it's not even necessary for either of them to dress up since it's not really a formal audition anyway.
>What's happening here is that Velvet is basically using the audition as an excuse to give LP some pretty clothes to wear in front of Homage. She has picked up on the situation between them and is giving it a nod of approval. Symbolically, this is Velvet stepping aside and acknowledging that she is no longer Littlepoop's primary love interest in the story, and that there are no hard feelings between them over what happened earlier. This would have worked a little better if the whole romance plot had been better developed, but I will acknowledge that the author actually handled this specific event pretty well.
I'd actually forgotten that Velvet and the others are still under the impression that DJ Pon3 is male. I was thinking that Velvet's having them dress up was meant to give LP an opportunity to look cute in front of the DJ, since she seems aware of LP's crush on Homage. However, both of these ideas would require Velvet to be aware that DJ Pon3 and Homage are the same pony. Whatever the author was thinking here, it wasn't what I had in mind, so I seem to have given him some undue credit. Don't worry, Charlie Brown, I'm sure you'll kick that football one of these days.
>“I’ve got a whole recording studio in here, so the recording will be as good as you are,” Homage said, stepping between us as she spoke to Velvet.
Is that what they're doing here? Making a record? I thought the idea was just to have Velvet sing live on air. In the entire text so far, there has been no mention of the DJ having a recording studio. The impression I get is that such technology is pretty hard to come by these days.
There have been quite a few sound recordings in the story, of course, but almost all of them have dated from the prewar era. As far as I can tell, LP is only able to listen to such recordings because of her PipBuck, which is not a common piece of technology (yet for some reason, nopony seems that impressed by it). The fact that there have been multiple generations of DJ Pon3s and yet the present one still only have like 8 or 9 records to play reinforces the idea that records are scarce. So why would either LP or Velvet assume that the DJ would automatically be able to record her? Nearly everything in the story involving music or the DJ makes very little sense under scrutiny.
>I found myself staring at Homage’s flanks, covered with a silky silver dress that sparkled as it clung so tightly to…
Homage is also dressed up? Why?
>Velvet was looking at me. She’d caught me staring, and the little smile on her face made my heart sink. I’d be lucky if the rest of our travels weren’t to a soundtrack of “Littlepip and Homage sitting in an appletree.”
Further proof that my original theory of why Velvet wanted the two of them to dress up was way, way off. With all the absolute shit I've read in these threads, I don't think I've yet come across an author who makes it quite this difficult to give him praise for anything.
Homage proceeds to give Velvet a tour of the studio.
>Velvet looked like she was in heaven. No matter how much she protested, no matter how much she longed to be a medical pony, the only one Velvet could hope to convince that she didn’t get unparalleled joy from singing was Velvet herself.
Velvet's entire character arc just keeps getting more nonsensical. One minute she wants to be a doctor, the next she wants to sing, and for some reason she seems to assume that the two are mutually exclusive, even though she's demonstrated an ability to do both without conflict (when she was at the slaver colony, for instance, she was both singing and practicing medicine for them). It seems like she can't decide which one is her true passion, but she seems to have no serious passion for either. As a character, she remains the frontrunner for biggest drip in the whole story.
1615107406.jpg (15.8 KB, 253x199, 9A0DB7D6E85B5D7C998C6F72367D89F4-16203.jpg)
>>303276
Anyway, the rest of this scene is pure cringe. There is some absolutely god-awful innuendo between Velvet and Homage, and I honestly can't tell if Velvet is trying to flirt with Homage, hook her up with Littlepoop, or propose a three way. The only thing I am certain about is that kkat understands how to write sexual banter about as well as he understands what gender he is.
And, the scene wouldn't be complete without more ridiculous profanity from Littlepoop:
>Solar-flaring orgasms of Celestia!
This sounds like something Celestia would have needed a prescription cream to take care of.
Anyway, after this she starts singing, and the scene ends.
There is a page break, and in the next scene LP and Homage are alone together, walking around in the mall area of Tenpony Tower (as far as I can tell the entire place is basically a giant mall). They mostly wander around talking about how great the music was.
>I loved seeing the little grey unicorn squee!
Every time a fanfiction author uses the word "squee," a cute little pony gets stabbed in the eyeball with a fork.
>We had reached the edge of a mezzanine staring down into the lower floor of the Tenpony Tower mall, filled with classy shops (including one just for wine and another across from it that had been just for cheese, but was now closed).
Whatever happened to Monterrey Jack, anyway? Is he dead now, or...what? This story introduces plotlines out of nowhere, they go nowhere and they return to nowhere.
Case in point: while walking around, they observe SteelHooves walking around looking into shop windows. He appears to be drawing some attention based on his appearance. Of course, Littlepoop, whose battlefield experience amounts to a whopping three whole weeks, and who had not seen such armor herself until just a few days ago, can't resist making a crack about it:
>I chuckled. “I guess the high society of Tenpony isn’t used to seeing a pony in magical power armor.” I wondered if his armored hooves were scuffing their pretentiously polished marble floor.
Once again, there seems to be a hint that Tenpony is somehow oppressive or elitist, and yet here these two are, wandering around its mall and enjoying is luxuries.
Anyway, the only significance to SteelHooves' appearance here is to allow Velvet and Homage's conversation to segue into the topic of the Steel Rangers. Homage remarks how strange it is that LP is traveling with a Ranger and seems to know nothing about them.
>I opened my muzzle to say that I knew they were… what? I knew them from the posters, but those were two hundred years old. Truth was, I didn’t know the Steel Rangers. I knew SteelHooves. At least more than my companions knew the enigmatic pony completely concealed by his armor. I’d seen a memory orb. One of a memory I had assumed (with reason) was his.
She really doesn't know SteelHooves that well either; they've barely spoken. The memory orb she saw granted her a view of one disjointed scene that told her nothing about his nature or his personal history.
>Homage guided us away from the stairs and towards a table at a small but expensive eatery. A waitress pony brought us menus the moment we sat down, managing to look haughty, as if her customers were beneath her.
Again, both LP and Homage keep making these remarks about how hoity-toity and elitist Tenpony Tower is, but there doesn't seem to be any real significance to it.
LP's disdain for the soft-hooved ponies of Tenpony who "wouldn't last a day on the outside" (according to Homage) goes on for a couple more paragraphs, then the conversation gets moderately interesting (for an entire paragraph, no less!). For once, the author seems willing to provide a half-assed explanation for how things work in his clusterfuck of a universe:
>“The stockpiles from Tenpony Tower itself ran out generations ago. What they sell now has been acquired from scavenger ponies, specialists in plumbing the ruins of Manehattan for foodstuffs. Fortunately, there were food shops, restaurants and groceries galore in this city before the bomb, so scavenging has been as fruitful as it is dangerous. But scavenger ponies don’t risk their necks for cheap. And with how irradiated all the water is, it’s hard for a pony family to purify enough for a tiny garden. For a restaurant like this, fresh crops are out of the question.”
The bit about water seems to contradict what we saw earlier: Littlepoop noticed a water talisman being used to run a fountain in the lobby outside Homage's personal penthouse, and remarked that the Tenpony was likely hoarding water. Now it looks like...water is scarce?
As far as I can tell, the situation here is that Tenpony has no resources of its own, so it buys what it can from scavengers, who sell it to them at a massive premium. The merchants at Tenpony, in turn, sell it at a massive premium to the residents of the settlement. On its own, this makes sense enough, but there are still some logical holes. For one, how are the ponies who live in this place able to afford these high-markup rates? As far as I can tell, Tenpony produces nothing of value on its own; the only ponies here who ought to be even marginally successful are the merchants who buy from the scavengers and sell their goods at markup. Yet the image is that everyone who lives here lives in luxury. Aside from merchants like Monterrey Jack (who appears to be a scavenger as well, btw), what do all of these ponies do for a living? It doesn't make sense.
Homage, too, is still an enigma. She occupies prime real estate at the top of the tower, commands personal use of a lot of equipment that is probably very expensive to run, and as far as I can tell has no income of any kind. If her radio station made money somehow it might be plausible, but as far as I can tell she broadcasts as a hobby or as philanthropy. The other ponies in this tower don't even know she does this, if I'm understanding things correctly. How can she afford to even eat at this restaurant?
Anyway, the rest of this scene is pure cringe. There is some absolutely god-awful innuendo between Velvet and Homage, and I honestly can't tell if Velvet is trying to flirt with Homage, hook her up with Littlepoop, or propose a three way. The only thing I am certain about is that kkat understands how to write sexual banter about as well as he understands what gender he is.
And, the scene wouldn't be complete without more ridiculous profanity from Littlepoop:
>Solar-flaring orgasms of Celestia!
This sounds like something Celestia would have needed a prescription cream to take care of.
Anyway, after this she starts singing, and the scene ends.
There is a page break, and in the next scene LP and Homage are alone together, walking around in the mall area of Tenpony Tower (as far as I can tell the entire place is basically a giant mall). They mostly wander around talking about how great the music was.
>I loved seeing the little grey unicorn squee!
Every time a fanfiction author uses the word "squee," a cute little pony gets stabbed in the eyeball with a fork.
>We had reached the edge of a mezzanine staring down into the lower floor of the Tenpony Tower mall, filled with classy shops (including one just for wine and another across from it that had been just for cheese, but was now closed).
Whatever happened to Monterrey Jack, anyway? Is he dead now, or...what? This story introduces plotlines out of nowhere, they go nowhere and they return to nowhere.
Case in point: while walking around, they observe SteelHooves walking around looking into shop windows. He appears to be drawing some attention based on his appearance. Of course, Littlepoop, whose battlefield experience amounts to a whopping three whole weeks, and who had not seen such armor herself until just a few days ago, can't resist making a crack about it:
>I chuckled. “I guess the high society of Tenpony isn’t used to seeing a pony in magical power armor.” I wondered if his armored hooves were scuffing their pretentiously polished marble floor.
Once again, there seems to be a hint that Tenpony is somehow oppressive or elitist, and yet here these two are, wandering around its mall and enjoying is luxuries.
Anyway, the only significance to SteelHooves' appearance here is to allow Velvet and Homage's conversation to segue into the topic of the Steel Rangers. Homage remarks how strange it is that LP is traveling with a Ranger and seems to know nothing about them.
>I opened my muzzle to say that I knew they were… what? I knew them from the posters, but those were two hundred years old. Truth was, I didn’t know the Steel Rangers. I knew SteelHooves. At least more than my companions knew the enigmatic pony completely concealed by his armor. I’d seen a memory orb. One of a memory I had assumed (with reason) was his.
She really doesn't know SteelHooves that well either; they've barely spoken. The memory orb she saw granted her a view of one disjointed scene that told her nothing about his nature or his personal history.
>Homage guided us away from the stairs and towards a table at a small but expensive eatery. A waitress pony brought us menus the moment we sat down, managing to look haughty, as if her customers were beneath her.
Again, both LP and Homage keep making these remarks about how hoity-toity and elitist Tenpony Tower is, but there doesn't seem to be any real significance to it.
LP's disdain for the soft-hooved ponies of Tenpony who "wouldn't last a day on the outside" (according to Homage) goes on for a couple more paragraphs, then the conversation gets moderately interesting (for an entire paragraph, no less!). For once, the author seems willing to provide a half-assed explanation for how things work in his clusterfuck of a universe:
>“The stockpiles from Tenpony Tower itself ran out generations ago. What they sell now has been acquired from scavenger ponies, specialists in plumbing the ruins of Manehattan for foodstuffs. Fortunately, there were food shops, restaurants and groceries galore in this city before the bomb, so scavenging has been as fruitful as it is dangerous. But scavenger ponies don’t risk their necks for cheap. And with how irradiated all the water is, it’s hard for a pony family to purify enough for a tiny garden. For a restaurant like this, fresh crops are out of the question.”
The bit about water seems to contradict what we saw earlier: Littlepoop noticed a water talisman being used to run a fountain in the lobby outside Homage's personal penthouse, and remarked that the Tenpony was likely hoarding water. Now it looks like...water is scarce?
As far as I can tell, the situation here is that Tenpony has no resources of its own, so it buys what it can from scavengers, who sell it to them at a massive premium. The merchants at Tenpony, in turn, sell it at a massive premium to the residents of the settlement. On its own, this makes sense enough, but there are still some logical holes. For one, how are the ponies who live in this place able to afford these high-markup rates? As far as I can tell, Tenpony produces nothing of value on its own; the only ponies here who ought to be even marginally successful are the merchants who buy from the scavengers and sell their goods at markup. Yet the image is that everyone who lives here lives in luxury. Aside from merchants like Monterrey Jack (who appears to be a scavenger as well, btw), what do all of these ponies do for a living? It doesn't make sense.
Homage, too, is still an enigma. She occupies prime real estate at the top of the tower, commands personal use of a lot of equipment that is probably very expensive to run, and as far as I can tell has no income of any kind. If her radio station made money somehow it might be plausible, but as far as I can tell she broadcasts as a hobby or as philanthropy. The other ponies in this tower don't even know she does this, if I'm understanding things correctly. How can she afford to even eat at this restaurant?
1615115430.jpg (68.6 KB, 564x863, 56ee0227229bb46453964ca315c382be.jpg)
>>303276
>Nearly everything in the story involving music or the DJ makes very little sense under scrutiny.
You might have guessed this but the radio station operated by a person with a 3 in the name only has about 9 songs because in Fallout 3, 3-Dog's radio station only had about 9 songs
That radio station was such a dumb idea at the time. It was only there because GTA4 had radios and BitchthEAsderp feared their game's gloomy spooky destroyed-america atmosphere would make people sad.
Gee, maybe listening to the spooky sound of wind or unique and catchy yet spooky music while shooting for your life at a monster that's steadily approaching turn after turn is supposed to cause some strong feelings.
Stronger feelings than you'd get in F3 firing a minigun or Fat Man(TM) Mini-Nuke Launcher at an easily-killed deathclaw while Butcher Pete is on your arm-mounted radio.
Anyway they decided to "solve" the "depressing architecture makes the audience sad" "problem" by giving players a radio they could turn on at will to replace all the spooky wind-noises and ambiance with cheery ancient licensed pop music.
The radio station only has 9 songs because Bethesda got lazy and cheap.
FNV made a better in-game radio by canonically making its radio host Mr New Vegas an AI working for House. It makes sense that the region would rely on this broadcast for into about what goes on in the world. It makes sense that he'd have some things to say about the other biggest radio station in the wastes, Tabitha's Black Mountain Radio.
And instead of playing LOLSORANDUM QUIRKY songs it plays western music and the occasional love song. Big Iron and Jingle Jangle Jingle have so much more character and fun than Butcher Pete/Civilization.
Fuck, at this rate I'm expecting a scene where Littlepip shoots Homage in the face, only for Homage to invincibly get back up because Fallout 3 was full of invincible immortal unkillable characters marked as Essential in the game's code.
It's about as realistic as Spyro's inability to burn non-enemies with his fire breath.
Bethesda knew their target audience (12 year old CODbabies) and made all the important characters (and many unimportant characters) invincible so your violent antics can't permanently screw yourself out of too much content or the ability to beat the game.
Also, why does Littlepip have an arm-mounted PipBoy from Fallout 3 when in Fallout 1 and 2 the Pip-Boys were handheld things?
>Nearly everything in the story involving music or the DJ makes very little sense under scrutiny.
You might have guessed this but the radio station operated by a person with a 3 in the name only has about 9 songs because in Fallout 3, 3-Dog's radio station only had about 9 songs
That radio station was such a dumb idea at the time. It was only there because GTA4 had radios and BitchthEAsderp feared their game's gloomy spooky destroyed-america atmosphere would make people sad.
Gee, maybe listening to the spooky sound of wind or unique and catchy yet spooky music while shooting for your life at a monster that's steadily approaching turn after turn is supposed to cause some strong feelings.
Stronger feelings than you'd get in F3 firing a minigun or Fat Man(TM) Mini-Nuke Launcher at an easily-killed deathclaw while Butcher Pete is on your arm-mounted radio.
Anyway they decided to "solve" the "depressing architecture makes the audience sad" "problem" by giving players a radio they could turn on at will to replace all the spooky wind-noises and ambiance with cheery ancient licensed pop music.
The radio station only has 9 songs because Bethesda got lazy and cheap.
FNV made a better in-game radio by canonically making its radio host Mr New Vegas an AI working for House. It makes sense that the region would rely on this broadcast for into about what goes on in the world. It makes sense that he'd have some things to say about the other biggest radio station in the wastes, Tabitha's Black Mountain Radio.
And instead of playing LOLSORANDUM QUIRKY songs it plays western music and the occasional love song. Big Iron and Jingle Jangle Jingle have so much more character and fun than Butcher Pete/Civilization.
Fuck, at this rate I'm expecting a scene where Littlepip shoots Homage in the face, only for Homage to invincibly get back up because Fallout 3 was full of invincible immortal unkillable characters marked as Essential in the game's code.
It's about as realistic as Spyro's inability to burn non-enemies with his fire breath.
Bethesda knew their target audience (12 year old CODbabies) and made all the important characters (and many unimportant characters) invincible so your violent antics can't permanently screw yourself out of too much content or the ability to beat the game.
Also, why does Littlepip have an arm-mounted PipBoy from Fallout 3 when in Fallout 1 and 2 the Pip-Boys were handheld things?
>>303279
>Big Iron and Jingle Jangle Jingle have so much more character and fun than Butcher Pete/Civilization
>Big Iron and Jingle Jangle Jingle have so much more character and fun than Butcher Pete/Civilization
>>303277
Also, we eventually get a brief paragraph that more or less explains what the Steel Rangers are all about:
>“The Steel Rangers,” Homage explained over our glasses of wine, “Are the old guard of the Ministry of Wartime Technology. They see themselves as the knights of the greatness of the past, which they consider to be tied to Equestria’s advancements in technology and industry, and custodians of the technology that their Ministry helped create.
>“Honestly, most of them would be more interested in saving your PipBuck than saving you.”
As someone in this thread explained earlier, the Steel Rangers in FoE are the analog of a group in Fallout called the Brotherhood of Steel. If I remember correctly, their deal was that they were some kind of religious group worshipping technology, or something to that effect.
I'm having a hard time keeping track of all the details in this story, which has as much to do with the author's haphazard method of revealing information as it does with the amount of information that's been revealed. However, I believe the Ministry of Wartime Technology was the one that was headed by Applejack, and had built SteelHooves' suit. So, it would make sense that the Steel Rangers would be connected to this ministry.
This feels like an area where the Fallout part of the story connects rather clumsily to the Equestria part that is to say, connects more clumsily than usual. For the most part, the author makes an effort to connect each ministry to the personality of the pony who founded it: Pinkie is Morale, Rarity is Image, Twilight is Arcane Science, Fluttershy is Peace, and Rainbow Dash is...well, her ministry is admittedly pretty stupid, but at least having a pointless do-nothing organization called the Ministry of Awesome is consistent with her character.
The only one that doesn't fit is Applejack. What about AJ's character suggests that developing wartime technology would interest her, or that she'd be good at it? It feels completely shoehorned in. It would have made far more sense to have AJ head up the Ministry of Agriculture or something to that effect, but presumably the author wanted to wedge his Brotherhood of Steel analog in here somewhere, and since poor AJ gets relegated to a background pony role no matter what story she's in, I guess she got stuck designing weapons for some insane reason or another.
The reason this matters is that the author has established a pattern: each of the Mane 6 are connected to a government agency that did horrible things, with each ministry representing a dark application of that pony's special talent. Twilight's talent with magic was focused on (I guess) military applications, Ponk's idea of keeping up "morale" became about espionage and control of public opinion, Rarity's love of aesthetics was presumably used to create propaganda, and so forth. Basically, each pony's role in this story is an inversion of their Element in the show...except for Applejack, who for some unknown reason was given the task of designing robotic suits of armor. It breaks the continuity of the author's established pattern, and achieves nothing except wedging one more tiresome, out-of-place Fallout element into Pastel Ponyland.
This image I found of the ministry insignias is a good example of what I'm talking about: all of these images bear a resemblance to the cutie mark of their respective Ministry heads, and visually suggest a relationship to that pony. Only AJ's looks out of place. Anyone who is basically familiar with these characters could look at each of these emblems individually and get an immediate sense of which pony they belong to, except AJ's doesn't really convey much of anything. An apple with gears in it? What the hell is that supposed to mean?
Anyway, after this bit about the Steel Rangers, there is another page break. Homage and Littlepoop continue their little sort-of date; they go to the spa, and we learn that apparently DJ Pon3 pre-records some of her broadcasts so she can be on the air while she is out doing stuff; part of maintaining le secret identity and all that I have no doubt.
She asks for the radio station to be put on while they are getting their bukkake seaweed wraps or whatever the fuck, and we are treated to another of Homage's random outbursts about something-or-other in Fallout. This broadcast focuses heavily on ghosts, which are apparently a thing in this world. As with most bits of information this author dumps into his text at random, this might be foreshadowing something important that's about to happen, or something that's about to happen forty chapters from now, or maybe we'll never hear another word about it; it's a roll of the dice. However, in the interest of being thorough, I've noted it here.
Of considerably more interest is a little nugget of information that Homage drops, after needlessly bragging about her past drug use to Littlepoop sacrebleu! le edge!:
>“No. I’m afraid my friend didn’t survive the efforts to get us into Tenpony Tower.”
This seems to imply that there is more to Homage's backstory then just "I was a DJ, just like my mammy before me and her mammy before her, all the way back to my great great great grandmammy Vinyl Scratch." Hopefully the author will at least attempt to offer an explanation as to how she came to be living rent-free in the nicest part of the tower, with access to all of its prewar broadcasting equipment.
Page break. When the next scene opens, they are still goofing around together.
As I've noted before, the author does a decent job of breaking his story into fairly even-sized chunks, but as I've also noted, these chunks are just disconnected microscenes that don't add up to much. Breaking up a long, meandering, pointless scene into a bunch of small, equally pointless scenes might make the text easier to digest, but doesn't really fix the story's main problems of excessive length and lack of overall focus.
Also, we eventually get a brief paragraph that more or less explains what the Steel Rangers are all about:
>“The Steel Rangers,” Homage explained over our glasses of wine, “Are the old guard of the Ministry of Wartime Technology. They see themselves as the knights of the greatness of the past, which they consider to be tied to Equestria’s advancements in technology and industry, and custodians of the technology that their Ministry helped create.
>“Honestly, most of them would be more interested in saving your PipBuck than saving you.”
As someone in this thread explained earlier, the Steel Rangers in FoE are the analog of a group in Fallout called the Brotherhood of Steel. If I remember correctly, their deal was that they were some kind of religious group worshipping technology, or something to that effect.
I'm having a hard time keeping track of all the details in this story, which has as much to do with the author's haphazard method of revealing information as it does with the amount of information that's been revealed. However, I believe the Ministry of Wartime Technology was the one that was headed by Applejack, and had built SteelHooves' suit. So, it would make sense that the Steel Rangers would be connected to this ministry.
This feels like an area where the Fallout part of the story connects rather clumsily to the Equestria part that is to say, connects more clumsily than usual. For the most part, the author makes an effort to connect each ministry to the personality of the pony who founded it: Pinkie is Morale, Rarity is Image, Twilight is Arcane Science, Fluttershy is Peace, and Rainbow Dash is...well, her ministry is admittedly pretty stupid, but at least having a pointless do-nothing organization called the Ministry of Awesome is consistent with her character.
The only one that doesn't fit is Applejack. What about AJ's character suggests that developing wartime technology would interest her, or that she'd be good at it? It feels completely shoehorned in. It would have made far more sense to have AJ head up the Ministry of Agriculture or something to that effect, but presumably the author wanted to wedge his Brotherhood of Steel analog in here somewhere, and since poor AJ gets relegated to a background pony role no matter what story she's in, I guess she got stuck designing weapons for some insane reason or another.
The reason this matters is that the author has established a pattern: each of the Mane 6 are connected to a government agency that did horrible things, with each ministry representing a dark application of that pony's special talent. Twilight's talent with magic was focused on (I guess) military applications, Ponk's idea of keeping up "morale" became about espionage and control of public opinion, Rarity's love of aesthetics was presumably used to create propaganda, and so forth. Basically, each pony's role in this story is an inversion of their Element in the show...except for Applejack, who for some unknown reason was given the task of designing robotic suits of armor. It breaks the continuity of the author's established pattern, and achieves nothing except wedging one more tiresome, out-of-place Fallout element into Pastel Ponyland.
This image I found of the ministry insignias is a good example of what I'm talking about: all of these images bear a resemblance to the cutie mark of their respective Ministry heads, and visually suggest a relationship to that pony. Only AJ's looks out of place. Anyone who is basically familiar with these characters could look at each of these emblems individually and get an immediate sense of which pony they belong to, except AJ's doesn't really convey much of anything. An apple with gears in it? What the hell is that supposed to mean?
Anyway, after this bit about the Steel Rangers, there is another page break. Homage and Littlepoop continue their little sort-of date; they go to the spa, and we learn that apparently DJ Pon3 pre-records some of her broadcasts so she can be on the air while she is out doing stuff; part of maintaining le secret identity and all that I have no doubt.
She asks for the radio station to be put on while they are getting their bukkake seaweed wraps or whatever the fuck, and we are treated to another of Homage's random outbursts about something-or-other in Fallout. This broadcast focuses heavily on ghosts, which are apparently a thing in this world. As with most bits of information this author dumps into his text at random, this might be foreshadowing something important that's about to happen, or something that's about to happen forty chapters from now, or maybe we'll never hear another word about it; it's a roll of the dice. However, in the interest of being thorough, I've noted it here.
Of considerably more interest is a little nugget of information that Homage drops, after needlessly bragging about her past drug use to Littlepoop sacrebleu! le edge!:
>“No. I’m afraid my friend didn’t survive the efforts to get us into Tenpony Tower.”
This seems to imply that there is more to Homage's backstory then just "I was a DJ, just like my mammy before me and her mammy before her, all the way back to my great great great grandmammy Vinyl Scratch." Hopefully the author will at least attempt to offer an explanation as to how she came to be living rent-free in the nicest part of the tower, with access to all of its prewar broadcasting equipment.
Page break. When the next scene opens, they are still goofing around together.
As I've noted before, the author does a decent job of breaking his story into fairly even-sized chunks, but as I've also noted, these chunks are just disconnected microscenes that don't add up to much. Breaking up a long, meandering, pointless scene into a bunch of small, equally pointless scenes might make the text easier to digest, but doesn't really fix the story's main problems of excessive length and lack of overall focus.
>>303286
>If I remember correctly, their deal was that they were some kind of religious group worshipping technology, or something to that effect.
In the original games, the BoS were xenophobic technophiles who hoarded technology because they didn't want random braindead retards from the wasteland getting their hands on the super fuck-you death ray 9000 and felt that they were the best-equipped to research and develop technology. Bethesda turned them into generic selfless good guy knights in shining armor who fought the generic bad guy knights in black armor.
>If I remember correctly, their deal was that they were some kind of religious group worshipping technology, or something to that effect.
In the original games, the BoS were xenophobic technophiles who hoarded technology because they didn't want random braindead retards from the wasteland getting their hands on the super fuck-you death ray 9000 and felt that they were the best-equipped to research and develop technology. Bethesda turned them into generic selfless good guy knights in shining armor who fought the generic bad guy knights in black armor.
>>303296
One of your first interactions with them as the player is trying to get into their base for your mission. The gate guard gives you a quest -- go to this nuclear hellhole in the ground to retrieve something for them. When you return the guard is surprised you actually did it, and wholly expected you to fuck off and die in the worst radiation pit in the known world.
They're a reclusive group that isn't very receptive to outsiders and hold a distaste for dumb wastelanders.
Their general goals as a group relate to the acquisition and hoarding of any and all useful technology, through force if it requires it (poor you if you're a wastelander who found a cool laser rifle). This is done under the aim of keeping bad tech out of the hands of bad people, and bringing it into the clutches of the Brotherhood who actually KNOW how to research and understand the technology in question.
"Xenophobic technophiles" is just a succinct way of getting that idea across, and is why I said it.
One of your first interactions with them as the player is trying to get into their base for your mission. The gate guard gives you a quest -- go to this nuclear hellhole in the ground to retrieve something for them. When you return the guard is surprised you actually did it, and wholly expected you to fuck off and die in the worst radiation pit in the known world.
They're a reclusive group that isn't very receptive to outsiders and hold a distaste for dumb wastelanders.
Their general goals as a group relate to the acquisition and hoarding of any and all useful technology, through force if it requires it (poor you if you're a wastelander who found a cool laser rifle). This is done under the aim of keeping bad tech out of the hands of bad people, and bringing it into the clutches of the Brotherhood who actually KNOW how to research and understand the technology in question.
"Xenophobic technophiles" is just a succinct way of getting that idea across, and is why I said it.
>>303286
>An apple with gears in it? What the hell is that supposed to mean?
The brotherhood of steel logo looks like pic related. That's... about it. We learn more about Applejack's role in things through Steelhooves eventually.
>An apple with gears in it? What the hell is that supposed to mean?
The brotherhood of steel logo looks like pic related. That's... about it. We learn more about Applejack's role in things through Steelhooves eventually.
Considering Twilight's intellect and reverence for Celestia it would make more sense to make her responsible for the Brotherhood Of Steel's existence and blame AJ for Rangers/NCR rangers.
>>303289
Yep. Back when I primarily read fanfiction, the best Pokemon and Naruto fanfictions enhanced their realism with the sort of non-combat realism-enhancing scenes I mentioned there.
Showing the pokemon trainers cook and eat food and set up camps while on multi-day treks through deadly forests/untamed wilds/treacherous mountain climbs made the story stand out from all the other fanfics where getting from one city to another takes two minutes of cycling just like in the games and the wild pokemon/obligatory criminal team/environment will typically never be an issue.
Pokemon videogames compress space for the sake of gameplay and pacing but it would be unrealistic for a book's world to be tiny enough to fit inside a Game Boy cartridge. It just adds depth to the world to say Lavaridge Town grows crops in their volcanic soil, Petalburg hunts for their food in Mount Moon and Petalburg Forest, Slateport and Dewford fish, and Mauville relies on trade from Slateport while producing much of the region's power at the New Mauville Power Plant and Wattson's Pokemon Gym.
And for Naruto fics, showing the characters go out of their way to avoid fights and hide evidence of their campfires/campsites and generally act like stealthy pro assassins far from home added realism and a sense of tension, especially when in enemy territory. These aren't invincible demigods who announce their presence with dramatic speeches, these are sneaky spies who dig holes in the forest before shitting so nobody will find evidence of them shitting in the woods and use it to track them down. The ninja kids weren't given overly edgy backstories full of abuse and unrealistic tortures that forced them to grow up too fast, they just attended ninja school with all their other friends where they were desensitized to gore and violence constantly, Physical Education classes were knife fights with wooden kunai, Hide And Seek means kids using the Transformation Jutsu to disguise themselves as random objects/people Prop Hunt style, and the kids were taught how to catch and disembowel and cook rabbits while they were learning ninja-world history and their multiplication tables. Kids in Konoha who aren't tough enough to become child soldiers learn something like blacksmithing so they can make knives for all sorts of ninja soldiers, and Pokemon Trainers who don't feel like travelling the world and raising a team of top-tier Pokemon earn a steady wage as Gym Trainers or town guards battling strangers for fun while patrolling different routes between towns and chasing away any wild pokemon who get too close to town. This sort of worldbuilding justifies why the world is the way it is, answering questions and justifying things like "why are pokemon routes full of NPCs who fight you?" and "Where do the shuriken ninja throw come from?"
Plus, I liked it when the shows used superpowers in mundane setting. It's creative when Bulbasaur and Sasuke Uchiha use their superpowers for mundane stuff like cooking and fishing and setting up camp and that sort of thing.
Sometimes these fanfics that went for a realistic tone would introduce a loser specifically there to suck at life and make the heroes look better. Like an overly confident loudmouthed idiot who rushes into fights he could have avoided and gets injured, or some stuck-up dirt-hating fancy bitch whose overly-elaborate princess outfit or slutty cleavage-exposing whore outfit with ripped stockings and high heels is incredibly ill-suited to getting through the tough challenges of harsh environments(waist-high swamps, muddy forests full of poisonous insects, snowy paths with chest-high snow and perpetual blizzards) that aren't an issue for her tougher smarter better-dressed friends who bother with protective gear like armour/thick fur coats and know not to wear their sunday best into fights for their lives/battles against the elements.
Kkat's attempts at this (explaining the random nonsense DJ uses all-seeing military surveillance and radio broadcast tech and comes from a long line of celebrity impersonators) don't go far enough to always explain what people eat and why. The characters that just exist for the sake of convenience and the roles they play might have a few bits of trivia added but they aren't fully fleshed-out parts of the world.
In Fallout NV you can learn all about the Boomers of Nellis, their culture, what they eat, where their power comes from, what their history is, and so on. This side-attraction has more depth than Megaton, the biggest city in Fallout 3 besides Tenpenny Tower. And more depth than this story's Tenpony Tower. Tenpony Tower might have silly laws and silly restaurants where 200 year old canned cram is served up and called fancy cuisine by silly snooty ponies but the tower itself has no history or backstory or justification to exist in its present state. If it pays scavengers to run around snatching up 200 year old canned food from a raider-infested city and the rest of the raider and slaver filled wasteland why hasn't that ran out yet? What do they pay scavengers with, coupons for free massages? How does the cheese faggot make his cheese without a milk source like cows? Don't tell me there's some cowification fetish room where insufficiently fancy ponies are kept as cows. Immortan Joe from fucking Mad Max Fury Road kept pregnant women as cattle to explain where he got his milk from. And most of all, if the wannabe DJ pon3 family has passed a voice gender change spell through its family line for generations why is Homage the first pony to get into this tower and how the fuck did she set up shop in its radio floor without anypony noticing?
>>303289
Yep. Back when I primarily read fanfiction, the best Pokemon and Naruto fanfictions enhanced their realism with the sort of non-combat realism-enhancing scenes I mentioned there.
Showing the pokemon trainers cook and eat food and set up camps while on multi-day treks through deadly forests/untamed wilds/treacherous mountain climbs made the story stand out from all the other fanfics where getting from one city to another takes two minutes of cycling just like in the games and the wild pokemon/obligatory criminal team/environment will typically never be an issue.
Pokemon videogames compress space for the sake of gameplay and pacing but it would be unrealistic for a book's world to be tiny enough to fit inside a Game Boy cartridge. It just adds depth to the world to say Lavaridge Town grows crops in their volcanic soil, Petalburg hunts for their food in Mount Moon and Petalburg Forest, Slateport and Dewford fish, and Mauville relies on trade from Slateport while producing much of the region's power at the New Mauville Power Plant and Wattson's Pokemon Gym.
And for Naruto fics, showing the characters go out of their way to avoid fights and hide evidence of their campfires/campsites and generally act like stealthy pro assassins far from home added realism and a sense of tension, especially when in enemy territory. These aren't invincible demigods who announce their presence with dramatic speeches, these are sneaky spies who dig holes in the forest before shitting so nobody will find evidence of them shitting in the woods and use it to track them down. The ninja kids weren't given overly edgy backstories full of abuse and unrealistic tortures that forced them to grow up too fast, they just attended ninja school with all their other friends where they were desensitized to gore and violence constantly, Physical Education classes were knife fights with wooden kunai, Hide And Seek means kids using the Transformation Jutsu to disguise themselves as random objects/people Prop Hunt style, and the kids were taught how to catch and disembowel and cook rabbits while they were learning ninja-world history and their multiplication tables. Kids in Konoha who aren't tough enough to become child soldiers learn something like blacksmithing so they can make knives for all sorts of ninja soldiers, and Pokemon Trainers who don't feel like travelling the world and raising a team of top-tier Pokemon earn a steady wage as Gym Trainers or town guards battling strangers for fun while patrolling different routes between towns and chasing away any wild pokemon who get too close to town. This sort of worldbuilding justifies why the world is the way it is, answering questions and justifying things like "why are pokemon routes full of NPCs who fight you?" and "Where do the shuriken ninja throw come from?"
Plus, I liked it when the shows used superpowers in mundane setting. It's creative when Bulbasaur and Sasuke Uchiha use their superpowers for mundane stuff like cooking and fishing and setting up camp and that sort of thing.
Sometimes these fanfics that went for a realistic tone would introduce a loser specifically there to suck at life and make the heroes look better. Like an overly confident loudmouthed idiot who rushes into fights he could have avoided and gets injured, or some stuck-up dirt-hating fancy bitch whose overly-elaborate princess outfit or slutty cleavage-exposing whore outfit with ripped stockings and high heels is incredibly ill-suited to getting through the tough challenges of harsh environments(waist-high swamps, muddy forests full of poisonous insects, snowy paths with chest-high snow and perpetual blizzards) that aren't an issue for her tougher smarter better-dressed friends who bother with protective gear like armour/thick fur coats and know not to wear their sunday best into fights for their lives/battles against the elements.
Kkat's attempts at this (explaining the random nonsense DJ uses all-seeing military surveillance and radio broadcast tech and comes from a long line of celebrity impersonators) don't go far enough to always explain what people eat and why. The characters that just exist for the sake of convenience and the roles they play might have a few bits of trivia added but they aren't fully fleshed-out parts of the world.
In Fallout NV you can learn all about the Boomers of Nellis, their culture, what they eat, where their power comes from, what their history is, and so on. This side-attraction has more depth than Megaton, the biggest city in Fallout 3 besides Tenpenny Tower. And more depth than this story's Tenpony Tower. Tenpony Tower might have silly laws and silly restaurants where 200 year old canned cram is served up and called fancy cuisine by silly snooty ponies but the tower itself has no history or backstory or justification to exist in its present state. If it pays scavengers to run around snatching up 200 year old canned food from a raider-infested city and the rest of the raider and slaver filled wasteland why hasn't that ran out yet? What do they pay scavengers with, coupons for free massages? How does the cheese faggot make his cheese without a milk source like cows? Don't tell me there's some cowification fetish room where insufficiently fancy ponies are kept as cows. Immortan Joe from fucking Mad Max Fury Road kept pregnant women as cattle to explain where he got his milk from. And most of all, if the wannabe DJ pon3 family has passed a voice gender change spell through its family line for generations why is Homage the first pony to get into this tower and how the fuck did she set up shop in its radio floor without anypony noticing?
1615193396.jpg (92.0 KB, 680x512, Tumblr_mag9y4Enjj1qh6r18o1_500.jpg)
>>303286
As Homage and Littlepoop are sitting in the Tenpony Tower food court drinking their Jamba Juice™ smoothies, a trio of young foals suddenly approaches them. These three charming little scamps turn out to be none other than the children of Monterrey Jack, currently awaiting summary execution for the cool crime of attempted robbery. Well, I guess that answers my earlier question about whether or not he's still alive. Incidentally, I remember the text saying something earlier about Velvet going to read up on the laws of Tenpony Tower, presumably to offer him some sort of legal defense. Did anything ever materialize there, or what's the deal? As shaken as Littlepoop seems to suddenly be about what's going to happen to Monterrey, it didn't stop her from going off on a pointless side quest to retrieve some dusty old RUN-CMC albums, and it doesn't seem to have dampened her enjoyment of the little date she's on with Homage.
However, now that the sudden appearance of Jack's kids has reminded her that he does, in fact, still exist, and the mess she made hasn't magically cleaned itself up yet, she feels compelled to show us how bad she still feels about the situation by uttering some more ridiculous profanity:
>Oh fuck me with the moon. Moon, sun, both of them. Rape me hard.
Heh heh heh. Maybe I will, Pip. Maybe I will.
Anyway, the dialog in this scene is maudlin beyond belief and nothing here really merits close scrutiny. The main purpose of this particular microscene is to let us know that Monterrey Jack is going to be hanged in two days.
Page break. Even though Littlepoop has shown virtually no interest in the fate of Monterrey Jack since she visited him the other day, and has spent all of her time since then goofing around, the sight of his poor wittle soon-to-be-orphaned foals cwying and weeping suddenly has her justice-boner engorged. So, now that she suddenly cares again, she resolves to do whatever she can to rescue him from the gallows, even if it means eating a whole cheesecake and taking a nap.
This next microscene is only a few lines long, and contains so much absolute bullshit that I'm not even sure where to begin. So, I'm just going to drop in the whole thing verbatim and add commentary where appropriate:
>I paced back and forth in the Athenaeum as Homage watched me sadly. “You can’t interfere.”
>“Oh yes I can!”
>Homage gave a melancholy sigh. “I understand why you feel you should. Even if he did lay his own hay. But from what you said, it doesn’t really sound like he wants to be helped.”
>I snorted. “Then I’m not going to leave it up to him. He has three children that need looking after. They need to come before his twisted-up code of honor.”
If Littlepoop is so concerned about this dumbass leaving his family behind over some nonsensical code of...let's just call it "honor" for now...then where has this concern been for the last few days? After Jack was imprisoned, LP went to visit him exactly once. Her remaining time between then and now has been spent on completely trivial and selfish pursuits: tracking down some rare albums for Homage, recording Velvet Remedy's demo tape, dressing up in fancy clothes and having a fun afternoon at the spa. None of these things are important or even remotely time sensitive; meanwhile Monterrey Jack's clock has been ticking away.
>“Littlepip,” Homage whimpered. “We’ve just met. I don’t want to lose you already.”
>I stopped, shocked. “Lose me?”
>In exasperation, Homage pointed out, “If you do anything, and survive the guards with their battle saddles, you and your friends will never be allowed to set hoof in Tenpony Tower again.”
This is beyond moronic. Basically, Homage's concern here is that if Littlepoop goes full-blown murderhobo in Tenpony Tower and breaks Monterrey Jack out of prison, she will be permanently banned from the tower. Not killed, not jailed; banned from the tower. Apparently, mass murder sprees are frowned upon here, so if you get caught single-handedly gunning down an entire battalion of guards Rambo-style, they revoke your guest pass and ask you to leave. Attempted robbery, meanwhile, carries a death sentence.
What makes this even dumber is Homage's reasoning: if Littlepoop can't enter the tower, then the two of them will never see each other again. Is there any particular reason that Homage couldn't just leave along with Littlepoop? Oh right, she has her "sacred ancestral family calling" of playing the same five songs over and over and making snarky commentary about random shit that happens in the wasteland; she certainly can't give that up. I'm also guessing she isn't too keen on giving up her rent-free luxury penthouse at the top of the most exclusive location in all of nu-Edgequestria, either.
>I turned and looked into her eyes. They were glistening, ready to cry.
>“I’ll be with you, always, pretty much wherever you go. Just tune in to DJ Pon3 and I’ll be there. But… you won’t be able to be with me.”
"I'm sorry, my sweet, sweet lesbian horse crush. I do wish I could go with you, but I must stay here, for I have an important job to do. If I leave, the ponies of the land will no longer be able to listen to me jabber about your heroic exploits, or hear that shitty demo tape that you and Velvet recorded earlier. Go, my love, and think of me the next time you are snout-deep in some other mare's stinky crevice."
Blecch.
>I fell back on my haunches as the weight of what I would be sacrificing descended fully upon me.
Yes, poor Littlepoop. What a terrible choice she must make. Does she stay here in the idyll of Tenpony, drinking banana smoothies at the spa and digging out Homage's clam every night? Or does she ruthlessly slaughter an entire guard platoon just to free someone she hadn't even spared a thought about until she ran into his kids fifteen minutes ago? Decisions, decisions.
I just can't get over what a deep, mature story this is; clearly this is a pastel pony tale intended only for adults.
As Homage and Littlepoop are sitting in the Tenpony Tower food court drinking their Jamba Juice™ smoothies, a trio of young foals suddenly approaches them. These three charming little scamps turn out to be none other than the children of Monterrey Jack, currently awaiting summary execution for the cool crime of attempted robbery. Well, I guess that answers my earlier question about whether or not he's still alive. Incidentally, I remember the text saying something earlier about Velvet going to read up on the laws of Tenpony Tower, presumably to offer him some sort of legal defense. Did anything ever materialize there, or what's the deal? As shaken as Littlepoop seems to suddenly be about what's going to happen to Monterrey, it didn't stop her from going off on a pointless side quest to retrieve some dusty old RUN-CMC albums, and it doesn't seem to have dampened her enjoyment of the little date she's on with Homage.
However, now that the sudden appearance of Jack's kids has reminded her that he does, in fact, still exist, and the mess she made hasn't magically cleaned itself up yet, she feels compelled to show us how bad she still feels about the situation by uttering some more ridiculous profanity:
>Oh fuck me with the moon. Moon, sun, both of them. Rape me hard.
Heh heh heh. Maybe I will, Pip. Maybe I will.
Anyway, the dialog in this scene is maudlin beyond belief and nothing here really merits close scrutiny. The main purpose of this particular microscene is to let us know that Monterrey Jack is going to be hanged in two days.
Page break. Even though Littlepoop has shown virtually no interest in the fate of Monterrey Jack since she visited him the other day, and has spent all of her time since then goofing around, the sight of his poor wittle soon-to-be-orphaned foals cwying and weeping suddenly has her justice-boner engorged. So, now that she suddenly cares again, she resolves to do whatever she can to rescue him from the gallows, even if it means eating a whole cheesecake and taking a nap.
This next microscene is only a few lines long, and contains so much absolute bullshit that I'm not even sure where to begin. So, I'm just going to drop in the whole thing verbatim and add commentary where appropriate:
>I paced back and forth in the Athenaeum as Homage watched me sadly. “You can’t interfere.”
>“Oh yes I can!”
>Homage gave a melancholy sigh. “I understand why you feel you should. Even if he did lay his own hay. But from what you said, it doesn’t really sound like he wants to be helped.”
>I snorted. “Then I’m not going to leave it up to him. He has three children that need looking after. They need to come before his twisted-up code of honor.”
If Littlepoop is so concerned about this dumbass leaving his family behind over some nonsensical code of...let's just call it "honor" for now...then where has this concern been for the last few days? After Jack was imprisoned, LP went to visit him exactly once. Her remaining time between then and now has been spent on completely trivial and selfish pursuits: tracking down some rare albums for Homage, recording Velvet Remedy's demo tape, dressing up in fancy clothes and having a fun afternoon at the spa. None of these things are important or even remotely time sensitive; meanwhile Monterrey Jack's clock has been ticking away.
>“Littlepip,” Homage whimpered. “We’ve just met. I don’t want to lose you already.”
>I stopped, shocked. “Lose me?”
>In exasperation, Homage pointed out, “If you do anything, and survive the guards with their battle saddles, you and your friends will never be allowed to set hoof in Tenpony Tower again.”
This is beyond moronic. Basically, Homage's concern here is that if Littlepoop goes full-blown murderhobo in Tenpony Tower and breaks Monterrey Jack out of prison, she will be permanently banned from the tower. Not killed, not jailed; banned from the tower. Apparently, mass murder sprees are frowned upon here, so if you get caught single-handedly gunning down an entire battalion of guards Rambo-style, they revoke your guest pass and ask you to leave. Attempted robbery, meanwhile, carries a death sentence.
What makes this even dumber is Homage's reasoning: if Littlepoop can't enter the tower, then the two of them will never see each other again. Is there any particular reason that Homage couldn't just leave along with Littlepoop? Oh right, she has her "sacred ancestral family calling" of playing the same five songs over and over and making snarky commentary about random shit that happens in the wasteland; she certainly can't give that up. I'm also guessing she isn't too keen on giving up her rent-free luxury penthouse at the top of the most exclusive location in all of nu-Edgequestria, either.
>I turned and looked into her eyes. They were glistening, ready to cry.
>“I’ll be with you, always, pretty much wherever you go. Just tune in to DJ Pon3 and I’ll be there. But… you won’t be able to be with me.”
"I'm sorry, my sweet, sweet lesbian horse crush. I do wish I could go with you, but I must stay here, for I have an important job to do. If I leave, the ponies of the land will no longer be able to listen to me jabber about your heroic exploits, or hear that shitty demo tape that you and Velvet recorded earlier. Go, my love, and think of me the next time you are snout-deep in some other mare's stinky crevice."
Blecch.
>I fell back on my haunches as the weight of what I would be sacrificing descended fully upon me.
Yes, poor Littlepoop. What a terrible choice she must make. Does she stay here in the idyll of Tenpony, drinking banana smoothies at the spa and digging out Homage's clam every night? Or does she ruthlessly slaughter an entire guard platoon just to free someone she hadn't even spared a thought about until she ran into his kids fifteen minutes ago? Decisions, decisions.
I just can't get over what a deep, mature story this is; clearly this is a pastel pony tale intended only for adults.
>>303380
The next microscene I'm going to start referring to these subchapters as microscenes because that's basically what they are opens later that night. For some reason, Littlepoop decided she needed to go for a walk on the monorail tracks, and for some equally baffling reason, her friends decided to go with her. The author's explanation for this doesn't clarify it much:
>All I had told the others was that I was going for a walk. Every one of them insisted on coming with me. Only Velvet Remedy asked if there was a reason why, and she did so in private. She could tell I was distressed, and she was alarmed that I was not spending the evening with Homage. Calamity, I think, was looking for an excuse to stretch his wings. SteelHooves simply fell in behind me without comment; I felt he would go anywhere I did, and I still had no idea why.
>Truth was, as much as I wanted to spend the night with Homage, I was too messed up inside to enjoy it. I needed fresh air. I needed to clear my head. I needed a distraction.
Best I can figure, she is all torn up trying to decide if she wants to go liberate that cheese nigger or spend the rest of her life in Tenpony lezzing out with Homage. So, she decided to go out into the cold, post-apocalyptic night, where there is danger lurking at every turn, with her friends tagging along in full battle formation in case she is attacked. I know that's what I always do when I need to relax and clear my head.
At this point, Calamity decides to fly off for no reason, apparently loots a raider nest while he's out there, and returns with a sack full of grenades and some other random crap.
Literally nothing else happens in this microscene.
Skimming ahead a little, it doesn't look like anything even remotely important or interesting is going to happen for a good long while, and I'm starting to lose patience with this story again, so in the interest of preserving my sanity and yours, I'm going to try to blow through the next batch of microscenes in fairly short order. Ready? Here we go:
Page break. The group now comes across a bunch of rotting ghoul corpses (this seems like something of an oxymoron). SteelHooves identifies this as Sheriff Rottingtail's group, which I vaguely remember as something that DJ Pon3 talked about in one of her broadcasts. Littlepoop notes that SteelHooves seems emotionally affected by the wholesale slaughter of ghouls; it's not clear how exactly. I seem to remember his having some kind of anti-ghoul prejudice, but I don't remember if there was a reason given. I know the subject is a hot-button topic for LP because of Derpy.
LP attempts to engage him in small talk by mentioning what Homage told her earlier: that the Steel Ranger's don't have a particularly heroic reputation. To his credit, he responds with probably the best line of spoken dialogue in this story so far:
>“Is that how you see yourself?” he replied. “You’re a hero?”
The rest of the conversation is uninteresting. We learn that SteelHooves considers himself a "traditionalist," and that the Steel Rangers are bound by some kind of oath, but there is an internal debate over its interpretation: some think they owe it to the mare in charge (presumably AJ), others feel the oath is to the ministry itself. Meanwhile, Calamity loots some more junk and Littlepoop burns all of the ghoul corpses for some unspecified reason.
The scene ends on this ominous note:
>A balefire phoenix was circling the bonfire of corpses.
Page break. Unsurprisingly, the balefire phoenix mentioned in the cliffhanger is nowhere to be seen, and we are given no clue as to what became of it. Instead, we are informed that the group is now traveling to a place called Horseshoe Tower. I know this place was mentioned somewhere before in the text but bugger me if I can remember its significance and bugger me harder if I care. We are not told why they are going there, but on the way LP picks up a distress call on her radio from the top of the tower. There is a group of Talons lead by a griffon named Blackwing trapped up there and they need help and blah blah blah. Calamity is not present for some reason; we are not told where he is.
Apparently, the group of griffons was responsible for the giant pile of dead ghouls LP just set on fire. I seem to remember something about this from the DJ's broadcast as well, but once again I don't remember the details and don't really care enough to go back and look it up. Anyway, point is, this group killed a bunch of ghouls and then somehow got trapped at the top of this Horseshoe Tower. Since LP has absolutely zero reason to give even a fraction of a fuck about any of this, she naturally decides to go and check it out. Since Calamity is gone because reasons, they decide they need to leave him a message, because that makes a lot more sense than just waiting for him. The rest of the scene consists of a discussion of how to go about leaving the message.
Page break. They are inside the stupid tower now. It's basically the same as every other abandoned place they've explored: ruin, wreckage, dead bodies all over the place, etc etc. There appears to be a high level of radiation in here, for whatever that's worth. They begin cautiously working their way up the tower, when suddenly a wild alicorn appears. Littlepoop, who is levitating SteelHooves, is so surprised by this that she drops him. He falls through the floor beneath and lands in a giant pool of water that is down there I guess. He seems to sink to the bottom. The alicorn also falls, because there is not enough room to spread her wings and fly, and lands on some floating debris. As Littlepoop is trying to figure out how to kill her, Velvet fires the combat shotgun, which she has for some reason, and its head is partially blown off. We learn that alicorns can apparently regenerate, but before this one is able to do so, Littlepoop saws its head off by levitating jagged pieces of nearby debris.
The next microscene I'm going to start referring to these subchapters as microscenes because that's basically what they are opens later that night. For some reason, Littlepoop decided she needed to go for a walk on the monorail tracks, and for some equally baffling reason, her friends decided to go with her. The author's explanation for this doesn't clarify it much:
>All I had told the others was that I was going for a walk. Every one of them insisted on coming with me. Only Velvet Remedy asked if there was a reason why, and she did so in private. She could tell I was distressed, and she was alarmed that I was not spending the evening with Homage. Calamity, I think, was looking for an excuse to stretch his wings. SteelHooves simply fell in behind me without comment; I felt he would go anywhere I did, and I still had no idea why.
>Truth was, as much as I wanted to spend the night with Homage, I was too messed up inside to enjoy it. I needed fresh air. I needed to clear my head. I needed a distraction.
Best I can figure, she is all torn up trying to decide if she wants to go liberate that cheese nigger or spend the rest of her life in Tenpony lezzing out with Homage. So, she decided to go out into the cold, post-apocalyptic night, where there is danger lurking at every turn, with her friends tagging along in full battle formation in case she is attacked. I know that's what I always do when I need to relax and clear my head.
At this point, Calamity decides to fly off for no reason, apparently loots a raider nest while he's out there, and returns with a sack full of grenades and some other random crap.
Literally nothing else happens in this microscene.
Skimming ahead a little, it doesn't look like anything even remotely important or interesting is going to happen for a good long while, and I'm starting to lose patience with this story again, so in the interest of preserving my sanity and yours, I'm going to try to blow through the next batch of microscenes in fairly short order. Ready? Here we go:
Page break. The group now comes across a bunch of rotting ghoul corpses (this seems like something of an oxymoron). SteelHooves identifies this as Sheriff Rottingtail's group, which I vaguely remember as something that DJ Pon3 talked about in one of her broadcasts. Littlepoop notes that SteelHooves seems emotionally affected by the wholesale slaughter of ghouls; it's not clear how exactly. I seem to remember his having some kind of anti-ghoul prejudice, but I don't remember if there was a reason given. I know the subject is a hot-button topic for LP because of Derpy.
LP attempts to engage him in small talk by mentioning what Homage told her earlier: that the Steel Ranger's don't have a particularly heroic reputation. To his credit, he responds with probably the best line of spoken dialogue in this story so far:
>“Is that how you see yourself?” he replied. “You’re a hero?”
The rest of the conversation is uninteresting. We learn that SteelHooves considers himself a "traditionalist," and that the Steel Rangers are bound by some kind of oath, but there is an internal debate over its interpretation: some think they owe it to the mare in charge (presumably AJ), others feel the oath is to the ministry itself. Meanwhile, Calamity loots some more junk and Littlepoop burns all of the ghoul corpses for some unspecified reason.
The scene ends on this ominous note:
>A balefire phoenix was circling the bonfire of corpses.
Page break. Unsurprisingly, the balefire phoenix mentioned in the cliffhanger is nowhere to be seen, and we are given no clue as to what became of it. Instead, we are informed that the group is now traveling to a place called Horseshoe Tower. I know this place was mentioned somewhere before in the text but bugger me if I can remember its significance and bugger me harder if I care. We are not told why they are going there, but on the way LP picks up a distress call on her radio from the top of the tower. There is a group of Talons lead by a griffon named Blackwing trapped up there and they need help and blah blah blah. Calamity is not present for some reason; we are not told where he is.
Apparently, the group of griffons was responsible for the giant pile of dead ghouls LP just set on fire. I seem to remember something about this from the DJ's broadcast as well, but once again I don't remember the details and don't really care enough to go back and look it up. Anyway, point is, this group killed a bunch of ghouls and then somehow got trapped at the top of this Horseshoe Tower. Since LP has absolutely zero reason to give even a fraction of a fuck about any of this, she naturally decides to go and check it out. Since Calamity is gone because reasons, they decide they need to leave him a message, because that makes a lot more sense than just waiting for him. The rest of the scene consists of a discussion of how to go about leaving the message.
Page break. They are inside the stupid tower now. It's basically the same as every other abandoned place they've explored: ruin, wreckage, dead bodies all over the place, etc etc. There appears to be a high level of radiation in here, for whatever that's worth. They begin cautiously working their way up the tower, when suddenly a wild alicorn appears. Littlepoop, who is levitating SteelHooves, is so surprised by this that she drops him. He falls through the floor beneath and lands in a giant pool of water that is down there I guess. He seems to sink to the bottom. The alicorn also falls, because there is not enough room to spread her wings and fly, and lands on some floating debris. As Littlepoop is trying to figure out how to kill her, Velvet fires the combat shotgun, which she has for some reason, and its head is partially blown off. We learn that alicorns can apparently regenerate, but before this one is able to do so, Littlepoop saws its head off by levitating jagged pieces of nearby debris.
>>303395
>Velvet fires the combat shotgun, which she has for some reason, and its head is partially blown off
I could have sworn that at some point in this tale, Velvet was a pacifist morally opposed to killing.
If she's taking a "I'm against killing ponies, and raiders/rapists/slavers/filthy fucking mutant Alicorns don't count" approach to Wasteland life now, such a change from "hurr durr killing is wrong and so is shooting little rapist colts" should have been declared dramatically after a great deal of internal struggle and external debates over the morality of remaining a non-murderer even if it means letting rapists go free or forcing your friends to deal with them.
Then again, skimming over Velvet's characterization changes and minimizing her individuality to the point where she's simply a shotgun-toting NPC during combat situations means we have to sit through less of her dialogue and endure less of her irritating influence on the story.
Although it does make Velvet's existing hypocritical semi-pacifist moments more irritating in retrospect. What was the point of all that shit she gave Calamity over shooting a pack of rapists including a rapist colt if she'd end up cool with murdering Evil(TM) NPCs anyway?
>Velvet fires the combat shotgun, which she has for some reason, and its head is partially blown off
I could have sworn that at some point in this tale, Velvet was a pacifist morally opposed to killing.
If she's taking a "I'm against killing ponies, and raiders/rapists/slavers/filthy fucking mutant Alicorns don't count" approach to Wasteland life now, such a change from "hurr durr killing is wrong and so is shooting little rapist colts" should have been declared dramatically after a great deal of internal struggle and external debates over the morality of remaining a non-murderer even if it means letting rapists go free or forcing your friends to deal with them.
Then again, skimming over Velvet's characterization changes and minimizing her individuality to the point where she's simply a shotgun-toting NPC during combat situations means we have to sit through less of her dialogue and endure less of her irritating influence on the story.
Although it does make Velvet's existing hypocritical semi-pacifist moments more irritating in retrospect. What was the point of all that shit she gave Calamity over shooting a pack of rapists including a rapist colt if she'd end up cool with murdering Evil(TM) NPCs anyway?
>>303395
Page break. The alicorn, who appeared out of absolutely nowhere and was killed before we could even get a sense of why she was there in the first place, is now dead. Meanwhile, Velvet is attending to a wound in Littlepoop's ear. SteelHooves, who fell to the bottom of a deep pool of water wearing extremely heavy armor, apparently climbed out of the pool at some point and is perfectly fine now.
He and Velvet stand around for awhile arguing about how much RadAway he should drink, until finally Littlepoop blurts this out:
>“SteelHooves, tell her.”
>“Look, if I was able to figure it out, so will she. She’s smarter than I am.”
I had to read this next section of text several times, because it's not always clear who is talking and it's even less clear what the hell they are talking about, but apparently the gist of it is that SteelHooves is actually a ghoul, and Littlepoop somehow figured this out, even though there is absolutely zero reason why she should have been able to. Presumably LP just used her special Mary Sue powers to deduce it, and we as mere mortals can do little but accept the truth of it and move on.
We also learn that apparently radiation, which damages ordinary ponies, has a regenerative effect on ghouls and also alicorns. Apparently this is part of how LP figured out that Roboponer was a ghoul, although we are given no explanation as to how she would have known this about radiation or ghouls.
Page break. They have now advanced further into the tower. Littlepoop is sneaking ahead because she is best at stealth apparently. She sees two more alicorns and kills them without incident. She notes that neither alicorn has a cutie mark; this may or may not be significant information. She also realizes that, for some idiotic reason or other, she and Velvet never bothered to leave a note for Calamity, even though they spent about half of a microscene discussing it.
Littlepoop takes a couple of seconds to meditate upon how desensitized to violence she has become, and then goes to a safe that was in the room, tries to pick the lock, realizes she can't pick the lock, and then takes a fucking crack mint to boost her Int stat. Now she can pick the lock. Jesus H. Christ, kkat, you might as well just mash the keyboard with your palms over and over and publish the results; it would be more interesting to read and probably make more sense than any of what's here.
Page break. They have moved into the tower further still, and encounter three more alicorns. SteelHooves takes out one of them with his grenade launcher, but the other two manage to get their shields up in time. LP tries to pull her trick with the memory orb again, but it doesn't work; the alicorn laughs and makes a cryptic joke about remembering how LP killed them last time. It's not clear whether this is because the alicorns are supposed to have some sort of telekinetic link to each other, or if the regeneration ability we just learned about means that this actually is the same alicorn she killed earlier. For the moment, we are left to wonder about it. And by that I mean that we are left to wonder about it for literally one moment.
Seeing that they are well fucked and far from home, Littlepoop signals a retreat. SteelHooves uses his grenade cannon to collapse a large portion of masonry onto the pursuing alicorns, which seems like kind of a stupid thing to do considering that they are on an upper story of a very tall, very structurally unsound building, and he has absolutely no way of knowing which of these walls are load-bearing. But hey, the building is just one big static mesh, amirite? I'm sure it's perfectly safe.
As they stand there catching their breath, everyone wonders incredulously how LP's (frankly idiotic) toss-a-memory-orb-at-the-alicorn trick had managed to fail. Personally, I find it amazing that it even worked the first time, but apparently the others take this as evidence of superintelligence on the part of the alicorns. LP once again uses her amazing Mary Sue powers of deduction to pull the answer out of thin air:
>Panting, I explained. “There’s some sort of telepathy involved…” My fears had been proven true. “…not just between the ones that are together. All of them. Every time we kill one, they learn from it.” I wouldn’t be able to trick them the same way twice.
Of course! Never mind how she figured it out; it just makes perfect sense on its own!
Anyway, it turns out that alicorns can teleport too. Unfortunately, when they materialize, LP is now inside their shield. She takes an entire goddamn bag of grenades, pulls the pin on all of them at once, and runs out through the shield. The explosion destroys both alicorns, and the shield ensures that none of the party receives any damage. Once again, Mary Sue has saved the day.
Page break. We are informed that sometime during the end of the last microscene and the beginning of this one, LP & Co. had to fight it out with four more alicorns. Bet it was a cool fight; too bad we missed it. Anyway, they are now on the roof, where the griffon mercenaries are trapped. This is the scene that greets them:
>On the roof were four more alicorns. They were sitting, frozen, at the four corners of the building, their attentions focused inward. Instead of surrounding themselves with a sphere of protective magic, they were cooperatively maintaining a hemisphere of magical force that was keeping the three griffin mercs caged.
Something just occurred to me. I remember now where we heard about Blackwing; it was mentioned all the way back in Chapter 16. The DJ mentioned that Blackwing and her squad had gotten trapped in this tower, and made a crack about how the ghouls could have saved them if they hadn't killed them all. This literally happened days ago. You mean to tell me that these four alicorns have been holding these mercenaries in a magic force field on top of this tower for a period of actual fucking days?!? For the love of God, WHY?!?
Page break. The alicorn, who appeared out of absolutely nowhere and was killed before we could even get a sense of why she was there in the first place, is now dead. Meanwhile, Velvet is attending to a wound in Littlepoop's ear. SteelHooves, who fell to the bottom of a deep pool of water wearing extremely heavy armor, apparently climbed out of the pool at some point and is perfectly fine now.
He and Velvet stand around for awhile arguing about how much RadAway he should drink, until finally Littlepoop blurts this out:
>“SteelHooves, tell her.”
>“Look, if I was able to figure it out, so will she. She’s smarter than I am.”
I had to read this next section of text several times, because it's not always clear who is talking and it's even less clear what the hell they are talking about, but apparently the gist of it is that SteelHooves is actually a ghoul, and Littlepoop somehow figured this out, even though there is absolutely zero reason why she should have been able to. Presumably LP just used her special Mary Sue powers to deduce it, and we as mere mortals can do little but accept the truth of it and move on.
We also learn that apparently radiation, which damages ordinary ponies, has a regenerative effect on ghouls and also alicorns. Apparently this is part of how LP figured out that Roboponer was a ghoul, although we are given no explanation as to how she would have known this about radiation or ghouls.
Page break. They have now advanced further into the tower. Littlepoop is sneaking ahead because she is best at stealth apparently. She sees two more alicorns and kills them without incident. She notes that neither alicorn has a cutie mark; this may or may not be significant information. She also realizes that, for some idiotic reason or other, she and Velvet never bothered to leave a note for Calamity, even though they spent about half of a microscene discussing it.
Littlepoop takes a couple of seconds to meditate upon how desensitized to violence she has become, and then goes to a safe that was in the room, tries to pick the lock, realizes she can't pick the lock, and then takes a fucking crack mint to boost her Int stat. Now she can pick the lock. Jesus H. Christ, kkat, you might as well just mash the keyboard with your palms over and over and publish the results; it would be more interesting to read and probably make more sense than any of what's here.
Page break. They have moved into the tower further still, and encounter three more alicorns. SteelHooves takes out one of them with his grenade launcher, but the other two manage to get their shields up in time. LP tries to pull her trick with the memory orb again, but it doesn't work; the alicorn laughs and makes a cryptic joke about remembering how LP killed them last time. It's not clear whether this is because the alicorns are supposed to have some sort of telekinetic link to each other, or if the regeneration ability we just learned about means that this actually is the same alicorn she killed earlier. For the moment, we are left to wonder about it. And by that I mean that we are left to wonder about it for literally one moment.
Seeing that they are well fucked and far from home, Littlepoop signals a retreat. SteelHooves uses his grenade cannon to collapse a large portion of masonry onto the pursuing alicorns, which seems like kind of a stupid thing to do considering that they are on an upper story of a very tall, very structurally unsound building, and he has absolutely no way of knowing which of these walls are load-bearing. But hey, the building is just one big static mesh, amirite? I'm sure it's perfectly safe.
As they stand there catching their breath, everyone wonders incredulously how LP's (frankly idiotic) toss-a-memory-orb-at-the-alicorn trick had managed to fail. Personally, I find it amazing that it even worked the first time, but apparently the others take this as evidence of superintelligence on the part of the alicorns. LP once again uses her amazing Mary Sue powers of deduction to pull the answer out of thin air:
>Panting, I explained. “There’s some sort of telepathy involved…” My fears had been proven true. “…not just between the ones that are together. All of them. Every time we kill one, they learn from it.” I wouldn’t be able to trick them the same way twice.
Of course! Never mind how she figured it out; it just makes perfect sense on its own!
Anyway, it turns out that alicorns can teleport too. Unfortunately, when they materialize, LP is now inside their shield. She takes an entire goddamn bag of grenades, pulls the pin on all of them at once, and runs out through the shield. The explosion destroys both alicorns, and the shield ensures that none of the party receives any damage. Once again, Mary Sue has saved the day.
Page break. We are informed that sometime during the end of the last microscene and the beginning of this one, LP & Co. had to fight it out with four more alicorns. Bet it was a cool fight; too bad we missed it. Anyway, they are now on the roof, where the griffon mercenaries are trapped. This is the scene that greets them:
>On the roof were four more alicorns. They were sitting, frozen, at the four corners of the building, their attentions focused inward. Instead of surrounding themselves with a sphere of protective magic, they were cooperatively maintaining a hemisphere of magical force that was keeping the three griffin mercs caged.
Something just occurred to me. I remember now where we heard about Blackwing; it was mentioned all the way back in Chapter 16. The DJ mentioned that Blackwing and her squad had gotten trapped in this tower, and made a crack about how the ghouls could have saved them if they hadn't killed them all. This literally happened days ago. You mean to tell me that these four alicorns have been holding these mercenaries in a magic force field on top of this tower for a period of actual fucking days?!? For the love of God, WHY?!?
>>303403
Anyway, there is a quick pithy dialog exchange, sort of along the lines of "Dr. Livingston, I presume" except not as witty. The alicorns seem focused on maintaining their force field and the party is able to communicate with the griffons through the shield. Apparently they can't hear either, because the party and the griffons stand around for the rest of the microscene openly discussing how to kill them, and they take absolutely no action.
There is a long exchange of Rainman-tier autism in which LP attempts to pinpoint the exact number of alicorns they still have to kill. Oh, also, we are offered sort-of an explanation as to why the griffons have been pinned down:
>“These four have just been keeping us pinned here while their reinforcements arrive,” Blackwing informed us.
For...let's see, how long has it been...? Time for me to descend into a little Rainman-tier counting autism of my own:
Iirc, they heard the broadcast about ghouls on the same day they arrived at Tenpony Tower. They stayed a night in Tenpony, and then all the shit with Monterrey Jack and meeting the DJ happened the following day. It was dusk I believe when Homage gave LP the request to find the records, and then the business with the Red Rider factory took up most of the next day. They slept after that I believe, spent another day goofing around in Tenpony, so this would be the night of the third day since we first heard about these griffons being trapped up here. So...three whole days, plus the better part of a night, these four alicorns have had these mercenaries pinned down while they "wait for reinforcements" to arrive? For fuck's sake, how slow do alicorns travel?
Oh, also, LP's Rainman-tier-counting-autism ultimately leads her to conclude that there should be three more alicorns on the way.
Page break. LP lays out a plan and gets everyone in position for the coming fight; meanwhile the four alicorns continue to take no action and keep holding up their force field. As they are getting ready, LP asks Blackwing what they were looking for up here that has the alicorns in such a tizzy. The answer, of course, is completely mundane: turns out they have the combination to a safe in one of the ministries, and there is some kind of zebra black magic spell book in the safe. Whatever it is exactly, I'm sure it will find its way into LP's bottomless saddlebag sooner or later.
Anyway, LP's inner monologue blathers on for a few dull paragraphs about the horrors of zebra necromancy, and then Velvet and SteelHooves blather on for a few more equally dull paragraphs about the different capabilities of the different types of alicorns we've seen. Yes, that's right; apparently there are different kinds of alicorns, even though so far the text has been describing them as if they were identical to each other.
Finally, they finish setting up their incredibly transparent ambush, and open fire on the four alicorns, who despite having literally sat here watching them set all this up, are somehow still caught off guard when multiple guns fire on them at once. Three out of four are killed instantly, and the fourth is dispatched immediately afterward by some kind of gigantic super-gun one of the griffons is carrying (the author described it in detail but my eyes were kind of glazing over at that point; about all you need to know is that it's a big gun and it goes boom).
The griffons pick up the non-flyers and they all dive off into the night just as the three remaining alicorns burst onto the roof. The alicorns, who can also fly, give chase. Conveniently, Calamity, whose disappearance was apparently written in for no other reason than to set this moment up, suddenly appears out of absolutely nowhere. He leads them towards a bunch of those exploding bus thingies that are all conveniently packed together, and yada yada yada, the buses explode. The alicorns are all killed, and LP & Co appear to catch some shrapnel from the explosion and crash-land somewhere.
And...that's the end of the chapter. Holy shit, that sequence of pointless microscenes accounted for literally about two thirds of the entire chapter.
Seriously, let's take a quick look at the events of this chapter from a bird's eye view:
LP wakes up, puts on a nice dress, and goes to Homage's place to record Velvet's demo tape. After this, she and Homage spend the day at the spa, and are having lunch when they suddenly run into Monterrey Jack's kids, which reminds LP that Monterrey Jack is going to be executed. She suddenly feels distraught over this, and starts cooking up a plan to break Monterrey out of prison. Homage reminds her that if she does this she won't be able to come back to Tenpony and they will never see each other again, because she can't leave for some reason. LP is now distraught over this as well, so she goes outside to clear her head. While outside, she ends up getting a distress call from some mercenary group that has been trapped on top of a tower for the last three days, so she and her friends go to rescue them, fight some alicorns, and the chapter ends with a giant explosion.
There is so much concentrated autism here I don't even know how to parse it. This sequence of events is not just farfetched, this is just pure nonsense; the ravings of an absolute madman. This story unironically reads like Axe Cop, except it's the work of a grown ass man and not a five year old.
Seriously, this is a whole new level of autism. If Chris-chan acquired magical powers, used them to summon his Sonichu character into meatspace, commanded it to fuck his gaping taint-wound, became pregnant with its child, and shat a clutch of 44 eggs into a corner of his mother's basement, those eggs would hatch into the chapters of this story. We've looked at some bad stories in these threads, but this is on a whole other level. This may even surpass Nigel's thing in terms of pure autism.
For the first time, I am afraid. I am really, truly afraid.
Anyway, there is a quick pithy dialog exchange, sort of along the lines of "Dr. Livingston, I presume" except not as witty. The alicorns seem focused on maintaining their force field and the party is able to communicate with the griffons through the shield. Apparently they can't hear either, because the party and the griffons stand around for the rest of the microscene openly discussing how to kill them, and they take absolutely no action.
There is a long exchange of Rainman-tier autism in which LP attempts to pinpoint the exact number of alicorns they still have to kill. Oh, also, we are offered sort-of an explanation as to why the griffons have been pinned down:
>“These four have just been keeping us pinned here while their reinforcements arrive,” Blackwing informed us.
For...let's see, how long has it been...? Time for me to descend into a little Rainman-tier counting autism of my own:
Iirc, they heard the broadcast about ghouls on the same day they arrived at Tenpony Tower. They stayed a night in Tenpony, and then all the shit with Monterrey Jack and meeting the DJ happened the following day. It was dusk I believe when Homage gave LP the request to find the records, and then the business with the Red Rider factory took up most of the next day. They slept after that I believe, spent another day goofing around in Tenpony, so this would be the night of the third day since we first heard about these griffons being trapped up here. So...three whole days, plus the better part of a night, these four alicorns have had these mercenaries pinned down while they "wait for reinforcements" to arrive? For fuck's sake, how slow do alicorns travel?
Oh, also, LP's Rainman-tier-counting-autism ultimately leads her to conclude that there should be three more alicorns on the way.
Page break. LP lays out a plan and gets everyone in position for the coming fight; meanwhile the four alicorns continue to take no action and keep holding up their force field. As they are getting ready, LP asks Blackwing what they were looking for up here that has the alicorns in such a tizzy. The answer, of course, is completely mundane: turns out they have the combination to a safe in one of the ministries, and there is some kind of zebra black magic spell book in the safe. Whatever it is exactly, I'm sure it will find its way into LP's bottomless saddlebag sooner or later.
Anyway, LP's inner monologue blathers on for a few dull paragraphs about the horrors of zebra necromancy, and then Velvet and SteelHooves blather on for a few more equally dull paragraphs about the different capabilities of the different types of alicorns we've seen. Yes, that's right; apparently there are different kinds of alicorns, even though so far the text has been describing them as if they were identical to each other.
Finally, they finish setting up their incredibly transparent ambush, and open fire on the four alicorns, who despite having literally sat here watching them set all this up, are somehow still caught off guard when multiple guns fire on them at once. Three out of four are killed instantly, and the fourth is dispatched immediately afterward by some kind of gigantic super-gun one of the griffons is carrying (the author described it in detail but my eyes were kind of glazing over at that point; about all you need to know is that it's a big gun and it goes boom).
The griffons pick up the non-flyers and they all dive off into the night just as the three remaining alicorns burst onto the roof. The alicorns, who can also fly, give chase. Conveniently, Calamity, whose disappearance was apparently written in for no other reason than to set this moment up, suddenly appears out of absolutely nowhere. He leads them towards a bunch of those exploding bus thingies that are all conveniently packed together, and yada yada yada, the buses explode. The alicorns are all killed, and LP & Co appear to catch some shrapnel from the explosion and crash-land somewhere.
And...that's the end of the chapter. Holy shit, that sequence of pointless microscenes accounted for literally about two thirds of the entire chapter.
Seriously, let's take a quick look at the events of this chapter from a bird's eye view:
LP wakes up, puts on a nice dress, and goes to Homage's place to record Velvet's demo tape. After this, she and Homage spend the day at the spa, and are having lunch when they suddenly run into Monterrey Jack's kids, which reminds LP that Monterrey Jack is going to be executed. She suddenly feels distraught over this, and starts cooking up a plan to break Monterrey out of prison. Homage reminds her that if she does this she won't be able to come back to Tenpony and they will never see each other again, because she can't leave for some reason. LP is now distraught over this as well, so she goes outside to clear her head. While outside, she ends up getting a distress call from some mercenary group that has been trapped on top of a tower for the last three days, so she and her friends go to rescue them, fight some alicorns, and the chapter ends with a giant explosion.
There is so much concentrated autism here I don't even know how to parse it. This sequence of events is not just farfetched, this is just pure nonsense; the ravings of an absolute madman. This story unironically reads like Axe Cop, except it's the work of a grown ass man and not a five year old.
Seriously, this is a whole new level of autism. If Chris-chan acquired magical powers, used them to summon his Sonichu character into meatspace, commanded it to fuck his gaping taint-wound, became pregnant with its child, and shat a clutch of 44 eggs into a corner of his mother's basement, those eggs would hatch into the chapters of this story. We've looked at some bad stories in these threads, but this is on a whole other level. This may even surpass Nigel's thing in terms of pure autism.
For the first time, I am afraid. I am really, truly afraid.
>>303403
>The alicorn, who appeared out of absolutely nowhere and was killed before we could even get a sense of why she was there in the first place
DDDDDDRUMROLL, PLEASE!
This entire pointless side-mission exists solely for one reason: Do you have a guess? It's a 1:1 reference to the Reilley's Rangers quest in Fallout 3, where you go to rescue a band of misfit mercs trapped on top of a tower filled with super mutants. I forget if this has any bearing on the story, but it is inserted at absolute random with an incredibly clunky segue.
>The alicorn, who appeared out of absolutely nowhere and was killed before we could even get a sense of why she was there in the first place
DDDDDDRUMROLL, PLEASE!
This entire pointless side-mission exists solely for one reason: Do you have a guess? It's a 1:1 reference to the Reilley's Rangers quest in Fallout 3, where you go to rescue a band of misfit mercs trapped on top of a tower filled with super mutants. I forget if this has any bearing on the story, but it is inserted at absolute random with an incredibly clunky segue.
1615228036.png (674.0 KB, 1280x1280, whydidnttheyjustyeetlittlepipofftheroof.png)
>>303406
>And...that's the end of the chapter. Holy shit, that sequence of pointless microscenes accounted for literally about two thirds of the entire chapter.
I'm going to go out on a bit of a limb here and play Kkat's advocate for a moment with the benefit of knowing what happens later in the story. A lot of the minor and seemingly pointless events in this chapter end up coming back later on in various capacities. There's a lot of setup here, it's just presented in such a way that it looks like another long stream of pointless details.
Still, there's a lot of important things here:
>The book of zebra necromancy is plot-critical and comes up again in a major capacity later.
>The nature and abilities of the alicorns, like their hive mind and their abilities varying by colour, are being set up for greater depth once their leader and end goals are revealed.
>Ghouls and alicorns being healed and strengthened by radiation is something that comes up multiple times in major capacities later on.
>Blackwing and his mercs become recurring characters (including for - if memory serves - one of the biggest "what the FUCK Littlepip/Kkat" moments in the story).
>Similarly, the balefire phoenix shows up again.
Etc, etc. There's a method, or at least a measure of forethought, to all the autism being put to paper here.
The problem, at least to my mind, is the almost whimsical way these events and pieces of information are strung together. Things happen because the author wants them to and with little to no logic or reason beyond that, such as - as you pointed out - the alicorns trapping the griffons in a forcefield for what must have been days. Littlepip wanders into an incredibly dangerous area for no particular reason except that she's (essentially) distracted and bored, her companions join her for no particular reason, they stumble on a sidequest purely by accident and perform a "heroic" rescue, which will no doubt be shilled by DJ Ho-bag, purely because the opportunity is there and for no other reason.
As >>303407 points out, "mercenaries pinned down by mutants on top of a tower" is a reference to a Fallout 3 quest. Though in the game they're an independent mercenary unit rather than members of the (cartoonishly evil in the game) Talon Company.
And once again, to hark back to the points I made in >>303078 and >>303088 , what galls me the most about this whole murderhobo romp is the sheer apathy with which Kkat, through Littlepip's PoV and the narrative, treats MJ's kids. They're not given names, they're not given motives or character traits, they are just [Poor Innocent Victims #4326-4328] who exist as a problem for her to solve and a reason for her to feel bad, rendering her entire reaction to them hollow from the start.
>And...that's the end of the chapter. Holy shit, that sequence of pointless microscenes accounted for literally about two thirds of the entire chapter.
I'm going to go out on a bit of a limb here and play Kkat's advocate for a moment with the benefit of knowing what happens later in the story. A lot of the minor and seemingly pointless events in this chapter end up coming back later on in various capacities. There's a lot of setup here, it's just presented in such a way that it looks like another long stream of pointless details.
Still, there's a lot of important things here:
>The book of zebra necromancy is plot-critical and comes up again in a major capacity later.
>The nature and abilities of the alicorns, like their hive mind and their abilities varying by colour, are being set up for greater depth once their leader and end goals are revealed.
>Ghouls and alicorns being healed and strengthened by radiation is something that comes up multiple times in major capacities later on.
>Blackwing and his mercs become recurring characters (including for - if memory serves - one of the biggest "what the FUCK Littlepip/Kkat" moments in the story).
>Similarly, the balefire phoenix shows up again.
Etc, etc. There's a method, or at least a measure of forethought, to all the autism being put to paper here.
The problem, at least to my mind, is the almost whimsical way these events and pieces of information are strung together. Things happen because the author wants them to and with little to no logic or reason beyond that, such as - as you pointed out - the alicorns trapping the griffons in a forcefield for what must have been days. Littlepip wanders into an incredibly dangerous area for no particular reason except that she's (essentially) distracted and bored, her companions join her for no particular reason, they stumble on a sidequest purely by accident and perform a "heroic" rescue, which will no doubt be shilled by DJ Ho-bag, purely because the opportunity is there and for no other reason.
As >>303407 points out, "mercenaries pinned down by mutants on top of a tower" is a reference to a Fallout 3 quest. Though in the game they're an independent mercenary unit rather than members of the (cartoonishly evil in the game) Talon Company.
And once again, to hark back to the points I made in >>303078 and >>303088 , what galls me the most about this whole murderhobo romp is the sheer apathy with which Kkat, through Littlepip's PoV and the narrative, treats MJ's kids. They're not given names, they're not given motives or character traits, they are just [Poor Innocent Victims #4326-4328] who exist as a problem for her to solve and a reason for her to feel bad, rendering her entire reaction to them hollow from the start.
>>303406
Chapter Nineteen: Betrayal
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>“Tell me that my friends are all lying to me and avoiding me because they don’t like my parties and they don’t want to be my friends anymore!”
If I'm not mistaken this is a quote from Pinkie Pie, from one of the early episodes of the series.
>Addiction.
>How do you know when you’re trapped? When you want something more than anything else? When you find yourself lying to your friends and hiding things from them because you don’t want them to know? When you can’t go a week without indulging? A day?
>Or simply when you insisted that because none of the above really applied to you, you were fine?
This is actually a rather well-written passage. Unfortunately, its emotional impact is severely blunted, as kkat has thus far demonstrated that he has no serious understanding of how substance addiction actually works or how to approach it in writing. In any case the subject has not been well-handled in this story (to put it politely). K "hi my name is kkatman and I'm addicted to estrogen supplements and anonymous gay hookups in public restrooms" kat may as well have just copypasted this text from a Narcotics Anonymous pamphlet.
Anyway, the opening microscene of this chapter is basically just a garbled mess of insincere lamentations from Littlepoop regarding her alleged drug problem. The timing is highly inappropriate (you will recall that the group just crash-landed after an explosion-filled chase sequence; not exactly an ideal moment for self-reflection). However, it is amusing that she chooses to remember Pinkie Pie's dying message to Twilight at this moment:
>Pinkie Pie’s last message plagued my dreams.
>As I peeled myself off the rubble-strewn street, my mind’s eye could still see that skeleton, alone in a corner… a clutched figure of a friend having fallen into her ribcage.
The figure she is talking about is the very same one that she removed from Pinkie's ribcage, that is now clanking around in her saddlebag along with all the other random tchotchkes she's collected over the course of the story. It's deeply ironic that the words she finds such poignant meaning in at this moment were spoken by a pony whose grave she robbed without a second thought; unfortunately, though, the irony seems to be lost on both the character and her creator.
For all her sermonizing about the value of friendship, this character has revealed herself to be a complete self-absorbed narcissist. She's not thinking about Pinkie or Twilight right now, she's thinking about her own problems; as far as she is concerned, Pinkie Pie's tragic death happened solely to teach her a lesson about drug addiction. When she took the statuette from Pinkie's bones, she wasn't thinking about either Pinkie or Twilight; she might have shed a few crocodile tears over how Pinkie died, but she didn't give any thought to whether or not it was right for her to take the statue. She didn't even have any practical use for it, she just took it because she wanted it.
Fundamentally, this is her mindset: everything in this world that exists, exists for her. Any object she finds is hers to keep by right, no matter who it belonged to originally. Every memory or treasured heirloom she comes across is just there to provide her with a piece of some giant puzzle that she alone has the divine right to solve, as if the entire world spent the last 200 years just waiting for Littlepoop to come along and save it. Even other characters, her friends and the various NPCs she comes into contact with, exist for no other reason than to teach her some kind of lesson or provide her some opportunity for personal growth or material gain. This is true of friends and enemies alike. As has been pointed out by others in this thread, even these side-quests she encounters are just opportunities for her to demonstrate her supposed altruism and bask in applause once the quest is complete. So far, this has been a story about a self-absorbed klepto who just wanders around the wasteland doing whatever the hell she wants, leaving others to clean up the mess behind her, and being praised to high heaven as some kind of "hero of the people ponies, whatever" for doing it. Again, as shitty as FoE may be as a work of fiction, it is proving to be an interesting psychological profile of its author.
Anyway, the microscene concludes with LP acknowledging that she may, in fact, have a mint problem.
Page break. LP's crew and the griffon mercenaries pull themselves out of the wreckage. The scene is just standard FoE fare: lots of vivid descriptions of injuries and damage, with various characters making snarky one-line remarks that comedically downplay the seriousness of the situation. The characters all fall into their standard behavior loops: Calamity dances around and hoots like a hillbilly, Velvet tut-tuts about how reckless everypony is while tending to their injuries, SteelHooves just stands there, and LP lies on the ground with a piece of rebar jammed through her leg, inner-monologuing angstily to herself. The scene ends with her losing consciousness again.
Page break. LP regains consciousness in an undisclosed location. SteelHooves and Blackwing are discussing the safe codes that the griffon group has obtained. Velvet is tending to LP's injuries, but seems injured herself and appears under strain. She reports having a concussion. She and LP exchange and deflect concerned remarks about each other's well-being, none of which feel like cause for actual concern since medicine in this story renders even the most serious injuries inconsequential. Littlepoop just got an iron bar jammed through her femur, for crying out loud; it's a bit hard to take Velvet's little conk on the head seriously.
Chapter Nineteen: Betrayal
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>“Tell me that my friends are all lying to me and avoiding me because they don’t like my parties and they don’t want to be my friends anymore!”
If I'm not mistaken this is a quote from Pinkie Pie, from one of the early episodes of the series.
>Addiction.
>How do you know when you’re trapped? When you want something more than anything else? When you find yourself lying to your friends and hiding things from them because you don’t want them to know? When you can’t go a week without indulging? A day?
>Or simply when you insisted that because none of the above really applied to you, you were fine?
This is actually a rather well-written passage. Unfortunately, its emotional impact is severely blunted, as kkat has thus far demonstrated that he has no serious understanding of how substance addiction actually works or how to approach it in writing. In any case the subject has not been well-handled in this story (to put it politely). K "hi my name is kkatman and I'm addicted to estrogen supplements and anonymous gay hookups in public restrooms" kat may as well have just copypasted this text from a Narcotics Anonymous pamphlet.
Anyway, the opening microscene of this chapter is basically just a garbled mess of insincere lamentations from Littlepoop regarding her alleged drug problem. The timing is highly inappropriate (you will recall that the group just crash-landed after an explosion-filled chase sequence; not exactly an ideal moment for self-reflection). However, it is amusing that she chooses to remember Pinkie Pie's dying message to Twilight at this moment:
>Pinkie Pie’s last message plagued my dreams.
>As I peeled myself off the rubble-strewn street, my mind’s eye could still see that skeleton, alone in a corner… a clutched figure of a friend having fallen into her ribcage.
The figure she is talking about is the very same one that she removed from Pinkie's ribcage, that is now clanking around in her saddlebag along with all the other random tchotchkes she's collected over the course of the story. It's deeply ironic that the words she finds such poignant meaning in at this moment were spoken by a pony whose grave she robbed without a second thought; unfortunately, though, the irony seems to be lost on both the character and her creator.
For all her sermonizing about the value of friendship, this character has revealed herself to be a complete self-absorbed narcissist. She's not thinking about Pinkie or Twilight right now, she's thinking about her own problems; as far as she is concerned, Pinkie Pie's tragic death happened solely to teach her a lesson about drug addiction. When she took the statuette from Pinkie's bones, she wasn't thinking about either Pinkie or Twilight; she might have shed a few crocodile tears over how Pinkie died, but she didn't give any thought to whether or not it was right for her to take the statue. She didn't even have any practical use for it, she just took it because she wanted it.
Fundamentally, this is her mindset: everything in this world that exists, exists for her. Any object she finds is hers to keep by right, no matter who it belonged to originally. Every memory or treasured heirloom she comes across is just there to provide her with a piece of some giant puzzle that she alone has the divine right to solve, as if the entire world spent the last 200 years just waiting for Littlepoop to come along and save it. Even other characters, her friends and the various NPCs she comes into contact with, exist for no other reason than to teach her some kind of lesson or provide her some opportunity for personal growth or material gain. This is true of friends and enemies alike. As has been pointed out by others in this thread, even these side-quests she encounters are just opportunities for her to demonstrate her supposed altruism and bask in applause once the quest is complete. So far, this has been a story about a self-absorbed klepto who just wanders around the wasteland doing whatever the hell she wants, leaving others to clean up the mess behind her, and being praised to high heaven as some kind of "hero of the people ponies, whatever" for doing it. Again, as shitty as FoE may be as a work of fiction, it is proving to be an interesting psychological profile of its author.
Anyway, the microscene concludes with LP acknowledging that she may, in fact, have a mint problem.
Page break. LP's crew and the griffon mercenaries pull themselves out of the wreckage. The scene is just standard FoE fare: lots of vivid descriptions of injuries and damage, with various characters making snarky one-line remarks that comedically downplay the seriousness of the situation. The characters all fall into their standard behavior loops: Calamity dances around and hoots like a hillbilly, Velvet tut-tuts about how reckless everypony is while tending to their injuries, SteelHooves just stands there, and LP lies on the ground with a piece of rebar jammed through her leg, inner-monologuing angstily to herself. The scene ends with her losing consciousness again.
Page break. LP regains consciousness in an undisclosed location. SteelHooves and Blackwing are discussing the safe codes that the griffon group has obtained. Velvet is tending to LP's injuries, but seems injured herself and appears under strain. She reports having a concussion. She and LP exchange and deflect concerned remarks about each other's well-being, none of which feel like cause for actual concern since medicine in this story renders even the most serious injuries inconsequential. Littlepoop just got an iron bar jammed through her femur, for crying out loud; it's a bit hard to take Velvet's little conk on the head seriously.
>>303406
Could have made the "alicorns keep the griffons captive for days" thing less retarded by making one alicorn keep better-armed griffons captive, characterizing the alicorns as creepy little shits who want to torture information out of the griffons and make them slowly run out of survivalist supplies miles away from anywhere you can reliably get supplies. This might be a setting where you can store food and water and twenty pounds of health potions and eight guns and two hundred pounds of ammo for each one in your saddlebags without issue but the problem of running out of food should come up at least once.
Could have made the "alicorns keep the griffons captive for days" thing less retarded by making one alicorn keep better-armed griffons captive, characterizing the alicorns as creepy little shits who want to torture information out of the griffons and make them slowly run out of survivalist supplies miles away from anywhere you can reliably get supplies. This might be a setting where you can store food and water and twenty pounds of health potions and eight guns and two hundred pounds of ammo for each one in your saddlebags without issue but the problem of running out of food should come up at least once.
>>303484
Speaking of the iron bar, it still hasn't been removed. Velvet informs LP that she is going to have to yank it out before she can take a healing potion, and that this is probably going to hurt. LP decides to look into a memory orb to take her mind off the pain:
>I floated out the memory orb from Horseshoe Tower, contemplating it a moment. The lock on that safe had been the hardest I’d ever tried to crack. It had been beyond the magical abilities of two alicorns. What secrets could it have been hiding.
It's a little hard to figure out which memory orb she's talking about here, since there was no mention of her finding one at any point during the Horseshoe Tower sequence. Presumably, the safe she's talking about here is the one that was so complicated that she needed to do a line of mint to crack it, and presumably the orb was inside. Once again, relatively important events are happening off-camera, while what's on-camera mostly consists of the mundane, the boring, and the generally irrelevant.
She dives into the memory orb just as Velvet begins pulling the rebar out. The memory belongs to a male pony, who appears to be an office worker at one of the ministries. He is sitting at a terminal monitoring communications or something.
>My host picked up a pencil in his mouth and started doodling on a notepad. I could taste the eraser, and feel the little bite marks on the wooden shaft. I tried to focus on taste and sight and sound, ignoring other senses sternly.
Little details like the taste of a pencil are nice to include and help flesh out a scene; I recommend doing stuff like this. The author only seems to use these techniques during these memory sequences, probably because he wants to emphasize that LP is experiencing the situation through another character's eyes. However, it's a good thing to do in general.
Anyway, the unknown stallion is monitoring a conversation between Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle regarding an injury that Applejack sustained. Apple Bloom is under the impression that it wasn't an accident. There is speculation that the perpetrator came from within her own ministry. There is some other drama detailed in here too: apparently Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash have had a falling out, with Dash calling Fluttershy a "traitor."
The computer informs the unknown stallion that the conversation is considered important, and that its details should be reported to his superior. The memory ends here.
Littlepoop awakens in pain with her leg bandaged. My guess is she will be right as rain in the next ten minutes.
>Not far away, I saw Calamity working on her “saddlebags”, replacing the battle damaged boxes with newer ones he had scavenged from… somewhere.
I'm not sure why the word 'saddlebags' is in quotation marks here.
Littlepoop takes a moment to reflect on what she just learned from the orb. The result is a dense, convoluted paragraph in which she attempts to piece this new info together with some of what she's learned from other sources. I don't really follow it, but if anyone else wants to take a whack at sifting through this autism, here it is:
>I had glimpsed hints that all was not well inside the Ministry of Technology before, but for anypony within the Ministry to have enough drive and animosity towards Applejack to plot her death… that took the conflict to a whole new level. That placed the call sometime after the death of Applejack’s big brother and her corresponding exertion of greater control over her own Ministry. Probably even after Applesnack’s memory. A new generation of magically-hardened terminals would explain why I kept finding functional ones in the Equestrian Wasteland. And if that call took place when I thought it did, that would explain why the vast majority of terminals were destroyed hunks of scrap. Only the ones deemed most vital or owned by ponies of wealth or prominence would have been upgraded.
As far as I can tell, there was some kind of internal coup within the Ministry of Technology that resulted in AJ getting killed. Beyond that I have no idea what she's on about here.
>Most importantly, Velvet Remedy must never see this memory.
There is no obvious reason why the contents of this orb should be kept from Velvet. My best guess is that it's because there is some side-conversation in it about Fluttershy being called a traitor, and since Velvet is gay for Fluttershy it might upset her, or something.
Littlepoop throws the orb away, I guess to keep Velvet from ever seeing it, and the scene ends.
Page break. In the next scene, Blackwing and SteelHooves are discussing the ghoul massacre earlier. Blackwing seems to feel that his side of the story was misrepresented by the DJ. I can't quite follow the details, but it sounds like there may be a ghoul-sympathetic doctor living in Tenpony Tower. Also, Blackwing does not seem to share SteelHooves' adamant view that all ghouls are bad, so they argue a little about this.
The author seems to be trying to do something with SteelHooves' character, but it's not at all clear what. Observing this conversation, LP notes that SteelHooves seems to intentionally adopt a passive tone of voice to put ponies at ease, but she suspects that he has some hidden agenda that...I guess has something to do with ghouls? Again, the author clearly has something in mind, but as ever his execution is poor and it's not even remotely clear what we're supposed to be thinking about SteelHooves.
Speaking of the iron bar, it still hasn't been removed. Velvet informs LP that she is going to have to yank it out before she can take a healing potion, and that this is probably going to hurt. LP decides to look into a memory orb to take her mind off the pain:
>I floated out the memory orb from Horseshoe Tower, contemplating it a moment. The lock on that safe had been the hardest I’d ever tried to crack. It had been beyond the magical abilities of two alicorns. What secrets could it have been hiding.
It's a little hard to figure out which memory orb she's talking about here, since there was no mention of her finding one at any point during the Horseshoe Tower sequence. Presumably, the safe she's talking about here is the one that was so complicated that she needed to do a line of mint to crack it, and presumably the orb was inside. Once again, relatively important events are happening off-camera, while what's on-camera mostly consists of the mundane, the boring, and the generally irrelevant.
She dives into the memory orb just as Velvet begins pulling the rebar out. The memory belongs to a male pony, who appears to be an office worker at one of the ministries. He is sitting at a terminal monitoring communications or something.
>My host picked up a pencil in his mouth and started doodling on a notepad. I could taste the eraser, and feel the little bite marks on the wooden shaft. I tried to focus on taste and sight and sound, ignoring other senses sternly.
Little details like the taste of a pencil are nice to include and help flesh out a scene; I recommend doing stuff like this. The author only seems to use these techniques during these memory sequences, probably because he wants to emphasize that LP is experiencing the situation through another character's eyes. However, it's a good thing to do in general.
Anyway, the unknown stallion is monitoring a conversation between Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle regarding an injury that Applejack sustained. Apple Bloom is under the impression that it wasn't an accident. There is speculation that the perpetrator came from within her own ministry. There is some other drama detailed in here too: apparently Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash have had a falling out, with Dash calling Fluttershy a "traitor."
The computer informs the unknown stallion that the conversation is considered important, and that its details should be reported to his superior. The memory ends here.
Littlepoop awakens in pain with her leg bandaged. My guess is she will be right as rain in the next ten minutes.
>Not far away, I saw Calamity working on her “saddlebags”, replacing the battle damaged boxes with newer ones he had scavenged from… somewhere.
I'm not sure why the word 'saddlebags' is in quotation marks here.
Littlepoop takes a moment to reflect on what she just learned from the orb. The result is a dense, convoluted paragraph in which she attempts to piece this new info together with some of what she's learned from other sources. I don't really follow it, but if anyone else wants to take a whack at sifting through this autism, here it is:
>I had glimpsed hints that all was not well inside the Ministry of Technology before, but for anypony within the Ministry to have enough drive and animosity towards Applejack to plot her death… that took the conflict to a whole new level. That placed the call sometime after the death of Applejack’s big brother and her corresponding exertion of greater control over her own Ministry. Probably even after Applesnack’s memory. A new generation of magically-hardened terminals would explain why I kept finding functional ones in the Equestrian Wasteland. And if that call took place when I thought it did, that would explain why the vast majority of terminals were destroyed hunks of scrap. Only the ones deemed most vital or owned by ponies of wealth or prominence would have been upgraded.
As far as I can tell, there was some kind of internal coup within the Ministry of Technology that resulted in AJ getting killed. Beyond that I have no idea what she's on about here.
>Most importantly, Velvet Remedy must never see this memory.
There is no obvious reason why the contents of this orb should be kept from Velvet. My best guess is that it's because there is some side-conversation in it about Fluttershy being called a traitor, and since Velvet is gay for Fluttershy it might upset her, or something.
Littlepoop throws the orb away, I guess to keep Velvet from ever seeing it, and the scene ends.
Page break. In the next scene, Blackwing and SteelHooves are discussing the ghoul massacre earlier. Blackwing seems to feel that his side of the story was misrepresented by the DJ. I can't quite follow the details, but it sounds like there may be a ghoul-sympathetic doctor living in Tenpony Tower. Also, Blackwing does not seem to share SteelHooves' adamant view that all ghouls are bad, so they argue a little about this.
The author seems to be trying to do something with SteelHooves' character, but it's not at all clear what. Observing this conversation, LP notes that SteelHooves seems to intentionally adopt a passive tone of voice to put ponies at ease, but she suspects that he has some hidden agenda that...I guess has something to do with ghouls? Again, the author clearly has something in mind, but as ever his execution is poor and it's not even remotely clear what we're supposed to be thinking about SteelHooves.
>>303486
I switched mobile carriers recently, and my new one allows me to use my phone as a hotspot. This means that I can just give my posts a quick proof and post them as I write them, instead of waiting until I get home from work. Saves me a little bit of time.
I switched mobile carriers recently, and my new one allows me to use my phone as a hotspot. This means that I can just give my posts a quick proof and post them as I write them, instead of waiting until I get home from work. Saves me a little bit of time.
>>303490
>I'm not sure why the word 'saddlebags' is in quotation marks here.
While to my knowledge it doesn't actually influence the story in any meaningful sense, Velvet wears metal medical cabinets in place of saddlebags. It was probably mentioned offhandedly somewhere back near the start of the story and we're just kinda expected to remember.
>I'm not sure why the word 'saddlebags' is in quotation marks here.
While to my knowledge it doesn't actually influence the story in any meaningful sense, Velvet wears metal medical cabinets in place of saddlebags. It was probably mentioned offhandedly somewhere back near the start of the story and we're just kinda expected to remember.
>>303490
Something else worth noting is that according to Blackwing, the ghouls that they slaughtered were actually planning an uprising against Tenpony Tower. The DJ presented this incident as if it were just a case of meanie-pants bigots slaughtering a bunch of defenseless ghouls, but in this case it seems the ghouls were actually planning something that justified this sort of action. There is also this:
>“Yeah. Sheriff Rottingtail didn’t want cohabitation, even if some of the Tenpony folk were willing to give it a go. That bastard had plans to wipe out everypony in that Tower and take it for himself and his crew.”
Thus far, we've been led to believe that Tenpony Tower is some kind of bigoted, elitist enclave and that they didn't want to let ghouls inside because of prejudice or something. Blackwing's tale, however, implies that the Tenpony residents were actually willing to consider letting ghouls inside; it was the ghouls themselves that were plotting to take advantage of the tower's kindness and slaughter them all.
I'm actually a little impressed, and not just because this is a surprisingly redpilled take on what can happen when a prosperous society takes in a bunch of refugees. Kkat's world is usually divided cleanly into heroes and villains, and he rarely attempts anything even this complex. This was actually an interesting twist, and for once I didn't see it coming; today, kkat was not a faggot.
Blackwing also mentions a tunnel underneath Tenpony Tower. Apparently, the ghouls' plan was to have the griffons get inside the tower, and open the door to the tunnel. However, this would have meant a violation of their contract, because I guess Blackwing is contracted to Tenpony Tower (this part is not tremendously clear), so she slaughtered the ghouls instead. For some reason, she elected not to tell Chief Grim Star, who I guess is the head of Tenpony Security (I think I've actually been getting him mixed up with Sheriff Rottingtail, who was the head of the ghoul group, which may be some of what has been confusing me here) about the fatal security flaw the ghouls were attempting to exploit. The reason she gives is not wanting to "fuel his bigotry," which seems like a pretty flimsy justification. SteelHooves, for some reason, thinks this makes sense, but resolves to tell Grim Star about the security flaw the first chance he gets. I'm not entirely sure why he would care, but there you have it.
Page break. Butcher, one of the other Talons, offers Littlepoop a battle saddle with a big ass gun on it (the same one they used on the roof to kill the last alicorn) as payment for saving their lives. There is some spirited debate over who should take it, since none of them can use it. Calamity wants to graft it onto SteelHooves' back, but Littlepoop nixes this idea. She ultimately refuses the gun, saying that the Talons can just owe them a favor instead. The griffons give LP a radio broadcaster, so her PipBuck can now transmit as well as receive radio signals. After this, they part ways. Then, Frank shows up.
Page break. LP suspects that Frank was following them earlier, but can't confirm it. He offers no reason as to why he is here or what he wanted to speak to Littlepoop about, and she doesn't ask. Instead, she randomly asks him if he would be willing to tell Gawd about what had happened to Blackwing's Talon group. This seems like a bit of a dumb request, since presumably the Talons would have ways of contacting each other, but in any case it's a moot point, because Frank unexpectedly refuses. He claims that he only intervenes in the affairs of others in order to save lives, and this isn't saving lives. This feels pretty flimsy, as I'm fairly certain most of the stuff he's had Littlepoop doing, as well as most of the requests he's carried out for her, have had little or nothing to do with saving lives.
However, this too proves a moot point, as he then suddenly reverses his decision and agrees to LP's request. But, he wants something in return: a Black Opal that is apparently stored in Tenpony Tower. He explains that a Black Opal is a type of memory orb that works with a special crown that allows ponies to record their memories onto orbs, and allows non-unicorns to view memory orbs. There's a catch, though: the opal in question belongs to Homage. LP is not happy about having to steal from her new lady friend just to appease Frank, but for some reason or other she really feels that helping Gawd and Blackwing find each other is an important enough matter to justify it. So, she agrees, on the condition that Frank deliver the message first. There is some autism involving the length of her conversations with Frank, the significance of which is completely lost on me, and then he disappears in his usual fashion.
Page break. It is now morning; LP went for an evening stroll and wound up spending the whole night fighting alicorns. Presumably, she's forgotten all about Monterrey Jack again, who was the whole reason she went out in the first place. By my count, he only has about 24 hours left to live, by the way.
However, LP has more important things on her mind: apparently, her PipBuck was broken during the crash earlier. Hilariously, she now has to make do without any of the fancy technology she relies upon in order to larp as a wasteland badass. Also, this is the first time the text has mentioned it, but she apparently has radiation sickness. Also, her leg hurts, because getting a piece of iron rebar jammed through solid bone will do that to you. Presumably she downed a few healing potions and RadAway and whatever the fuck else, but I guess it takes awhile for that stuff to work.
Actually, it explains a bit of this in the next paragraph: they didn't quite have enough RadAway to completely take care of all of them, so they had to split what they had evenly. Poor LP, looks like she's going to have to endure some mild inconvenience for a page or two.
Something else worth noting is that according to Blackwing, the ghouls that they slaughtered were actually planning an uprising against Tenpony Tower. The DJ presented this incident as if it were just a case of meanie-pants bigots slaughtering a bunch of defenseless ghouls, but in this case it seems the ghouls were actually planning something that justified this sort of action. There is also this:
>“Yeah. Sheriff Rottingtail didn’t want cohabitation, even if some of the Tenpony folk were willing to give it a go. That bastard had plans to wipe out everypony in that Tower and take it for himself and his crew.”
Thus far, we've been led to believe that Tenpony Tower is some kind of bigoted, elitist enclave and that they didn't want to let ghouls inside because of prejudice or something. Blackwing's tale, however, implies that the Tenpony residents were actually willing to consider letting ghouls inside; it was the ghouls themselves that were plotting to take advantage of the tower's kindness and slaughter them all.
I'm actually a little impressed, and not just because this is a surprisingly redpilled take on what can happen when a prosperous society takes in a bunch of refugees. Kkat's world is usually divided cleanly into heroes and villains, and he rarely attempts anything even this complex. This was actually an interesting twist, and for once I didn't see it coming; today, kkat was not a faggot.
Blackwing also mentions a tunnel underneath Tenpony Tower. Apparently, the ghouls' plan was to have the griffons get inside the tower, and open the door to the tunnel. However, this would have meant a violation of their contract, because I guess Blackwing is contracted to Tenpony Tower (this part is not tremendously clear), so she slaughtered the ghouls instead. For some reason, she elected not to tell Chief Grim Star, who I guess is the head of Tenpony Security (I think I've actually been getting him mixed up with Sheriff Rottingtail, who was the head of the ghoul group, which may be some of what has been confusing me here) about the fatal security flaw the ghouls were attempting to exploit. The reason she gives is not wanting to "fuel his bigotry," which seems like a pretty flimsy justification. SteelHooves, for some reason, thinks this makes sense, but resolves to tell Grim Star about the security flaw the first chance he gets. I'm not entirely sure why he would care, but there you have it.
Page break. Butcher, one of the other Talons, offers Littlepoop a battle saddle with a big ass gun on it (the same one they used on the roof to kill the last alicorn) as payment for saving their lives. There is some spirited debate over who should take it, since none of them can use it. Calamity wants to graft it onto SteelHooves' back, but Littlepoop nixes this idea. She ultimately refuses the gun, saying that the Talons can just owe them a favor instead. The griffons give LP a radio broadcaster, so her PipBuck can now transmit as well as receive radio signals. After this, they part ways. Then, Frank shows up.
Page break. LP suspects that Frank was following them earlier, but can't confirm it. He offers no reason as to why he is here or what he wanted to speak to Littlepoop about, and she doesn't ask. Instead, she randomly asks him if he would be willing to tell Gawd about what had happened to Blackwing's Talon group. This seems like a bit of a dumb request, since presumably the Talons would have ways of contacting each other, but in any case it's a moot point, because Frank unexpectedly refuses. He claims that he only intervenes in the affairs of others in order to save lives, and this isn't saving lives. This feels pretty flimsy, as I'm fairly certain most of the stuff he's had Littlepoop doing, as well as most of the requests he's carried out for her, have had little or nothing to do with saving lives.
However, this too proves a moot point, as he then suddenly reverses his decision and agrees to LP's request. But, he wants something in return: a Black Opal that is apparently stored in Tenpony Tower. He explains that a Black Opal is a type of memory orb that works with a special crown that allows ponies to record their memories onto orbs, and allows non-unicorns to view memory orbs. There's a catch, though: the opal in question belongs to Homage. LP is not happy about having to steal from her new lady friend just to appease Frank, but for some reason or other she really feels that helping Gawd and Blackwing find each other is an important enough matter to justify it. So, she agrees, on the condition that Frank deliver the message first. There is some autism involving the length of her conversations with Frank, the significance of which is completely lost on me, and then he disappears in his usual fashion.
Page break. It is now morning; LP went for an evening stroll and wound up spending the whole night fighting alicorns. Presumably, she's forgotten all about Monterrey Jack again, who was the whole reason she went out in the first place. By my count, he only has about 24 hours left to live, by the way.
However, LP has more important things on her mind: apparently, her PipBuck was broken during the crash earlier. Hilariously, she now has to make do without any of the fancy technology she relies upon in order to larp as a wasteland badass. Also, this is the first time the text has mentioned it, but she apparently has radiation sickness. Also, her leg hurts, because getting a piece of iron rebar jammed through solid bone will do that to you. Presumably she downed a few healing potions and RadAway and whatever the fuck else, but I guess it takes awhile for that stuff to work.
Actually, it explains a bit of this in the next paragraph: they didn't quite have enough RadAway to completely take care of all of them, so they had to split what they had evenly. Poor LP, looks like she's going to have to endure some mild inconvenience for a page or two.
>>303496
>This was actually an interesting twist, and for once I didn't see it coming; today, kkat was not a faggot.
Not so fast charlie brown, it turns out that this was part of the fallout 3 quest, and the handling of this quest was apparently so obnoxious that everyone hated it.
>This was actually an interesting twist, and for once I didn't see it coming; today, kkat was not a faggot.
Not so fast charlie brown, it turns out that this was part of the fallout 3 quest, and the handling of this quest was apparently so obnoxious that everyone hated it.
>>303496
Might have said it before but really peeves me how earth ponies in this story seem completly useless. Unicorns can cast any spells the plot needs them to and they can levitate themsevles to fly or levitate guns built by ponies with small trigger guards that only a someone with fingers can fire. Pegasus ponies can fly and move clouds still and use those battle saddles to fire and fly around in combat. Earth ponies though they are just mewling retards who bum rush things with pool sticks or rebar screaming at the top of their lungs and are only effective if they have a power armor suit. Even their gimmick of being able to grow plants and have a connection to nature is nullified by the taint while nothing else is affected and LP and co can still easily best them in cqc even though she is a unicorn midget.
Fallout 1 and 2 had towns spring up, could have earth ponies use their skills to help try and grow crops and make towns built around protecting it with factions fighting to control the food and water supplies they can provide.
Might have said it before but really peeves me how earth ponies in this story seem completly useless. Unicorns can cast any spells the plot needs them to and they can levitate themsevles to fly or levitate guns built by ponies with small trigger guards that only a someone with fingers can fire. Pegasus ponies can fly and move clouds still and use those battle saddles to fire and fly around in combat. Earth ponies though they are just mewling retards who bum rush things with pool sticks or rebar screaming at the top of their lungs and are only effective if they have a power armor suit. Even their gimmick of being able to grow plants and have a connection to nature is nullified by the taint while nothing else is affected and LP and co can still easily best them in cqc even though she is a unicorn midget.
Fallout 1 and 2 had towns spring up, could have earth ponies use their skills to help try and grow crops and make towns built around protecting it with factions fighting to control the food and water supplies they can provide.
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>>303502
Aye. And to make matters worse it's also another "Kkat knew he had to fix something but had no idea what was wrong or how to fix it correctly" moment.
When playing Fallout 3 you can either get Tenpenny Tower to let the ghouls in, and the ghouls slaughter everyone, or you slaughter the ghouls yourself and DJ 3Dog calls you a faggot bigotler racexist virgincel literalitler live on the radio.
Of course you can also leave this quest unfinished. But the thought of not completing content in a game intentionally is alien to Kkunt the goomerfag completionist. Completing everything in a hard game for hardcore gamers is cool. Finding all 9999 pinecones in BOTW doesn't make you cool, it means you wasted too much of your life on dull unchallenging goychow prolefeed shite.
Anyway Kkat decided to "fix" this problem by making this BlackHawk faggot or whatever his World of Warcraft screenname is get his hooves dirty with replacist Ghoul invader blood, so littlepip's can remain squeaky clean-ish.
Even though if LP had to slaughter these ghouls to keep her lover safe even though it meant breaking her lover's ghoul-loving sissy citizenfag heart it would make their relationship deeper than two lesbians who stumble upon each other and decide "We'll bang, okay?".
>>303504
You said it, pal. Earlier on I ranted autistically about all the creative and cool weapons ponies could use instead of Fallout guns and mechanical saddles to autoaim (but for no fucking reason, manually fire with a mouth trigger you bite down on) those guns.
Where are the earth ponies with magic hammers on SuperBuffout, a super strength drug so potent it would instantly kill anypony without an earth pony's constitution? Where are the necklaces with magically animated metal human arms attatched? Where are the replacement horse limbs with cybernetic fingers and cool bonus features like Gerbera blasts and Ragtime timezones and Punchline rocket punches? Where are the Pegasi who fly fast miles above their foes where enemy bullets can't reach while dropping explosives and/or heavy objects? Where are the Military Pegasi in Jet Assisted Power Armour with enough bombs and missiles and nukes and railguns and other shit to make Ace Combat/Project Wingman jets bukkake buckets at the sight of them?
There is a fucking reason why most fanfic authors say "Twilight's a magic prodigy athlete freak of nature and the average Pegasus or Earth Pony is better than the average Unicorn". It lets the other races feel meaningful and contribute to the story even if there is a reality-bending mage running around with enough magic power to destroy a solar system.
Kkat is a faggot for restricting pony combat to "Falloutish" combat and making Unicorns the gods of this new setting by making LP an unjustifiably strong powerhouse and then calling LP a fucking nopony implying they should all be able to lift what she can lift.
Aye. And to make matters worse it's also another "Kkat knew he had to fix something but had no idea what was wrong or how to fix it correctly" moment.
When playing Fallout 3 you can either get Tenpenny Tower to let the ghouls in, and the ghouls slaughter everyone, or you slaughter the ghouls yourself and DJ 3Dog calls you a faggot bigotler racexist virgincel literalitler live on the radio.
Of course you can also leave this quest unfinished. But the thought of not completing content in a game intentionally is alien to Kkunt the goomerfag completionist. Completing everything in a hard game for hardcore gamers is cool. Finding all 9999 pinecones in BOTW doesn't make you cool, it means you wasted too much of your life on dull unchallenging goychow prolefeed shite.
Anyway Kkat decided to "fix" this problem by making this BlackHawk faggot or whatever his World of Warcraft screenname is get his hooves dirty with replacist Ghoul invader blood, so littlepip's can remain squeaky clean-ish.
Even though if LP had to slaughter these ghouls to keep her lover safe even though it meant breaking her lover's ghoul-loving sissy citizenfag heart it would make their relationship deeper than two lesbians who stumble upon each other and decide "We'll bang, okay?".
>>303504
You said it, pal. Earlier on I ranted autistically about all the creative and cool weapons ponies could use instead of Fallout guns and mechanical saddles to autoaim (but for no fucking reason, manually fire with a mouth trigger you bite down on) those guns.
Where are the earth ponies with magic hammers on SuperBuffout, a super strength drug so potent it would instantly kill anypony without an earth pony's constitution? Where are the necklaces with magically animated metal human arms attatched? Where are the replacement horse limbs with cybernetic fingers and cool bonus features like Gerbera blasts and Ragtime timezones and Punchline rocket punches? Where are the Pegasi who fly fast miles above their foes where enemy bullets can't reach while dropping explosives and/or heavy objects? Where are the Military Pegasi in Jet Assisted Power Armour with enough bombs and missiles and nukes and railguns and other shit to make Ace Combat/Project Wingman jets bukkake buckets at the sight of them?
There is a fucking reason why most fanfic authors say "Twilight's a magic prodigy athlete freak of nature and the average Pegasus or Earth Pony is better than the average Unicorn". It lets the other races feel meaningful and contribute to the story even if there is a reality-bending mage running around with enough magic power to destroy a solar system.
Kkat is a faggot for restricting pony combat to "Falloutish" combat and making Unicorns the gods of this new setting by making LP an unjustifiably strong powerhouse and then calling LP a fucking nopony implying they should all be able to lift what she can lift.
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>>303496
So basically, their current situation is that they are all suffering from mild radiation poisoning and various injuries, and they can't properly attend to these problems until they make it back to Tenpony Tower. It's unclear how long this will take, but since they made it out here and explored the tower in the space of a night, I'm going to assume a couple of hours. To take her mind off of the searing agony that every movement causes her, LP decides to spend the journey piecing together some more details about the memory fragment she just witnessed. The long and short of it seems to be that the Ministry of Technology was involved in some fairly shady business, which should surprise absolutely no one at this point.
The group stops at a ruined building, and LP finds a desk with some bottle caps inside. She has this weird little revelation:
>My fogged mind insisted on asking why I kept finding bottle caps in places like this. Desks. Trash cans. Lockers. Filing cabinets. What kind of pony went around putting money in random spots? What thought process leads to: Oh, look! A desk in the urban wilderness. Let’s put some caps in there. Not much -- just enough to buy a sandwich…?
This is, of course, a perfectly valid question, one which any sane person reading this text has probably asked out loud at least forty or fifty times already. However, I'm not sure what it's supposed to mean here. Either the author is making a joke about the helpful (from a game perspective) but illogical (from a reality perspective) way that goodies are distributed throughout game levels, or else there is some in-world reason that money is being randomly hidden in desk drawers around Edgequestria. My guess is that it's probably the former, but you never know with this story.
Anyway, at this moment, the balefire phoenix that was mentioned briefly several microscenes ago has suddenly reappeared.
One of these days, someone is going to have to sit kkat down and give him a long, serious talk about how to properly build action and suspense. The first appearance of this phoenix was treated as a cliffhanger event that ended a scene, and then *poof*, it's gone with no explanation. Then, suddenly, it appears again out of absolutely nowhere, at a completely random moment. Why? What was the author's reason for structuring his story this way? I'd be curious to hear his answer.
What irks me the most is that k "is that a balefire phoenix in my pants or is it just the shredded remains of my penis" kat probably thinks he's being clever by doing shit like this. More irksome still is that the pseudo-literate portion of his reader base, the kind of people who can throw terms like "Chekhov's gun" and "foreshadowing" around but clearly don't have the foggiest idea what they mean, will probably agree with him and praise him for it.
However, the scene isn't quite done being ridiculous yet. Velvet Remedy, who for some unknown reason has suddenly decided to start acting like a badass, steps out and aims the combat shotgun, which she now apparently carries as her primary weapon what happened to her needle gun, anyway?. However, instead of shooting at the balefire phoenix which appeared suddenly out of nowhere, she begins firing on some bloodwings, which also appear suddenly out of nowhere.
Oh, wait a minute, turns out I read this wrong. It looks like the bloodwings were already attacking the balefire phoenix. LP & Co. chanced upon the fight already in progress, and Velvet just pulled out her shotgun and started shooting at bloodwings, even though both the phoenix and the bloodwings were preoccupied with each other and neither were showing the party any aggression.
As ever, the author does an absolutely piss-poor job of laying out the scene; there is no mention at all of the distance between the bloodwing-phoenix altercation and the spot where the group is standing. There is also no mention at all of the size of either type of creature. I was under the impression that a balefire phoenix was quite large, and the fact that it is being attacked by several bloodwings seems to support this. However, at one point, the phoenix gets trapped underneath one of the bloodwings, which means it would have to be the same size or smaller. As to the bloodwings themselves, we have never had any proper description of them at all, beyond that they are giant bats, which doesn't help us much. How big is giant? Are we talking the size of a school bus here? Or are they just giant in comparison to a regular-sized bat, so like maybe the size of a hawk or something? We need a proper visual, kkat; we can't see what's in your head.
Anyway, the fight scene goes on for awhile, but sadly it never gets any more coherent. Eventually Littlepoop ends it by rapid-firing a bunch of exploding fire-bullets at them, which barbecues the bloodwings but leaves the phoenix intact (balefire phoenixes don't take fire damage as you may recall).
It turns out I misunderstood another crucial part of this: Velvet got involved in the fight because she wanted to save the phoenix, not because it was attacking them. The text was not even remotely clear on this point. When it was mentioned earlier, it was also treated as though it were an ominous or threatening presence, and we haven't seen enough of these things to get a sense of whether or not they are supposed to be hostile.
Now that I see what the author was doing, it makes a bit more sense; like Littlepoop, Velvet is becoming jaded and hardened by her time spent in the wasteland, but she still has the same kinda-sorta gentle-hearted nature that the author assures us she's always had. So, she wanted to protect the pretty firebird from the mean ol' ugly bats; the scene was meant to juxtapose her newfound willingness to spill blood against her compassionate nature. Makes sense I suppose, but kkat needed to make clear what was actually happening.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wbkKWrUD-A
So basically, their current situation is that they are all suffering from mild radiation poisoning and various injuries, and they can't properly attend to these problems until they make it back to Tenpony Tower. It's unclear how long this will take, but since they made it out here and explored the tower in the space of a night, I'm going to assume a couple of hours. To take her mind off of the searing agony that every movement causes her, LP decides to spend the journey piecing together some more details about the memory fragment she just witnessed. The long and short of it seems to be that the Ministry of Technology was involved in some fairly shady business, which should surprise absolutely no one at this point.
The group stops at a ruined building, and LP finds a desk with some bottle caps inside. She has this weird little revelation:
>My fogged mind insisted on asking why I kept finding bottle caps in places like this. Desks. Trash cans. Lockers. Filing cabinets. What kind of pony went around putting money in random spots? What thought process leads to: Oh, look! A desk in the urban wilderness. Let’s put some caps in there. Not much -- just enough to buy a sandwich…?
This is, of course, a perfectly valid question, one which any sane person reading this text has probably asked out loud at least forty or fifty times already. However, I'm not sure what it's supposed to mean here. Either the author is making a joke about the helpful (from a game perspective) but illogical (from a reality perspective) way that goodies are distributed throughout game levels, or else there is some in-world reason that money is being randomly hidden in desk drawers around Edgequestria. My guess is that it's probably the former, but you never know with this story.
Anyway, at this moment, the balefire phoenix that was mentioned briefly several microscenes ago has suddenly reappeared.
One of these days, someone is going to have to sit kkat down and give him a long, serious talk about how to properly build action and suspense. The first appearance of this phoenix was treated as a cliffhanger event that ended a scene, and then *poof*, it's gone with no explanation. Then, suddenly, it appears again out of absolutely nowhere, at a completely random moment. Why? What was the author's reason for structuring his story this way? I'd be curious to hear his answer.
What irks me the most is that k "is that a balefire phoenix in my pants or is it just the shredded remains of my penis" kat probably thinks he's being clever by doing shit like this. More irksome still is that the pseudo-literate portion of his reader base, the kind of people who can throw terms like "Chekhov's gun" and "foreshadowing" around but clearly don't have the foggiest idea what they mean, will probably agree with him and praise him for it.
However, the scene isn't quite done being ridiculous yet. Velvet Remedy, who for some unknown reason has suddenly decided to start acting like a badass, steps out and aims the combat shotgun, which she now apparently carries as her primary weapon what happened to her needle gun, anyway?. However, instead of shooting at the balefire phoenix which appeared suddenly out of nowhere, she begins firing on some bloodwings, which also appear suddenly out of nowhere.
Oh, wait a minute, turns out I read this wrong. It looks like the bloodwings were already attacking the balefire phoenix. LP & Co. chanced upon the fight already in progress, and Velvet just pulled out her shotgun and started shooting at bloodwings, even though both the phoenix and the bloodwings were preoccupied with each other and neither were showing the party any aggression.
As ever, the author does an absolutely piss-poor job of laying out the scene; there is no mention at all of the distance between the bloodwing-phoenix altercation and the spot where the group is standing. There is also no mention at all of the size of either type of creature. I was under the impression that a balefire phoenix was quite large, and the fact that it is being attacked by several bloodwings seems to support this. However, at one point, the phoenix gets trapped underneath one of the bloodwings, which means it would have to be the same size or smaller. As to the bloodwings themselves, we have never had any proper description of them at all, beyond that they are giant bats, which doesn't help us much. How big is giant? Are we talking the size of a school bus here? Or are they just giant in comparison to a regular-sized bat, so like maybe the size of a hawk or something? We need a proper visual, kkat; we can't see what's in your head.
Anyway, the fight scene goes on for awhile, but sadly it never gets any more coherent. Eventually Littlepoop ends it by rapid-firing a bunch of exploding fire-bullets at them, which barbecues the bloodwings but leaves the phoenix intact (balefire phoenixes don't take fire damage as you may recall).
It turns out I misunderstood another crucial part of this: Velvet got involved in the fight because she wanted to save the phoenix, not because it was attacking them. The text was not even remotely clear on this point. When it was mentioned earlier, it was also treated as though it were an ominous or threatening presence, and we haven't seen enough of these things to get a sense of whether or not they are supposed to be hostile.
Now that I see what the author was doing, it makes a bit more sense; like Littlepoop, Velvet is becoming jaded and hardened by her time spent in the wasteland, but she still has the same kinda-sorta gentle-hearted nature that the author assures us she's always had. So, she wanted to protect the pretty firebird from the mean ol' ugly bats; the scene was meant to juxtapose her newfound willingness to spill blood against her compassionate nature. Makes sense I suppose, but kkat needed to make clear what was actually happening.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wbkKWrUD-A
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>>303502
>Not so fast charlie brown, it turns out that this was part of the fallout 3 quest, and the handling of this quest was apparently so obnoxious that everyone hated it.
Oh, good grief. Every. Single. Time.
>Not so fast charlie brown, it turns out that this was part of the fallout 3 quest, and the handling of this quest was apparently so obnoxious that everyone hated it.
Oh, good grief. Every. Single. Time.
>>303534
Page break. The group is still walking back to Tenpony Tower.
>“Gaul-dangit, when we get back Ah’m takin’ a long bath!” Calamity exclaimed, prompting Velvet to mock-faint.
This is a running joke. It's funny because Calamity doesn't usually bathe. Or rather, it would be funny if the author had actually established it as a running joke by having it come up intermittently throughout the text, instead of just suddenly telling us that it's been a running joke even though we've heard virtually no mention of it.
Anyway, now that another pointless side-quest is in the bag, Littlepoop shifts gears and redirects her attention to the soon-to-be-executed Monterrey Jack. She brings the topic up with her friends, and is met with some unexpected resistance. Calamity is vehemently opposed to saving him, and surprisingly enough Velvet objects as well.
Personally, I don't quite see the logic behind any of their objections. Calamity's view seems to be that Monterrey deserves to hang for what he did, and Velvet basically agrees, adding that it isn't fair for Littlepoop to get them all permanently barred from Tenpony Tower over someone who doesn't deserve compassion. As ever, Velvet's behavior blatantly contradicts her alleged principles. Both of them also note the difficulty of the undertaking, which would involve fighting their way past a large number of guards. SteelHooves, as usual, just stands there.
In terms of difficulty, this prison break is a far less daunting proposition than fighting their way through an entire tower full of alicorns, which they literally just did for literally no reason at all. While Tenpony Tower's laws don't make a fuckton of sense and Monterrey Jack's reasons for confessing to breaking them make even less sense, I think most reasonable people ponies, whatever would agree that Monterrey's sentence is unreasonably harsh. While they might counsel non-involvement on the grounds that Monterrey's fate is none of their business, I can't really understand why any of these characters would so strongly oppose this idea, particularly in light of the fact that they have followed Littlepoop on much dumber jobs without even questioning her.
Most notably, Velvet becomes far angrier than she has any logical reason to be:
>“Dammit, Littlepip!” Velvet Remedy was suddenly mad at me. Why was she mad at me? “Monterey Jack doesn’t get to do this! You saved that miserable bastard’s life, and he repaid you by trying to screw you! He doesn’t get to cheat you out of happiness too!”
Does Velvet even know this story? They've never discussed it anywhere on-camera that I can recall, and they weren't together when the robbery occurred.
As I've said before, Monterrey's behavior was far from exemplary, but in the grand scheme of things he didn't do anything all that terrible, certainly not anything he reasonably should hang for. This would be true in general, and when you consider the kind of crimes that normally occur in the wasteland, attempted robbery is pretty low on the shock scale. If Tenpony has overly draconian laws and Monterrey wants to throw his life away because of some bizarre personal honor code then that's all well and good, but what dog does Velvet have in this fight? Or Calamity for that matter?
The whole thing seems to revolve around the issue of Littlepoop's not being allowed to return to Tenpony if she chooses this path. This again seems to be the author's video-game logic rearing its ugly head; the player can accept or refuse a particular quest, but if she completes it she will no longer be able to enter a particular area. This kind of structure serves the dual purpose of making the game's story more interesting and also adding to replay value: you can't complete all the quests in a single playthrough because the story forks, so if you want to play to 100% completion you'll have to play it again. Personally, I like it when games are designed this way; I don't care that much about completion, but if I like a game I usually play it more than once, and it's nice to have a different experience on each playthrough.
However, outside the context of a game, this idea starts getting weird. How much sense does it make that Tenpony will execute one of its own citizens for an unsuccessful robbery of a non-citizen that occurred well outside its borders, but merely imposes banishment on an outsider who kills a large number of its guards and helps one of its prisoners escape? What makes even less sense here is that LP's friends all seem to be on the same page about this without it even being discussed. They all seem to just take it as a given that:
A) the jailbreak will be successful, and
B) the worst thing that will happen to any of them is that they will no longer be allowed to enter Tenpony Tower.
My best guess as to the author's thinking here is that since Velvet was kinda-sorta instrumental in getting Homage and Littlepoop together (which I suspect she did partly because she feels guilty about toying with Littlepoop's feelings for her own gain) she is incensed that LP would consider throwing this relationship away just to save someone like Monterrey Jack. This is actually a reasonable enough view for her to take, and I like that the author is thinking inb4 Charlie Brown somehow. However, the problem is that she just assumes that banishment from the Tower is the worst thing that could possibly happen here; that is a completely unreasonable assumption. It's far more reasonable to assume that, even if they succeed in freeing Monterrey, the Tower will either send whatever fighting force it has to chase them, or would at the very least put out a massive bounty on them.
Remember, they are not just flaunting Tenpony's laws here; in order to pull this off they will almost certainly have to kill some of Tenpony's guards or soldiers. No one could reasonably expect the Tower to just let them walk away from that.
Page break. The group is still walking back to Tenpony Tower.
>“Gaul-dangit, when we get back Ah’m takin’ a long bath!” Calamity exclaimed, prompting Velvet to mock-faint.
This is a running joke. It's funny because Calamity doesn't usually bathe. Or rather, it would be funny if the author had actually established it as a running joke by having it come up intermittently throughout the text, instead of just suddenly telling us that it's been a running joke even though we've heard virtually no mention of it.
Anyway, now that another pointless side-quest is in the bag, Littlepoop shifts gears and redirects her attention to the soon-to-be-executed Monterrey Jack. She brings the topic up with her friends, and is met with some unexpected resistance. Calamity is vehemently opposed to saving him, and surprisingly enough Velvet objects as well.
Personally, I don't quite see the logic behind any of their objections. Calamity's view seems to be that Monterrey deserves to hang for what he did, and Velvet basically agrees, adding that it isn't fair for Littlepoop to get them all permanently barred from Tenpony Tower over someone who doesn't deserve compassion. As ever, Velvet's behavior blatantly contradicts her alleged principles. Both of them also note the difficulty of the undertaking, which would involve fighting their way past a large number of guards. SteelHooves, as usual, just stands there.
In terms of difficulty, this prison break is a far less daunting proposition than fighting their way through an entire tower full of alicorns, which they literally just did for literally no reason at all. While Tenpony Tower's laws don't make a fuckton of sense and Monterrey Jack's reasons for confessing to breaking them make even less sense, I think most reasonable people ponies, whatever would agree that Monterrey's sentence is unreasonably harsh. While they might counsel non-involvement on the grounds that Monterrey's fate is none of their business, I can't really understand why any of these characters would so strongly oppose this idea, particularly in light of the fact that they have followed Littlepoop on much dumber jobs without even questioning her.
Most notably, Velvet becomes far angrier than she has any logical reason to be:
>“Dammit, Littlepip!” Velvet Remedy was suddenly mad at me. Why was she mad at me? “Monterey Jack doesn’t get to do this! You saved that miserable bastard’s life, and he repaid you by trying to screw you! He doesn’t get to cheat you out of happiness too!”
Does Velvet even know this story? They've never discussed it anywhere on-camera that I can recall, and they weren't together when the robbery occurred.
As I've said before, Monterrey's behavior was far from exemplary, but in the grand scheme of things he didn't do anything all that terrible, certainly not anything he reasonably should hang for. This would be true in general, and when you consider the kind of crimes that normally occur in the wasteland, attempted robbery is pretty low on the shock scale. If Tenpony has overly draconian laws and Monterrey wants to throw his life away because of some bizarre personal honor code then that's all well and good, but what dog does Velvet have in this fight? Or Calamity for that matter?
The whole thing seems to revolve around the issue of Littlepoop's not being allowed to return to Tenpony if she chooses this path. This again seems to be the author's video-game logic rearing its ugly head; the player can accept or refuse a particular quest, but if she completes it she will no longer be able to enter a particular area. This kind of structure serves the dual purpose of making the game's story more interesting and also adding to replay value: you can't complete all the quests in a single playthrough because the story forks, so if you want to play to 100% completion you'll have to play it again. Personally, I like it when games are designed this way; I don't care that much about completion, but if I like a game I usually play it more than once, and it's nice to have a different experience on each playthrough.
However, outside the context of a game, this idea starts getting weird. How much sense does it make that Tenpony will execute one of its own citizens for an unsuccessful robbery of a non-citizen that occurred well outside its borders, but merely imposes banishment on an outsider who kills a large number of its guards and helps one of its prisoners escape? What makes even less sense here is that LP's friends all seem to be on the same page about this without it even being discussed. They all seem to just take it as a given that:
A) the jailbreak will be successful, and
B) the worst thing that will happen to any of them is that they will no longer be allowed to enter Tenpony Tower.
My best guess as to the author's thinking here is that since Velvet was kinda-sorta instrumental in getting Homage and Littlepoop together (which I suspect she did partly because she feels guilty about toying with Littlepoop's feelings for her own gain) she is incensed that LP would consider throwing this relationship away just to save someone like Monterrey Jack. This is actually a reasonable enough view for her to take, and I like that the author is thinking inb4 Charlie Brown somehow. However, the problem is that she just assumes that banishment from the Tower is the worst thing that could possibly happen here; that is a completely unreasonable assumption. It's far more reasonable to assume that, even if they succeed in freeing Monterrey, the Tower will either send whatever fighting force it has to chase them, or would at the very least put out a massive bounty on them.
Remember, they are not just flaunting Tenpony's laws here; in order to pull this off they will almost certainly have to kill some of Tenpony's guards or soldiers. No one could reasonably expect the Tower to just let them walk away from that.
>>303538
Let the record show that Tenpony Tower pays ponies to scavenge resources for it, and canonically "This isn't cheap"
And yet how Tenpony Tower pays its scavengers and why a cheese-seller would spend so long away from his shop to scavenge for food is never explained.
Ain't like the place prints its own money or has a stripper bar full of slave mares and desperate homeless mares that trade sexual favours for heavily taxed income if they want to remain in the safe Tenpony Tower and away from the rapists outside.
Furthermore "there is always food to find in the raider-infested areas around town because most shops around here were restaurants before the nukes went boom"
Because it makes ALL the sense that pre-war restaurants serving ratatoile and linguini and le avocado toaste and shit like that would have stashes of 200 year old cans of beans and spam.
Remember that Tenpony Tower prides itself on being irrationally snooty and punishing all Wastelandy behaviour with death even if it comes from their own citizens provided said citizens confess to it.
Somehow this tower of "rich" faggots is able to attend restaurants where "pro" chefs turn scavenged ancient shit into imitation fancy shit and afford the exorbitant prices... and offer all sorts of bizarrely non-post-apocalyptic goods and services like spas and cheese stores. If Tenpony Tower wants its "safe haven in the wasteland" reputation to remain intact it would make sense that it would want anyone who breaks in and frees its soon-to-be-executed criminals killed ASAP.
And yet something tells me it won't spend a single dime sending bounty hunters after Monterry Jackass or Littleshit or Vulva Malady or Crappity or Steeltoes because Tenpenny Tower didn't send bounty hunters after you in Fallout 3 and instead bounty hunters would occasionally ambush you at random for having a Karma score (morality number) that's too high or low. Give too much free water to hobos or steal too much stuff and assassins will randomly spawn near you sometimes.
Wait a fucking second, if I'm playing Vergil to someone's Dante where the fuck is Nero? Why did the african-themed Zebras have Chinese Communist and Caesar's Legion inventions/traits/buzzwords shoehorned into them before the war with poners even though Caesar's Legion is a VERY post-war thing from 200 years after America's nuking?
Also, why is breaking MJ out of jail crossing LP's mind instead of anything that could help her DJ GF? I recall the DJ saying the boss of Tenpony Tower was a cunt at some point who somehow didn't know DJ Pon3 is Homage. Shouldn't LP think "I should kill the boss of Tenpony Tower and put DJ Cuntpocalypse in charge of everything while I'm freeing Moneypaytowin Jick from death row"?
Man, imagine if the heroes had a Tranq Dart Gun right now to nonlethally and silently disable the guards and free Micheal Jackson without any bloodshed while being so stealthy it will look like Miles Jaune got himself out of there without outside help.
Let the record show that Tenpony Tower pays ponies to scavenge resources for it, and canonically "This isn't cheap"
And yet how Tenpony Tower pays its scavengers and why a cheese-seller would spend so long away from his shop to scavenge for food is never explained.
Ain't like the place prints its own money or has a stripper bar full of slave mares and desperate homeless mares that trade sexual favours for heavily taxed income if they want to remain in the safe Tenpony Tower and away from the rapists outside.
Furthermore "there is always food to find in the raider-infested areas around town because most shops around here were restaurants before the nukes went boom"
Because it makes ALL the sense that pre-war restaurants serving ratatoile and linguini and le avocado toaste and shit like that would have stashes of 200 year old cans of beans and spam.
Remember that Tenpony Tower prides itself on being irrationally snooty and punishing all Wastelandy behaviour with death even if it comes from their own citizens provided said citizens confess to it.
Somehow this tower of "rich" faggots is able to attend restaurants where "pro" chefs turn scavenged ancient shit into imitation fancy shit and afford the exorbitant prices... and offer all sorts of bizarrely non-post-apocalyptic goods and services like spas and cheese stores. If Tenpony Tower wants its "safe haven in the wasteland" reputation to remain intact it would make sense that it would want anyone who breaks in and frees its soon-to-be-executed criminals killed ASAP.
And yet something tells me it won't spend a single dime sending bounty hunters after Monterry Jackass or Littleshit or Vulva Malady or Crappity or Steeltoes because Tenpenny Tower didn't send bounty hunters after you in Fallout 3 and instead bounty hunters would occasionally ambush you at random for having a Karma score (morality number) that's too high or low. Give too much free water to hobos or steal too much stuff and assassins will randomly spawn near you sometimes.
Wait a fucking second, if I'm playing Vergil to someone's Dante where the fuck is Nero? Why did the african-themed Zebras have Chinese Communist and Caesar's Legion inventions/traits/buzzwords shoehorned into them before the war with poners even though Caesar's Legion is a VERY post-war thing from 200 years after America's nuking?
Also, why is breaking MJ out of jail crossing LP's mind instead of anything that could help her DJ GF? I recall the DJ saying the boss of Tenpony Tower was a cunt at some point who somehow didn't know DJ Pon3 is Homage. Shouldn't LP think "I should kill the boss of Tenpony Tower and put DJ Cuntpocalypse in charge of everything while I'm freeing Moneypaytowin Jick from death row"?
Man, imagine if the heroes had a Tranq Dart Gun right now to nonlethally and silently disable the guards and free Micheal Jackson without any bloodshed while being so stealthy it will look like Miles Jaune got himself out of there without outside help.
>>303551
Unrelated to thread.
It's kinda funny how niggers say nigguha in repetition like they do. It's almost like they are pokemon or something.
Unrelated to thread.
It's kinda funny how niggers say nigguha in repetition like they do. It's almost like they are pokemon or something.
>>303538
>Finally, I shot back at them, focusing on Velvet Remedy. “It doesn’t matter! It doesn’t matter if he’s worthy of saving or not. Everyone on the battlefield, Fluttershy said, right?
Did Fluttershy ever say that? I think I missed that episode. Seriously, though; I don't think I remember that from anywhere in the text. However, this author is better at keeping track of all the obscure nuggets of information buried in his word-vomit than I am, so who knows?
>That buck has kids! Two colts and a filly. What do you think will happen to them if he dies? Does Tenpony Tower strike you as the sort of place that comprehends charity? Did any of you see an orphanage in there while you were shopping around?”
The world is an icky-wicky place, and only the Author's Chosen can put it right; we've been through all this before so it's not really worth picking her argument apart.
One thing that's been bugging me a little for awhile now is the author's use of the word "buck" as a slang term for a male pony. It's probably meant to be a horse pun, since "bucking" is something horses do, but it's a bit awkward because buck is also a term for a male deer or rabbit. There are some other animals where I think the males are also referred to as bucks *cough* niggers *cough*, but I've never heard it applied to an equine before. This author chooses odd terminology, and he uses it oddly.
Anyway, LP gives a rousing speech, and apparently that's enough to cause the others to instantly drop their objections and go along with her scheme. Rather than even try to argue with her, they simply cave and do whatever she wants, because she's the hero and they are the supplementary characters, and also because no one in this story has a spine, values, or anything resembling a personality.
This, however, caught my eye:
>Sometimes, to do what’s right, you have to become the villain of the piece.
This is the same line that Scootaloo used on herself earlier, in a chapter that was also titled "The Villain of the Piece." The author obviously used this phrasing on purpose and we were obviously supposed to notice it, but I don't quite understand what he was trying to say.
Scootaloo used this phrase to describe the experiments she was conducting with the stables. Specifically, she was telling Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle that she was willing to take the fall in the event that the Ministries discovered what StableTec was up to.
What Scoot was essentially saying is that she was willing to be seen as the villain, and to accept the consequences for all three of them. The government, or their sisters, or whomever they were trying to hide their activity from I'm still not 100% clear on this part, would have frowned upon these experiments, and the CMC would likely have faced some kind of punishment for conducting them. However, the CMC, or at least Scootaloo, seemed to believe strongly in what they were doing. In this case, Scoot's being the "villain of the piece" simply meant doing something technically illegal that she knew she could be punished for, but that she felt to be morally justified.
LP, superficially, seems to be saying the same thing here: that breaking Monterrey Jack out of prison might get them in trouble with the Tenpony Tower leadership, but she feels it's the right thing to do, so she's going to follow her conscience and damn the consequences. However, it's curious that she uses Scootaloo's line. Again, Scoot uses this to justify her stable experiments, and we've seen the end results of three of these. Personally, I'd argue that the tragedies in these places were just unhappy accidents that can't really be blamed on anyone, but LP seems to feel that StableTec is directly responsible for what happened. So, Scoot's 'villain' statement takes on a whole new meaning here: from LP's point of view, Scoot really did become a villain, even if she didn't intend to.
So in that context, what is she trying to say here? That she wants to do something reckless and potentially evil just because? That doesn't sound right. But it doesn't really make sense as a "do the right thing" statement either. Her use of this particular phrase is clearly meant to be significant, but I'll be fucked by Celestia with the moon if I can figure out just what that significance is exactly.
Anyway, since the whole crew has once again decided to follow this neurotic midget through the gates of Hell and back, all that remains is to discuss the plan:
>“I have one StealthBuck left. I sneak in. Shoot him with a dart. Just one; the poison will paralyze him for a few hours but have no lasting effects. Then I pick the lock and float him onto my back. I’ll use my levitation to lessen his weight. As long as I’m actually carrying him, the invisibility spell should cover both of us, just like it covers my saddlebags.”
But wait a minute, LP; didn't you give your poison dart gun away?
>Velvet Remedy’s eyes were wet, but she stepped forward. “In that case, we have something we must do before I can take my bath.”
>I looked to her questioningly, hopefully.
>“We need to stop by that workstation so you can build a new dart gun.”
Oh, kkat, you clever, clever fox. I just can't "trap" this guy.
Oh yeah, one more thing:
>the poison will paralyze him for a few hours but have no lasting effects.
How do you know it will only paralyze him? Are you an expert in biochemistry on top of all the other disciplines you've inexplicably mastered? As I understand it, the only poison she has handy is manticore venom, and I don't know that she's had any extensive experience working with it. It could do nearly anything; for all she knows, Monterrey could be allergic to it and go into anaphylactic shock the second she shoots him.
Page break. In the next microscene, something interesting and unexpected actually happens for once. Stay tuned to find out what it is.
>Finally, I shot back at them, focusing on Velvet Remedy. “It doesn’t matter! It doesn’t matter if he’s worthy of saving or not. Everyone on the battlefield, Fluttershy said, right?
Did Fluttershy ever say that? I think I missed that episode. Seriously, though; I don't think I remember that from anywhere in the text. However, this author is better at keeping track of all the obscure nuggets of information buried in his word-vomit than I am, so who knows?
>That buck has kids! Two colts and a filly. What do you think will happen to them if he dies? Does Tenpony Tower strike you as the sort of place that comprehends charity? Did any of you see an orphanage in there while you were shopping around?”
The world is an icky-wicky place, and only the Author's Chosen can put it right; we've been through all this before so it's not really worth picking her argument apart.
One thing that's been bugging me a little for awhile now is the author's use of the word "buck" as a slang term for a male pony. It's probably meant to be a horse pun, since "bucking" is something horses do, but it's a bit awkward because buck is also a term for a male deer or rabbit. There are some other animals where I think the males are also referred to as bucks *cough* niggers *cough*, but I've never heard it applied to an equine before. This author chooses odd terminology, and he uses it oddly.
Anyway, LP gives a rousing speech, and apparently that's enough to cause the others to instantly drop their objections and go along with her scheme. Rather than even try to argue with her, they simply cave and do whatever she wants, because she's the hero and they are the supplementary characters, and also because no one in this story has a spine, values, or anything resembling a personality.
This, however, caught my eye:
>Sometimes, to do what’s right, you have to become the villain of the piece.
This is the same line that Scootaloo used on herself earlier, in a chapter that was also titled "The Villain of the Piece." The author obviously used this phrasing on purpose and we were obviously supposed to notice it, but I don't quite understand what he was trying to say.
Scootaloo used this phrase to describe the experiments she was conducting with the stables. Specifically, she was telling Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle that she was willing to take the fall in the event that the Ministries discovered what StableTec was up to.
What Scoot was essentially saying is that she was willing to be seen as the villain, and to accept the consequences for all three of them. The government, or their sisters, or whomever they were trying to hide their activity from I'm still not 100% clear on this part, would have frowned upon these experiments, and the CMC would likely have faced some kind of punishment for conducting them. However, the CMC, or at least Scootaloo, seemed to believe strongly in what they were doing. In this case, Scoot's being the "villain of the piece" simply meant doing something technically illegal that she knew she could be punished for, but that she felt to be morally justified.
LP, superficially, seems to be saying the same thing here: that breaking Monterrey Jack out of prison might get them in trouble with the Tenpony Tower leadership, but she feels it's the right thing to do, so she's going to follow her conscience and damn the consequences. However, it's curious that she uses Scootaloo's line. Again, Scoot uses this to justify her stable experiments, and we've seen the end results of three of these. Personally, I'd argue that the tragedies in these places were just unhappy accidents that can't really be blamed on anyone, but LP seems to feel that StableTec is directly responsible for what happened. So, Scoot's 'villain' statement takes on a whole new meaning here: from LP's point of view, Scoot really did become a villain, even if she didn't intend to.
So in that context, what is she trying to say here? That she wants to do something reckless and potentially evil just because? That doesn't sound right. But it doesn't really make sense as a "do the right thing" statement either. Her use of this particular phrase is clearly meant to be significant, but I'll be fucked by Celestia with the moon if I can figure out just what that significance is exactly.
Anyway, since the whole crew has once again decided to follow this neurotic midget through the gates of Hell and back, all that remains is to discuss the plan:
>“I have one StealthBuck left. I sneak in. Shoot him with a dart. Just one; the poison will paralyze him for a few hours but have no lasting effects. Then I pick the lock and float him onto my back. I’ll use my levitation to lessen his weight. As long as I’m actually carrying him, the invisibility spell should cover both of us, just like it covers my saddlebags.”
But wait a minute, LP; didn't you give your poison dart gun away?
>Velvet Remedy’s eyes were wet, but she stepped forward. “In that case, we have something we must do before I can take my bath.”
>I looked to her questioningly, hopefully.
>“We need to stop by that workstation so you can build a new dart gun.”
Oh, kkat, you clever, clever fox. I just can't "trap" this guy.
Oh yeah, one more thing:
>the poison will paralyze him for a few hours but have no lasting effects.
How do you know it will only paralyze him? Are you an expert in biochemistry on top of all the other disciplines you've inexplicably mastered? As I understand it, the only poison she has handy is manticore venom, and I don't know that she's had any extensive experience working with it. It could do nearly anything; for all she knows, Monterrey could be allergic to it and go into anaphylactic shock the second she shoots him.
Page break. In the next microscene, something interesting and unexpected actually happens for once. Stay tuned to find out what it is.
>>303555
Aye.
One thing that bugs me about Kkat's take on a "fixed" Tenpenny Tower is that it makes no fucking sense, and it's an amateurish and lazy attempt to fix what was already incomplete in Fallout 3.
Fallout 3's Tenpenny Tower is the home of "rich" assholes. You're told they're rich. Even though they produce nothing. They're the haves with nice land and the angry invasive Ghouls who want to be let in are the have-nots.
Where do they get their food and water from? Lmao you tell me. Some faggot Fallout 3 fanboy would likely claim the three videogamely-weekly-respawning Molerats 10 feet behind the tower are a valid food source for everyone in town, that's the shit I heard when I criticized Megaton's complete lack of a food supply.
You can let the africanized killer bees in to kill all the whites, or refuse to complete the quest you're given, or slaughter the ghoul who gives you the "let us in" quest and his ghoul friends.
Normalfags hate that there is no "immigrants and owners of the original home live happily ever after" ending to this quest.
But there's more.
Tenpenny Tower is the home of one rich faggot and he lives with his rich faggot friends. I think there was one non-shit character? Anyway their boss likes lounging on the tower's top floor, sniping random wastelanders, and pretending he's a big game safari hunter. But only sometimes.
A lot of fun things can be done with the idea of a big game safari hunter.
Just look at Stranglethorn Vale's quests from World of Warcraft. Ernest Hemmingway or whatever his name was, he was a fun character.
Could you imagine if he paid you good money to hunt down the heads of the Wasteland's nastiest monsters, so he can mount them on his wall and tell his rich friends he killed those monsters himself?
It would make more sense than randomly telling you (and trusting you) to go and detonate the nuke in the center of Megaton, a town of boringly normal no-characterization NPCs (besides Moira Brown the faggot who writes the Wasteland Survival Guide with you, and even her characterization is only skin-deep as the obligatory memey wacky scientist chick) that for no valid reason, chose to build their town (and its walls and complex town gate) out of metallic scrap around the crater of an unexploded nuclear bomb. (instead of the alright-ish ruins of a nearby pre-war city. or literally anywhere else)
Sadly, the author responsible for the evil rich white old man atop the rich old men's tower put no thought into this rich old white man character and simply wanted to write a trashy story where this evil rich old white man does evil rich old white man things like shoot poor people and pay others to randomly nuke towns and can, if you appeal to his better nature and use his naivete against him, get murdered by invasive diversity. He works with evil shady cardboard cutouts in shady suits who have evil voices, because he's a bad guy. He's got a lot of baddies he could trust with the destruction of Megaton but for absolutely no goddamn reason he trusts this job to you, a random fucking nobody who sometimes watches other main characters like Your Idiot Father and Sarah Lyons and Fawkes The Big Idiot With Pretentious Dialogue And A Minigun and Le Fucking Angry Rival Colonel Autumn and Liberty Prime do stuff during quests important to the disgustingly dull main quest.
Fallout 3 was written by corporate hacks for an impossibly low and depressingly common denominator. Nostalgia prevents them from thinking critically about a game they'd scream until they're blue in the face to defend. I wish consoomerscum wasn't hypersensitive and overprotective of its prolefeed.
Kkat's attempt to fix this tower of mistakes? if you get that reference you're gay
Simple.
Aye.
One thing that bugs me about Kkat's take on a "fixed" Tenpenny Tower is that it makes no fucking sense, and it's an amateurish and lazy attempt to fix what was already incomplete in Fallout 3.
Fallout 3's Tenpenny Tower is the home of "rich" assholes. You're told they're rich. Even though they produce nothing. They're the haves with nice land and the angry invasive Ghouls who want to be let in are the have-nots.
Where do they get their food and water from? Lmao you tell me. Some faggot Fallout 3 fanboy would likely claim the three videogamely-weekly-respawning Molerats 10 feet behind the tower are a valid food source for everyone in town, that's the shit I heard when I criticized Megaton's complete lack of a food supply.
You can let the africanized killer bees in to kill all the whites, or refuse to complete the quest you're given, or slaughter the ghoul who gives you the "let us in" quest and his ghoul friends.
Normalfags hate that there is no "immigrants and owners of the original home live happily ever after" ending to this quest.
But there's more.
Tenpenny Tower is the home of one rich faggot and he lives with his rich faggot friends. I think there was one non-shit character? Anyway their boss likes lounging on the tower's top floor, sniping random wastelanders, and pretending he's a big game safari hunter. But only sometimes.
A lot of fun things can be done with the idea of a big game safari hunter.
Just look at Stranglethorn Vale's quests from World of Warcraft. Ernest Hemmingway or whatever his name was, he was a fun character.
Could you imagine if he paid you good money to hunt down the heads of the Wasteland's nastiest monsters, so he can mount them on his wall and tell his rich friends he killed those monsters himself?
It would make more sense than randomly telling you (and trusting you) to go and detonate the nuke in the center of Megaton, a town of boringly normal no-characterization NPCs (besides Moira Brown the faggot who writes the Wasteland Survival Guide with you, and even her characterization is only skin-deep as the obligatory memey wacky scientist chick) that for no valid reason, chose to build their town (and its walls and complex town gate) out of metallic scrap around the crater of an unexploded nuclear bomb. (instead of the alright-ish ruins of a nearby pre-war city. or literally anywhere else)
Sadly, the author responsible for the evil rich white old man atop the rich old men's tower put no thought into this rich old white man character and simply wanted to write a trashy story where this evil rich old white man does evil rich old white man things like shoot poor people and pay others to randomly nuke towns and can, if you appeal to his better nature and use his naivete against him, get murdered by invasive diversity. He works with evil shady cardboard cutouts in shady suits who have evil voices, because he's a bad guy. He's got a lot of baddies he could trust with the destruction of Megaton but for absolutely no goddamn reason he trusts this job to you, a random fucking nobody who sometimes watches other main characters like Your Idiot Father and Sarah Lyons and Fawkes The Big Idiot With Pretentious Dialogue And A Minigun and Le Fucking Angry Rival Colonel Autumn and Liberty Prime do stuff during quests important to the disgustingly dull main quest.
Fallout 3 was written by corporate hacks for an impossibly low and depressingly common denominator. Nostalgia prevents them from thinking critically about a game they'd scream until they're blue in the face to defend. I wish consoomerscum wasn't hypersensitive and overprotective of its prolefeed.
Kkat's attempt to fix this tower of mistakes? if you get that reference you're gay
Simple.
>>303559
Tenpenny Tower is renamed Tenpony Tower.
"Where do they get food?" is answered with "They eat at expensive restaurants because they're rich ponies!"
The follow-up question "Where do those restaurants get their ingredients?" is answered with "They pay ponies to scavenge it in surrounding areas. There's a lot of perfectly-preserved 200 year old cans of creamed corn and beans in the area despite all the Raiders and Rapists and survivalists unaffiliated with the tower and non-Raider(TM) bandits because... um... there were restaurants here before the big kaboom! They willingly pay top dollar for canned shit remade into imitation fancy stuff because they're silly! Lawbreakers are punished with death and the word of outsiders means nothing in the legal system because they're soooo snooty!"
"Wait if LP's word means nothing why would anypony care when she accuses MJ of robbing her?"
"Uh... oh shit. uh... He confesses! Because he's so proud and honest!"
"Wow, these guys are very silly!" You might say. "Does that mean their spa is shit too and their book of laws is comically large?"
"No," Kkat says, "They're only silly when it's convenient for me."
Follow-up questions like "If the ponies here pay scavengers for food, what do the tower's ponies pay scavengers with?" and "Wait, I thought you said Monterry Jack owns a cheese store. Are you telling me he scavenges 201+ year old cheese from the basements and fridges of random homes or does he make his own cheese somehow? Where are the cows and/or pregnant milked mares to produce that cheese?" have no answer because Kkat has a tiny brain and doesn't put any effort into his writing. Excreting a lot of shit at once doesn't make the large pile of shit you produce high-effort.
DJ Pon3's radio broadcast station is artificially moved here.
"How does the radio station function" is answered with "It's a pre-war emergency broadcast station! Rarity also sent copies of the books/songs her ministry banned here to preserve them for post-war generations! Don't ask why none of the songs here are overly subversive shite nuked-by-ziggers ponies would hate hearing"
"How does the DJ know everything?" is answered with "Sometimes loyal listeners call in to give intel... fucking somehow. But normally the DJ uses a pre-war super-surveillance system that still works perfectly after 200 years to spy on everything ever!"
"Where does the DJ get that music?" is answered with "Sometimes she pays ponies to get new tracks, but only when able-bodied bored murderhobos fall into her lap!"
"Why is the tower's owner fine with the radio badmouthing the tower almost constantly?" is answered with "The tower's owner is very silly and doesn't realize DJ Pon3 is Homage, the pony who entered his tower shortly before a stallion's voice on a radio station that had apparently never said anything before started badmouthing his tower and civilization over the airwaves! Gee, it's a good thing he never thought to check if Homage is using his tower's radio shite!"
"How does Homage sound male on the radio?" is answered with "The voice gender-changing spell has been passed down her celebrity-impersonating family line for generations!"
"What? Fucking why? Homage didn't inherit the radio station, she got into the tower solo. Her friend died along the way" has no answer.
"What funds the radio station?" has no answer.
It would have been so fucking easy to make Tenpony Tower a seemingly-perfect settlement with a dark secret, instead of an inconsistently-cartoonish farce.
It would have been easy to make it a "beacon of civilization" with a radio host forced to call it the greatest place ever even though she'd rather scream "DON'T COME HERE!" but doesn't because that would get her shot and replaced.
Tenpony Tower could be a "safe haven" that accepts all newcomers and sells them all sorts of luxuries as they rack up an ever-increasing high-interest-rate debt that can only be paid off through sexual slavery and/or scavenging for food with an explosive GPS collar around your neck that can also taze you if you displease your owner, or taze you to death if your owner wants you dead and your collar re-used.
Because really, how can the rich remain rich in the post-apocalypse if they aren't unfairly profiting off literal slave labour and entertaining themselves by watching sex slaves get forced to fuck each other/get gorily and horrifyingly killed/other assorted cartoon-land evil-people pasttimes?
Tenpenny Tower is renamed Tenpony Tower.
"Where do they get food?" is answered with "They eat at expensive restaurants because they're rich ponies!"
The follow-up question "Where do those restaurants get their ingredients?" is answered with "They pay ponies to scavenge it in surrounding areas. There's a lot of perfectly-preserved 200 year old cans of creamed corn and beans in the area despite all the Raiders and Rapists and survivalists unaffiliated with the tower and non-Raider(TM) bandits because... um... there were restaurants here before the big kaboom! They willingly pay top dollar for canned shit remade into imitation fancy stuff because they're silly! Lawbreakers are punished with death and the word of outsiders means nothing in the legal system because they're soooo snooty!"
"Wait if LP's word means nothing why would anypony care when she accuses MJ of robbing her?"
"Uh... oh shit. uh... He confesses! Because he's so proud and honest!"
"Wow, these guys are very silly!" You might say. "Does that mean their spa is shit too and their book of laws is comically large?"
"No," Kkat says, "They're only silly when it's convenient for me."
Follow-up questions like "If the ponies here pay scavengers for food, what do the tower's ponies pay scavengers with?" and "Wait, I thought you said Monterry Jack owns a cheese store. Are you telling me he scavenges 201+ year old cheese from the basements and fridges of random homes or does he make his own cheese somehow? Where are the cows and/or pregnant milked mares to produce that cheese?" have no answer because Kkat has a tiny brain and doesn't put any effort into his writing. Excreting a lot of shit at once doesn't make the large pile of shit you produce high-effort.
DJ Pon3's radio broadcast station is artificially moved here.
"How does the radio station function" is answered with "It's a pre-war emergency broadcast station! Rarity also sent copies of the books/songs her ministry banned here to preserve them for post-war generations! Don't ask why none of the songs here are overly subversive shite nuked-by-ziggers ponies would hate hearing"
"How does the DJ know everything?" is answered with "Sometimes loyal listeners call in to give intel... fucking somehow. But normally the DJ uses a pre-war super-surveillance system that still works perfectly after 200 years to spy on everything ever!"
"Where does the DJ get that music?" is answered with "Sometimes she pays ponies to get new tracks, but only when able-bodied bored murderhobos fall into her lap!"
"Why is the tower's owner fine with the radio badmouthing the tower almost constantly?" is answered with "The tower's owner is very silly and doesn't realize DJ Pon3 is Homage, the pony who entered his tower shortly before a stallion's voice on a radio station that had apparently never said anything before started badmouthing his tower and civilization over the airwaves! Gee, it's a good thing he never thought to check if Homage is using his tower's radio shite!"
"How does Homage sound male on the radio?" is answered with "The voice gender-changing spell has been passed down her celebrity-impersonating family line for generations!"
"What? Fucking why? Homage didn't inherit the radio station, she got into the tower solo. Her friend died along the way" has no answer.
"What funds the radio station?" has no answer.
It would have been so fucking easy to make Tenpony Tower a seemingly-perfect settlement with a dark secret, instead of an inconsistently-cartoonish farce.
It would have been easy to make it a "beacon of civilization" with a radio host forced to call it the greatest place ever even though she'd rather scream "DON'T COME HERE!" but doesn't because that would get her shot and replaced.
Tenpony Tower could be a "safe haven" that accepts all newcomers and sells them all sorts of luxuries as they rack up an ever-increasing high-interest-rate debt that can only be paid off through sexual slavery and/or scavenging for food with an explosive GPS collar around your neck that can also taze you if you displease your owner, or taze you to death if your owner wants you dead and your collar re-used.
Because really, how can the rich remain rich in the post-apocalypse if they aren't unfairly profiting off literal slave labour and entertaining themselves by watching sex slaves get forced to fuck each other/get gorily and horrifyingly killed/other assorted cartoon-land evil-people pasttimes?
>>303560
Also the FEV had to be modified by the Enclave before it killed anyone with a trace of radiation. But in this story FEV is already rigged to kill anyone who is irradiated... I think? It's been a while.
also it dawned on me that these ponies are going through a wasteland that could be FULL of billboards and semi destroyed advertisements that can be as minor or tragic or ironic or hilarious as the author wants.
A new town could take its name from a "Dead End" sign with a hole in it and call itself Eaden as in Eden. Like how Novac got its name from the destroyed NO VACancy sign outside.
There could be a destroyed taxi with an advertisement on it for Ironhide's Transformers which is a reference to Ironhide the Transformer from Transformers. Nyx's story kept referencing stupid fanon names for background ponies voted on by MLP Wiki users like Bastion Yorsets instead of referencing anything real. Hasbro owns Transformers and FIM and this kind of self-referential bullshit is something movie studios love doing. Like when Deadpool 2 the comic book movie had an advert for Alpha Flight on the car which is a comics thing. And the red book from Planes Trains and Automobiles.
There could be a billboard for hemmeroids cream with the slogan "For that burning sensation!" right behind a pile of burning recently-crippled super-raped poners some Raiders are dancing around while yelling assorted slurs and making fucked-up "Raider art" on nearby walls.
There could be a billboard with a shocked open-mouthed pony and some message that was painted over also a dick was drawn in the mouth of the pony with mud or blood and the billboard was moved in front of a slaver town that sells sex slaves.
Imagine if LP saw a "Buy war bonds" billboard that once said "Buy war bonds today. Tomorrow may be too late!" But it had holes blown in it so now it says "Bu t t"
What do we get instead? Every now and then, Littlepoop will see an untouched 201-211+ year old propaganda poster made by some Mane Six Ministry.
Surely fucking somepony would have defaced those kinds of posters by now.
LP could encounter a bar that makes moonshine and fermented hops and beer basted molerat ribs and blinding bathtub booze in the basement. And the bar could have a defaced "War? Death? Fear? No! We must do better" poster that now reads "Wa t e r? No! Be er!"
Also the FEV had to be modified by the Enclave before it killed anyone with a trace of radiation. But in this story FEV is already rigged to kill anyone who is irradiated... I think? It's been a while.
also it dawned on me that these ponies are going through a wasteland that could be FULL of billboards and semi destroyed advertisements that can be as minor or tragic or ironic or hilarious as the author wants.
A new town could take its name from a "Dead End" sign with a hole in it and call itself Eaden as in Eden. Like how Novac got its name from the destroyed NO VACancy sign outside.
There could be a destroyed taxi with an advertisement on it for Ironhide's Transformers which is a reference to Ironhide the Transformer from Transformers. Nyx's story kept referencing stupid fanon names for background ponies voted on by MLP Wiki users like Bastion Yorsets instead of referencing anything real. Hasbro owns Transformers and FIM and this kind of self-referential bullshit is something movie studios love doing. Like when Deadpool 2 the comic book movie had an advert for Alpha Flight on the car which is a comics thing. And the red book from Planes Trains and Automobiles.
There could be a billboard for hemmeroids cream with the slogan "For that burning sensation!" right behind a pile of burning recently-crippled super-raped poners some Raiders are dancing around while yelling assorted slurs and making fucked-up "Raider art" on nearby walls.
There could be a billboard with a shocked open-mouthed pony and some message that was painted over also a dick was drawn in the mouth of the pony with mud or blood and the billboard was moved in front of a slaver town that sells sex slaves.
Imagine if LP saw a "Buy war bonds" billboard that once said "Buy war bonds today. Tomorrow may be too late!" But it had holes blown in it so now it says "Bu t t"
What do we get instead? Every now and then, Littlepoop will see an untouched 201-211+ year old propaganda poster made by some Mane Six Ministry.
Surely fucking somepony would have defaced those kinds of posters by now.
LP could encounter a bar that makes moonshine and fermented hops and beer basted molerat ribs and blinding bathtub booze in the basement. And the bar could have a defaced "War? Death? Fear? No! We must do better" poster that now reads "Wa t e r? No! Be er!"
Everyone, do you think this story should have leaned into the "cartoonishly black and white" aspects harder to become a fun fast-paced action tale? Or do you think it should have thought things through better and made things deeper so the story can deeply analyze the philosophies and ideologies of its main characters and main villains?
>>303717
Yes. It should have done something to the best of its ability and completed it.
I think a combination of either could have worked as well.
Instead of just shallow imitation, a deeper imitation would have been nicer.
This is the same issue over and over. It isn't complete.
Yes. It should have done something to the best of its ability and completed it.
I think a combination of either could have worked as well.
Instead of just shallow imitation, a deeper imitation would have been nicer.
This is the same issue over and over. It isn't complete.
>>303728
I'm not sure what single issue can be called responsible for all of the fic's problems but I'd put my money on the Fallout "references".
Kkunt feels the need to cram as many things from Fallout, and especially Fallout 3, into this setting.
Even random events in the world like saving a building of idiots from alicorns/super mutants.
This causes these absurdly unlikely moments where LP wanders around and happens to stumble upon an event that has been waiting at least four days for her to experience it, or a pony like Diamond Tiara or Scootaloo gets blamed for how a place turned out even though it only turned out that way so an approximation of Fallout 3 goomplay with a Gravity Gun telekinesis mod and the GodMode cheat turned on can happen in it.
For Fallout to happen, nuclear war between nations needs to happen along with a lot of very specific things including the creation of Vaults and Super Mutants and a Master and the Enclave. Even if the context surrounding these things and the meaning behind them is changed so that a ponified imitation of them can exist in Edgequestria.
At no point pre-nuking is kindness and friendship allowed to work. Those ideas weren't put aside in favour of Holy Solar Empire cartoon-fascism and/or cartoonishly caricatured Poner Supremacy/Manifest Destiny. Sometimes war failed ponies and sometimes mercy failed them. But once the bombs fall and Littlesue and her friends start using kindness and war and they are not only allowed to win, the difficulty of the world is toned down whenever they normally wouldn't win. They are allowed to be the best warriors and kindest heroes and while no-win scenarios and choices where your choices are to compromise your morality in one way or another or die and betray those counting on you might be forced upon ponies around them the heroes fundamentally (in the author's eyes) remain squeaky clean in a simplistic world of black and white. Raiders and Slavers and non-union bandits are all just pure evil targets for Littlepip to kill just like priceless family heirlooms are only there for LP to loot.
Kkat's attempts at originality aren't good. But if he tried to write a story without fucking up Equestria and Fallout to tell his story I'd dislike it less.
I'm not sure what single issue can be called responsible for all of the fic's problems but I'd put my money on the Fallout "references".
Kkunt feels the need to cram as many things from Fallout, and especially Fallout 3, into this setting.
Even random events in the world like saving a building of idiots from alicorns/super mutants.
This causes these absurdly unlikely moments where LP wanders around and happens to stumble upon an event that has been waiting at least four days for her to experience it, or a pony like Diamond Tiara or Scootaloo gets blamed for how a place turned out even though it only turned out that way so an approximation of Fallout 3 goomplay with a Gravity Gun telekinesis mod and the GodMode cheat turned on can happen in it.
For Fallout to happen, nuclear war between nations needs to happen along with a lot of very specific things including the creation of Vaults and Super Mutants and a Master and the Enclave. Even if the context surrounding these things and the meaning behind them is changed so that a ponified imitation of them can exist in Edgequestria.
At no point pre-nuking is kindness and friendship allowed to work. Those ideas weren't put aside in favour of Holy Solar Empire cartoon-fascism and/or cartoonishly caricatured Poner Supremacy/Manifest Destiny. Sometimes war failed ponies and sometimes mercy failed them. But once the bombs fall and Littlesue and her friends start using kindness and war and they are not only allowed to win, the difficulty of the world is toned down whenever they normally wouldn't win. They are allowed to be the best warriors and kindest heroes and while no-win scenarios and choices where your choices are to compromise your morality in one way or another or die and betray those counting on you might be forced upon ponies around them the heroes fundamentally (in the author's eyes) remain squeaky clean in a simplistic world of black and white. Raiders and Slavers and non-union bandits are all just pure evil targets for Littlepip to kill just like priceless family heirlooms are only there for LP to loot.
Kkat's attempts at originality aren't good. But if he tried to write a story without fucking up Equestria and Fallout to tell his story I'd dislike it less.
>>303732
So from my understanding about the underlying structure the issue is that any attempt at anything is never completed to its fullest extent.
It's not the single direct issues of references, nor the absurdity, or even the non-characters, or the meandering copy and paste of a greater work with a half assed paint job.
It's not even that kkat doesn't think things through, or the 'morality' going on.
All of them are issues, caused by one fundamental root problem. The pronlem is that everything, and I do mean Everything, is missing its pieces.
It's broken, it's not whole, the shit that makes whatever it is up isn't there, there are holes where stuff should be, it's going out there without leaving, it tries to enter but never comes inside, it is missing several key components in everything at various points.
So yes the individual issues can be corrected to be made whole, the means and methods would make the story better.
But, the fundamental root issue of this story will still remain at its heart.
No matter how much patch work is done unless that core is fixed it'll be fancier shit as a tribute to the people who are just as broken as thist story is that demands vast imaginary input from others to even be considered whole.
It's a crazy amount of work, but that's what's needed otherwise it's more stuff on a pile of broken dreams, words, and promises.
I'm being harsh because to hold this work up as the shining achievement of what fan works can accomplish is personally disgusting.
People should treasure the fiction the touches their heart, some do so more than others, but to say Fallout: Equestria is the pinnacle of literary achievement in that community is sad.
So from my understanding about the underlying structure the issue is that any attempt at anything is never completed to its fullest extent.
It's not the single direct issues of references, nor the absurdity, or even the non-characters, or the meandering copy and paste of a greater work with a half assed paint job.
It's not even that kkat doesn't think things through, or the 'morality' going on.
All of them are issues, caused by one fundamental root problem. The pronlem is that everything, and I do mean Everything, is missing its pieces.
It's broken, it's not whole, the shit that makes whatever it is up isn't there, there are holes where stuff should be, it's going out there without leaving, it tries to enter but never comes inside, it is missing several key components in everything at various points.
So yes the individual issues can be corrected to be made whole, the means and methods would make the story better.
But, the fundamental root issue of this story will still remain at its heart.
No matter how much patch work is done unless that core is fixed it'll be fancier shit as a tribute to the people who are just as broken as thist story is that demands vast imaginary input from others to even be considered whole.
It's a crazy amount of work, but that's what's needed otherwise it's more stuff on a pile of broken dreams, words, and promises.
I'm being harsh because to hold this work up as the shining achievement of what fan works can accomplish is personally disgusting.
People should treasure the fiction the touches their heart, some do so more than others, but to say Fallout: Equestria is the pinnacle of literary achievement in that community is sad.
>>303735
Absolutely true. There have been stories where ponies get mean before and get fucked over for it by losing magic or their world. There have been stories where ponies don't get mean and get eaten alive by a more aggressive or manipulative or evil force. But this story tries both at the same time with Equestria. Good intentions fail it solely because they are not allowed to. Ziggers did literally everything wrong but when Flutters field tested her fIrst Healing Megaspell ICBM at a battlefield ponies and ziggers fought over, healing the ponies left alive on the battlefield and the wounded zebras who were limping away with their tails between their legs only caused the healed zebras to turn around and continue fighting with ponies on that battlefield. Nyx's tale is a shitty maudlin Littlest Orphan Naruto story where an adopted kid who struggles in school and is bullied for the dark power within him has sacharine moments with his chosen adopted parent and eventually snaps when some arbitrary moment or something unrealistic like an angry mob of ignorant adult strawman-civilian villagers hell-bent on kicking a child to death or a school bully attempting to kill the hero orphan fucks shit up. Demon kid unleashes his darkness and calls everyone shitheads and might even become the new villain but will eventually ride away on his motorcycle into the distance once the author decides this setting is too shit for "and then the hero remained in this town" to be a happy ending. It was an uncreative cliche less creative than the body swap cliche or overheard misunderstanding cliche but the bronies ate it up because they had never read a Naruto fanfiction before and they are intellectually poorer as a result. But while Nyx's connection to NMM aka Luna's rage made no sense the story still mostly functioned. The story beats could have worked if executed better. The problems could have been solved if it just had one more draft. The story screamed "written by the seat of my pants and compromised now and then to fit the tastes of overemotional overrreacting commenters putting on a show for each other in the comment section" after all. But FE? The pony world dies as a result of its own unwillingness to treat Ziggers like the Wastelanders treat Raiders. Falloutish stuff is recycled in this filler arc of a confused meandering self-indulgent power-fantasy of a story. And then Littleshit stumbles upon The Godmaker from Ben 10 and Danny Phantom: 5 Years Later except it turns Littleshit into a weather goddess. This is treated like a heroic sacrifice even though LP can step out of the weather machine to fuck Homage at will and then walk back into the weather machine. The world under Weather Goddess LP is so wonderful that raiders stop being raiders. There are still average bandits but no full-on spiked-leather raiders who piss on their own beds and shit at the walls of their own gore-decorated homes. And then, offscreen, a new generation of Element Of Harmony users finds the main magical worldfixer to make the world so perfect that foals openly doubt the horrific parents of their kids as they run around and play in the grass. Did I mention that worldfixer is guarded by Spike The Giant Dragon aka The Watcher? Yeah a fucking giant dragon is also le uber 1337 haxx0r who hacks drones mysteriously to act as plot convenience. You'd think Spike would seek to rebuild Equestria over the 200 years since its downfall to create a peaceful corner of the world where virtue is easy and nopony would have to compromise their honesty or loyalty or kindness or generosity to survive another day. But nah lol. Equestria didn't die because of any one specific flaw the heroes can seek to fix or any ideology the heroes can reject or any villainous group the heroes can kill in a way that matters. Equestria died so Littlesue can stream 200 hours of an unedited Fallout 3 Let's Play and then find the arbitrary designated holy grail mcguffin that makes her a weather god able to mostly fix the world even though eventually the real new Mane Six shows up anyway, undoing the apocalypse and making everything pointless in retrospect.
Absolutely true. There have been stories where ponies get mean before and get fucked over for it by losing magic or their world. There have been stories where ponies don't get mean and get eaten alive by a more aggressive or manipulative or evil force. But this story tries both at the same time with Equestria. Good intentions fail it solely because they are not allowed to. Ziggers did literally everything wrong but when Flutters field tested her fIrst Healing Megaspell ICBM at a battlefield ponies and ziggers fought over, healing the ponies left alive on the battlefield and the wounded zebras who were limping away with their tails between their legs only caused the healed zebras to turn around and continue fighting with ponies on that battlefield. Nyx's tale is a shitty maudlin Littlest Orphan Naruto story where an adopted kid who struggles in school and is bullied for the dark power within him has sacharine moments with his chosen adopted parent and eventually snaps when some arbitrary moment or something unrealistic like an angry mob of ignorant adult strawman-civilian villagers hell-bent on kicking a child to death or a school bully attempting to kill the hero orphan fucks shit up. Demon kid unleashes his darkness and calls everyone shitheads and might even become the new villain but will eventually ride away on his motorcycle into the distance once the author decides this setting is too shit for "and then the hero remained in this town" to be a happy ending. It was an uncreative cliche less creative than the body swap cliche or overheard misunderstanding cliche but the bronies ate it up because they had never read a Naruto fanfiction before and they are intellectually poorer as a result. But while Nyx's connection to NMM aka Luna's rage made no sense the story still mostly functioned. The story beats could have worked if executed better. The problems could have been solved if it just had one more draft. The story screamed "written by the seat of my pants and compromised now and then to fit the tastes of overemotional overrreacting commenters putting on a show for each other in the comment section" after all. But FE? The pony world dies as a result of its own unwillingness to treat Ziggers like the Wastelanders treat Raiders. Falloutish stuff is recycled in this filler arc of a confused meandering self-indulgent power-fantasy of a story. And then Littleshit stumbles upon The Godmaker from Ben 10 and Danny Phantom: 5 Years Later except it turns Littleshit into a weather goddess. This is treated like a heroic sacrifice even though LP can step out of the weather machine to fuck Homage at will and then walk back into the weather machine. The world under Weather Goddess LP is so wonderful that raiders stop being raiders. There are still average bandits but no full-on spiked-leather raiders who piss on their own beds and shit at the walls of their own gore-decorated homes. And then, offscreen, a new generation of Element Of Harmony users finds the main magical worldfixer to make the world so perfect that foals openly doubt the horrific parents of their kids as they run around and play in the grass. Did I mention that worldfixer is guarded by Spike The Giant Dragon aka The Watcher? Yeah a fucking giant dragon is also le uber 1337 haxx0r who hacks drones mysteriously to act as plot convenience. You'd think Spike would seek to rebuild Equestria over the 200 years since its downfall to create a peaceful corner of the world where virtue is easy and nopony would have to compromise their honesty or loyalty or kindness or generosity to survive another day. But nah lol. Equestria didn't die because of any one specific flaw the heroes can seek to fix or any ideology the heroes can reject or any villainous group the heroes can kill in a way that matters. Equestria died so Littlesue can stream 200 hours of an unedited Fallout 3 Let's Play and then find the arbitrary designated holy grail mcguffin that makes her a weather god able to mostly fix the world even though eventually the real new Mane Six shows up anyway, undoing the apocalypse and making everything pointless in retrospect.
>>303739
>>303735
Fuck The Watcher. He is pure plot convenience. He shows up when he is needed and fades away when not needed. His unwillingness to be a consistent party member is completely unjustified. He reminds me of every bad GMPC that every bad amateur Dungeon Master adds to their story when they want one magical all-seeing all-knowing faggot who can be anywhere and do anything to guide the heroes ham-fistedly without using his overwhelming infinite-stats power to trivialize the adventure for the heroes singleuhandedly. The kind of faggot who really should be able to solve the plot solo and has no reason to "manipulate" the heroes by directly ordering them around like the mouse in a Real Time Strategy game.
Also when I tried to write a "good FE" fic I could only give the story themes that make sense by retconning something in Equestria's backstory.
The hero was a (pardon me for saying it) based and redpilled Unicorn chad who loves guns and runs the Ponyitler Youth for the downtrodden betrayed youth of his shitty fake-meritocratic stable ruled by a cabal of upper-class degenerate greedy liars. And the hero has a fucking awesome revolver that fires shotgun shells with assorted magical effects. This buff handsome rockstar and charismatic political speaker with no flaws besides narcolepsy and anger issues(that actually fuck him over because they're meaningful flaws he struggles with) fucks the Overmare's daughter and starts a revolution, breaking out into the surface world to slaughter enemies, especially zigger-infested areas, and show assorted groups the light when making them join his army. Like a tribe of carfags, the camerafags, good alicorns from a stable that researched alicornism but was isolationist until one of them heard about the hero on the radio and wanted to be a part of New Equestria, and edgy Wolves from a Stable where the poners turned themselves into wolves to survive in the Wasteland and made up a pantheon of wolf gods but needed to be re-taught friendship and morality to have a future.
Baddies like raiders and the hero's vault's Stable Security enforcer thug cops are soulless and mindless and ruled by their hedonism and foolishness. But the heroes are creative and unique and find interesting ways to use their magic to fight in ways unique to them. The heroes have teamwork and friendly competition while the villains have enforced brainwashed conformity or messy anarchic inefficient chaos depending on the faction. The leaders of bad factions... some have good points to their wrong ideologies and some don't. There's deep worldbuilding, most of the Wasteland that's not territory for a Zebra tribe is ruled by an evil faction the heroes have to defeat. My favourite was the Midnight Empire, ruled by an evil Twilight Sparkle clone.
There's stuff I added in for filler like the Pillar Men ponies who reference G1 subtly and the Yugioh duels and Custom Robo battles and the story arc where the hero enters a Matrix-style dream simulation vault to complete an original Pokemon Mystery Dungeon story to break the trapped ponies-turned-into-pokemon out of the dream and get them in his army.
The villains responsible for Equestria's downfall were rich griffons who made Equestria degenerate and forced it to get involved with a Zebra commie-vs-monarch civil war with no good guys because zigs are bad. Ponies wanted to play peacekeeper in a shithole continent and got exploited and shot at by both sides while taking in unsustainable levels of zebra "refugees". The fucktons of Zebras in this corner of the Wasteland come from local vaults that were forced to be multiracial but ended up being conquered by Zebras and becoming overcrowded once the bombs fell and the doors sealed themselves off. There was this really cool bit where the hero finds a once-great Zebra town turned rotten by Zebras and infested with zebras so the hero makes a mass grave using an earth spell and then grabs a refugees welcome sign with his magic and plants it in front of the mass grave. I got that from a Moon Man song. The hero also makes a passionate speech on the radio at the Enclave that immediately fractures the organization into the shit old selfish faction and the good faction that wants to help the hero make Equestria great again. And the origin of the Twilight clone is The Institute from Fallout 4 done right: one of Twilight's backup plans was to make a Stable full of clones of herself where they could science in peace and they founded The Foundation in their MWT stable vault thing built beneath Twilight's magic school called The Foundation Of Arcane Science. Get it, like how The Institute spontaneously came into existence in MIT's basement in F4 but a better name and less envy for FNV's Old World Blues DLC. Evil griffons in her Ministry of Wartime Technology manipulated them (griffons can use their magic tongues to lie extra-convincingly if you've got an open mind and overly trusting heart) into doing assorted mad scientist crap in the post apocalyptic world and maintaining the luxuries in the MWTwilight stable and thinking that was Twilight's goal. But the hero helps them see the light and turn into a scientific force for good, finding a clever way to undo the world's nuking without needing a certain retarded something from the main FE story. Ultimately this is the tale of one good man (pony, whatever) bringing the world back from the brink of annihilation through the power of morality, hope, efficiency, and superior firepower. He says fuck globalism and fuck the old generation and fuck their bad ideas and fuck nihilism and fuck moral relativism, let's be good and rebuild a better Equestria. And that theme would be damaged if he spontaneously stumbled upon a machine that made him OP or unfucked the world spontaneously.
I know that story probably isn't perfect which is why I gave up on writing it and returned to the silver story. But if you wanted to unretard FE it would need themes that work and a worthy hero.
>>303735
Fuck The Watcher. He is pure plot convenience. He shows up when he is needed and fades away when not needed. His unwillingness to be a consistent party member is completely unjustified. He reminds me of every bad GMPC that every bad amateur Dungeon Master adds to their story when they want one magical all-seeing all-knowing faggot who can be anywhere and do anything to guide the heroes ham-fistedly without using his overwhelming infinite-stats power to trivialize the adventure for the heroes singleuhandedly. The kind of faggot who really should be able to solve the plot solo and has no reason to "manipulate" the heroes by directly ordering them around like the mouse in a Real Time Strategy game.
Also when I tried to write a "good FE" fic I could only give the story themes that make sense by retconning something in Equestria's backstory.
The hero was a (pardon me for saying it) based and redpilled Unicorn chad who loves guns and runs the Ponyitler Youth for the downtrodden betrayed youth of his shitty fake-meritocratic stable ruled by a cabal of upper-class degenerate greedy liars. And the hero has a fucking awesome revolver that fires shotgun shells with assorted magical effects. This buff handsome rockstar and charismatic political speaker with no flaws besides narcolepsy and anger issues(that actually fuck him over because they're meaningful flaws he struggles with) fucks the Overmare's daughter and starts a revolution, breaking out into the surface world to slaughter enemies, especially zigger-infested areas, and show assorted groups the light when making them join his army. Like a tribe of carfags, the camerafags, good alicorns from a stable that researched alicornism but was isolationist until one of them heard about the hero on the radio and wanted to be a part of New Equestria, and edgy Wolves from a Stable where the poners turned themselves into wolves to survive in the Wasteland and made up a pantheon of wolf gods but needed to be re-taught friendship and morality to have a future.
Baddies like raiders and the hero's vault's Stable Security enforcer thug cops are soulless and mindless and ruled by their hedonism and foolishness. But the heroes are creative and unique and find interesting ways to use their magic to fight in ways unique to them. The heroes have teamwork and friendly competition while the villains have enforced brainwashed conformity or messy anarchic inefficient chaos depending on the faction. The leaders of bad factions... some have good points to their wrong ideologies and some don't. There's deep worldbuilding, most of the Wasteland that's not territory for a Zebra tribe is ruled by an evil faction the heroes have to defeat. My favourite was the Midnight Empire, ruled by an evil Twilight Sparkle clone.
There's stuff I added in for filler like the Pillar Men ponies who reference G1 subtly and the Yugioh duels and Custom Robo battles and the story arc where the hero enters a Matrix-style dream simulation vault to complete an original Pokemon Mystery Dungeon story to break the trapped ponies-turned-into-pokemon out of the dream and get them in his army.
The villains responsible for Equestria's downfall were rich griffons who made Equestria degenerate and forced it to get involved with a Zebra commie-vs-monarch civil war with no good guys because zigs are bad. Ponies wanted to play peacekeeper in a shithole continent and got exploited and shot at by both sides while taking in unsustainable levels of zebra "refugees". The fucktons of Zebras in this corner of the Wasteland come from local vaults that were forced to be multiracial but ended up being conquered by Zebras and becoming overcrowded once the bombs fell and the doors sealed themselves off. There was this really cool bit where the hero finds a once-great Zebra town turned rotten by Zebras and infested with zebras so the hero makes a mass grave using an earth spell and then grabs a refugees welcome sign with his magic and plants it in front of the mass grave. I got that from a Moon Man song. The hero also makes a passionate speech on the radio at the Enclave that immediately fractures the organization into the shit old selfish faction and the good faction that wants to help the hero make Equestria great again. And the origin of the Twilight clone is The Institute from Fallout 4 done right: one of Twilight's backup plans was to make a Stable full of clones of herself where they could science in peace and they founded The Foundation in their MWT stable vault thing built beneath Twilight's magic school called The Foundation Of Arcane Science. Get it, like how The Institute spontaneously came into existence in MIT's basement in F4 but a better name and less envy for FNV's Old World Blues DLC. Evil griffons in her Ministry of Wartime Technology manipulated them (griffons can use their magic tongues to lie extra-convincingly if you've got an open mind and overly trusting heart) into doing assorted mad scientist crap in the post apocalyptic world and maintaining the luxuries in the MWTwilight stable and thinking that was Twilight's goal. But the hero helps them see the light and turn into a scientific force for good, finding a clever way to undo the world's nuking without needing a certain retarded something from the main FE story. Ultimately this is the tale of one good man (pony, whatever) bringing the world back from the brink of annihilation through the power of morality, hope, efficiency, and superior firepower. He says fuck globalism and fuck the old generation and fuck their bad ideas and fuck nihilism and fuck moral relativism, let's be good and rebuild a better Equestria. And that theme would be damaged if he spontaneously stumbled upon a machine that made him OP or unfucked the world spontaneously.
I know that story probably isn't perfect which is why I gave up on writing it and returned to the silver story. But if you wanted to unretard FE it would need themes that work and a worthy hero.
>>303742
>once great zebra town
lmao typo I meant once-great pony town ruined and conquered by refugees.
also the Mane Six Ministries were griffon-controlled ministries with overworked mane six members used as celebrity propaganda endorsers without real power over the organization. So when the hero dies from exhaustion after his fight with Evil Twilight and goes to the DBZ afterlife and speaks with King Kai and is trained and speaks with the Mane Six and forgives them for their sins because in this timeline they really did do their best, and his forgiveness lets them move on, then the hero is revived and gets better.
Sometimes I wish I finished that tale but it had scenes full of horrifying degeneracy and too many fans enjoyed bits they weren't supposed to and demanded more.
I could have gone my whole life without being told I'm great at writing degeneracy.
>once great zebra town
lmao typo I meant once-great pony town ruined and conquered by refugees.
also the Mane Six Ministries were griffon-controlled ministries with overworked mane six members used as celebrity propaganda endorsers without real power over the organization. So when the hero dies from exhaustion after his fight with Evil Twilight and goes to the DBZ afterlife and speaks with King Kai and is trained and speaks with the Mane Six and forgives them for their sins because in this timeline they really did do their best, and his forgiveness lets them move on, then the hero is revived and gets better.
Sometimes I wish I finished that tale but it had scenes full of horrifying degeneracy and too many fans enjoyed bits they weren't supposed to and demanded more.
I could have gone my whole life without being told I'm great at writing degeneracy.
>>303811
It would be interesting to review that as a story and as a parody of FE.
Are there separate words for the kind of parody where it's a silly version of something, and a parody where it's something that highlights how silly it usually is?
You know, the difference between a silly action movie with fish nunchucks and lethal exploding nerf dart guns and exploding chickens/penguins vs an action movie that makes fun of cliches common to action movies like wirework and plot armour letting a hero survive explosions that should kill him and a loser instantly becoming a pro after an absurdly short amount of training and so on.
It would be interesting to review that as a story and as a parody of FE.
Are there separate words for the kind of parody where it's a silly version of something, and a parody where it's something that highlights how silly it usually is?
You know, the difference between a silly action movie with fish nunchucks and lethal exploding nerf dart guns and exploding chickens/penguins vs an action movie that makes fun of cliches common to action movies like wirework and plot armour letting a hero survive explosions that should kill him and a loser instantly becoming a pro after an absurdly short amount of training and so on.
>>303557
Littlepoop and the others have presumably made it back to the Tower without incident, as we rejoin our hero in some kind of makeshift workshop she's constructed somewhere or other. She is, of course, manufacturing yet another poison dart gun what is this, the third one she's made? Seriously, what is this faggot author's obsession with dart guns?. She is still suffering immensely from the effects of mint withdrawal, radiation sickness, iron-bar-through-the-leg, and whatever the fuck else she has, although it's not clear why she hasn't received treatment for these ailments now that they are all safely back at the tower. Velvet is at her side, providing words of encouragement. She seems to have warmed up to the plan, ostensibly because she was moved by the plight of Monterrey Jack's soon-to-be-orphaned children.
>Velvet Remedy nodded and gave me a little nuzzle. “Your heart is always in the right place, Littlepip.”
The fact that it hasn't yet been blown out of her ribcage is probably a big plus in this setting.
>She backed up, giving me a sad smile. “Your mind maybe not so much. But I’ve learned to believe in your heart…” She looked down, scuffing the floor with her hoof. “I do care about you, you know.”
"Oh, Mary Sue, you are so caring and wise," said Captain James T. Kirk. "I want to kiss you all over..."
Anyway, Littlepoop is immediately thrown off by Velvet's behavior here, as she appears to be once again trying to seduce her. This comes right on the heels of Velvet's earlier efforts to get LP and Homage together. LP gets flustered and tries to change the subject, noting the presence of a red wagon that seems to have mysteriously appeared in the corner. This is likely provided as a clue for what is about to happen.
LP, meanwhile, redirects her attention to the gun. Velvet asks some perfunctory questions about its construction, though continues with her coy seductress routine:
>“Let me see,” Velvet cooed. I floated out one of my poisoned darts and set it into the dart gun. Velvet Remedy wrapped her telekinesis around it and lifted it to her eye, checking the alignment. It occurred to me that a non-lethal weapon like the dart gun should hold quite the appeal for my more pacifistic friend.
It's worth noting that her "more pacifistic friend" was recently seen blasting gigantic bats with a combat shotgun, which no one seemed to consider unusual despite how out of character it was for her. It's also worth noting that Velvet already has a dart gun, which LP gave to her specifically because she wanted a more pacifistic weapon. The fate of this dart gun is unknown; she just suddenly and inexplicably stopped using it within the space of this last chapter, and began favoring the combat shotgun, which it is unclear how she obtained, since it was last seen in Littlepoop's possession.
>I remembered my earlier worries. How much would Velvet Remedy benefit, psychologically and spiritually, from being able to handle enemies without further soaking her own hooves in blood and death? Dammit, why didn’t I think of this before?
Again, you did think of this before, and that's why you gave her the dart gun in the first place. There are some other issues here too; for instance, would being able to temporarily incapacitate her enemies really benefit Velvet that much "psychologically and spiritually" when her friends LP and Calamity are still blowing them away left and right? I really don't understand how this author thinks about these kinds of things, but it's getting to the point where I'm just too tired to analyze most of these minor points.
Anyway, all of this proves to be moot anyway, because while LP was musing on this, Velvet somehow gets hold of the now-finished dart gun and fires a single dart into LP, causing her to lose consciousness. Apparently, Velvet was once again taking advantage of LP's attraction to her to get something she wanted, in this case getting her to let her guard down so she could take the dart gun away.
One of the most frustrating things about going through these amateur-hour stories so closely is noticing the directions the author could have taken things had he just been a slightly better writer. Velvet is a shit character for a number of reasons I've already gone over, but what's frustrating here is that she actually could have been the most interesting (or at least the most fun) character in the entire story, but the author just blew it big time.
One of the things I commented on fairly early was that Velvet could have been turned into a sort of Faye Valentine type character: the mature, beautiful, cynical femme fatale who callously uses her looks and charm to manipulate others into doing what she wants. This impression is bolstered by what Nigel II pointed out earlier: that she is aware of LP's crush on her and used it to her advantage in order to escape the stable. What's even more frustrating is that this might actually have been what the author was trying to do: he established that she has a knack for smooth-talking ponies, and we've seen this rather callous manipulation of LP's crush on her before. However, this author also has absolutely no talent for characterization, and so we get this discordant mishmash of contradictory traits: she clearly has a talent for manipulation and knows how to use her sex appeal to her advantage, but at the same time she is portrayed as this compassionate Fluttershy knockoff who loves all creatures great and small and abhors violence. Now, if her goody-two-horseshoes persona was supposed to just be an act she puts on in order to manipulate ponies, sort of like Golly in the later seasons of the show, that could have been interesting. However, the author has conveyed no such impression; so far as I can tell, her compassionate, pacifistic side is supposed to be taken seriously, so the result is that she just looks like a wishy-washy, insincere hypocrite most of the time.
Littlepoop and the others have presumably made it back to the Tower without incident, as we rejoin our hero in some kind of makeshift workshop she's constructed somewhere or other. She is, of course, manufacturing yet another poison dart gun what is this, the third one she's made? Seriously, what is this faggot author's obsession with dart guns?. She is still suffering immensely from the effects of mint withdrawal, radiation sickness, iron-bar-through-the-leg, and whatever the fuck else she has, although it's not clear why she hasn't received treatment for these ailments now that they are all safely back at the tower. Velvet is at her side, providing words of encouragement. She seems to have warmed up to the plan, ostensibly because she was moved by the plight of Monterrey Jack's soon-to-be-orphaned children.
>Velvet Remedy nodded and gave me a little nuzzle. “Your heart is always in the right place, Littlepip.”
The fact that it hasn't yet been blown out of her ribcage is probably a big plus in this setting.
>She backed up, giving me a sad smile. “Your mind maybe not so much. But I’ve learned to believe in your heart…” She looked down, scuffing the floor with her hoof. “I do care about you, you know.”
"Oh, Mary Sue, you are so caring and wise," said Captain James T. Kirk. "I want to kiss you all over..."
Anyway, Littlepoop is immediately thrown off by Velvet's behavior here, as she appears to be once again trying to seduce her. This comes right on the heels of Velvet's earlier efforts to get LP and Homage together. LP gets flustered and tries to change the subject, noting the presence of a red wagon that seems to have mysteriously appeared in the corner. This is likely provided as a clue for what is about to happen.
LP, meanwhile, redirects her attention to the gun. Velvet asks some perfunctory questions about its construction, though continues with her coy seductress routine:
>“Let me see,” Velvet cooed. I floated out one of my poisoned darts and set it into the dart gun. Velvet Remedy wrapped her telekinesis around it and lifted it to her eye, checking the alignment. It occurred to me that a non-lethal weapon like the dart gun should hold quite the appeal for my more pacifistic friend.
It's worth noting that her "more pacifistic friend" was recently seen blasting gigantic bats with a combat shotgun, which no one seemed to consider unusual despite how out of character it was for her. It's also worth noting that Velvet already has a dart gun, which LP gave to her specifically because she wanted a more pacifistic weapon. The fate of this dart gun is unknown; she just suddenly and inexplicably stopped using it within the space of this last chapter, and began favoring the combat shotgun, which it is unclear how she obtained, since it was last seen in Littlepoop's possession.
>I remembered my earlier worries. How much would Velvet Remedy benefit, psychologically and spiritually, from being able to handle enemies without further soaking her own hooves in blood and death? Dammit, why didn’t I think of this before?
Again, you did think of this before, and that's why you gave her the dart gun in the first place. There are some other issues here too; for instance, would being able to temporarily incapacitate her enemies really benefit Velvet that much "psychologically and spiritually" when her friends LP and Calamity are still blowing them away left and right? I really don't understand how this author thinks about these kinds of things, but it's getting to the point where I'm just too tired to analyze most of these minor points.
Anyway, all of this proves to be moot anyway, because while LP was musing on this, Velvet somehow gets hold of the now-finished dart gun and fires a single dart into LP, causing her to lose consciousness. Apparently, Velvet was once again taking advantage of LP's attraction to her to get something she wanted, in this case getting her to let her guard down so she could take the dart gun away.
One of the most frustrating things about going through these amateur-hour stories so closely is noticing the directions the author could have taken things had he just been a slightly better writer. Velvet is a shit character for a number of reasons I've already gone over, but what's frustrating here is that she actually could have been the most interesting (or at least the most fun) character in the entire story, but the author just blew it big time.
One of the things I commented on fairly early was that Velvet could have been turned into a sort of Faye Valentine type character: the mature, beautiful, cynical femme fatale who callously uses her looks and charm to manipulate others into doing what she wants. This impression is bolstered by what Nigel II pointed out earlier: that she is aware of LP's crush on her and used it to her advantage in order to escape the stable. What's even more frustrating is that this might actually have been what the author was trying to do: he established that she has a knack for smooth-talking ponies, and we've seen this rather callous manipulation of LP's crush on her before. However, this author also has absolutely no talent for characterization, and so we get this discordant mishmash of contradictory traits: she clearly has a talent for manipulation and knows how to use her sex appeal to her advantage, but at the same time she is portrayed as this compassionate Fluttershy knockoff who loves all creatures great and small and abhors violence. Now, if her goody-two-horseshoes persona was supposed to just be an act she puts on in order to manipulate ponies, sort of like Golly in the later seasons of the show, that could have been interesting. However, the author has conveyed no such impression; so far as I can tell, her compassionate, pacifistic side is supposed to be taken seriously, so the result is that she just looks like a wishy-washy, insincere hypocrite most of the time.
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>>303831
Page break. As Littlepoop is losing consciousness from the dart, she swears she will kill Velvet Remedy. In the hands of a competent writer, this might indicate a gripping plot twist: the heroine has just been callously betrayed by the pony she has loved and looked up to for the better part of the story so far, and this betrayal cuts so deep that she vows to take her revenge in blood. However, in the hands of this writer, it's probably going to go absolutely nowhere. In fact, I'm assuming that the reason for Velvet's "betrayal" will turn out to be completely asinine. My current working theory is that she knocked LP unconscious in order to drag her off to rehab for her mint problem. Let's see if I'm right.
The first part of the microscene consists of LP's hazy recollections of being transported to wherever she is currently. She recalls a trip on a wagon, and being in an elevator at one point. Now, as she regains consciousness, she finds herself strapped to a medical table. Her first thought, of course, is that Velvet is somehow in cahoots with the unnamed ghoul doctor who was working on her earlier, and brought her back to his evil lair for further experimentation. This is, of course, quite absurd for a number of obvious reasons.
Anyway, tl;dr, my theory was correct: Velvet and Calamity cooked up a plan to get Littlepoop into rehab. Apparently, Calamity is not happy with how Velvet approached it, but she feels it was necessary due to LP's recent actions. Specifically, she was concerned that LP's plan to rescue Monterrey Jack would get them barred from Tenpony before they could get her to agree to treatment, so Velvet took drastic action.
Page break. When LP wakes up again (she lost consciousness again at the end of the last microscene), literally nothing has changed. She is still strapped to a medical table, and she is still hopping mad that her so-called friends would trick her like this. It's worth noting that her anger is focused entirely on her friends' supposed betrayal of her, mixed with some whiny half-admissions of her supposed drug problem. The really significant issue here, from where I'm standing, is that by forcing her into rehab, Velvet has essentially condemned Monterrey Jack to death. I mean, technically he was already condemned to die, but since LP was going to rescue him, and since she is the author's chosen almighty Mary Sue we can take it as a given that she would have automatically succeeded, then Velvet has essentially chosen to sacrifice Monterrey Jack's life in order to cure LP's cocaine addiction. If LP genuinely cared about Monterrey Jack and wanted to save him, she should be absolutely furious about this, but at present she is only thinking about her own problems.
Anyway, the microscene mostly consists of a long conversation between LP and Dr. Helpinghoof, the drug rehab consultant. There isn't anything in here that is really worth going over in detail. The doctor basically just explains to her that the crack mints grant enhanced cognitive abilities to whoever takes them, but the resulting withdrawal has the opposite effect, resulting in slower thinking when the person pony, whatever is not taking them. Over time, this develops into a complete dependency; the pony is incapable of thinking on their own without using the drug.
A somewhat interesting detail of LP's backstory is also given: we learn that LP's mother was an alcoholic, and apparently addiction runs in her family. I feel like this may have been mentioned once or twice already, but this is the first time it has actually factored into anything.
>I ground my teeth, staring everywhere but at the doctor. He waited patiently until my spit and fury subsided enough to answer, “Well, her cutie mark was a glass of hard apple cider. What else was she going to do?”
>“You do know that cutie marks don’t control your destiny, right?”
I thought that was the entire point of cutie marks.
Oh yeah, one more thing. At the very end of the conversation, LP finally remembers that she was supposed to be helping Monterrey Jack escape from prison, and asks the doctor when they were going to execute him. The doctor informs her that the execution took place two hours ago and that he is already dead.
Page break. In the next scene, LP seems to have made a full recovery. Velvet enters the room and removes the straps holding her down (shouldn't an orderly or something be handling that?). A predictable conversation follows, in which Velvet explains that she did what she had to do, but does not expect LP to forgive her. LP replies that this is all well and good, as she had not planned on forgiving her. She also lays the death of Monterrey Jack and the orphaning of his children at her feet hooves, whatever.
As an added bit of sadness porn, we learn that, in addition to being made orphans, Monterrey's children are now going to be tossed out into the cold cruel world of the wasteland:
>I recalled the doctor’s words: Tenpony Tower is a “meritocracy” according to Helpinghoof, not a socialist commune. Those who have not earned their right to be here, and who cannot afford the privilege to be here, have no place here. The colts and filly would be kicked out of the Tower at the end of the month.
As with most of kkat's attempts at heart-wrenching, this one is a little too silly and improbable to have much impact.
It's likely that if Monterrey understood that attempted robbery carried a death sentence in Tenpony, he would also reasonably have known that his children would also be kicked out. Since this is effectively a death sentence for them as well, it makes his confession and his reasons for confessing even sillier than they were already. Also, this bit of information makes Homage's presence in the Tower even more questionable. If anyone fits the definition of a useless eater, it's her. What exactly is she doing to earn her keep?
Page break. As Littlepoop is losing consciousness from the dart, she swears she will kill Velvet Remedy. In the hands of a competent writer, this might indicate a gripping plot twist: the heroine has just been callously betrayed by the pony she has loved and looked up to for the better part of the story so far, and this betrayal cuts so deep that she vows to take her revenge in blood. However, in the hands of this writer, it's probably going to go absolutely nowhere. In fact, I'm assuming that the reason for Velvet's "betrayal" will turn out to be completely asinine. My current working theory is that she knocked LP unconscious in order to drag her off to rehab for her mint problem. Let's see if I'm right.
The first part of the microscene consists of LP's hazy recollections of being transported to wherever she is currently. She recalls a trip on a wagon, and being in an elevator at one point. Now, as she regains consciousness, she finds herself strapped to a medical table. Her first thought, of course, is that Velvet is somehow in cahoots with the unnamed ghoul doctor who was working on her earlier, and brought her back to his evil lair for further experimentation. This is, of course, quite absurd for a number of obvious reasons.
Anyway, tl;dr, my theory was correct: Velvet and Calamity cooked up a plan to get Littlepoop into rehab. Apparently, Calamity is not happy with how Velvet approached it, but she feels it was necessary due to LP's recent actions. Specifically, she was concerned that LP's plan to rescue Monterrey Jack would get them barred from Tenpony before they could get her to agree to treatment, so Velvet took drastic action.
Page break. When LP wakes up again (she lost consciousness again at the end of the last microscene), literally nothing has changed. She is still strapped to a medical table, and she is still hopping mad that her so-called friends would trick her like this. It's worth noting that her anger is focused entirely on her friends' supposed betrayal of her, mixed with some whiny half-admissions of her supposed drug problem. The really significant issue here, from where I'm standing, is that by forcing her into rehab, Velvet has essentially condemned Monterrey Jack to death. I mean, technically he was already condemned to die, but since LP was going to rescue him, and since she is the author's chosen almighty Mary Sue we can take it as a given that she would have automatically succeeded, then Velvet has essentially chosen to sacrifice Monterrey Jack's life in order to cure LP's cocaine addiction. If LP genuinely cared about Monterrey Jack and wanted to save him, she should be absolutely furious about this, but at present she is only thinking about her own problems.
Anyway, the microscene mostly consists of a long conversation between LP and Dr. Helpinghoof, the drug rehab consultant. There isn't anything in here that is really worth going over in detail. The doctor basically just explains to her that the crack mints grant enhanced cognitive abilities to whoever takes them, but the resulting withdrawal has the opposite effect, resulting in slower thinking when the person pony, whatever is not taking them. Over time, this develops into a complete dependency; the pony is incapable of thinking on their own without using the drug.
A somewhat interesting detail of LP's backstory is also given: we learn that LP's mother was an alcoholic, and apparently addiction runs in her family. I feel like this may have been mentioned once or twice already, but this is the first time it has actually factored into anything.
>I ground my teeth, staring everywhere but at the doctor. He waited patiently until my spit and fury subsided enough to answer, “Well, her cutie mark was a glass of hard apple cider. What else was she going to do?”
>“You do know that cutie marks don’t control your destiny, right?”
I thought that was the entire point of cutie marks.
Oh yeah, one more thing. At the very end of the conversation, LP finally remembers that she was supposed to be helping Monterrey Jack escape from prison, and asks the doctor when they were going to execute him. The doctor informs her that the execution took place two hours ago and that he is already dead.
Page break. In the next scene, LP seems to have made a full recovery. Velvet enters the room and removes the straps holding her down (shouldn't an orderly or something be handling that?). A predictable conversation follows, in which Velvet explains that she did what she had to do, but does not expect LP to forgive her. LP replies that this is all well and good, as she had not planned on forgiving her. She also lays the death of Monterrey Jack and the orphaning of his children at her feet hooves, whatever.
As an added bit of sadness porn, we learn that, in addition to being made orphans, Monterrey's children are now going to be tossed out into the cold cruel world of the wasteland:
>I recalled the doctor’s words: Tenpony Tower is a “meritocracy” according to Helpinghoof, not a socialist commune. Those who have not earned their right to be here, and who cannot afford the privilege to be here, have no place here. The colts and filly would be kicked out of the Tower at the end of the month.
As with most of kkat's attempts at heart-wrenching, this one is a little too silly and improbable to have much impact.
It's likely that if Monterrey understood that attempted robbery carried a death sentence in Tenpony, he would also reasonably have known that his children would also be kicked out. Since this is effectively a death sentence for them as well, it makes his confession and his reasons for confessing even sillier than they were already. Also, this bit of information makes Homage's presence in the Tower even more questionable. If anyone fits the definition of a useless eater, it's her. What exactly is she doing to earn her keep?
>>303831
The "I am a stupid author who does not realize manipulating others, especially with sex appeal, is actually a morally reprehensible thing to do" thing is a surprisingly common mistake amateur authors make.
Christ, if I had a nickel for every female OC whose newfag author says "she likes using her sex appeal to get what she wants" without realizing it makes her a manipulative cunt...
Do you think it's because hollywood shows glamorize the femme fatale as a strong capable smart heroic-rogue of a woman who's morally right to effortlessly play the stupid sex-obsessed men around her like violins for personal gain?
Or do you think the authors just really really want to say "this character is very sexy" and this seems like the easiest and most obvious way to "show dont tell" that?
The "I am a stupid author who does not realize manipulating others, especially with sex appeal, is actually a morally reprehensible thing to do" thing is a surprisingly common mistake amateur authors make.
Christ, if I had a nickel for every female OC whose newfag author says "she likes using her sex appeal to get what she wants" without realizing it makes her a manipulative cunt...
Do you think it's because hollywood shows glamorize the femme fatale as a strong capable smart heroic-rogue of a woman who's morally right to effortlessly play the stupid sex-obsessed men around her like violins for personal gain?
Or do you think the authors just really really want to say "this character is very sexy" and this seems like the easiest and most obvious way to "show dont tell" that?
>>303847
Anyway, as punishment for her whole asinine rehab scheme, Littlepoop tasks Velvet with finding Monterrey's children and explaining to them that they will now be staying at Shattered Hoof with a bunch of Talons. Oh, also, LP decides that that's where they are going to live from now on. Seems to me it would have made sense to at least talk to them first, and maybe find out if they had any relatives or anything they could stay with before making this decision for them. You'd think it might also concern her at least a little that she has absolutely no guarantee that Gawd will even accept them.
LP claims she is "calling in the favor" that the Talons owe her, but it's technically only Blackwing's group that owes her the favor, and all she's asking them to do is transport the orphans. It's entirely up to Gawd to decide whether or not to take them in, and nothing the author has told us about either her personally or the rules by which her group lives suggests that she would be interested in caring for three strange children that a casual acquaintance just dumped on her. Who's to say she won't just tell them to fuck off and slam the door on them? Blackwing probably wouldn't take them back at that point; if I understand the Talons, they take their contracts literally. If LP tasks them with delivering three orphans to Shattered Hoof, then that is what they would do; beyond that, the kids are on their own, whether they are welcomed or not.
The more I think about this plan, the less sense it makes, and the more annoyed I am that both LP and the author seem to believe that she is doing something noble here. The last orphan foal that LP saved was Silver Bell, and as I recall she sent her back to New Appleoosa with Derpy. That would be a far more sensible place to send her than Shattered Hoof. What's more is that using the Talons to transport these three is reckless and irresponsible. If she really gives a shit, why doesn't she assume responsibility and escort the three orphans to NA, or Shattered Hoof, or wherever she wants them to go? She had no problem doing this sort of thing for the ponies of Shantytown, or whatever that town was called that she brought the ghoul doctor's victims home to. Plus, don't they have an airship or something now? Seems like ferrying these kids around would be relatively easy for this group, and it's not like they have anything better to do. The author might argue that LP's being in rehab might make this impossible, but I would point out that the orphans can remain in Tenpony until the end of the month; that should be plenty of time.
Anyway, Velvet agrees to this arrangement. The three unnamed orphans have now been neatly and conveniently accounted for, without Littlepoop having to assume any real responsibility or learn any real lessons. End of scene.
Page break. The next microscene is even more micro than usual. It's only six paragraphs long, and consists of Calamity apologizing to Littlepoop for getting her hooked on crack mints in the first place. He apparently has been feeling guilty about this for some time now:
>Flaming sun-farts. Calamity was right. For the first time, I considered what seeing me losing it to those things must be doing to him. Had he been tearing himself up all this time? Oh merciful Celestia, what had I been doing to my friends?
I have completely lost all ability to tell which parts of this story I'm supposed to be laughing at, so to be safe I've just been laughing at all of it. However, this paragraph made me laugh even harder than usual, and it wasn't just because of "flaming sun-farts."
Page break. Littlepoop has apparently breezed through 8 out of 12 steps of rehab, and is now in the process of making amends for her shitty behavior. Unfortunately, this only applies to her shitty behavior while on drugs, and only the behavior which she (and the author) consider shitty.
First, she goes to SteelHooves and apologizes for not being there for him when he was hurting. No, really; this character who has probably spoken less than twenty lines of dialogue in this entire story so far has apparently been hurting:
>“I’ve been… out of it for a long time,” I admitted. “I’ve missed things. Obvious things. Or, at least, been too slow in coming to them.” I swallowed. “For example, you told me that the Ministry of Technology funded Four Stars. And then you discovered what they did. I can’t imagine how that must have hit you…”
I have completely forgotten what Four Stars was or what they were doing, or why SteelHooves would give a shit about any of it. Was Four Stars the group that was putting pony brains into robots? Or were they the group that hired a bunch of zebra zombies to smuggle an atomic bomb into Manehattan? This story is so convoluted and ridiculous that I can no longer keep track of all the insane shit the author has flung at us. However, Littlepoop is sorry, and that's what matters. I guess.
Anyway, even though the microscene begins with this line (author's italics preserved):
>I had a lot of apologizing to do.
Littlepoop only actually apologizes to one pony: SteelHooves. Then:
>For the next half of an hour, I focused on getting my PipBuck working again.
Yeah, don't feel too bad, LP; most ponies fudge their way through step nine. Just ask Pony George Costanza oy vey it's a Seinfeld™ reference.
Anyway, once she has the PipBuck working, she calls Blackwing and explains what she wants her to do. Blackwing grumbles but accepts the quest. After that, SteelHooves drops this weird little nugget of angst out of absolutely nowhere:
>“Littlepip, you’re the sort of mare who makes me wish I was a better pony.” He sounded… sad? “Only one other mare has ever made me feel that way. And sooner or later, you’re bound to learn, just like she did, that I’m not a better pony.”
I'll say it again: I can no longer tell which parts of this story I'm supposed to be laughing at, but I'm pretty much laughing at all of it.
Anyway, as punishment for her whole asinine rehab scheme, Littlepoop tasks Velvet with finding Monterrey's children and explaining to them that they will now be staying at Shattered Hoof with a bunch of Talons. Oh, also, LP decides that that's where they are going to live from now on. Seems to me it would have made sense to at least talk to them first, and maybe find out if they had any relatives or anything they could stay with before making this decision for them. You'd think it might also concern her at least a little that she has absolutely no guarantee that Gawd will even accept them.
LP claims she is "calling in the favor" that the Talons owe her, but it's technically only Blackwing's group that owes her the favor, and all she's asking them to do is transport the orphans. It's entirely up to Gawd to decide whether or not to take them in, and nothing the author has told us about either her personally or the rules by which her group lives suggests that she would be interested in caring for three strange children that a casual acquaintance just dumped on her. Who's to say she won't just tell them to fuck off and slam the door on them? Blackwing probably wouldn't take them back at that point; if I understand the Talons, they take their contracts literally. If LP tasks them with delivering three orphans to Shattered Hoof, then that is what they would do; beyond that, the kids are on their own, whether they are welcomed or not.
The more I think about this plan, the less sense it makes, and the more annoyed I am that both LP and the author seem to believe that she is doing something noble here. The last orphan foal that LP saved was Silver Bell, and as I recall she sent her back to New Appleoosa with Derpy. That would be a far more sensible place to send her than Shattered Hoof. What's more is that using the Talons to transport these three is reckless and irresponsible. If she really gives a shit, why doesn't she assume responsibility and escort the three orphans to NA, or Shattered Hoof, or wherever she wants them to go? She had no problem doing this sort of thing for the ponies of Shantytown, or whatever that town was called that she brought the ghoul doctor's victims home to. Plus, don't they have an airship or something now? Seems like ferrying these kids around would be relatively easy for this group, and it's not like they have anything better to do. The author might argue that LP's being in rehab might make this impossible, but I would point out that the orphans can remain in Tenpony until the end of the month; that should be plenty of time.
Anyway, Velvet agrees to this arrangement. The three unnamed orphans have now been neatly and conveniently accounted for, without Littlepoop having to assume any real responsibility or learn any real lessons. End of scene.
Page break. The next microscene is even more micro than usual. It's only six paragraphs long, and consists of Calamity apologizing to Littlepoop for getting her hooked on crack mints in the first place. He apparently has been feeling guilty about this for some time now:
>Flaming sun-farts. Calamity was right. For the first time, I considered what seeing me losing it to those things must be doing to him. Had he been tearing himself up all this time? Oh merciful Celestia, what had I been doing to my friends?
I have completely lost all ability to tell which parts of this story I'm supposed to be laughing at, so to be safe I've just been laughing at all of it. However, this paragraph made me laugh even harder than usual, and it wasn't just because of "flaming sun-farts."
Page break. Littlepoop has apparently breezed through 8 out of 12 steps of rehab, and is now in the process of making amends for her shitty behavior. Unfortunately, this only applies to her shitty behavior while on drugs, and only the behavior which she (and the author) consider shitty.
First, she goes to SteelHooves and apologizes for not being there for him when he was hurting. No, really; this character who has probably spoken less than twenty lines of dialogue in this entire story so far has apparently been hurting:
>“I’ve been… out of it for a long time,” I admitted. “I’ve missed things. Obvious things. Or, at least, been too slow in coming to them.” I swallowed. “For example, you told me that the Ministry of Technology funded Four Stars. And then you discovered what they did. I can’t imagine how that must have hit you…”
I have completely forgotten what Four Stars was or what they were doing, or why SteelHooves would give a shit about any of it. Was Four Stars the group that was putting pony brains into robots? Or were they the group that hired a bunch of zebra zombies to smuggle an atomic bomb into Manehattan? This story is so convoluted and ridiculous that I can no longer keep track of all the insane shit the author has flung at us. However, Littlepoop is sorry, and that's what matters. I guess.
Anyway, even though the microscene begins with this line (author's italics preserved):
>I had a lot of apologizing to do.
Littlepoop only actually apologizes to one pony: SteelHooves. Then:
>For the next half of an hour, I focused on getting my PipBuck working again.
Yeah, don't feel too bad, LP; most ponies fudge their way through step nine. Just ask Pony George Costanza oy vey it's a Seinfeld™ reference.
Anyway, once she has the PipBuck working, she calls Blackwing and explains what she wants her to do. Blackwing grumbles but accepts the quest. After that, SteelHooves drops this weird little nugget of angst out of absolutely nowhere:
>“Littlepip, you’re the sort of mare who makes me wish I was a better pony.” He sounded… sad? “Only one other mare has ever made me feel that way. And sooner or later, you’re bound to learn, just like she did, that I’m not a better pony.”
I'll say it again: I can no longer tell which parts of this story I'm supposed to be laughing at, but I'm pretty much laughing at all of it.
>>303849
Almost every heroic group has one obligatory big guy of the crew.
The big tough guy who likes big guns or big melee weapons or his bare fists, he's straightforward and uncomplicated, and he might be stupid.
Some works play around with these archetypes.
Sometimes the big dumb idiot only sounds retarded because he barely speaks english and he's eloquent in his native language with 69 PHDs in russian literature, like Heavy from TF2.
Sometimes the big tough fighter guy hates violence like the big guy from Storm Hawks.
Sometimes the massive motherfucker wears skimpy barbarian pelts like Vaike from Fire Emblem Awakening and sometimes he wears excessive armour like Kellam from Fire Emblem Awakening. But there's more to them than that, Vaike wants to inspire people from his slums hometown and make life better for them while Kellam is a joke character who lacks presence and can sneak up on anyone. Fellow big guys from the same game like Sully the angry chick and Frederick the comically-serious overly-dedicated butler have their own characterization gimmicks.
Sometimes the role of "best and toughest fighter" is filled by a little girl with immense magical might like Toph from Avatar, or the toughest/fastest one in the group like AJ/Rainbow Dash from MLP.
But this story's take on "big guy" seems incredibly dull.
Steelhooves is a big guy in a suit of armour. Take that away and what is he?
Not a tech genius who built his own armour and regularly upgrades it. Calamity is the one who wanted to upgrade his guns at Tenpony Tower.
He's not some glorious righteous Lawful Good paladin or a subversion of that trope like the fallen paladin who lost his way or the "grey jedi" who knows you sometimes doing the right thing means going outside the law/divine codex. He isn't particularly heroic or unheroic so far and I struggle to think of any way to describe the characterization he's shown.
Calamity is the yeehaw shotgun-shooting pegasus and Steelhooves is the grr military grenade-gun/minigun-shooting power armour earth pony. The author isn't very good at writing masculine characters or their interactions with others so what little shreds of characterization they get blur them together and step on each others toes. Hooves, whatever. Both like guns and violence and neither is particularly socially-graceful like LP or Velvet. (even though those two characters aren't charismatic and the author usually skips Charisma Check/Speech Skill Check scenes because he sucks at writing social manipulators intentionally)
He hunts Alicorns and his wife AJ is dead just like Boone from FNV hunts the Legion and his wife Carla is dead. But Boone hated the Legion for the role they played in killing his wife, he hated the Legion and loved the NCR and unironically thought Vegas was "NCR land for the most part" and "tamed by the NCR". Yeah, say that in Fiend or Powder Ganger territory. Fuck NCR, House's ending has you hold the gun of every securitron to their heads and make them act like the morally-upright "benevolent peacekeeping force" those in that self-interested army see themselves as.
Who the fuck is Steelhooves? We know he was in a relationship with Applejack and he might be a 200ish year old ghoul but what about his age or pre-war perspective on things changes who he is? Does he feel insecure about the fact that despite living in Edgequestria for 200 years he has been unable to create serious change for the better but Littlepip in just a few weeks has had a huge impact on the world and even gotten her metaphorical dick deepthroated by the radio whore?
Raul from FNV was fucking ancient and full of self doubt. Calamity the Ghoul Doctor in Jacobstown and her "i like to travel and take on new names/identities" gimmick foreshadowed what he might do in one of his many possible endings, the one where you don't solve his issues.
Also, he was in a relationship with Applejack. But... why?
What about this OC before or after Equestria became Edgequestria makes you say "yeah, I can see why AJ would like him"?
Does he kill Alicorns because he wants to keep the wasteland from getting taken over by what he considers "its worst predator" to be? Or is it a personal quest where he just loves testing out his big guns against bigger targets? Does he prioritize alicorns over raiders/slavers because they're harder to kill than slavers anypony could kill or because he hates alicorns more? Will he ever encounter a sad little filly full of scars and tragic raped backstory stuff who asks "why didn't you kill raiders?" and forces him to reconsider his hyperfocus on alicorns?
Has he grown distant from the poners he saves and forgotten why he hunts monsters in the first place? Or is he so bent on hunting monsters he's given up on human(pony) interaction until hearing the legend of LP on the radio makes him curious and willing to try working in a team again?
Is he a true believer of what his faction preaches or not? Does he come into conflict with the ex-Enclave Dashite Calamity over their respective beliefs? Does he think Calamity is a little bitch for leaving the Enclave or a cunt for ever having anything to do with them?
Characterizing him strongly early on would make up for his lack of screentime and overall importance to the narrative. It would let the author set up some expectations like "he is a heroic legend spoken of in myth, an invincible shield who loves to protect the innocent and kill Alicorns" and then add depth to it with a line like "he saves poners now because he feels bad about being unable to save those he cared for in the past".
The best superhero comics try to make their superheroes and supervillains more than their supername and gimmicks/superpowers and costume. They try to make characters out of the one-note memes who are just there to fill archetypical roles out of obligation.
It's hard to see Steeltoes as anything other than his costume and weapon and silly names.
Almost every heroic group has one obligatory big guy of the crew.
The big tough guy who likes big guns or big melee weapons or his bare fists, he's straightforward and uncomplicated, and he might be stupid.
Some works play around with these archetypes.
Sometimes the big dumb idiot only sounds retarded because he barely speaks english and he's eloquent in his native language with 69 PHDs in russian literature, like Heavy from TF2.
Sometimes the big tough fighter guy hates violence like the big guy from Storm Hawks.
Sometimes the massive motherfucker wears skimpy barbarian pelts like Vaike from Fire Emblem Awakening and sometimes he wears excessive armour like Kellam from Fire Emblem Awakening. But there's more to them than that, Vaike wants to inspire people from his slums hometown and make life better for them while Kellam is a joke character who lacks presence and can sneak up on anyone. Fellow big guys from the same game like Sully the angry chick and Frederick the comically-serious overly-dedicated butler have their own characterization gimmicks.
Sometimes the role of "best and toughest fighter" is filled by a little girl with immense magical might like Toph from Avatar, or the toughest/fastest one in the group like AJ/Rainbow Dash from MLP.
But this story's take on "big guy" seems incredibly dull.
Steelhooves is a big guy in a suit of armour. Take that away and what is he?
Not a tech genius who built his own armour and regularly upgrades it. Calamity is the one who wanted to upgrade his guns at Tenpony Tower.
He's not some glorious righteous Lawful Good paladin or a subversion of that trope like the fallen paladin who lost his way or the "grey jedi" who knows you sometimes doing the right thing means going outside the law/divine codex. He isn't particularly heroic or unheroic so far and I struggle to think of any way to describe the characterization he's shown.
Calamity is the yeehaw shotgun-shooting pegasus and Steelhooves is the grr military grenade-gun/minigun-shooting power armour earth pony. The author isn't very good at writing masculine characters or their interactions with others so what little shreds of characterization they get blur them together and step on each others toes. Hooves, whatever. Both like guns and violence and neither is particularly socially-graceful like LP or Velvet. (even though those two characters aren't charismatic and the author usually skips Charisma Check/Speech Skill Check scenes because he sucks at writing social manipulators intentionally)
He hunts Alicorns and his wife AJ is dead just like Boone from FNV hunts the Legion and his wife Carla is dead. But Boone hated the Legion for the role they played in killing his wife, he hated the Legion and loved the NCR and unironically thought Vegas was "NCR land for the most part" and "tamed by the NCR". Yeah, say that in Fiend or Powder Ganger territory. Fuck NCR, House's ending has you hold the gun of every securitron to their heads and make them act like the morally-upright "benevolent peacekeeping force" those in that self-interested army see themselves as.
Who the fuck is Steelhooves? We know he was in a relationship with Applejack and he might be a 200ish year old ghoul but what about his age or pre-war perspective on things changes who he is? Does he feel insecure about the fact that despite living in Edgequestria for 200 years he has been unable to create serious change for the better but Littlepip in just a few weeks has had a huge impact on the world and even gotten her metaphorical dick deepthroated by the radio whore?
Raul from FNV was fucking ancient and full of self doubt. Calamity the Ghoul Doctor in Jacobstown and her "i like to travel and take on new names/identities" gimmick foreshadowed what he might do in one of his many possible endings, the one where you don't solve his issues.
Also, he was in a relationship with Applejack. But... why?
What about this OC before or after Equestria became Edgequestria makes you say "yeah, I can see why AJ would like him"?
Does he kill Alicorns because he wants to keep the wasteland from getting taken over by what he considers "its worst predator" to be? Or is it a personal quest where he just loves testing out his big guns against bigger targets? Does he prioritize alicorns over raiders/slavers because they're harder to kill than slavers anypony could kill or because he hates alicorns more? Will he ever encounter a sad little filly full of scars and tragic raped backstory stuff who asks "why didn't you kill raiders?" and forces him to reconsider his hyperfocus on alicorns?
Has he grown distant from the poners he saves and forgotten why he hunts monsters in the first place? Or is he so bent on hunting monsters he's given up on human(pony) interaction until hearing the legend of LP on the radio makes him curious and willing to try working in a team again?
Is he a true believer of what his faction preaches or not? Does he come into conflict with the ex-Enclave Dashite Calamity over their respective beliefs? Does he think Calamity is a little bitch for leaving the Enclave or a cunt for ever having anything to do with them?
Characterizing him strongly early on would make up for his lack of screentime and overall importance to the narrative. It would let the author set up some expectations like "he is a heroic legend spoken of in myth, an invincible shield who loves to protect the innocent and kill Alicorns" and then add depth to it with a line like "he saves poners now because he feels bad about being unable to save those he cared for in the past".
The best superhero comics try to make their superheroes and supervillains more than their supername and gimmicks/superpowers and costume. They try to make characters out of the one-note memes who are just there to fill archetypical roles out of obligation.
It's hard to see Steeltoes as anything other than his costume and weapon and silly names.
>>302867
>Hard Reset
>>302924
>Horsing Around, by HermitBunny
I'll go ahead and add these to the queue.
>>302986
>You have already done that one. It was the one about that space marine that ended up in ponyland
I thought there was one other green that you had asked me to look at besides the space marine one, but I might be mistaken. Sorry, I try to keep track of everything that people suggest but I don't always succeed.
>Hard Reset
>>302924
>Horsing Around, by HermitBunny
I'll go ahead and add these to the queue.
>>302986
>You have already done that one. It was the one about that space marine that ended up in ponyland
I thought there was one other green that you had asked me to look at besides the space marine one, but I might be mistaken. Sorry, I try to keep track of everything that people suggest but I don't always succeed.
>>303847
Keep in mind that in fallout, addictions can be handwaved away almost magically in a moment by any town doctor. There exists a drug that also alleviates withdrawal systems. That coupled with the fact this is a magic setting with crazy tech (like talismans, who can conjure stuff from nothing) is a bit funny. It seems Kkat likes picking and choosing how to use the video game logic in varying levels of consistency and accuracy, depending on the sort of drama they wish to foster.
Keep in mind that in fallout, addictions can be handwaved away almost magically in a moment by any town doctor. There exists a drug that also alleviates withdrawal systems. That coupled with the fact this is a magic setting with crazy tech (like talismans, who can conjure stuff from nothing) is a bit funny. It seems Kkat likes picking and choosing how to use the video game logic in varying levels of consistency and accuracy, depending on the sort of drama they wish to foster.
1615832482.png (621.8 KB, 768x608, 5eb9a6b9-0ec3-4b47-a014-19dd3eed2a64.png)
>>303849
This whole ordeal makes me think. Steelhooves praising Littlepip. Homage, too. This whole event being caused because Monterrey Jack because his kids look up to her.
What has she DONE? Fucked over trade relations with a town, killed some raiders in Ponyville, cleared out a stable for New Appleoosa. She's a saint when she arrives at the tower, but this just makes me think why?
I understand that it's because Fallout 3 wanted a tangible reaction to scripted quests and encounters you complete and that's fair, but it brings a whole host of questions. You don't become a wasteland savior even then by completing one quest. Three-Dog just comments on it and moves on with the news.
I think Kkat, in transplanting video game concepts, has forgotten how to make a reasonable or understandable setting or world. They take the idea of Three-Dog heralding you as a force for good and use that as the only gauge of morality, instead of thinking on it on a deeper level. you did this thing like the game, therefore you're good and a hero. It's pretty clueless.
I also wonder about other people in the setting. She's the only pony like this, and gets her dick sucked for such minor things. Are there really no others in the setting accomplishing stuff like her? I heard people talking in other contexts about making a world feel lived-in and expansive by mentioning other places (take Star-Wars) for example, and this could do a lot to alleviate the focus on Pip's sue-ness and having the world center around her and her only.
In fact, even going by the story's logic itself, there SHOULD be other news reports. She basically STUMBLES into praise by clearing out a building and finding a hidden sidequest. Why aren't we hearing about John McBumblefuck who cleared out a radscorpion nest which just so HAPPENED to be harassing a town, thus people think he's a hero? She's the protagonist, sure, and can do things others cannot. Realistically in these games you as the player have a mass advantage of levels and game knowledge. Most RPGs highlight certain enemies as being "World-level-threats" which you can stroll up to in iron armor and beat to death while tanking hits just fine. It's a discrepancy between realism of a world and gameplay concessions. You can't really have a nameless nobody strolling around killing hundreds of tough monsters like Littlepip has, because they're not special enough. In a realistic setting too, everyone is on equal ground and your tactical knowledge and quality of your guns/ allies determines how "Strong" you are, and anyone could catch one wrong bullet or one infected bite and it's game over. So this would make it even more difficult for unnamed randoms to succeed. However, we've already seen strong "Unique" individuals: Calamity, Steelhooves, and so on. Surely there's more ponies out there who can pull off the minor feats Littlepip and co have accomplished.
I just wonder what the scale of this is. What warrants a reaction from the DJ? How big does your group have to be before you're labelled as a safety concern for the area around? What is the level of your deed necessary to get you deemed a hero or significant pony? Etc.
This whole ordeal makes me think. Steelhooves praising Littlepip. Homage, too. This whole event being caused because Monterrey Jack because his kids look up to her.
What has she DONE? Fucked over trade relations with a town, killed some raiders in Ponyville, cleared out a stable for New Appleoosa. She's a saint when she arrives at the tower, but this just makes me think why?
I understand that it's because Fallout 3 wanted a tangible reaction to scripted quests and encounters you complete and that's fair, but it brings a whole host of questions. You don't become a wasteland savior even then by completing one quest. Three-Dog just comments on it and moves on with the news.
I think Kkat, in transplanting video game concepts, has forgotten how to make a reasonable or understandable setting or world. They take the idea of Three-Dog heralding you as a force for good and use that as the only gauge of morality, instead of thinking on it on a deeper level. you did this thing like the game, therefore you're good and a hero. It's pretty clueless.
I also wonder about other people in the setting. She's the only pony like this, and gets her dick sucked for such minor things. Are there really no others in the setting accomplishing stuff like her? I heard people talking in other contexts about making a world feel lived-in and expansive by mentioning other places (take Star-Wars) for example, and this could do a lot to alleviate the focus on Pip's sue-ness and having the world center around her and her only.
In fact, even going by the story's logic itself, there SHOULD be other news reports. She basically STUMBLES into praise by clearing out a building and finding a hidden sidequest. Why aren't we hearing about John McBumblefuck who cleared out a radscorpion nest which just so HAPPENED to be harassing a town, thus people think he's a hero? She's the protagonist, sure, and can do things others cannot. Realistically in these games you as the player have a mass advantage of levels and game knowledge. Most RPGs highlight certain enemies as being "World-level-threats" which you can stroll up to in iron armor and beat to death while tanking hits just fine. It's a discrepancy between realism of a world and gameplay concessions. You can't really have a nameless nobody strolling around killing hundreds of tough monsters like Littlepip has, because they're not special enough. In a realistic setting too, everyone is on equal ground and your tactical knowledge and quality of your guns/ allies determines how "Strong" you are, and anyone could catch one wrong bullet or one infected bite and it's game over. So this would make it even more difficult for unnamed randoms to succeed. However, we've already seen strong "Unique" individuals: Calamity, Steelhooves, and so on. Surely there's more ponies out there who can pull off the minor feats Littlepip and co have accomplished.
I just wonder what the scale of this is. What warrants a reaction from the DJ? How big does your group have to be before you're labelled as a safety concern for the area around? What is the level of your deed necessary to get you deemed a hero or significant pony? Etc.
>>303855
She also killed a dragon at Shattered Hoof prison/rock-breaking facility, but I don't remember if it was actively doing evil things and preying on surrounding ponies for a food source or if the existence of the dragon was the best-kept secret of all time and his only real crime was being in charge of badddies.
Where did he get his food, anyway? Was he buying pony slaves from the black market and eating them, while giving his "mysterious pony" public persona a reputation of killing the slaves he purchases?
The radio whore said "You shouldn't have saved those baddies, I guess you're an equal-opportunity hero but I don't agree with you on this one" but I don't remember if she actually saved raiders from the dragon or an oncoming swarm of raiders or something else.
I think she was working for Gawd of Gawd's Griffons, who work for or are the leaders of the Talon Company, which was hired by some local wasteland crime boss along with some other organization Gawd suspected of foul play, also the local wasteland crime boss turned out to be a dragon..
Fuck, I'm still trying to puzzle out what happened there.
What the fuck happened back there? Was anyone else keeping notes? Mine were full of abbreviations and I've forgotten what they meant.
>>303855
Come to think of it, if Homage took a break from gobbling LP's snatch to suck Steelcunt off live on-air, it would be excellent foreshadowing for his eventual arrival.
Littlepip killed one Alicorn in a slaver town, but this guy has supposedly been hunting Alicorns for... I don't remember how long, but it's probably been a while.
LP could hear "Littlepip is amazing! She killed her first Alicorn by dropping something heavy on it! That reminds me of how Steelhooves The Alicorn-Hunter is said to have killed his first Alicorn!" on the radio and go to bed wondering if she'd ever meet that legendary figure.
And if her trick was given away on the airwaves, it would also give LP some logical thing to assume besides "All alicorns are in a hive mind" when wondering why the tactics she used to kill one Alicorn don't work on the next ones she encounters.
Plus...
Setting up his existence ahead of time would help make his sudden arrival (and immediate "Oh shit i need medical help, please either repair my suit or heal me by getting a sprocket drive chungus from Vault Full Of Medical Shite And A Killer AI That Does Not Become A Problem You Must Deal With And Also Contains Dead Ponies- oh fuck you got some made-up disease and passed out and masturbated. Never mind, I'm fine" moment) feel less like a deus ex machina "AND THEN A NEW HERO SHOWED UP OUT OF NOWHERE TO BAIL THE HEROES OUT BY KILLING THREE OF THE ALICORNS EVEN THOUGH YOU PLAYERS STRUGGLED TO KILL JUST ONE!" tabletop roleplaying DMPC/ham-fisted new arrival of a munchkin stat-obssessed fag moment.
Also
"Why are there still alicorns if he's killed some every day for 200 years and is part of an organization that also does this and has presumably done this for about 200 years too" would be a good question for LP or Velvet to ask.
It would give the author a chance to justify that or look stupid trying.
She also killed a dragon at Shattered Hoof prison/rock-breaking facility, but I don't remember if it was actively doing evil things and preying on surrounding ponies for a food source or if the existence of the dragon was the best-kept secret of all time and his only real crime was being in charge of badddies.
Where did he get his food, anyway? Was he buying pony slaves from the black market and eating them, while giving his "mysterious pony" public persona a reputation of killing the slaves he purchases?
The radio whore said "You shouldn't have saved those baddies, I guess you're an equal-opportunity hero but I don't agree with you on this one" but I don't remember if she actually saved raiders from the dragon or an oncoming swarm of raiders or something else.
I think she was working for Gawd of Gawd's Griffons, who work for or are the leaders of the Talon Company, which was hired by some local wasteland crime boss along with some other organization Gawd suspected of foul play, also the local wasteland crime boss turned out to be a dragon..
Fuck, I'm still trying to puzzle out what happened there.
What the fuck happened back there? Was anyone else keeping notes? Mine were full of abbreviations and I've forgotten what they meant.
>>303855
Come to think of it, if Homage took a break from gobbling LP's snatch to suck Steelcunt off live on-air, it would be excellent foreshadowing for his eventual arrival.
Littlepip killed one Alicorn in a slaver town, but this guy has supposedly been hunting Alicorns for... I don't remember how long, but it's probably been a while.
LP could hear "Littlepip is amazing! She killed her first Alicorn by dropping something heavy on it! That reminds me of how Steelhooves The Alicorn-Hunter is said to have killed his first Alicorn!" on the radio and go to bed wondering if she'd ever meet that legendary figure.
And if her trick was given away on the airwaves, it would also give LP some logical thing to assume besides "All alicorns are in a hive mind" when wondering why the tactics she used to kill one Alicorn don't work on the next ones she encounters.
Plus...
Setting up his existence ahead of time would help make his sudden arrival (and immediate "Oh shit i need medical help, please either repair my suit or heal me by getting a sprocket drive chungus from Vault Full Of Medical Shite And A Killer AI That Does Not Become A Problem You Must Deal With And Also Contains Dead Ponies- oh fuck you got some made-up disease and passed out and masturbated. Never mind, I'm fine" moment) feel less like a deus ex machina "AND THEN A NEW HERO SHOWED UP OUT OF NOWHERE TO BAIL THE HEROES OUT BY KILLING THREE OF THE ALICORNS EVEN THOUGH YOU PLAYERS STRUGGLED TO KILL JUST ONE!" tabletop roleplaying DMPC/ham-fisted new arrival of a munchkin stat-obssessed fag moment.
Also
"Why are there still alicorns if he's killed some every day for 200 years and is part of an organization that also does this and has presumably done this for about 200 years too" would be a good question for LP or Velvet to ask.
It would give the author a chance to justify that or look stupid trying.
>>303859
Spike eats gems in the show and i'm sure that might be some kind of option for Topaz since it was a rock-breaking facility Right? Idunno how present that idea was in early show canon though. The way ponies approached and discussed that big red dragon in Dragonshy, and the fact it's a big mythical creature seems to imply it could eat ponies.
Spike eats gems in the show and i'm sure that might be some kind of option for Topaz since it was a rock-breaking facility Right? Idunno how present that idea was in early show canon though. The way ponies approached and discussed that big red dragon in Dragonshy, and the fact it's a big mythical creature seems to imply it could eat ponies.
>>303870
Not who u asked, but for me it's definitely Nigel. That faggot cant help but drive the convo in absurd directions that have nothing to do with literary review
Not who u asked, but for me it's definitely Nigel. That faggot cant help but drive the convo in absurd directions that have nothing to do with literary review
>>303870
Velvet Remedy, because even though i'm terribly imperceptive about literature and critique, she still managed to irk me she was just THAT bad.
I think my least-favorite little spat from her is later on when they're fleeing from Hellhounds and she's begging and pleading Littlepip and co. to stop returning fire because apparently shooting back at savage monsters intent on killing you is something you shouldn't do.
Velvet Remedy, because even though i'm terribly imperceptive about literature and critique, she still managed to irk me she was just THAT bad.
I think my least-favorite little spat from her is later on when they're fleeing from Hellhounds and she's begging and pleading Littlepip and co. to stop returning fire because apparently shooting back at savage monsters intent on killing you is something you shouldn't do.
>>303870
<Removing anyone on anything would make the whole work better if it's worked on.
Little Pip, if she perished the potential story would have the hallmarks of an adventure.
Calamity the gun for hire finishes the work for keeping safe a caravan.
Mercy kills Little Pip, her dying wish is to give back Velvet's Pipbuck. He gets LittlePip's Pip Buck.
She had some random crap on her.
Removing the taintwhatever manticores using the new PipBuck ('tutorial level') he doesn't have a whole lot of work.
What pony would go out of their Stable just because a pony is pretty? Someone to die for (eh? Eh?)
That one town with Velvet Remedy.
It's all hunkey dorey, sure they're assholes with slaves, but he's just sending a message. Little Pip died ect ect here's some of her crap.
They go for a drink/meal and bond a bit.
On the radio his good deed for putting a young soul to rest by fulfilling her dying wishes.
Velvet thinks the radio pony is tapping into the Pip Bucks for information.
Calamity knows the Pip Bucks are fucking awesome with his expertise, but being tracked is not good.
Velvet now obligated by the shmuck she inadvertently led to her death. Decides to settle the score with Calamity for not being a massive dick.
She's warmly sent off by the slavers, and they'll make sure to keep that one town Calamity likes unraided for more future free healing.
Calamity realises exactly what being a pacifist means to Velvet the naieve Stable pony.
Seeing she'll be useless maybe even antagonistic in a fight it's decided she'll 'Talk' to the ponies or whatever ruining the element of suprise, but this PipBuck thing might even the odds yet again.
Velvet eventually stops being a twat. Something something love interest ect.
Somehow being roped into Watcher's scheme to END GOAL HERE
<Removing anyone on anything would make the whole work better if it's worked on.
Little Pip, if she perished the potential story would have the hallmarks of an adventure.
Calamity the gun for hire finishes the work for keeping safe a caravan.
Mercy kills Little Pip, her dying wish is to give back Velvet's Pipbuck. He gets LittlePip's Pip Buck.
She had some random crap on her.
Removing the taintwhatever manticores using the new PipBuck ('tutorial level') he doesn't have a whole lot of work.
What pony would go out of their Stable just because a pony is pretty? Someone to die for (eh? Eh?)
That one town with Velvet Remedy.
It's all hunkey dorey, sure they're assholes with slaves, but he's just sending a message. Little Pip died ect ect here's some of her crap.
They go for a drink/meal and bond a bit.
On the radio his good deed for putting a young soul to rest by fulfilling her dying wishes.
Velvet thinks the radio pony is tapping into the Pip Bucks for information.
Calamity knows the Pip Bucks are fucking awesome with his expertise, but being tracked is not good.
Velvet now obligated by the shmuck she inadvertently led to her death. Decides to settle the score with Calamity for not being a massive dick.
She's warmly sent off by the slavers, and they'll make sure to keep that one town Calamity likes unraided for more future free healing.
Calamity realises exactly what being a pacifist means to Velvet the naieve Stable pony.
Seeing she'll be useless maybe even antagonistic in a fight it's decided she'll 'Talk' to the ponies or whatever ruining the element of suprise, but this PipBuck thing might even the odds yet again.
Velvet eventually stops being a twat. Something something love interest ect.
Somehow being roped into Watcher's scheme to END GOAL HERE
>>303874
Misclick sorry, I meant to direct that question towards everyone
also dont be silly I am not a character in Fallout Equestria. I was going to be a character in mugen but he's unfinished and using his old design. Now my poner has sick phoenix wings. It would be off topic to say his alpha counter's a shoryuken but discussing the fic is on topic.
>>303877
Yeah velvet's the worst. As a wise man once said, being a pacifist in the Wasteland means you try not to kill anyone and then feel bad when that doesn't work out.
Leaving raiders alive in the wasteland means they prolong their own existence through more raiding. Leaving monsters alive in the wasteland means they prey upon the innocent. Or prey animals you'd rather eat. It's a neverending survival situation where more living rivals means less food to scavenge/buy/whatever.
Then again Kkunt is so generous with the loot I'm surprised Littlepip isn't carrying around a month's worth of meals for herself and her team and hasn't found a Holy Hand Grenade yet. Or worse, something outdated cringe meme like a dubstep gun.
Although, "I am a dj with a lot of sound equipment and free time so I made this sick sonic gun out of the only useful components from burned-out parts. Get records for me and you can have this sick sonic blaster" would make Homage's stupid "get these records for no reason" quest less stupid.
also fuck the author for not thinking to give the place with giant bats and manticore lion scorpion chimera thingies a name with a pun on the word Batallion.
>>303877
Calamity would be a fucking sick main lead!
It's always funny when authors accidentally make their female leads less interesting than their male companions.
Calamity could feel bad about killing LP and butt heads with Steelhooves over ideology and leadership style but eventually form a brotherly bond and it would be great.
Misclick sorry, I meant to direct that question towards everyone
also dont be silly I am not a character in Fallout Equestria. I was going to be a character in mugen but he's unfinished and using his old design. Now my poner has sick phoenix wings. It would be off topic to say his alpha counter's a shoryuken but discussing the fic is on topic.
>>303877
Yeah velvet's the worst. As a wise man once said, being a pacifist in the Wasteland means you try not to kill anyone and then feel bad when that doesn't work out.
Leaving raiders alive in the wasteland means they prolong their own existence through more raiding. Leaving monsters alive in the wasteland means they prey upon the innocent. Or prey animals you'd rather eat. It's a neverending survival situation where more living rivals means less food to scavenge/buy/whatever.
Then again Kkunt is so generous with the loot I'm surprised Littlepip isn't carrying around a month's worth of meals for herself and her team and hasn't found a Holy Hand Grenade yet. Or worse, something outdated cringe meme like a dubstep gun.
Although, "I am a dj with a lot of sound equipment and free time so I made this sick sonic gun out of the only useful components from burned-out parts. Get records for me and you can have this sick sonic blaster" would make Homage's stupid "get these records for no reason" quest less stupid.
also fuck the author for not thinking to give the place with giant bats and manticore lion scorpion chimera thingies a name with a pun on the word Batallion.
>>303877
Calamity would be a fucking sick main lead!
It's always funny when authors accidentally make their female leads less interesting than their male companions.
Calamity could feel bad about killing LP and butt heads with Steelhooves over ideology and leadership style but eventually form a brotherly bond and it would be great.
>>303849
Page break. Next, we have an extremely micro microscene (I might even term it a nanoscene) in which exactly four lines of dialogue are exchanged between Calamity and Littlepoop. There is absolutely no attempt on the author's part to set a scene or to clarify exactly what the fuck is going on. Since it's short, I'll just dump it in verbatim:
>“Where’s SteelHooves?”
>“Should ya really be up, Li’lpip?” Calamity asked, his eyes widening with concern as I burst into the suite.
>“Do you know where he is?” After SteelHooves had left, I had just stared. It took several minutes for the sinking sensation to fully prompt me to action. And by then, I had lost track of him.
>“uh… well, last Ah saw, he was talkin’ t’ Chief Grim Star.”
>No! I turned and galloped for the elevator.
This might seem confusing out of context, but I'd like to reassure you that it isn't any less confusing in context. At the end of the previous scene, LP was apologizing to SteelHooves for not being there for him or whatever, and then he left. Then, suddenly, this.
As far as I can tell, this event takes place a short time after the previous scene. LP has used her divine Mary Sue powers to scry into SteelHooves' mind, and has somehow figured out that he is about to do something terrible, which apparently involves Chief Grim Star, a character whose name has been mentioned several times but who has yet to actually appear in the story. She goes back to their hotel room, asks Calamity if he has seen him, and learns that he has gone to visit this individual. The significance of this is about as clear as mud to us mere mortals, but again, Littlepoop's godlike ability to see what evil lurks within the hearts of men stallions, whatever has made her immediately realize what SteelHooves is up to, so she runs off to stop him. Or something.
Page break.
>It took me too long -- way too long -- to find the door to the basement.
Apparently, Littlepoop is on her way to the basement for some reason. Beyond that, I have absolutely no idea what the fuck is going on.
Anyway, she eventually finds the door to the basement. Whatever the situation is, it has her in a state of extreme anxiety. The walls are apparently too thicc for her Eyes Forward Sparkle to function, so she once again has to rely on her normal mortal abilities. However, she is able to find an open door, with a sign on it that reads "authorized unicorns only." In complete contradiction of what the text literally just fucking said about her EFS not working down here, her EFS now detects a single friendly presence, which she correctly assumes to be SteelHooves. SteelHooves is standing by another door, with his hoof over the control panel.
LP begs SteelHooves not to do what he's about to do, and SteelHooves pretends not to know what she's talking about. After a brief dialogue exchange, it finally becomes apparent what has Littlepoop's taint in such a tizzy. Apparently, this is the secret back door into Tenpony Tower that we heard about earlier, and she is afraid that SteelHooves is going to open it and let all the zombies in. However, it turns out that SteelHooves is actually doing the complete opposite of this: he has sealed the door, so that none of the zombies can get in. Also, for some completely unexplained reason, he somehow managed to lock Chief Grim Star on the other side, and the zombies now tear him limb from limb as Littlepoop watches in horror. End of chapter.
Okay...well. At this point, I am completely numb to the nonsensical turns that this story takes, so while I would ordinarily grouse for several posts about how little sense this chapter ending makes, I just can't summon the energy to do it. So, instead, I will just quickly highlight the things that don't make any sense here, along with a brief explanation of why they don't make any sense (or at least why they don't make sense to me; maybe someone else will have some insight here).
>Steelhooves
His actions here are completely incomprehensible, as are Littlepoop's insights into them. I seem to remember him saying something earlier about wanting to let Grim Star know about the secret tunnel so he could close it off, so that part makes sense enough, but I don't understand why he locked Grim Star outside of the tower to be eaten by zombies. I also don't understand how Littlepoop reached the conclusion that he was down here, or why she thought he might be opening the door instead of locking it.
>zombies
Where the hell did these zombies even come from? Why are they trying to get inside Tenpony Tower? How did SteelHooves or Littlepoop know that they would be coming? My understanding is that there was a group of ghouls that had been planning to sneak inside Tenpony via this basement entrance so they could feast on the flesh of the living. However, my understanding is also that the ghouls had all been killed by Blackwing's group. Littlepoop even set fire to their corpses, thus ensuring that they could not somehow come back from the dead. So why zombies all of a sudden? Was the plot not foiled? Were there more of them hiding somewhere? This whole development makes no sense whatsoever.
>Chief Grim Star
The implication here seems to be that Grim Star's fate was some kind of comeuppance for him, but the problem is that, again, he has not appeared in the story at all, so the reader has no reason to care about him. Why does he deserve to be eaten by zombies? More importantly, why does SteelHooves feel that he deserves to be eaten by zombies? Presumably what happened is that SteelHooves brought him down here under the pretense of showing him the security vulnerability created by this door, and then pushed him through the door and locked it behind him. The question, though, is why? This seems like a personal vendetta, but Grim Star and SteelHooves have had no interaction to my knowledge. Whatever the author was trying to say here, I'm afraid I just don't get it.
Page break. Next, we have an extremely micro microscene (I might even term it a nanoscene) in which exactly four lines of dialogue are exchanged between Calamity and Littlepoop. There is absolutely no attempt on the author's part to set a scene or to clarify exactly what the fuck is going on. Since it's short, I'll just dump it in verbatim:
>“Where’s SteelHooves?”
>“Should ya really be up, Li’lpip?” Calamity asked, his eyes widening with concern as I burst into the suite.
>“Do you know where he is?” After SteelHooves had left, I had just stared. It took several minutes for the sinking sensation to fully prompt me to action. And by then, I had lost track of him.
>“uh… well, last Ah saw, he was talkin’ t’ Chief Grim Star.”
>No! I turned and galloped for the elevator.
This might seem confusing out of context, but I'd like to reassure you that it isn't any less confusing in context. At the end of the previous scene, LP was apologizing to SteelHooves for not being there for him or whatever, and then he left. Then, suddenly, this.
As far as I can tell, this event takes place a short time after the previous scene. LP has used her divine Mary Sue powers to scry into SteelHooves' mind, and has somehow figured out that he is about to do something terrible, which apparently involves Chief Grim Star, a character whose name has been mentioned several times but who has yet to actually appear in the story. She goes back to their hotel room, asks Calamity if he has seen him, and learns that he has gone to visit this individual. The significance of this is about as clear as mud to us mere mortals, but again, Littlepoop's godlike ability to see what evil lurks within the hearts of men stallions, whatever has made her immediately realize what SteelHooves is up to, so she runs off to stop him. Or something.
Page break.
>It took me too long -- way too long -- to find the door to the basement.
Apparently, Littlepoop is on her way to the basement for some reason. Beyond that, I have absolutely no idea what the fuck is going on.
Anyway, she eventually finds the door to the basement. Whatever the situation is, it has her in a state of extreme anxiety. The walls are apparently too thicc for her Eyes Forward Sparkle to function, so she once again has to rely on her normal mortal abilities. However, she is able to find an open door, with a sign on it that reads "authorized unicorns only." In complete contradiction of what the text literally just fucking said about her EFS not working down here, her EFS now detects a single friendly presence, which she correctly assumes to be SteelHooves. SteelHooves is standing by another door, with his hoof over the control panel.
LP begs SteelHooves not to do what he's about to do, and SteelHooves pretends not to know what she's talking about. After a brief dialogue exchange, it finally becomes apparent what has Littlepoop's taint in such a tizzy. Apparently, this is the secret back door into Tenpony Tower that we heard about earlier, and she is afraid that SteelHooves is going to open it and let all the zombies in. However, it turns out that SteelHooves is actually doing the complete opposite of this: he has sealed the door, so that none of the zombies can get in. Also, for some completely unexplained reason, he somehow managed to lock Chief Grim Star on the other side, and the zombies now tear him limb from limb as Littlepoop watches in horror. End of chapter.
Okay...well. At this point, I am completely numb to the nonsensical turns that this story takes, so while I would ordinarily grouse for several posts about how little sense this chapter ending makes, I just can't summon the energy to do it. So, instead, I will just quickly highlight the things that don't make any sense here, along with a brief explanation of why they don't make any sense (or at least why they don't make sense to me; maybe someone else will have some insight here).
>Steelhooves
His actions here are completely incomprehensible, as are Littlepoop's insights into them. I seem to remember him saying something earlier about wanting to let Grim Star know about the secret tunnel so he could close it off, so that part makes sense enough, but I don't understand why he locked Grim Star outside of the tower to be eaten by zombies. I also don't understand how Littlepoop reached the conclusion that he was down here, or why she thought he might be opening the door instead of locking it.
>zombies
Where the hell did these zombies even come from? Why are they trying to get inside Tenpony Tower? How did SteelHooves or Littlepoop know that they would be coming? My understanding is that there was a group of ghouls that had been planning to sneak inside Tenpony via this basement entrance so they could feast on the flesh of the living. However, my understanding is also that the ghouls had all been killed by Blackwing's group. Littlepoop even set fire to their corpses, thus ensuring that they could not somehow come back from the dead. So why zombies all of a sudden? Was the plot not foiled? Were there more of them hiding somewhere? This whole development makes no sense whatsoever.
>Chief Grim Star
The implication here seems to be that Grim Star's fate was some kind of comeuppance for him, but the problem is that, again, he has not appeared in the story at all, so the reader has no reason to care about him. Why does he deserve to be eaten by zombies? More importantly, why does SteelHooves feel that he deserves to be eaten by zombies? Presumably what happened is that SteelHooves brought him down here under the pretense of showing him the security vulnerability created by this door, and then pushed him through the door and locked it behind him. The question, though, is why? This seems like a personal vendetta, but Grim Star and SteelHooves have had no interaction to my knowledge. Whatever the author was trying to say here, I'm afraid I just don't get it.
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Chapter Twenty: Behind the Curtain
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>“Can I do something for you? ...Or to you?”
I'm assuming this was the last thing kkat heard before his vaginoplasty surgeon put him under the gas.
Anyway, this chapter begins on an uplifting note:
>Failure.
>I couldn’t save Monterey Jack. I couldn’t stop SteelHooves from murdering Chief Grim Star.
>I was letting down my friends and everyone who needed me.
Couple of things here. First, neither Monterrey Jack nor Chief Grim Star are Littlepoop's friends, and of these two only Monterrey could really be said to have needed her. Second, it's still not even remotely clear why SteelHooves even wanted to murder Chief Grim Star in the first place, let alone how LP could possibly have known in advance that it was going to happen.
Anyway, she drones on self-pityingly for awhile:
>The realization of what I had been doing to those closest to me with my damn addiction cut deep. And as much as I wanted to rage at Velvet Remedy, it was my fault that Monterey Jack was dead. I’d killed him with a mint. Actually, I’d killed him with a whole lot of them. I had been eating them like… dammit, they actually tasted like candy; how fucking wrong is that?
I will once again protest that Littlepoop's entire supposed "drug addiction" was handled extremely poorly, and the author has done little to make me feel any sympathy for her here.
>I was physically exhausted and mentally overwhelmed, on the verge of crying.
What else is new? Maybe try heroin mints next time, you whiny tart.
>It took me a long time to pull myself up off the floor and make my way back.
Why is she on the floor? What happened to SteelHooves? Did he just leave? Has LP just been lying on the basement floor moping during the space between the end of the last chapter and the beginning of this one? I will once again protest that this author has no idea how to properly set a scene.
Anyway, she wanders around the basement for awhile, generally whining and bitching to herself about how shitty the world is. She finds another skeleton (surprise), and muses that, alas, he was a fellow of infinite jest, yet where are his gibes and gambols now? Angst, angst, angst.
Eventually she finds her way out of the basement, only to be stopped by two Tenpony guards, who promptly arrest her. Apparently, they think she was the one who had murdered Chief Grim Star, even though it's unlikely anyone would have even realized he's dead yet, and there is little reason to suspect Littlepoop.
>I wondered if any of the ponies I had played seductress with in order to get a private audience with Monterey Jack would be there. They wouldn’t need to execute me; I could simply die from embarrassment.
When did this happen? You can't reference events that took place off-camera and expect your jokes to land.
>I recognized a few of the guards on duty, including the one I had sweet-talked into giving me his pencil so I could write down all the ideas that my PTM-fueled brain had been devising.
This never happened either. Again, even if it "did" happen, it happened off camera, so the reference has no significance to the reader.
Anyway, eventually they march her up to the laundry brig, but it looks like she jumped to the wrong conclusions about why she is here. Instead of putting her in a cell, they take her to an office. SteelHooves is also there for some reason.
Page break. The scene only gets more convoluted and confusing.
There is a radio in the office, and LP switches it on, but instead of the DJ's music, she hears a pre-recorded message from SteelHooves, detailing what happened in the basement just now. He explains the situation with the ghouls: that Sheriff Rotting Tail was planning an invasion of the Tower, and that the Talons had thwarted the plan. He then claims that he and Chief Grim Star had gone down to the basement to seal the door, because apparently there were still zombies down there for whatever reason (this part is left unexplained). Apparently, they went outside to futz with the door controls or something, when the zombies suddenly attacked. SteelHooves survived because of his armor, but Grim Star was pretty much fucked. He told SteelHooves to go back through the door, close it, and seal it behind him, thus sacrificing himself to save the tower.
This story actually sounds completely plausible, at least as plausible as any explanation of this strange turn of events could sound. However, LP seems to believe that SteelHooves is actually lying. This is her take:
>I stared at the radio. By Celestia’s mane, he was actually going to pull this off, wasn’t he? There was so much truth woven into the story that it would hold up to investigation. And anypony who questioned it would be questioning the heroism of Chief Grim Star. I knew different, but I was the only one, and it would be my word against his. My very non-citizen word. Not that I would say anything. I’d already made the mistake of going down that path.
The scene ends without clarifying anything:
>Oh. Wait… was that why he trotted into here? My lockpicking skills seemed virtually unique, but I doubted my ability to hack a terminal was nearly so rare. And if anypony could do it, who was more likely than a “knight of the Ministry of Technology”? It was just a guess, a suspicion, but it struck me that SteelHooves was covering his bases. Part of me almost admired what he was capable of. Part of me was angry that he was using Homage’s broadcast, dedicated to the truth of the wasteland (no matter how bad it hurt), to spread his lies.
I have literally no idea what she's on about here; like I don't even have any commentary to offer, because this is complete gibberish to me. I have no idea what lockpicking or terminals have to do with any of what's going on, or whether or not SteelHooves actually murdered the chief, or why LP was arrested. None of this makes any apparent sense, and I have little faith that it's going to be clarified any time soon.
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>“Can I do something for you? ...Or to you?”
I'm assuming this was the last thing kkat heard before his vaginoplasty surgeon put him under the gas.
Anyway, this chapter begins on an uplifting note:
>Failure.
>I couldn’t save Monterey Jack. I couldn’t stop SteelHooves from murdering Chief Grim Star.
>I was letting down my friends and everyone who needed me.
Couple of things here. First, neither Monterrey Jack nor Chief Grim Star are Littlepoop's friends, and of these two only Monterrey could really be said to have needed her. Second, it's still not even remotely clear why SteelHooves even wanted to murder Chief Grim Star in the first place, let alone how LP could possibly have known in advance that it was going to happen.
Anyway, she drones on self-pityingly for awhile:
>The realization of what I had been doing to those closest to me with my damn addiction cut deep. And as much as I wanted to rage at Velvet Remedy, it was my fault that Monterey Jack was dead. I’d killed him with a mint. Actually, I’d killed him with a whole lot of them. I had been eating them like… dammit, they actually tasted like candy; how fucking wrong is that?
I will once again protest that Littlepoop's entire supposed "drug addiction" was handled extremely poorly, and the author has done little to make me feel any sympathy for her here.
>I was physically exhausted and mentally overwhelmed, on the verge of crying.
What else is new? Maybe try heroin mints next time, you whiny tart.
>It took me a long time to pull myself up off the floor and make my way back.
Why is she on the floor? What happened to SteelHooves? Did he just leave? Has LP just been lying on the basement floor moping during the space between the end of the last chapter and the beginning of this one? I will once again protest that this author has no idea how to properly set a scene.
Anyway, she wanders around the basement for awhile, generally whining and bitching to herself about how shitty the world is. She finds another skeleton (surprise), and muses that, alas, he was a fellow of infinite jest, yet where are his gibes and gambols now? Angst, angst, angst.
Eventually she finds her way out of the basement, only to be stopped by two Tenpony guards, who promptly arrest her. Apparently, they think she was the one who had murdered Chief Grim Star, even though it's unlikely anyone would have even realized he's dead yet, and there is little reason to suspect Littlepoop.
>I wondered if any of the ponies I had played seductress with in order to get a private audience with Monterey Jack would be there. They wouldn’t need to execute me; I could simply die from embarrassment.
When did this happen? You can't reference events that took place off-camera and expect your jokes to land.
>I recognized a few of the guards on duty, including the one I had sweet-talked into giving me his pencil so I could write down all the ideas that my PTM-fueled brain had been devising.
This never happened either. Again, even if it "did" happen, it happened off camera, so the reference has no significance to the reader.
Anyway, eventually they march her up to the laundry brig, but it looks like she jumped to the wrong conclusions about why she is here. Instead of putting her in a cell, they take her to an office. SteelHooves is also there for some reason.
Page break. The scene only gets more convoluted and confusing.
There is a radio in the office, and LP switches it on, but instead of the DJ's music, she hears a pre-recorded message from SteelHooves, detailing what happened in the basement just now. He explains the situation with the ghouls: that Sheriff Rotting Tail was planning an invasion of the Tower, and that the Talons had thwarted the plan. He then claims that he and Chief Grim Star had gone down to the basement to seal the door, because apparently there were still zombies down there for whatever reason (this part is left unexplained). Apparently, they went outside to futz with the door controls or something, when the zombies suddenly attacked. SteelHooves survived because of his armor, but Grim Star was pretty much fucked. He told SteelHooves to go back through the door, close it, and seal it behind him, thus sacrificing himself to save the tower.
This story actually sounds completely plausible, at least as plausible as any explanation of this strange turn of events could sound. However, LP seems to believe that SteelHooves is actually lying. This is her take:
>I stared at the radio. By Celestia’s mane, he was actually going to pull this off, wasn’t he? There was so much truth woven into the story that it would hold up to investigation. And anypony who questioned it would be questioning the heroism of Chief Grim Star. I knew different, but I was the only one, and it would be my word against his. My very non-citizen word. Not that I would say anything. I’d already made the mistake of going down that path.
The scene ends without clarifying anything:
>Oh. Wait… was that why he trotted into here? My lockpicking skills seemed virtually unique, but I doubted my ability to hack a terminal was nearly so rare. And if anypony could do it, who was more likely than a “knight of the Ministry of Technology”? It was just a guess, a suspicion, but it struck me that SteelHooves was covering his bases. Part of me almost admired what he was capable of. Part of me was angry that he was using Homage’s broadcast, dedicated to the truth of the wasteland (no matter how bad it hurt), to spread his lies.
I have literally no idea what she's on about here; like I don't even have any commentary to offer, because this is complete gibberish to me. I have no idea what lockpicking or terminals have to do with any of what's going on, or whether or not SteelHooves actually murdered the chief, or why LP was arrested. None of this makes any apparent sense, and I have little faith that it's going to be clarified any time soon.
>>303904
>I have literally no idea what she's on about here; like I don't even have any commentary to offer, because this is complete gibberish to me.
I think I know what's supposed to be happening here, having played Fo3's version of this sequence of events. Basically, it's "improving" on Fallout 3's tenpenny/ghouls quest.
In the game, you arrive at Tenpenny Tower to find a group of sapient ghouls trying to negotiate entry with Chief Gustavo, the head of security. He's having none of it and eventually sends them away. If you discuss the matter with him, he explains that the ghouls may be planning to get into the tower by force and offers you a fair sum of caps to get rid of them. If you take the time to speak to Roy Phillips, the ghouls' leader, rather than straight up killing them, they make a counter-offer: Tenpenny's basement door connects to an adjacent subway system filled with feral ghouls. Open that door and the ghouls will swarm the tower and kill everyone, letting Roy and his group move in and take over. Alternatively you can convince the tower's denizens to let Roy and the others in peacefully, but this also results in the ghouls slaughtering everyone.
Whatever route you take through the quest, Three Dog talks shit about you on the radio. Either you cold-bloodedly murdered a group of ghouls that just wanted a better life, or you callously unleashed a zombie horde on Tenpenny's population. It's a dumb quest, because Fallout 3 is a dumb game.
Kkat's shuffled the events around a bit. Chief Gustavo is now Chief Grim Star. Roy Phillips is now Sheriff Rotting Tail. Rather than hiring Littlepip (the 'player'), Grim Star already hired Blackwing and his talons to kill Rotting Tail and the others before Pip arrived on the scene. Apparently the basement situation is the same as in the game, though this isn't clarified at all in the text.
So here's what I think is happening here:
>Grim Star ordered the ghouls killed because he's a racist meaniepants
>Steelhooves is a ghoul, but he keeps quiet about this and keeps his opinions close to his chest as well. Littlepip has figured this out.
>Steelhooves murders Grim Star for being a racist anti-ghoul meanie, despite the fact that he was (apparently) entirely justified in targeting Rottingtail and his group due to the fact that the zombie basement exists.
>He (somehow) lures Grim Star into the basement zombie room and then seals the door behind him - presumably the door locks are controlled from a terminal, hence Pip's blabbering about hacking skills.
>Steelhooves then lies to the DJ offscreen while Pip is rolling around on the floor moping and talking to skeletons, telling her that Grim Star died heroically trying to defend the tower from the feral ghouls/zombies.
>Ho-bag either believes him (because she's retarded) or goes along with it anyway (because she doesn't like Grim Star either) and broadcasts this excuse as news
>Littlepip is pic related about the whole thing, and uses it as a reason for angst. Racism bad, murder bad, lying bad, crawling in my skin etc
>I have literally no idea what she's on about here; like I don't even have any commentary to offer, because this is complete gibberish to me.
I think I know what's supposed to be happening here, having played Fo3's version of this sequence of events. Basically, it's "improving" on Fallout 3's tenpenny/ghouls quest.
In the game, you arrive at Tenpenny Tower to find a group of sapient ghouls trying to negotiate entry with Chief Gustavo, the head of security. He's having none of it and eventually sends them away. If you discuss the matter with him, he explains that the ghouls may be planning to get into the tower by force and offers you a fair sum of caps to get rid of them. If you take the time to speak to Roy Phillips, the ghouls' leader, rather than straight up killing them, they make a counter-offer: Tenpenny's basement door connects to an adjacent subway system filled with feral ghouls. Open that door and the ghouls will swarm the tower and kill everyone, letting Roy and his group move in and take over. Alternatively you can convince the tower's denizens to let Roy and the others in peacefully, but this also results in the ghouls slaughtering everyone.
Whatever route you take through the quest, Three Dog talks shit about you on the radio. Either you cold-bloodedly murdered a group of ghouls that just wanted a better life, or you callously unleashed a zombie horde on Tenpenny's population. It's a dumb quest, because Fallout 3 is a dumb game.
Kkat's shuffled the events around a bit. Chief Gustavo is now Chief Grim Star. Roy Phillips is now Sheriff Rotting Tail. Rather than hiring Littlepip (the 'player'), Grim Star already hired Blackwing and his talons to kill Rotting Tail and the others before Pip arrived on the scene. Apparently the basement situation is the same as in the game, though this isn't clarified at all in the text.
So here's what I think is happening here:
>Grim Star ordered the ghouls killed because he's a racist meaniepants
>Steelhooves is a ghoul, but he keeps quiet about this and keeps his opinions close to his chest as well. Littlepip has figured this out.
>Steelhooves murders Grim Star for being a racist anti-ghoul meanie, despite the fact that he was (apparently) entirely justified in targeting Rottingtail and his group due to the fact that the zombie basement exists.
>He (somehow) lures Grim Star into the basement zombie room and then seals the door behind him - presumably the door locks are controlled from a terminal, hence Pip's blabbering about hacking skills.
>Steelhooves then lies to the DJ offscreen while Pip is rolling around on the floor moping and talking to skeletons, telling her that Grim Star died heroically trying to defend the tower from the feral ghouls/zombies.
>Ho-bag either believes him (because she's retarded) or goes along with it anyway (because she doesn't like Grim Star either) and broadcasts this excuse as news
>Littlepip is pic related about the whole thing, and uses it as a reason for angst. Racism bad, murder bad, lying bad, crawling in my skin etc
>>303900
If Grim Star killed ghouls and Steelhooves is mad about that because he is also a ghoul...
This scene still doesn't work. Grim Star didn't kill the ghouls because "ew icky racist", that's just what the radio whore assumed. Grim killed the ghouls because they wanted to conquer the tower.
If Steelhooves thinks doing what needs to be done to protect your people from savage spiteful mutants is "racist", locking someone out of civilization to be torn apart by the savage spiteful mutants clawing at its gates isn't some witty ironic death. It's proof that the racist was always right about the bloodthirsty zombie-like shuffling savages outside.
Hell, in this scene Steelhooves specifically locks Grim outside of civilization to be killed by the danger Grim protected the tower from, while staying within its safety which only continues to exist thanks to Grim's actions.
Diversity for thee and not for me, eh? Reminds me of how liberals use niggers as a weapon of war to commit war crimes against whites until they leave, it's ballot-stuffing with extra steps.
Once more, the author provides a fascinating window into his own shattered psyche through his godawful pony fanfiction. How fascinating that there is such a big divide between the "good ghouls" who are just like you or I and the savage murderous feral "zombies" who are nothing but wandering monsters that need to be put down. For the "hate crime" of doing his job and defending his homeland and loved ones from a horde of evil "good" ghouls that felt entitled to live within his borders and wanted to invade and conquer his homeland, the author decided he deserves to be torn apart by "the bad ones" with the aid of Steelhooves, Applejack's 200 year old ghoul boyfriend.
This really says a lot about our society. And the folly of diversity.
Considering why Equestria really fell, it's hilarious to see the author's far-left insanity shine through once again when "punishing" a white guy whose only crime was defending himself from the supposed "good ones" who were blinded by greed and envy enough to have conquest on the mind.
Also, isn't it retarded that MJ's kids can't stay in the tower? The idea that children cannot work or earn their keep is a modern idea that would surely be one of the first things to go in the post apocalypse. Children helped their families farm/blacksmith/tailor once while learning the family trade, and children worked in factories once. Surely in the post-apocalypse when labor is in short supply nopony would cast aside perfectly healthy children who could work for the tower until they're old enough for more demanding labor/specialized roles.
If Grim Star killed ghouls and Steelhooves is mad about that because he is also a ghoul...
This scene still doesn't work. Grim Star didn't kill the ghouls because "ew icky racist", that's just what the radio whore assumed. Grim killed the ghouls because they wanted to conquer the tower.
If Steelhooves thinks doing what needs to be done to protect your people from savage spiteful mutants is "racist", locking someone out of civilization to be torn apart by the savage spiteful mutants clawing at its gates isn't some witty ironic death. It's proof that the racist was always right about the bloodthirsty zombie-like shuffling savages outside.
Hell, in this scene Steelhooves specifically locks Grim outside of civilization to be killed by the danger Grim protected the tower from, while staying within its safety which only continues to exist thanks to Grim's actions.
Diversity for thee and not for me, eh? Reminds me of how liberals use niggers as a weapon of war to commit war crimes against whites until they leave, it's ballot-stuffing with extra steps.
Once more, the author provides a fascinating window into his own shattered psyche through his godawful pony fanfiction. How fascinating that there is such a big divide between the "good ghouls" who are just like you or I and the savage murderous feral "zombies" who are nothing but wandering monsters that need to be put down. For the "hate crime" of doing his job and defending his homeland and loved ones from a horde of evil "good" ghouls that felt entitled to live within his borders and wanted to invade and conquer his homeland, the author decided he deserves to be torn apart by "the bad ones" with the aid of Steelhooves, Applejack's 200 year old ghoul boyfriend.
This really says a lot about our society. And the folly of diversity.
Considering why Equestria really fell, it's hilarious to see the author's far-left insanity shine through once again when "punishing" a white guy whose only crime was defending himself from the supposed "good ones" who were blinded by greed and envy enough to have conquest on the mind.
Also, isn't it retarded that MJ's kids can't stay in the tower? The idea that children cannot work or earn their keep is a modern idea that would surely be one of the first things to go in the post apocalypse. Children helped their families farm/blacksmith/tailor once while learning the family trade, and children worked in factories once. Surely in the post-apocalypse when labor is in short supply nopony would cast aside perfectly healthy children who could work for the tower until they're old enough for more demanding labor/specialized roles.
>>303904
Page break. We now learn the reason for LP's being detained. Turns out it had nothing to do with Chief Grim Star.
A unicorn clerk enters and begins going over some expense accounts. He details the cost to Tenpony Tower of executing Monterrey Jack, and at first LP is convinced that they are going to hand her a bill. I'll confess that this was my first impression as well, so kkat was actually able to pull a successful bait and switch on me. I'll give him a point for it.
Anyway, it turns out that since Littlepoop was the victim of Monterrey's attempted butt banditry, she is legally entitled to his property, minus expenses, which go to Tenpony. This is actually fairly logical, though one might think that LP's being a non-citizen would mean that the Tower takes everything, since she would have no recourse under their law and no law outside of Tenpony that she could appeal to. That the Tower's government would willingly hand over Jack's property on their own initiative rather goes against the greedy image of them that the author has tried to paint so far. However, in and of itself, I don't have a problem with this development.
A bit of conversation follows. When the lawyer or whatever he is asks, Littlepoop confesses that she had no idea that she stood to gain from Monterrey's death. The lawyer tells her that Monterrey has been borderline suicidal since his wife died, and there was some speculation about whether the whole incident was some kind of scheme cooked up between the two of them.
This comment provides a segue into some backstory about Monterrey's wife, Clarinet:
>“There’s a rumor that there is an untouched Stable somewhere in Fetlock. Few months back they were trying to find it. Never did; nobody has…”
Apparently, she and Monterrey Jack went looking for Stable 29 for some unknown reason, and Clarinet was killed by a manticore on the way.
Of all the possible tragedies the author could have chosen to explain Clarinet's death, this is among the stupidest. Why were they trying to find Stable 29? No reason is given; they were just looking for it. Presumably, this was just treasure hunting of the same variety that LP & Co. routinely engage in; hunting around in random buildings looking for random junk. I guess they just wanted to be the ones to find the long-lost Stable 29.
I might be able to grant some leeway here if the idea was that they were supposed to be scavengers or something, and this was part of how they earned their living. But, it's already been established that Monterrey has a successful cheese business, and they had three children at home to worry about. It's not just their lives on the line here, and they don't have any obvious need to be treasure-hunting. Why were they out in the wasteland, risking their lives trying to find some long-lost stable? It doesn't make any goddamn sense.
Anyway, the long and short of it is that Littlepoop is now the legal owner of Monterrey's cheese shop, as well as his living quarters and whatever furniture is inside. However, since LP isn't a citizen, she can't legally run the business or live in Tenpony, so the lawyer advises her to just sell both properties. However, here is what I imagine the author sees as the creative twist: Monterrey's children are still living in the house, which means that when she takes possession, she will be the one kicking them out on the street. Dun dun DUNNNNNN.
LP has a sudden revelation:
>I felt I was finally seeing behind the curtain. Monterey Jack’s execution made me, the heroine his children worshiped, into the pony stealing their home from them just after their father died. The ultimate buck when they’re down. Unless, of course, I did something about it….
>…exactly like I had already done. I’d taken care of them even before this trap had snapped shut.
As far as I can tell, the insinuation here is that Monterrey Jack felt angry and/or guilty about his children worshipping the pony that he had tried to rob. So, when Littlepoop accused him of robbing her, he went ahead and confessed to the crime, knowing full well that they would execute him. He didn't care if he lived or died anyway because he was still depressed about his wife, and apparently he didn't give a fuck about his kids either, because he also knew that LP would inherit his property and would have to kick them out on the street. The upshot for him was that, since LP would be the one evicting them, it would destroy their image of her as a hero.
This is just...wow. I'll give kkat some points purely for creativity here, but just...wow. What the actual fuck? So...Monterrey basically used Tenpony's screwy legal system to commit suicide because...why exactly did he do this? Seriously, what was the endgame supposed to be here? He wanted to spite his kids? Or spite Littlepoop, maybe? This is just...wow. It's not even worth it for me to explain in detail why this plot twist is idiotic; you guys are smart enough to figure it out for yourselves.
Anyway, this actually simplifies the problem of what to do about MJ's kids. Since they already have a home, and LP is now the owner of said home, all she really needs to do is transfer the property to someone in town who would be willing to take care of the three foals. She already knows Homage, who could probably use the extra income from the cheese shop or any income for that matter, since it doesn't look like she has a job. So, just transfer the deed of both properties to Homage, and ask her to take care of the children in return; boom, done. The kids get to stay in their home, and as a bonus gain a weirdo lesbian stepmom who I'm sure will be a good role model for them. It's not a perfect solution, but it makes a hell of a lot more sense than shipping them off to Shattered Hoof by way of the Talons. Will Littlepoop and the author be smart enough to realize that such an obvious solution is staring her right in the face? Let's find out.
Page break. We now learn the reason for LP's being detained. Turns out it had nothing to do with Chief Grim Star.
A unicorn clerk enters and begins going over some expense accounts. He details the cost to Tenpony Tower of executing Monterrey Jack, and at first LP is convinced that they are going to hand her a bill. I'll confess that this was my first impression as well, so kkat was actually able to pull a successful bait and switch on me. I'll give him a point for it.
Anyway, it turns out that since Littlepoop was the victim of Monterrey's attempted butt banditry, she is legally entitled to his property, minus expenses, which go to Tenpony. This is actually fairly logical, though one might think that LP's being a non-citizen would mean that the Tower takes everything, since she would have no recourse under their law and no law outside of Tenpony that she could appeal to. That the Tower's government would willingly hand over Jack's property on their own initiative rather goes against the greedy image of them that the author has tried to paint so far. However, in and of itself, I don't have a problem with this development.
A bit of conversation follows. When the lawyer or whatever he is asks, Littlepoop confesses that she had no idea that she stood to gain from Monterrey's death. The lawyer tells her that Monterrey has been borderline suicidal since his wife died, and there was some speculation about whether the whole incident was some kind of scheme cooked up between the two of them.
This comment provides a segue into some backstory about Monterrey's wife, Clarinet:
>“There’s a rumor that there is an untouched Stable somewhere in Fetlock. Few months back they were trying to find it. Never did; nobody has…”
Apparently, she and Monterrey Jack went looking for Stable 29 for some unknown reason, and Clarinet was killed by a manticore on the way.
Of all the possible tragedies the author could have chosen to explain Clarinet's death, this is among the stupidest. Why were they trying to find Stable 29? No reason is given; they were just looking for it. Presumably, this was just treasure hunting of the same variety that LP & Co. routinely engage in; hunting around in random buildings looking for random junk. I guess they just wanted to be the ones to find the long-lost Stable 29.
I might be able to grant some leeway here if the idea was that they were supposed to be scavengers or something, and this was part of how they earned their living. But, it's already been established that Monterrey has a successful cheese business, and they had three children at home to worry about. It's not just their lives on the line here, and they don't have any obvious need to be treasure-hunting. Why were they out in the wasteland, risking their lives trying to find some long-lost stable? It doesn't make any goddamn sense.
Anyway, the long and short of it is that Littlepoop is now the legal owner of Monterrey's cheese shop, as well as his living quarters and whatever furniture is inside. However, since LP isn't a citizen, she can't legally run the business or live in Tenpony, so the lawyer advises her to just sell both properties. However, here is what I imagine the author sees as the creative twist: Monterrey's children are still living in the house, which means that when she takes possession, she will be the one kicking them out on the street. Dun dun DUNNNNNN.
LP has a sudden revelation:
>I felt I was finally seeing behind the curtain. Monterey Jack’s execution made me, the heroine his children worshiped, into the pony stealing their home from them just after their father died. The ultimate buck when they’re down. Unless, of course, I did something about it….
>…exactly like I had already done. I’d taken care of them even before this trap had snapped shut.
As far as I can tell, the insinuation here is that Monterrey Jack felt angry and/or guilty about his children worshipping the pony that he had tried to rob. So, when Littlepoop accused him of robbing her, he went ahead and confessed to the crime, knowing full well that they would execute him. He didn't care if he lived or died anyway because he was still depressed about his wife, and apparently he didn't give a fuck about his kids either, because he also knew that LP would inherit his property and would have to kick them out on the street. The upshot for him was that, since LP would be the one evicting them, it would destroy their image of her as a hero.
This is just...wow. I'll give kkat some points purely for creativity here, but just...wow. What the actual fuck? So...Monterrey basically used Tenpony's screwy legal system to commit suicide because...why exactly did he do this? Seriously, what was the endgame supposed to be here? He wanted to spite his kids? Or spite Littlepoop, maybe? This is just...wow. It's not even worth it for me to explain in detail why this plot twist is idiotic; you guys are smart enough to figure it out for yourselves.
Anyway, this actually simplifies the problem of what to do about MJ's kids. Since they already have a home, and LP is now the owner of said home, all she really needs to do is transfer the property to someone in town who would be willing to take care of the three foals. She already knows Homage, who could probably use the extra income from the cheese shop or any income for that matter, since it doesn't look like she has a job. So, just transfer the deed of both properties to Homage, and ask her to take care of the children in return; boom, done. The kids get to stay in their home, and as a bonus gain a weirdo lesbian stepmom who I'm sure will be a good role model for them. It's not a perfect solution, but it makes a hell of a lot more sense than shipping them off to Shattered Hoof by way of the Talons. Will Littlepoop and the author be smart enough to realize that such an obvious solution is staring her right in the face? Let's find out.
>>303915
Thank you, this actually helped clarify it quite a bit. This author's assumption of the reader's familiarity with both Fallout 3 and the contents of his head remains this story's greatest shortcoming.
Thank you, this actually helped clarify it quite a bit. This author's assumption of the reader's familiarity with both Fallout 3 and the contents of his head remains this story's greatest shortcoming.
>>303921
Glim, would it be good writing or maudlin bullshit if Velvet found a wild dog in the Wasteland, fed it, and made it her friend, but raiders/slavers/alicorns killed and ate the dog in front of her to piss her off and cause her to break her inconsistent no-killing rule for good?
Glim, would it be good writing or maudlin bullshit if Velvet found a wild dog in the Wasteland, fed it, and made it her friend, but raiders/slavers/alicorns killed and ate the dog in front of her to piss her off and cause her to break her inconsistent no-killing rule for good?
>>303923
That would be a little on the maudlin side, but if you didn't ham it up too much it would probably be fine. However, what this story needs is focus, not extra sideplots. What the author really needs to do with Velvet is to create a consistent personality and a consistent set of values for her (they don't have to be positive values necessarily; she just needs to make sense), and then flesh out her dialogue and behavior in the story so that her personality and values are communicated to the reader. This extra story about a dog isn't necessarily bad in and of itself, but it doesn't really add anything to the existing story besides words, which it has more than enough of already.
That would be a little on the maudlin side, but if you didn't ham it up too much it would probably be fine. However, what this story needs is focus, not extra sideplots. What the author really needs to do with Velvet is to create a consistent personality and a consistent set of values for her (they don't have to be positive values necessarily; she just needs to make sense), and then flesh out her dialogue and behavior in the story so that her personality and values are communicated to the reader. This extra story about a dog isn't necessarily bad in and of itself, but it doesn't really add anything to the existing story besides words, which it has more than enough of already.
>>303900
The whole Grim Star thing is just a reference to Fallout 3, and how this quest has you using the secret backdoor to let feral ghouls into the tower for one of the options. That's it. Kkat had to figure out a way to put that into play without killing the residents of the tower.
The whole Grim Star thing is just a reference to Fallout 3, and how this quest has you using the secret backdoor to let feral ghouls into the tower for one of the options. That's it. Kkat had to figure out a way to put that into play without killing the residents of the tower.
>>303928
The way he tried to fix this by changing as little as possible irks me.
It reminds me of the way so many authors waste time trying to create a "fixed" version of media they didn't like while trying to change as little as possible even when larger changes are needed. As if they're terrified of, for example, trying to figure out what would happen in RWBY season 4 if the consequences of S3 were changed.
Kkunt...
He looked at how the quest forces a moral no-win situation on you where you either kill the "good" asshole Ghouls even though all your anti-racist mandatory diversity training says to roll over and lie back and think of england whenever spiteful mutants get horny, or you become an ickypanta racist and save everyone in the vault from the raiders.
Kkat's solution was to make some NPC complete the queat himself, getting his own hands/hooves dirty to protect the tower. And then a party member of LP's kills him for being put into a supposed no-win situation where he had to choose between killing wasteland baddies to protect what you care about or rolling over and playing dead because killing ghouls feels racist to you.
Steelhooves is not a hero here. He is a 200 year old ghoul inside a suit of armour that makes him damn near invincible while letting him use huge weapons like grenade machineguns and miniguns without needing magic. And he is putting his racial identity as a pony turned ghoul over logic and reason, judging the white tower poner as if he's some monstrous murderer who deserves execution for the "crime" of protecting his tower and all the ponies inside it including the foals and Team LP.
And despite this little show of force and attempt at a karmic execution he is too much of a coward to proudly admit his misdeeds as that would probably fuck over Team LP's ability to visit the tower and LP's ability to see Homage unless he quit the team.
It's interesting that apolitical normies hated this quest in F3 so much. Do you think it was because in a game full of simplistic good and evil binary choices there was no truly heroic option here? Or do you think it is because the authors unintentionally and accidentally made divershity invasionism look bad?
The way he tried to fix this by changing as little as possible irks me.
It reminds me of the way so many authors waste time trying to create a "fixed" version of media they didn't like while trying to change as little as possible even when larger changes are needed. As if they're terrified of, for example, trying to figure out what would happen in RWBY season 4 if the consequences of S3 were changed.
Kkunt...
He looked at how the quest forces a moral no-win situation on you where you either kill the "good" asshole Ghouls even though all your anti-racist mandatory diversity training says to roll over and lie back and think of england whenever spiteful mutants get horny, or you become an ickypanta racist and save everyone in the vault from the raiders.
Kkat's solution was to make some NPC complete the queat himself, getting his own hands/hooves dirty to protect the tower. And then a party member of LP's kills him for being put into a supposed no-win situation where he had to choose between killing wasteland baddies to protect what you care about or rolling over and playing dead because killing ghouls feels racist to you.
Steelhooves is not a hero here. He is a 200 year old ghoul inside a suit of armour that makes him damn near invincible while letting him use huge weapons like grenade machineguns and miniguns without needing magic. And he is putting his racial identity as a pony turned ghoul over logic and reason, judging the white tower poner as if he's some monstrous murderer who deserves execution for the "crime" of protecting his tower and all the ponies inside it including the foals and Team LP.
And despite this little show of force and attempt at a karmic execution he is too much of a coward to proudly admit his misdeeds as that would probably fuck over Team LP's ability to visit the tower and LP's ability to see Homage unless he quit the team.
It's interesting that apolitical normies hated this quest in F3 so much. Do you think it was because in a game full of simplistic good and evil binary choices there was no truly heroic option here? Or do you think it is because the authors unintentionally and accidentally made divershity invasionism look bad?
>>303946
I think the issue was that the clear "good" option was a surprise GOTCHA! moment.
"Oh there's a more difficult, lengthier way to make them coexist and everyone wins? Cool! I'll put the effort toward that outcome and expect a good thing for my investment!" which the game then goes "Yeah everyone dies anyway for no reason you STUPID fucking MORON."
That and of course the results being group A or B dies definitely upsets people as there's no real satisfying or decent outcome.
I think the issue was that the clear "good" option was a surprise GOTCHA! moment.
"Oh there's a more difficult, lengthier way to make them coexist and everyone wins? Cool! I'll put the effort toward that outcome and expect a good thing for my investment!" which the game then goes "Yeah everyone dies anyway for no reason you STUPID fucking MORON."
That and of course the results being group A or B dies definitely upsets people as there's no real satisfying or decent outcome.
>>303946
>It's interesting that apolitical normies hated this quest in F3 so much.
It put them in a no-win situation, and outright lied to the player about the event and their choices. Fair enough, people shouldn't be so gullible, and where you go from the mistake of trusting the ghouls or the peace option should define the morality of the event. Do you let it go? or avenge both the dead and your own honor? Does the setting acknowledge that sometimes messed up shit happens? A pretty good comic was made to demonstrate the feeling of the quest itself, and I thought I had it, but I can't seem to find it.
Obviously the proto-sjw angle is that tenpenny tower = bad therefore a "diversity of tactics" is entirely warranted against them(lying your ass off to them, taking advantage of their willingness to trust and forgive), but the playerbase weren't exactly sold on that.
>It's interesting that apolitical normies hated this quest in F3 so much.
It put them in a no-win situation, and outright lied to the player about the event and their choices. Fair enough, people shouldn't be so gullible, and where you go from the mistake of trusting the ghouls or the peace option should define the morality of the event. Do you let it go? or avenge both the dead and your own honor? Does the setting acknowledge that sometimes messed up shit happens? A pretty good comic was made to demonstrate the feeling of the quest itself, and I thought I had it, but I can't seem to find it.
Obviously the proto-sjw angle is that tenpenny tower = bad therefore a "diversity of tactics" is entirely warranted against them(lying your ass off to them, taking advantage of their willingness to trust and forgive), but the playerbase weren't exactly sold on that.
>>303946
>Steelhooves is not a hero here. He is a 200 year old ghoul inside a suit of armour that makes him damn near invincible while letting him use huge weapons like grenade machineguns and miniguns without needing magic. And he is putting his racial identity as a pony turned ghoul over logic and reason, judging the white tower poner as if he's some monstrous murderer who deserves execution for the "crime" of protecting his tower and all the ponies inside it including the foals and Team LP.
This on its own isn't necessarily a bad thing. Steelhooves having moral failings makes perfect sense in light of his situation and what we know of his character so far. He's (to be charitable for a moment) a grizzled, ancient soldier who's lived through the fall of his nation and the following 200 years of it becoming a shithole among shitholes. Even the organization he dedicated his (un)life to has apparently strayed from its intended path. It's entirely plausible, if not expected, for him to be jaded and prone to lashing out.
The problem is twofold - first is the question of whether Steelhooves' more dubious actions are addressed by and meaningful within the narrative. So far at least, they don't seem to be. Second is the fact that, as his "you’re the sort of mare who makes me wish I was a better pony" line earlier implies, the ultimate narrative purpose of this whole diversion is most likely to make Littlepip look better by comparison. Once again, the story's issues loop back to Littlepip's solipsistic position within the narrative. Everything that exists and happens does so for her benefit.
>Steelhooves is not a hero here. He is a 200 year old ghoul inside a suit of armour that makes him damn near invincible while letting him use huge weapons like grenade machineguns and miniguns without needing magic. And he is putting his racial identity as a pony turned ghoul over logic and reason, judging the white tower poner as if he's some monstrous murderer who deserves execution for the "crime" of protecting his tower and all the ponies inside it including the foals and Team LP.
This on its own isn't necessarily a bad thing. Steelhooves having moral failings makes perfect sense in light of his situation and what we know of his character so far. He's (to be charitable for a moment) a grizzled, ancient soldier who's lived through the fall of his nation and the following 200 years of it becoming a shithole among shitholes. Even the organization he dedicated his (un)life to has apparently strayed from its intended path. It's entirely plausible, if not expected, for him to be jaded and prone to lashing out.
The problem is twofold - first is the question of whether Steelhooves' more dubious actions are addressed by and meaningful within the narrative. So far at least, they don't seem to be. Second is the fact that, as his "you’re the sort of mare who makes me wish I was a better pony" line earlier implies, the ultimate narrative purpose of this whole diversion is most likely to make Littlepip look better by comparison. Once again, the story's issues loop back to Littlepip's solipsistic position within the narrative. Everything that exists and happens does so for her benefit.
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>>303954
It's posted on /v/ sometimes. All I could find was the version censored by Reddit, that replaced the MUHFUGGIN BIX NOOD AYO DAS RITE dialogue of three-dog.
It's posted on /v/ sometimes. All I could find was the version censored by Reddit, that replaced the MUHFUGGIN BIX NOOD AYO DAS RITE dialogue of three-dog.
>>303953
Makes sense.
It still bugs me that in this artificial no-win situation where you can't take some perfect solution where everyone wins like putting the "good" ghouls to work outside the tower as guards or getting them some other kind of job so they can be good citizens or finding the ghouls some other place to live and helping them conga-line there halfway across the Wasteland.
The quest doesn't let a hero willing to put in the extra effort get a good ending.
It's like it spits in the face of everyone who assumed this would be like the Necropolis quest from F1 where you can steal their water chip for yourself if you're a lazy prick and don't mind fighting your way out of there or put in extra effort to get the quest done "right".
And Kkat's attempt to fix this quest basically forced the NPC questgiver to get his hands dirty himself (sort of) by hiring some mercs to do it for him. Who were then randomly trapped by Alicorns atop a tower for 4ish days. LP saves them and doesn't blame the mercs for accepting this dirty job and even considers their organization a good place for children! MJ's children! But of course the characters shit-talk Grim for doing what had to be done to keep his society safe, even though that society is silly and snooty but mostly silly.
And then The Big Guy of Team LP murders the fucker in cold blood and gets away with it by lying, right after all that bullshit about honesty and Finding Your Virtue? What the fuck is this hypocritical shit?!
Absolutely none of Steelhooves' characterization hints that he could or would do this. Nothing here motivates him except a desire to "avenge his ghoul bretheren". It ain't like he's backstabbing Grim Star to get some benefit for Team LP in the name of moral greyness.
It would have been so easy to make this less shit if DJ Ho-bag was assigned her DJ job by a friendly harmless old coot in charge of the tower which generated wealth for the tower by printing the money it and other city states around the wasteland use but the fucking huge and excessively shouty (whose very body is enchanted to make him the biggest in the room no matter who enters it) Inquisitor Paladin Grim Star planned on taking over the tower with a military coup and then making the tower isolationist for some fallacious reason and then killing DJ CarpetMuncher for shit-talking the tower's "righteous and holy divine glory". Then say the ghouls are mutated workers from the tower who got that way from a tower reactor leak and demand to be let back into the tower to see their families.
This would make Grim a literal colossal prick and more importantly, a colossal prick whose idea of "elitism" and how to do what's right for your society is as dishonest and fundamentally faulty as the fake fancy food lying chefs make out of scavenged tins and serve to ignorant wannabe-fancy ponies.
Could also make him a tiny prick who relies on magic to seem larger and buffer than he is. After an epic fight scene of Buff Grim Star thrashing Team LP like they're stuffed dolls LP figures out how to negate his magic and reveal his true form to the tower and then crush him for being evil. Or arrest him or kick him into the wasteland outside where he can return as a major threat later.
There, that should tie into this story arc's attempted themes of honesty and dishonesty and the right/wrong way to get shit done for the greater good.
At least I think that's what this story arc was going for considering the mad scientist who chopped up poners "for the greater good" and the bullshit food restaurants and bullshit laws if the tower and how Velvet tranq darted LP to force her into rehab and how LP and Velvet sometimes lie for their respective greater goods but LP hates when Velvet plays her like some random NPC in the Wasteland that's 100% morally ok to dupe.
Makes sense.
It still bugs me that in this artificial no-win situation where you can't take some perfect solution where everyone wins like putting the "good" ghouls to work outside the tower as guards or getting them some other kind of job so they can be good citizens or finding the ghouls some other place to live and helping them conga-line there halfway across the Wasteland.
The quest doesn't let a hero willing to put in the extra effort get a good ending.
It's like it spits in the face of everyone who assumed this would be like the Necropolis quest from F1 where you can steal their water chip for yourself if you're a lazy prick and don't mind fighting your way out of there or put in extra effort to get the quest done "right".
And Kkat's attempt to fix this quest basically forced the NPC questgiver to get his hands dirty himself (sort of) by hiring some mercs to do it for him. Who were then randomly trapped by Alicorns atop a tower for 4ish days. LP saves them and doesn't blame the mercs for accepting this dirty job and even considers their organization a good place for children! MJ's children! But of course the characters shit-talk Grim for doing what had to be done to keep his society safe, even though that society is silly and snooty but mostly silly.
And then The Big Guy of Team LP murders the fucker in cold blood and gets away with it by lying, right after all that bullshit about honesty and Finding Your Virtue? What the fuck is this hypocritical shit?!
Absolutely none of Steelhooves' characterization hints that he could or would do this. Nothing here motivates him except a desire to "avenge his ghoul bretheren". It ain't like he's backstabbing Grim Star to get some benefit for Team LP in the name of moral greyness.
It would have been so easy to make this less shit if DJ Ho-bag was assigned her DJ job by a friendly harmless old coot in charge of the tower which generated wealth for the tower by printing the money it and other city states around the wasteland use but the fucking huge and excessively shouty (whose very body is enchanted to make him the biggest in the room no matter who enters it) Inquisitor Paladin Grim Star planned on taking over the tower with a military coup and then making the tower isolationist for some fallacious reason and then killing DJ CarpetMuncher for shit-talking the tower's "righteous and holy divine glory". Then say the ghouls are mutated workers from the tower who got that way from a tower reactor leak and demand to be let back into the tower to see their families.
This would make Grim a literal colossal prick and more importantly, a colossal prick whose idea of "elitism" and how to do what's right for your society is as dishonest and fundamentally faulty as the fake fancy food lying chefs make out of scavenged tins and serve to ignorant wannabe-fancy ponies.
Could also make him a tiny prick who relies on magic to seem larger and buffer than he is. After an epic fight scene of Buff Grim Star thrashing Team LP like they're stuffed dolls LP figures out how to negate his magic and reveal his true form to the tower and then crush him for being evil. Or arrest him or kick him into the wasteland outside where he can return as a major threat later.
There, that should tie into this story arc's attempted themes of honesty and dishonesty and the right/wrong way to get shit done for the greater good.
At least I think that's what this story arc was going for considering the mad scientist who chopped up poners "for the greater good" and the bullshit food restaurants and bullshit laws if the tower and how Velvet tranq darted LP to force her into rehab and how LP and Velvet sometimes lie for their respective greater goods but LP hates when Velvet plays her like some random NPC in the Wasteland that's 100% morally ok to dupe.
>>303919
Page break. Very little actually happens in the next two microscenes, so I am going to dispense with them quickly.
Littlepoop is alone in the group's hotel room, raging over Monterrey Jack's weird little scheme. I'm not really sure what she's supposed to be mad about to be perfectly honest; it seems like MJ's actions were committed more to fuck over his own kids than to fuck her over, but she seems to be angry on her own behalf rather than theirs. This whole episode seems like further evidence of the author's derangement.
Anyway, she finds some crack mints in her saddlebag, and has a moment of weakness where she wants to get high. However, at this moment she has what I'm sure the author intended as a breakthrough, and realizes that crack mints have brought her nothing but ruin. So, she flushes her stash down the toilet.
Page break. She has flushed nearly her entire stash, with the exception of one last tin. She now has her Frodo-and-the-Ring moment, where she struggles to part with the thing that has a hold on her, but before she can make the decision, Homage enters the room. LP is ashamed to have her dyke lover see her at her absolute worst, but Homage pulls her in for a hug, and as they embrace she empties the last tin of crack mints into the toilet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5G-vHpOcrAY
The scene itself technically we're dealing with two scenes, but they are effectively one scene with an inappropriate page break wedged in the middle is executed more or less decently. This is a pretty standard "junkie realizes she's hit rock bottom and has her moment of clarity" scene. Having Homage appear at the moment she does, so she can offer comfort to LP and help her throw the last of the mints away, is symbolically appropriate: the message here is basically that LP has friends and doesn't need to struggle alone.
However my complaint here is not that the scene is poorly executed, but that the plotline leading up to this scene, LP's drug addiction, was handled so poorly that it completely negates any emotional impact the scene might have had. This author either doesn't understand addiction or doesn't understand how to write about it; I'm not sure which it is. The former is plausible because as far as I can tell he has spent his entire life in his mother's basement playing video games, and would therefore have as little direct knowledge of addiction as he has of any other subject besides games; the latter is plausible because he has clearly demonstrated that he doesn't understand how to write about much of anything. In any case, though, the result is the same.
Addiction essentially takes over a person's life and becomes the driving force of their existence. Gradually, all other areas of their life become subservient to it; it's why people with severe crack or heroin addictions often end up as criminals or prostitutes. They spend so much time inebriated that they can't hold down a job, so they begin doing whatever they need to do in order to finance their habit. Other areas of their life, ie family, work, hobbies, etc, begin to fade into the background as the person's life revolves more and more around getting high. Has Littlepoop experienced anything like this? Not that I've seen.
The author has committed the same fallacy with Pip's addiction that Peen Stroke committed with Nyx's supposed angst and sadness: he tells us about it instead of showing it to us. Despite his assurances that she is really hooked on these stupid mints and that her friends are really worried about her, we've seen virtually no real addict behavior from LP. Or, more accurately, she behaves like an addict when the author wants her to, but the rest of the time she is just doing what she would normally do if she didn't have a problem. What specific examples can anyone cite from the text where LP's addiction to crack mints affects some major part of the story? Personally, I can't think of any. The mints alternate between being a convenient device that the author uses to help her solve otherwise unsolvable puzzles, and being something that she intermittently whines about being hooked on, despite how little actual impact being hooked actually has on her life or the lives of others around her.
Even the Monterrey Jack situation, which she blames her addiction for, had nothing to do with the mints directly. If she had, oh I don't know, gone on a mint-bender and completely forgotten about MJ's execution, and then learned after waking up in a puddle of her own piss and vomit that MJ is dead, then she might have a point here. As it stands, MJ is only dead because LP's plan to free him was thwarted by Velvet, who wanted to send LP to a rehab session that she arguably didn't even need. The whole thing is completely silly, and so this mint-flushing scene, which is intended to be an emotionally moving and dramatic scene, also becomes silly, and the heavy-handed emotion and drama only serves to make it sillier.
If the author wants to do this sort of thing correctly, he needs to have LP's mint use gradually become a recurring problem, that has an actual effect on events in the story. We need to see LP deteriorate, we need to see her relationship with her friends deteriorate. We need to see her make dumb choices or take stupid risks because she's high or because she needs mints. Maybe she takes the group on a dangerous stable raid, risking everyone's lives because she heard there was a big mint stash in there. Maybe one of her friends dies or nearly dies because she was high during a fight. Maybe MJ dies because she was on a mint bender, like I outlined earlier. At that point, if her friends want to ship her off to rehab it's probably justified. However, as it stands, this whole addiction subplot is just stupid, and the artificial hamfisted attempts at emotion on display in these two microscenes is made into unintentional comedy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yN-EZW0Plsg
Page break. Very little actually happens in the next two microscenes, so I am going to dispense with them quickly.
Littlepoop is alone in the group's hotel room, raging over Monterrey Jack's weird little scheme. I'm not really sure what she's supposed to be mad about to be perfectly honest; it seems like MJ's actions were committed more to fuck over his own kids than to fuck her over, but she seems to be angry on her own behalf rather than theirs. This whole episode seems like further evidence of the author's derangement.
Anyway, she finds some crack mints in her saddlebag, and has a moment of weakness where she wants to get high. However, at this moment she has what I'm sure the author intended as a breakthrough, and realizes that crack mints have brought her nothing but ruin. So, she flushes her stash down the toilet.
Page break. She has flushed nearly her entire stash, with the exception of one last tin. She now has her Frodo-and-the-Ring moment, where she struggles to part with the thing that has a hold on her, but before she can make the decision, Homage enters the room. LP is ashamed to have her dyke lover see her at her absolute worst, but Homage pulls her in for a hug, and as they embrace she empties the last tin of crack mints into the toilet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5G-vHpOcrAY
The scene itself technically we're dealing with two scenes, but they are effectively one scene with an inappropriate page break wedged in the middle is executed more or less decently. This is a pretty standard "junkie realizes she's hit rock bottom and has her moment of clarity" scene. Having Homage appear at the moment she does, so she can offer comfort to LP and help her throw the last of the mints away, is symbolically appropriate: the message here is basically that LP has friends and doesn't need to struggle alone.
However my complaint here is not that the scene is poorly executed, but that the plotline leading up to this scene, LP's drug addiction, was handled so poorly that it completely negates any emotional impact the scene might have had. This author either doesn't understand addiction or doesn't understand how to write about it; I'm not sure which it is. The former is plausible because as far as I can tell he has spent his entire life in his mother's basement playing video games, and would therefore have as little direct knowledge of addiction as he has of any other subject besides games; the latter is plausible because he has clearly demonstrated that he doesn't understand how to write about much of anything. In any case, though, the result is the same.
Addiction essentially takes over a person's life and becomes the driving force of their existence. Gradually, all other areas of their life become subservient to it; it's why people with severe crack or heroin addictions often end up as criminals or prostitutes. They spend so much time inebriated that they can't hold down a job, so they begin doing whatever they need to do in order to finance their habit. Other areas of their life, ie family, work, hobbies, etc, begin to fade into the background as the person's life revolves more and more around getting high. Has Littlepoop experienced anything like this? Not that I've seen.
The author has committed the same fallacy with Pip's addiction that Peen Stroke committed with Nyx's supposed angst and sadness: he tells us about it instead of showing it to us. Despite his assurances that she is really hooked on these stupid mints and that her friends are really worried about her, we've seen virtually no real addict behavior from LP. Or, more accurately, she behaves like an addict when the author wants her to, but the rest of the time she is just doing what she would normally do if she didn't have a problem. What specific examples can anyone cite from the text where LP's addiction to crack mints affects some major part of the story? Personally, I can't think of any. The mints alternate between being a convenient device that the author uses to help her solve otherwise unsolvable puzzles, and being something that she intermittently whines about being hooked on, despite how little actual impact being hooked actually has on her life or the lives of others around her.
Even the Monterrey Jack situation, which she blames her addiction for, had nothing to do with the mints directly. If she had, oh I don't know, gone on a mint-bender and completely forgotten about MJ's execution, and then learned after waking up in a puddle of her own piss and vomit that MJ is dead, then she might have a point here. As it stands, MJ is only dead because LP's plan to free him was thwarted by Velvet, who wanted to send LP to a rehab session that she arguably didn't even need. The whole thing is completely silly, and so this mint-flushing scene, which is intended to be an emotionally moving and dramatic scene, also becomes silly, and the heavy-handed emotion and drama only serves to make it sillier.
If the author wants to do this sort of thing correctly, he needs to have LP's mint use gradually become a recurring problem, that has an actual effect on events in the story. We need to see LP deteriorate, we need to see her relationship with her friends deteriorate. We need to see her make dumb choices or take stupid risks because she's high or because she needs mints. Maybe she takes the group on a dangerous stable raid, risking everyone's lives because she heard there was a big mint stash in there. Maybe one of her friends dies or nearly dies because she was high during a fight. Maybe MJ dies because she was on a mint bender, like I outlined earlier. At that point, if her friends want to ship her off to rehab it's probably justified. However, as it stands, this whole addiction subplot is just stupid, and the artificial hamfisted attempts at emotion on display in these two microscenes is made into unintentional comedy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yN-EZW0Plsg
>>303979
Page break. Homage takes LP back to her penthouse athenaeum and serves her pancakes, or a meal at least. There is some gentle, intimate banter between them. Apparently Homage is a good cook, and serves her much better food than the expensive restaurants downstairs. I'm a little curious how exactly this works since it sounds like all they have available are prepackaged foodstuffs from 200 years ago, but we'll put a pin in that for now.
We learn a little bit about Homage's past, as well as the details of the 200 year old DJ chain that I've been puzzling about. Apparently the "DJ Pon3" title has not been passed down through a direct bloodline succession as I had originally assumed. Homage explains that she was originally an assistant to the previous DJ, who seems to have been an actual male. In any case, the "voice" of the DJ is a spell that is passed down to each successive unicorn who takes up the mantle, thus ensuring that there is always a DJ and that "he" always speaks with the same voice. I'm a little curious about this as well, since if the original DJ was supposed to be Vinyl Scratch, you would think that it would be her voice being passed down, and not some random dude's. However, this might be something that the author will elaborate on later.
We pick up a few other scraps of information as well. We learn that Homage used to have a close friend named Jokeblue, and that the two of them would go on errands for the DJ together. We are told that Homage gradually "earned her way into the Tower" I'm assuming the same way kkat earned his way into Club Manhole and became the assistant of the DJ, but no details are given. Presumably, the DJ has been broadcasting out of this single room in Tenpony Tower the entire time the character existed, which makes it all the more curious that he would be able to operate out of the Tower without anyone being aware.
And of course, the author just can't resist injecting a little gratuitous, edgy sadness porn. Here is what became of Jokeblue:
>Some cruel bastard rigged up a baby carriage with explosives, used the corpse of a newborn colt and a recording of a baby’s crying to lure victims in.” I cringed, horrified. “By the time she was close enough to realize the baby was dead, it was too late to run. She tried to disarm it, but…” The dear unicorn’s voice broke off, choked.
>Now it was my turn to hold Homage.
Page break. Homage gives Littlepoop a sensual massage, and then they have sex. Nothing else happens.
Page break. Littlepoop wakes up in bed next to Homage and observes a green light outside. Homage tells her it's just a balefire phoenix, and that she should come back to bed. LP observes that a phoenix has been following them for some time now. Nothing else happens.
Page break. LP and Homage spend the following morning together, then Homage goes off to do her radio show, and LP listens in. It's just more of the usual fare: Homage plays up LP's so-called accomplishments, LP feigns modesty. Later, LP asks Homage about the Black Opal, which she needs for...uh, hold on, let me check; I've forgotten what the deal with this thing is. Oh yeah; Frank needs it. LP asked him to tell Gawd about Blackwing's mercenary group needing an emergency airlift or some shit, and in return he wants this opal thing. Well, it turns out they're both in luck. Homage has it, she doesn't give a shit about it, and she's willing to part with it. On top of that, she has another quest for LP and her friends.
After all this time, it looks like LP still plans on going to Fillydelphia, although by now I have completely forgotten why she ever wanted to go there in the first place. Apparently this is why:
>I nodded firmly. “I’m still convinced that something is escalating in the Equestrian Wasteland. Something involving Red Eye and the alicorns. I know they’ve been around for quite a while,” I told her.
Absolutely nothing in the story so far would lead a rational person to this conclusion. Either that, or they would need to be a dedicated autist with a strong working knowledge of Fallout lore in order to put all the pieces together. Actually, I'm going to assume the latter.
Anyway, the two of them jaw about some incomprehensible bullshit for awhile, something about alicorns I guess. Then, Homage gets to what I will generously call her point:
>You remember that bank of blank screens in the E.B.S.?
No, I have literally no idea what the fuck you're talking about. I don't remember any blank screens, I don't know what these screens would have to do with Equestrian Butt Sauce, and I can't keep track of even half of the zany bullshit that's been introduced in this story so far.
Fortunately, Littlepoop is going to clarify it for us:
>I had taken note of them when she first allowed me inside the M.A.S.E.B.S. and let me look around. I told her so.
Ah, yes, of course. The M.A.S.E.B.S. Those are the guys from P.B.N.J., who split apart from F.U.H.Q. and formed P.B.4.U.G.O.2.B.E.D. It's all so clear now. Seriously, the autism in this story is convoluted enough without all of these acronyms to keep track of. This thing may actually be the death of me.
Anyway, from what I'm able to gather from the next paragraph, Homage wants LP to go to wherever the fuck Red Eye is at, Fillydelphia I guess, and attach some kind of doohickey to one of those big-ass radio tower things out there, the ones mentioned earlier that she uses to spy on everyone. I guess the one near Fillydelphia is closed off to her, so she can't see anything happening in that area.
Well, I'm a bit conflicted on how I should feel here. On the one hand, I have no idea what the hell is going on anymore. On the other, it looks like finally, at long last, after slogging through literally (LITERALLY) 165,374 words of this horrendous nonsensical dreck, we are finally (FINALLY) seeing the first seeds of what might (MIGHT) turn into an actual plot. inb4 Charlie Brown.
Page break. Homage takes LP back to her penthouse athenaeum and serves her pancakes, or a meal at least. There is some gentle, intimate banter between them. Apparently Homage is a good cook, and serves her much better food than the expensive restaurants downstairs. I'm a little curious how exactly this works since it sounds like all they have available are prepackaged foodstuffs from 200 years ago, but we'll put a pin in that for now.
We learn a little bit about Homage's past, as well as the details of the 200 year old DJ chain that I've been puzzling about. Apparently the "DJ Pon3" title has not been passed down through a direct bloodline succession as I had originally assumed. Homage explains that she was originally an assistant to the previous DJ, who seems to have been an actual male. In any case, the "voice" of the DJ is a spell that is passed down to each successive unicorn who takes up the mantle, thus ensuring that there is always a DJ and that "he" always speaks with the same voice. I'm a little curious about this as well, since if the original DJ was supposed to be Vinyl Scratch, you would think that it would be her voice being passed down, and not some random dude's. However, this might be something that the author will elaborate on later.
We pick up a few other scraps of information as well. We learn that Homage used to have a close friend named Jokeblue, and that the two of them would go on errands for the DJ together. We are told that Homage gradually "earned her way into the Tower" I'm assuming the same way kkat earned his way into Club Manhole and became the assistant of the DJ, but no details are given. Presumably, the DJ has been broadcasting out of this single room in Tenpony Tower the entire time the character existed, which makes it all the more curious that he would be able to operate out of the Tower without anyone being aware.
And of course, the author just can't resist injecting a little gratuitous, edgy sadness porn. Here is what became of Jokeblue:
>Some cruel bastard rigged up a baby carriage with explosives, used the corpse of a newborn colt and a recording of a baby’s crying to lure victims in.” I cringed, horrified. “By the time she was close enough to realize the baby was dead, it was too late to run. She tried to disarm it, but…” The dear unicorn’s voice broke off, choked.
>Now it was my turn to hold Homage.
Page break. Homage gives Littlepoop a sensual massage, and then they have sex. Nothing else happens.
Page break. Littlepoop wakes up in bed next to Homage and observes a green light outside. Homage tells her it's just a balefire phoenix, and that she should come back to bed. LP observes that a phoenix has been following them for some time now. Nothing else happens.
Page break. LP and Homage spend the following morning together, then Homage goes off to do her radio show, and LP listens in. It's just more of the usual fare: Homage plays up LP's so-called accomplishments, LP feigns modesty. Later, LP asks Homage about the Black Opal, which she needs for...uh, hold on, let me check; I've forgotten what the deal with this thing is. Oh yeah; Frank needs it. LP asked him to tell Gawd about Blackwing's mercenary group needing an emergency airlift or some shit, and in return he wants this opal thing. Well, it turns out they're both in luck. Homage has it, she doesn't give a shit about it, and she's willing to part with it. On top of that, she has another quest for LP and her friends.
After all this time, it looks like LP still plans on going to Fillydelphia, although by now I have completely forgotten why she ever wanted to go there in the first place. Apparently this is why:
>I nodded firmly. “I’m still convinced that something is escalating in the Equestrian Wasteland. Something involving Red Eye and the alicorns. I know they’ve been around for quite a while,” I told her.
Absolutely nothing in the story so far would lead a rational person to this conclusion. Either that, or they would need to be a dedicated autist with a strong working knowledge of Fallout lore in order to put all the pieces together. Actually, I'm going to assume the latter.
Anyway, the two of them jaw about some incomprehensible bullshit for awhile, something about alicorns I guess. Then, Homage gets to what I will generously call her point:
>You remember that bank of blank screens in the E.B.S.?
No, I have literally no idea what the fuck you're talking about. I don't remember any blank screens, I don't know what these screens would have to do with Equestrian Butt Sauce, and I can't keep track of even half of the zany bullshit that's been introduced in this story so far.
Fortunately, Littlepoop is going to clarify it for us:
>I had taken note of them when she first allowed me inside the M.A.S.E.B.S. and let me look around. I told her so.
Ah, yes, of course. The M.A.S.E.B.S. Those are the guys from P.B.N.J., who split apart from F.U.H.Q. and formed P.B.4.U.G.O.2.B.E.D. It's all so clear now. Seriously, the autism in this story is convoluted enough without all of these acronyms to keep track of. This thing may actually be the death of me.
Anyway, from what I'm able to gather from the next paragraph, Homage wants LP to go to wherever the fuck Red Eye is at, Fillydelphia I guess, and attach some kind of doohickey to one of those big-ass radio tower things out there, the ones mentioned earlier that she uses to spy on everyone. I guess the one near Fillydelphia is closed off to her, so she can't see anything happening in that area.
Well, I'm a bit conflicted on how I should feel here. On the one hand, I have no idea what the hell is going on anymore. On the other, it looks like finally, at long last, after slogging through literally (LITERALLY) 165,374 words of this horrendous nonsensical dreck, we are finally (FINALLY) seeing the first seeds of what might (MIGHT) turn into an actual plot. inb4 Charlie Brown.
>>303983
>>Some cruel bastard rigged up a baby carriage with explosives, used the corpse of a newborn colt and a recording of a baby’s crying to lure victims in.”
This made me laugh, because it's literally an edgier version of something that already exists in Fallout 3. Along with landmines, grenade bouquets and other traps, you can occasionally run into baby carriages rigged with explosives. Inside is a doll, which will cry as a last second warning if the trap is activated. They're usually found in areas with lots of assorted debris like shopping carts and luggage, so you can wind up stumbling into them accidentally.
In the game they're a sneaky trap and a little bit creepy. This wasn't bad enough apparently, so Kkat had to make them edgy as well.
>>Some cruel bastard rigged up a baby carriage with explosives, used the corpse of a newborn colt and a recording of a baby’s crying to lure victims in.”
This made me laugh, because it's literally an edgier version of something that already exists in Fallout 3. Along with landmines, grenade bouquets and other traps, you can occasionally run into baby carriages rigged with explosives. Inside is a doll, which will cry as a last second warning if the trap is activated. They're usually found in areas with lots of assorted debris like shopping carts and luggage, so you can wind up stumbling into them accidentally.
In the game they're a sneaky trap and a little bit creepy. This wasn't bad enough apparently, so Kkat had to make them edgy as well.
>>303983
>ministry of arcane science
Is Twilight in charge of the Ministry of Arcane Science, the Ministry of Wartime Technology, or both? Gee, Luna, how come you let her have TWO ministries?
>MASEBS
Ministry of Arcane Science's Emergency Broadcast System.
fuck Kkunt for not bothering to think of a cutesy ponyish name for this thing's acronym that makes its function as a combination emergency broadcast radio tower and an impossibly perfect magical spy device that could make Brother Eye from the DC Retardverse jealous easy to remember.
God, it's so fucked up that the tower's primary purpose was to spy on damn near everypony in Equestria and its emergency radio broadcast system simply doubles as a handy dandy radio tower great for commercial radio DJs with a few old vinyl records.
And it's fucking stupid that this is a Twilight invention and not a Pinkie Pie invention. Wasn't Pinkie supposed to be the ruler of the Ministry Of Unpersoning? Oh right, they relied on crack mints to turn her Pinkie Sense meme into conveniently semi-omniscient future sight.
It's a shame nopony pre-war thought to give Pinkie Pie a shotgun and tell her to use her bullshit cartoon physics to pop out of random unexpected places in Zebrica to blast some zigger general/king/commander faces off.
Seriously, this bullshit radio surveillance system needs an acronym that fits or hilariously fits poorly.
Possibilities include the MASTER, Ministry of Arcane Science Terrestrial Emergency Radio
MASSIVE, the Ministry of Arcane Science Surveillance Intelligence and Vision Equipment
and MASTURBATER, the Ministry of Arcane Science Terrestrial Underground Behind-the-scenes All-seeing Tower of Echolocative Research
>ministry of arcane science
Is Twilight in charge of the Ministry of Arcane Science, the Ministry of Wartime Technology, or both? Gee, Luna, how come you let her have TWO ministries?
>MASEBS
Ministry of Arcane Science's Emergency Broadcast System.
fuck Kkunt for not bothering to think of a cutesy ponyish name for this thing's acronym that makes its function as a combination emergency broadcast radio tower and an impossibly perfect magical spy device that could make Brother Eye from the DC Retardverse jealous easy to remember.
God, it's so fucked up that the tower's primary purpose was to spy on damn near everypony in Equestria and its emergency radio broadcast system simply doubles as a handy dandy radio tower great for commercial radio DJs with a few old vinyl records.
And it's fucking stupid that this is a Twilight invention and not a Pinkie Pie invention. Wasn't Pinkie supposed to be the ruler of the Ministry Of Unpersoning? Oh right, they relied on crack mints to turn her Pinkie Sense meme into conveniently semi-omniscient future sight.
It's a shame nopony pre-war thought to give Pinkie Pie a shotgun and tell her to use her bullshit cartoon physics to pop out of random unexpected places in Zebrica to blast some zigger general/king/commander faces off.
Seriously, this bullshit radio surveillance system needs an acronym that fits or hilariously fits poorly.
Possibilities include the MASTER, Ministry of Arcane Science Terrestrial Emergency Radio
MASSIVE, the Ministry of Arcane Science Surveillance Intelligence and Vision Equipment
and MASTURBATER, the Ministry of Arcane Science Terrestrial Underground Behind-the-scenes All-seeing Tower of Echolocative Research
>>303983
>Jokeblue gets killed by an explosive trap
I bet she and DJ Ho-bag wish she had the Light Step(tm) perk just like Littlepip, the perk that makes you unable to accidentally set off explosives like landmines and tripwires. I don't remember if it works on all booby traps ever like baby carriage bombs and tripwires attatched to heavy objects that will swing into you Home Alone style but I remember it working on tripwires attatched to shotguns.
It's bullshit that LP gets videogamey plot armour when other characters don't.
Glim, is it bullshit that something that typically never kills players in the games killed a NPC in this story?
It's kind of like if a lowly Goomba from mario actually killed people in a dark and edgy mario fanfic that still shows the heroes effortlessly defeat worse threats.
Or if someone was killed by a lowly level 3 rattata in a dark edgy pokemon story even though rattata are common weak normal-type rats that are no match for your almighty electric rat/psychic waifu/prehistoric power-creeped fish bastard/brave bird talonflame that eats lucarios and their furfag trainers for breakfast/semi-invincible ghost-bug shell husk/mountain eating sandstorm shitter
>Jokeblue gets killed by an explosive trap
I bet she and DJ Ho-bag wish she had the Light Step(tm) perk just like Littlepip, the perk that makes you unable to accidentally set off explosives like landmines and tripwires. I don't remember if it works on all booby traps ever like baby carriage bombs and tripwires attatched to heavy objects that will swing into you Home Alone style but I remember it working on tripwires attatched to shotguns.
It's bullshit that LP gets videogamey plot armour when other characters don't.
Glim, is it bullshit that something that typically never kills players in the games killed a NPC in this story?
It's kind of like if a lowly Goomba from mario actually killed people in a dark and edgy mario fanfic that still shows the heroes effortlessly defeat worse threats.
Or if someone was killed by a lowly level 3 rattata in a dark edgy pokemon story even though rattata are common weak normal-type rats that are no match for your almighty electric rat/psychic waifu/prehistoric power-creeped fish bastard/brave bird talonflame that eats lucarios and their furfag trainers for breakfast/semi-invincible ghost-bug shell husk/mountain eating sandstorm shitter
>>303985
Interestingly, Stardust's sequel Mente Materia used a similar concept by sending Pinkie Pie on such a mission, and although it's been a while since I've read it I know that scene was a better action sequence than anything FOE will likely cook up. FOE is disappointing in how bad it is; this isn't some obscure crackfic like FIO but is supposed to be the flagship of the fandom, yet it's only because of GlimGlam's wit that this is entertaining; it's not even creative in a weird but poorly written way. Although I want all of it and its rancid organs to be dissected, I also am looking forward to whatever fic comes next.
Interestingly, Stardust's sequel Mente Materia used a similar concept by sending Pinkie Pie on such a mission, and although it's been a while since I've read it I know that scene was a better action sequence than anything FOE will likely cook up. FOE is disappointing in how bad it is; this isn't some obscure crackfic like FIO but is supposed to be the flagship of the fandom, yet it's only because of GlimGlam's wit that this is entertaining; it's not even creative in a weird but poorly written way. Although I want all of it and its rancid organs to be dissected, I also am looking forward to whatever fic comes next.
>>303983
Page break. Littlepoop, naturally, has accepted Homage's quest. Homage now takes her to the main room of her library athenaeum, whatever where a big-ass picture of a place called Splendid Valley is hanging (this picture was mentioned earlier, but I've long forgotten what the deal with it was). There is, naturally, a wall safe hidden behind it. Homage pulls out the opal orb thingie that Frank wants, and also a statuette of Pinkie Pie which she has for some reason. I think LP has collected just about all of those statues now.
Anyway, the statue was a gift from the previous DJ and Homage is passing it on to Littlepoop and blah blah blah. Apparently she wants her to have it to give her strength whenever she starts to feel a mint-craving coming on, because I guess remembering what a loony coke-fiend Ponk turned into is supposed to cure the itch. Also, I think these statues have magic powers or something, though the author has (naturally) done a piss-poor job of explaining how any of that works.
The statue also has a cryptic epigram inscribed on the bottom:
>“Awareness! It was under ‘E’!”
This feels like it might be an MLP reference, or else it's referencing some obscure detail from an earlier part of the text whose significance I've long forgotten.
Anyway, Littlepoop takes the statue and tells Homage that she will treasure it always, as a memento of the smelly reclusive weirdo hiding at the top of Tenpony Tower that she bumped ponuts with that one time.
>I took a piece of cloth and tied Pinkie Pie next to Twilight. Now, they could be together again. It was silly, but it just felt right.
Reminder that Littlepoop obtained the Twilight statue in an act of literal grave robbery, and has thus far shown no remorse whatsoever for the act. If she wanted to do something touching and symbolically appropriate, she ought to have left the Twilight statue in Pinkie's ribcage where it belonged, and then taken this Pinkie statue back to the skyscraper so she could place it alongside the Twilight one. However, that would require the author to recognize that these objects have significance beyond being silly collectibles for theplayer protagonist to just pick up for no reason.
Page break. Naturally, there is also a weapon of some kind in the safe, and naturally it's some kind of super-powered boss-level magic gun that Homage just found lying around somewhere. The story of how Homage found the gun meanders a bit, and eventually segues into some backstory about the Zebras that seems like it may be important. Like everything else in this story it's fairly convoluted, but I'll do my best to summarize it:
The pony mythology in Edgequestria is basically the same as it is in the show: Celestia and Luna move the sun and the moon, and all of that. However, after the pegasi closed off the sky (this event has not yet been explained in detail to my recollection), it separated the sun and moon from the surface ponies. It is also confirmed that Celestia and Luna both died at some point during the war.
Since they are no longer a physical presence in the world, they have gradually been mythologized and turned into the goddesses that LP's vaguely-defined religion revolves around. In any case, there seems to be an ideological split between religious devotees like Littlepoop like her addiction, her zealotry comes and goes as the author pleases and a more pragmatic "atheist" sect, which seems aware that Celestia and Luna were living alicorns and not goddesses. Hence all the shit about "blasphemy" that LP occasionally goes off on whenever kkat remembers that she is supposed to be religious.
Again, I'm a bit curious how all of this works. It actually makes sense that if Celestia and Luna died or disappeared, they would likely be mythologized in this way centuries after the fact. However, I'd like to know how the atheists figured out that their "gods" were just long-dead alicorns. Since Homage has access to this massive collection of pre-war books it makes sense that she would know all of this, but what about a simple hick like Calamity? I have the same complaint here that I have with other areas of this world's backstory and lore: that it's not at all clear just how much knowledge the average pony can be expected to have, how the knowledge of a stable-dweller like LP would differ from that of a wastelander like Calamity, and what falls into the category of secret or lost knowledge. Sadly, this could have been one of this story's more interesting bits of lore had the author chosen to put a little more thought into how he approached it.
Meanwhile, the zebras have their own myths, which are pretty strange. While the ponies revere the sun and the moon, the zebras seem to have some kind of fear of the stars. This bit is actually a little confusing, since there seems to be an implication that the zebras are able to see stars but not the sun or the moon, which seems strange. I'm also a little curious why the zebras can see the sky, but the ponies can't. Is the cloud cover only over Equestria? Is it permanently night in Zebrica? This part could do with a bit of clarification.
Anyway, the point of all this is that the zebras' religion and/or worldview seems to revolve around the idea that the stars are malicious gods, who occasionally wreak havoc on the earth or whatever the world is called in MLP; Equus, I think. There is also mention of four specific star-gods, who I guess have some burning desire to see the creatures on the ground destroy themselves. Here is LP's take on all of this:
>Four stars helping destroy Equestria. Now why did that sound familiar.
This is a question and should end with a question mark. Also, I'm not quite sure what she's referencing here. My guess is that it's something from early MLP that has slipped my mind, but it could also be something specific to this story. In any event, I'm not sure what the significance of the four stars is meant to be.
Page break. Littlepoop, naturally, has accepted Homage's quest. Homage now takes her to the main room of her library athenaeum, whatever where a big-ass picture of a place called Splendid Valley is hanging (this picture was mentioned earlier, but I've long forgotten what the deal with it was). There is, naturally, a wall safe hidden behind it. Homage pulls out the opal orb thingie that Frank wants, and also a statuette of Pinkie Pie which she has for some reason. I think LP has collected just about all of those statues now.
Anyway, the statue was a gift from the previous DJ and Homage is passing it on to Littlepoop and blah blah blah. Apparently she wants her to have it to give her strength whenever she starts to feel a mint-craving coming on, because I guess remembering what a loony coke-fiend Ponk turned into is supposed to cure the itch. Also, I think these statues have magic powers or something, though the author has (naturally) done a piss-poor job of explaining how any of that works.
The statue also has a cryptic epigram inscribed on the bottom:
>“Awareness! It was under ‘E’!”
This feels like it might be an MLP reference, or else it's referencing some obscure detail from an earlier part of the text whose significance I've long forgotten.
Anyway, Littlepoop takes the statue and tells Homage that she will treasure it always, as a memento of the smelly reclusive weirdo hiding at the top of Tenpony Tower that she bumped ponuts with that one time.
>I took a piece of cloth and tied Pinkie Pie next to Twilight. Now, they could be together again. It was silly, but it just felt right.
Reminder that Littlepoop obtained the Twilight statue in an act of literal grave robbery, and has thus far shown no remorse whatsoever for the act. If she wanted to do something touching and symbolically appropriate, she ought to have left the Twilight statue in Pinkie's ribcage where it belonged, and then taken this Pinkie statue back to the skyscraper so she could place it alongside the Twilight one. However, that would require the author to recognize that these objects have significance beyond being silly collectibles for the
Page break. Naturally, there is also a weapon of some kind in the safe, and naturally it's some kind of super-powered boss-level magic gun that Homage just found lying around somewhere. The story of how Homage found the gun meanders a bit, and eventually segues into some backstory about the Zebras that seems like it may be important. Like everything else in this story it's fairly convoluted, but I'll do my best to summarize it:
The pony mythology in Edgequestria is basically the same as it is in the show: Celestia and Luna move the sun and the moon, and all of that. However, after the pegasi closed off the sky (this event has not yet been explained in detail to my recollection), it separated the sun and moon from the surface ponies. It is also confirmed that Celestia and Luna both died at some point during the war.
Since they are no longer a physical presence in the world, they have gradually been mythologized and turned into the goddesses that LP's vaguely-defined religion revolves around. In any case, there seems to be an ideological split between religious devotees like Littlepoop like her addiction, her zealotry comes and goes as the author pleases and a more pragmatic "atheist" sect, which seems aware that Celestia and Luna were living alicorns and not goddesses. Hence all the shit about "blasphemy" that LP occasionally goes off on whenever kkat remembers that she is supposed to be religious.
Again, I'm a bit curious how all of this works. It actually makes sense that if Celestia and Luna died or disappeared, they would likely be mythologized in this way centuries after the fact. However, I'd like to know how the atheists figured out that their "gods" were just long-dead alicorns. Since Homage has access to this massive collection of pre-war books it makes sense that she would know all of this, but what about a simple hick like Calamity? I have the same complaint here that I have with other areas of this world's backstory and lore: that it's not at all clear just how much knowledge the average pony can be expected to have, how the knowledge of a stable-dweller like LP would differ from that of a wastelander like Calamity, and what falls into the category of secret or lost knowledge. Sadly, this could have been one of this story's more interesting bits of lore had the author chosen to put a little more thought into how he approached it.
Meanwhile, the zebras have their own myths, which are pretty strange. While the ponies revere the sun and the moon, the zebras seem to have some kind of fear of the stars. This bit is actually a little confusing, since there seems to be an implication that the zebras are able to see stars but not the sun or the moon, which seems strange. I'm also a little curious why the zebras can see the sky, but the ponies can't. Is the cloud cover only over Equestria? Is it permanently night in Zebrica? This part could do with a bit of clarification.
Anyway, the point of all this is that the zebras' religion and/or worldview seems to revolve around the idea that the stars are malicious gods, who occasionally wreak havoc on the earth or whatever the world is called in MLP; Equus, I think. There is also mention of four specific star-gods, who I guess have some burning desire to see the creatures on the ground destroy themselves. Here is LP's take on all of this:
>Four stars helping destroy Equestria. Now why did that sound familiar.
This is a question and should end with a question mark. Also, I'm not quite sure what she's referencing here. My guess is that it's something from early MLP that has slipped my mind, but it could also be something specific to this story. In any event, I'm not sure what the significance of the four stars is meant to be.
>>303996
>FOE is disappointing in how bad it is; this isn't some obscure crackfic like FIO but is supposed to be the flagship of the fandom, yet it's only because of GlimGlam's wit that this is entertaining; it's not even creative in a weird but poorly written way. Although I want all of it and its rancid organs to be dissected, I also am looking forward to whatever fic comes next.
Thank you, I am happy I could entertain. This is a pretty good assessment of how I feel at this point as well.
>FOE is disappointing in how bad it is; this isn't some obscure crackfic like FIO but is supposed to be the flagship of the fandom, yet it's only because of GlimGlam's wit that this is entertaining; it's not even creative in a weird but poorly written way. Although I want all of it and its rancid organs to be dissected, I also am looking forward to whatever fic comes next.
Thank you, I am happy I could entertain. This is a pretty good assessment of how I feel at this point as well.
>>303997
"It was under E" is what Pinkie said about that book during FIM episode 1/2
The author is a faggot for trying to take the magical stat-boosting Bobblehead collectables from Fallout 3 and make them "make sense" in FIM.
The mane six do not neatly match the 7 SPECIAL stats.
Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, Luck...
Instead of including Spike or some other character for the 7th, the Luck bonus happens when you gather the full set of six. One of many signs that trying to tie 6 friends to 7 character statistics in some RPG was a mistake.
It's easy to match Twilight to Intelligence. Who else would be Intelligence, RD?
But the rest aren't as easy to place.
Which pony could possibly be called Luck? Besides Twilight, who was immensely lucky to be born smart and strong to parents who wanted the best for her in the best possible town for her magical growth and was eventually lucky enough to be sent to Ponyville for a job that got her to interact with five ponies who were fortunately the best friends she could ask for.
Who among the mane six is physically stronger or tougher than Applejack? Should this make her Strength or Endurance? If you pick one for AJ, some other pony gets the other.
Who is faster and more agile, Rainbow Dash or Pinkie Pie?
Who is more perceptive, Rarity or Ponka Po?
You could designate Rarity as the party's Charismatic one, or Fluttershy if you think being a physically attractive and kind person is the same as being charisma or your knowledge of charisma comes solely from how Animal Handling is a charisma skill in DND.
Fluttershy assumed there was a thorn in the paw of that monster in S1E2 before noticing it, the same episode Pinkie's "it was under E" line came from, so should that qualify her for Perception or is she lucky that she was right about animals that day?
If you say Strength is Applejack, Perception is Pinkie Pie the future-seer, Endurance is RD the athlete, Charisma is Rarity, Intelligence is Twilight, and Agility... Fluttershy gets agility or luck by default in this setup.
Give Agility to RD and that leaves her Endurance spot free. If you give Charisma to Fluttershy and Perception to Rarity... no, that still doesn't fix things.
>four stars
Team Four Star did 9/11
just kidding, muslims did that and jews helped.
That sounded familiar so I checked the wiki and ignored spoilers.
Remember the Four Stars company that helped Zebras bomb equestria? It's a reference to them.
Which is still fucking retarded.
Zebras thought the night sky and all the stars were all evil. Plus they thought four particular stars were evil gods who wanted those on this planet to destroy themselves.
So Zebras war on ponies for no good reason (FE fanboys commonly assume ponies invaded zebrica for its coal since unga bunga whitey must always be bad in these sorts of stories plus Fallout's Shitmerica warred with many nations for the earth's last remaining resources even though FE Equestria did nothing wrong) for over 10 years and eventually smuggle nukes into ponyland to blow it up.
The zebras feared four stars were evil gods who wanted ponies to destroy each other and then a company named four stars helps the baddies in a genocidal war murder countless civilians of a retarded nation that still think peace is an option. Wow, so deep, it's almost like their religion predicted the future meaning it was more right all along than the poner friendship religion was.
Fuck Kkat.
The savages fear the night sky and think it's full of evil gods who want them to be short sighted and self destructive so they do exactly what it wants?!
*e;r voice*IT MAKES ALL THE SENSE.
"It was under E" is what Pinkie said about that book during FIM episode 1/2
The author is a faggot for trying to take the magical stat-boosting Bobblehead collectables from Fallout 3 and make them "make sense" in FIM.
The mane six do not neatly match the 7 SPECIAL stats.
Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, Luck...
Instead of including Spike or some other character for the 7th, the Luck bonus happens when you gather the full set of six. One of many signs that trying to tie 6 friends to 7 character statistics in some RPG was a mistake.
It's easy to match Twilight to Intelligence. Who else would be Intelligence, RD?
But the rest aren't as easy to place.
Which pony could possibly be called Luck? Besides Twilight, who was immensely lucky to be born smart and strong to parents who wanted the best for her in the best possible town for her magical growth and was eventually lucky enough to be sent to Ponyville for a job that got her to interact with five ponies who were fortunately the best friends she could ask for.
Who among the mane six is physically stronger or tougher than Applejack? Should this make her Strength or Endurance? If you pick one for AJ, some other pony gets the other.
Who is faster and more agile, Rainbow Dash or Pinkie Pie?
Who is more perceptive, Rarity or Ponka Po?
You could designate Rarity as the party's Charismatic one, or Fluttershy if you think being a physically attractive and kind person is the same as being charisma or your knowledge of charisma comes solely from how Animal Handling is a charisma skill in DND.
Fluttershy assumed there was a thorn in the paw of that monster in S1E2 before noticing it, the same episode Pinkie's "it was under E" line came from, so should that qualify her for Perception or is she lucky that she was right about animals that day?
If you say Strength is Applejack, Perception is Pinkie Pie the future-seer, Endurance is RD the athlete, Charisma is Rarity, Intelligence is Twilight, and Agility... Fluttershy gets agility or luck by default in this setup.
Give Agility to RD and that leaves her Endurance spot free. If you give Charisma to Fluttershy and Perception to Rarity... no, that still doesn't fix things.
>four stars
Team Four Star did 9/11
just kidding, muslims did that and jews helped.
That sounded familiar so I checked the wiki and ignored spoilers.
Remember the Four Stars company that helped Zebras bomb equestria? It's a reference to them.
Which is still fucking retarded.
Zebras thought the night sky and all the stars were all evil. Plus they thought four particular stars were evil gods who wanted those on this planet to destroy themselves.
So Zebras war on ponies for no good reason (FE fanboys commonly assume ponies invaded zebrica for its coal since unga bunga whitey must always be bad in these sorts of stories plus Fallout's Shitmerica warred with many nations for the earth's last remaining resources even though FE Equestria did nothing wrong) for over 10 years and eventually smuggle nukes into ponyland to blow it up.
The zebras feared four stars were evil gods who wanted ponies to destroy each other and then a company named four stars helps the baddies in a genocidal war murder countless civilians of a retarded nation that still think peace is an option. Wow, so deep, it's almost like their religion predicted the future meaning it was more right all along than the poner friendship religion was.
Fuck Kkat.
The savages fear the night sky and think it's full of evil gods who want them to be short sighted and self destructive so they do exactly what it wants?!
*e;r voice*IT MAKES ALL THE SENSE.
>>303987
It's different in video games because things are abstracted or made for specific purposes. In New Vegas you could theoretically die from the really small mantises, and put like 15 in a room with a full grown human npc and they'll probably die. Typically as a player you're so massively overpowered for a reason and it's not really comparable. In real life, simply put on some jeans, or keep moving and you'll probably be able to kill thousands, or so mant mantises that you get tired due to your REALISTIC advantage of size, strength, etc, and no person will ever get killed by one. This isn't even considering realistic behaviours like mantises not seeing you, ignoring you, and so on.
I think when writing a story with some grasp on realism you have to make the dangers well, appropriate for something that can kill you. If you're making a cheeky parody video game fic that doesn't matter, and you could have some fun references where Goombas send you flying into the sky and kill you instantly if they tap your shin.
As for how it impacts the protagonist compared to random people in the setting, I suppose it's a weight of how dangerous the thing is. It would be ridiculous if a tiny blob that the protag just squishes with no effort every time was this genocide-level threat that everyone gets killed by offscreen. IT's sort of what happens here in FO:E with the alicorns, and later Hellhounds
Just reasonably balance the danger. It's alright if the protagonist survives, but the higher the danger the more care needs to be taken with your explanation how someone survives. Characters should be increasingly clever or resourceful, or have a plan for more dangerous threats. REALLY show that without these things that are pre-established and make sense, that these characters could be easily dead. Running away is a thing to highlight this too.
It's different in video games because things are abstracted or made for specific purposes. In New Vegas you could theoretically die from the really small mantises, and put like 15 in a room with a full grown human npc and they'll probably die. Typically as a player you're so massively overpowered for a reason and it's not really comparable. In real life, simply put on some jeans, or keep moving and you'll probably be able to kill thousands, or so mant mantises that you get tired due to your REALISTIC advantage of size, strength, etc, and no person will ever get killed by one. This isn't even considering realistic behaviours like mantises not seeing you, ignoring you, and so on.
I think when writing a story with some grasp on realism you have to make the dangers well, appropriate for something that can kill you. If you're making a cheeky parody video game fic that doesn't matter, and you could have some fun references where Goombas send you flying into the sky and kill you instantly if they tap your shin.
As for how it impacts the protagonist compared to random people in the setting, I suppose it's a weight of how dangerous the thing is. It would be ridiculous if a tiny blob that the protag just squishes with no effort every time was this genocide-level threat that everyone gets killed by offscreen. IT's sort of what happens here in FO:E with the alicorns, and later Hellhounds
Just reasonably balance the danger. It's alright if the protagonist survives, but the higher the danger the more care needs to be taken with your explanation how someone survives. Characters should be increasingly clever or resourceful, or have a plan for more dangerous threats. REALLY show that without these things that are pre-established and make sense, that these characters could be easily dead. Running away is a thing to highlight this too.
>>303997
"It was under E!" is from the second episode of MLP, wherein Pinkie Pie finds the Elements of Harmony book for Twilight. Awareness! denotes the fact these are analogues to the stat-raising bobbleheads in Fallout 3, in this case you can assume Pinkie's is Perception, since she is a sort of clairvoyant.
"It was under E!" is from the second episode of MLP, wherein Pinkie Pie finds the Elements of Harmony book for Twilight. Awareness! denotes the fact these are analogues to the stat-raising bobbleheads in Fallout 3, in this case you can assume Pinkie's is Perception, since she is a sort of clairvoyant.
>>303997
>Also, I'm not quite sure what she's referencing here. My guess is that it's something from early MLP that has slipped my mind, but it could also be something specific to this story. In any event, I'm not sure what the significance of the four stars is meant to be.
This refers to a minor and obscure detail in S1's pilot episode. The prophecy of Nightmare Moon's return that kicks off the plot contains the line "the stars will aid in her escape". Shortly before Nightmare Moon's appearance, four sparkling points of light can be seen spiralling towards the moon in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it shot.
From this, Kkat extrapolates that:
>The stars are Cthulhu
>The zebras fear/revere these four stars in particular
>The zebras believe that Nightmare Moon and these four specific stars are allied
>The zebras can't tell the difference between Princess Luna and Nightmare Moon
>If Nightmare Moon is allowed to rule Equestria she'll take over and/or destroy the world!!!1!!!11!
>This belief is strong enough to justify a genocidal nuclear war.
>Also, I'm not quite sure what she's referencing here. My guess is that it's something from early MLP that has slipped my mind, but it could also be something specific to this story. In any event, I'm not sure what the significance of the four stars is meant to be.
This refers to a minor and obscure detail in S1's pilot episode. The prophecy of Nightmare Moon's return that kicks off the plot contains the line "the stars will aid in her escape". Shortly before Nightmare Moon's appearance, four sparkling points of light can be seen spiralling towards the moon in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it shot.
From this, Kkat extrapolates that:
>The stars are Cthulhu
>The zebras fear/revere these four stars in particular
>The zebras believe that Nightmare Moon and these four specific stars are allied
>The zebras can't tell the difference between Princess Luna and Nightmare Moon
>If Nightmare Moon is allowed to rule Equestria she'll take over and/or destroy the world!!!1!!!11!
>This belief is strong enough to justify a genocidal nuclear war.
>>304001
>>304008
>>304011
>The stars are Cthulhu
>Plus they thought four particular stars were evil gods who wanted those on this planet to destroy themselves.
Hunh did kkat predict an IDW comic plotline?
Nahhhhh. Too many common elements laying around.
The comics took canon history mystery (Why was Discord stoned?) mashed with Lovecraft as it does often and anything remotely spooky.
Also a dash of body horror, body snatcher stuff, and the wtf from beyond, all in a package that is more or less family friendly.
>>304008
>>304011
>The stars are Cthulhu
>Plus they thought four particular stars were evil gods who wanted those on this planet to destroy themselves.
Hunh did kkat predict an IDW comic plotline?
Nahhhhh. Too many common elements laying around.
The comics took canon history mystery (Why was Discord stoned?) mashed with Lovecraft as it does often and anything remotely spooky.
Also a dash of body horror, body snatcher stuff, and the wtf from beyond, all in a package that is more or less family friendly.
>>304002
That makes sense. If Littlepoop and her party is supposed to be special for beating assorted horrors it wouldn't make sense for the horrors to be easy for those other than herself and her party members to beat.
Then again she could get the same fame and popularity for killing monsters and saving poners for free, without also having to be the best at poner-saving right?
@everyone
The plot so far has sucked.
Good Fallout games usually use the first half of the game to set up the setting and dedicate the second half to you saving it.
Like how in F1 your quest for a water chip takes you all over the wasteland before finally taking you to Necropolis before Super Mutants get involved. And Fallout NV has three acts. Whether you take the easy mode path around the world to New Vegas for act 1 and get a smooth introduction to all the major factions or skip it and take the quick path to NV for experienced gamers you'll still go through act 2 where you do missions for your faction of choice and learn more setting stuff if you want to. Then Act 3 has the war for Hoover Dam.
But this story... Are we still in act 1? Are Tenpony Tower and the assorted Griffon Mercs going to be important later on? Who or what is Red Eye? Is there anything we should know about the Alicorns and what they're about? How relevant was the shattered hoof shit and the chimera vault LP looted and blew up and the slaver town LP slaughtered and the medical supply-filled fucked stable?
If you told me this story had no second drafts or proof-readers I'd believe you. And after the Gareth story, if you told me this story had a shitload of proof-readers and editors I'd believe you.
That makes sense. If Littlepoop and her party is supposed to be special for beating assorted horrors it wouldn't make sense for the horrors to be easy for those other than herself and her party members to beat.
Then again she could get the same fame and popularity for killing monsters and saving poners for free, without also having to be the best at poner-saving right?
@everyone
The plot so far has sucked.
Good Fallout games usually use the first half of the game to set up the setting and dedicate the second half to you saving it.
Like how in F1 your quest for a water chip takes you all over the wasteland before finally taking you to Necropolis before Super Mutants get involved. And Fallout NV has three acts. Whether you take the easy mode path around the world to New Vegas for act 1 and get a smooth introduction to all the major factions or skip it and take the quick path to NV for experienced gamers you'll still go through act 2 where you do missions for your faction of choice and learn more setting stuff if you want to. Then Act 3 has the war for Hoover Dam.
But this story... Are we still in act 1? Are Tenpony Tower and the assorted Griffon Mercs going to be important later on? Who or what is Red Eye? Is there anything we should know about the Alicorns and what they're about? How relevant was the shattered hoof shit and the chimera vault LP looted and blew up and the slaver town LP slaughtered and the medical supply-filled fucked stable?
If you told me this story had no second drafts or proof-readers I'd believe you. And after the Gareth story, if you told me this story had a shitload of proof-readers and editors I'd believe you.
Saw a writing advice video that said "An author shouldn't tie everything up with a neat little bow until it's the end. You can end short stories and side-stories and the arcs of characters, but there should always be long-running story threads tying things together, the reader should always want to know/see more and there should always be currents of story running over his head".
How could the story be rewritten to follow that advice?
What long-running story threads could tie together the random disconnected dungeon-crawling we've seen from Littlepip so far?
how trim fat?
could rewrite Old/New Appleoosa so she visits both towns and has to choose which side to support, the slavers or their colony that wants freedom.
NA says "We know exactly where Velvet Remedy is, work for us+we'll tell you"
one pony in Old Appleoosa says "I saw Velvet arrive here a week before you showed up and if you save us from the chimera stable I'll tell you what direction I saw her go when she left town"
This makes LP's decision to support the non-slavers a moral choice she makes even though she knows it will make finding Velvet harder.
Then the shit with Shattered Hoof... Velvet was on her way north to Tenpony with some slavers who auctioned her off when a rich guy from Tenpony bought her to sing in his nightclub
Velvet and her owner and his three Evil Slaver Company baddies all got arrested and taken to Shattered Hoof Prison And Gem Mine (It was this during the war and after the nuking, simplifying things) because some separate factions of mercs here hired by a local bandit-warlord
Littlepip turns down the offer of immense riches+ownership of Velvet if she works for the baddies
Littlepip helps Gawd, the least evil choice, take over the facility and kill King Bandit
btw to change Calamity: "Calamity the yeehaw shotgun hilariously-stupid hick who occasionally has flashes of brilliant insight and says super smart things that could only come from such a plain-talkin' simple guy" is a character that pegasus puts on, complete with silly cowpony accent. He's really called Cloudburst and he's a hardcore tacticool ex-commando and survivalist fired by the Enclave for refusing a mission he deemed immoral like killing foals who saw too much
Btw the slave-miners here dug too deep and uncovered a savage hibernating dragon unrelated to everything, fucking up LP's all-new totally-reasonable stealthy silenced 22LR assassination plan
Radiation from the pre-war mining mega-drills turned the dragon into a mindless animal
And during the chaos of the battle against the dragon, Velvet and her owner and his goons flee to Tenpony Tower
Specifically to get this team the right to enter the tower, they EACH need to be fucking rich or be from a major faction/caravan company/slaver company or have something good to offer this tower to get their individual Temporary Citizenship Pass that's not as good as a Full Citizenship
LP's skills as a murderer/sneaker/gun and toaster and anything else-fixer/shooter/hacker/lockpicker don't impress anypony since they already have a technician(Homage, fixing shit is her job now) and "Calamity" doesn't feel like calling his retarded cowpony act into question by revealing a skill he probably shouldn't have
So they wander around and encounter Gutterville which is now an interesting settlement like Freeside/Westside from FNV and by solving its problems they get something they can use to get into the tower. There's also one cultist preacher working for the Alicorns but LP doesn't know that yet
The heroes help poners here and make friends and take a "go kill this raider tribe that's set up camp near us" quest
And it turns out the evil raider tribe has a captured evil scientist who's experimenting on ghouls to make a radiation-immunity chip LP takes, and the scientist is also making drugs for the raiders so they'll work for him. The raiders were here to kidnap ghouls from Gutterville because it has a fuckton of non-zombie Ghoul citizens. He goes on a "You and I are both heroes! How many lives have we ended for the greater good?!" speech at LP
I guess Rottingtail's group could be here plotting a violent takeover of Tenpony Tower but LP talks them down and convinces them to guard Gutterville better. If that stuff isn't rewritten into a quest accepted from within tenpony tower that at first sounds like "Go stop those ghouls who want in" but then turns out to be "We're mutated factory workers and we want to see our families again"
Anyway
When Team LP gets back from killing those raiders and their boss, the preacher's gone and three Alicorns showed up and slaughtered all of Gutterville and all its interesting unique memorable fan-favorite characters when looking for LP
Then Steelhooves shows up and kills the alicorns without getting near-fatally wounded. He gets one, making the alicorns aware of him
He gets the second during an epic fight where all of team LP work together to get the third.
Steelhooves was hunting alicorns but he also wanted somepony with a pipbuck to help him with something. LP fits the bill, since the radio mentioned her pipbuck
His goal right now? To find that Stable full of dead poners killed by the AI, because he heard Pinkie Pie was in this one and she was the best mare at his wedding with AJ
All that tower shite with the records where the heroes randomly stumble upon le mad scientist gets shortened and folded into this part, LP finds rare records from DJ Pon3's collection
and the Stable AI tries to trap Team LP down here forever but she talks the AI and its workerbots into accepting repairs and becoming Team LP's sick new Home Base
she also finds medical shit to sell to Tenpony to buy her way in while Steelhooves has a deep emotional tearful goodbye to Pinkie's skeleton. His goal is to say goodbye to all six ministry mares and gather the Statuettes, he saw AJ die because he wasn't strong enough to save her. He wants the statuette collectable thingies because spoiler
Anyway they into tower
LP fuks homage
word count lower
yay
How could the story be rewritten to follow that advice?
What long-running story threads could tie together the random disconnected dungeon-crawling we've seen from Littlepip so far?
how trim fat?
could rewrite Old/New Appleoosa so she visits both towns and has to choose which side to support, the slavers or their colony that wants freedom.
NA says "We know exactly where Velvet Remedy is, work for us+we'll tell you"
one pony in Old Appleoosa says "I saw Velvet arrive here a week before you showed up and if you save us from the chimera stable I'll tell you what direction I saw her go when she left town"
This makes LP's decision to support the non-slavers a moral choice she makes even though she knows it will make finding Velvet harder.
Then the shit with Shattered Hoof... Velvet was on her way north to Tenpony with some slavers who auctioned her off when a rich guy from Tenpony bought her to sing in his nightclub
Velvet and her owner and his three Evil Slaver Company baddies all got arrested and taken to Shattered Hoof Prison And Gem Mine (It was this during the war and after the nuking, simplifying things) because some separate factions of mercs here hired by a local bandit-warlord
Littlepip turns down the offer of immense riches+ownership of Velvet if she works for the baddies
Littlepip helps Gawd, the least evil choice, take over the facility and kill King Bandit
btw to change Calamity: "Calamity the yeehaw shotgun hilariously-stupid hick who occasionally has flashes of brilliant insight and says super smart things that could only come from such a plain-talkin' simple guy" is a character that pegasus puts on, complete with silly cowpony accent. He's really called Cloudburst and he's a hardcore tacticool ex-commando and survivalist fired by the Enclave for refusing a mission he deemed immoral like killing foals who saw too much
Btw the slave-miners here dug too deep and uncovered a savage hibernating dragon unrelated to everything, fucking up LP's all-new totally-reasonable stealthy silenced 22LR assassination plan
Radiation from the pre-war mining mega-drills turned the dragon into a mindless animal
And during the chaos of the battle against the dragon, Velvet and her owner and his goons flee to Tenpony Tower
Specifically to get this team the right to enter the tower, they EACH need to be fucking rich or be from a major faction/caravan company/slaver company or have something good to offer this tower to get their individual Temporary Citizenship Pass that's not as good as a Full Citizenship
LP's skills as a murderer/sneaker/gun and toaster and anything else-fixer/shooter/hacker/lockpicker don't impress anypony since they already have a technician(Homage, fixing shit is her job now) and "Calamity" doesn't feel like calling his retarded cowpony act into question by revealing a skill he probably shouldn't have
So they wander around and encounter Gutterville which is now an interesting settlement like Freeside/Westside from FNV and by solving its problems they get something they can use to get into the tower. There's also one cultist preacher working for the Alicorns but LP doesn't know that yet
The heroes help poners here and make friends and take a "go kill this raider tribe that's set up camp near us" quest
And it turns out the evil raider tribe has a captured evil scientist who's experimenting on ghouls to make a radiation-immunity chip LP takes, and the scientist is also making drugs for the raiders so they'll work for him. The raiders were here to kidnap ghouls from Gutterville because it has a fuckton of non-zombie Ghoul citizens. He goes on a "You and I are both heroes! How many lives have we ended for the greater good?!" speech at LP
I guess Rottingtail's group could be here plotting a violent takeover of Tenpony Tower but LP talks them down and convinces them to guard Gutterville better. If that stuff isn't rewritten into a quest accepted from within tenpony tower that at first sounds like "Go stop those ghouls who want in" but then turns out to be "We're mutated factory workers and we want to see our families again"
Anyway
When Team LP gets back from killing those raiders and their boss, the preacher's gone and three Alicorns showed up and slaughtered all of Gutterville and all its interesting unique memorable fan-favorite characters when looking for LP
Then Steelhooves shows up and kills the alicorns without getting near-fatally wounded. He gets one, making the alicorns aware of him
He gets the second during an epic fight where all of team LP work together to get the third.
Steelhooves was hunting alicorns but he also wanted somepony with a pipbuck to help him with something. LP fits the bill, since the radio mentioned her pipbuck
His goal right now? To find that Stable full of dead poners killed by the AI, because he heard Pinkie Pie was in this one and she was the best mare at his wedding with AJ
All that tower shite with the records where the heroes randomly stumble upon le mad scientist gets shortened and folded into this part, LP finds rare records from DJ Pon3's collection
and the Stable AI tries to trap Team LP down here forever but she talks the AI and its workerbots into accepting repairs and becoming Team LP's sick new Home Base
she also finds medical shit to sell to Tenpony to buy her way in while Steelhooves has a deep emotional tearful goodbye to Pinkie's skeleton. His goal is to say goodbye to all six ministry mares and gather the Statuettes, he saw AJ die because he wasn't strong enough to save her. He wants the statuette collectable thingies because spoiler
Anyway they into tower
LP fuks homage
word count lower
yay
fuk ended up making second post anyway
also fuk kkat for ripping off Mr House's "I am the mysterious Mr House and I don't want just anypony seeing me" gimmick for Homage. Makes no sense for her to want anonymity as a shield when you couldn't possibly maintain that anonymity using the tower's penthouse suite and radio/all-seeing eyes unless the tower's retarded
also I still think making that Pinkie Pie knockoff "Silver Bell" a full-time party member would have been more interesting than shoving her out of the story to a designated safe place for orphans (which LP forgets about when she has to save MJ's kids) especially since Steelhooves knew Applejack and Pinkie Pie and the others. What would Silver Bell have to say about Steelhooves if she'd only been alive long enough to know of the Steelhooves Knights (or whatever they were called) after they'd lost their way? What would this child of the wasteland, burdened by its horrors, have to say to a pony from the generation that allowed Equestria to die and has made little progress unfucking it even with 200 years of time and power armour and the biggest guns this side of alicornicopia or whatever alicorn-town is called? Plus the interesting character dynamic goes both ways. This guy knew Pinkie Pie, after all. If anyone's qualified to say "You are no Pinkie Pie" to her face it's him, and if anyone's qualified to talk her down from a crazy moment by empathizing with her about the loved ones they've lost it's him. Plus the party could use some comic relief kid who cries during the sad parts. A competent author can even make comic relief kid characters interesting and beloved. Kkat's not a competent writer but if he ever played Fire Emblem Awakening he could rip off Nowi and change her name and outfit and call it a day.
LP meets Velvet in the tower, the addiction plotline is dropped because it sucked and even LP realizes her drug problem only started because Calamity said "lmao take these pills they're a hangover cure... a temporary one lol fuck you..."
It doesn't even make sense that shr got drunk at a bar just because the fact that coal-carrying steam trains run on steam generated by burning coal bothered her so much
anyway
LP does some job for the club guy to gain ownership of Velvet (even though she plans on freeing her) and by interacting with a named tower citizen besides Homage/Monterry Jack (Maybe even completing a series of sidequests for him that force her to travel around the tower and meet more characters!) she lets the author show the Tenpony Tower Citizen mindset from its assorted angles and perspectives on the different floors. We get to learn more about the tower, who lives here, what they're like, what they think of its rule and the world outside, and so on.
personally I'd either rewrite absolutely everything to make them coherent and smart or keep them in their stupid state and let characters notice how dense they are. I'd make them hilariously-wrong idiots who are wrong about what the pre-war world was like specifically because they're just the result of a family of post-nuke illiterate tribals who entered the tower and started acting fancy, putting together what they could from the shit in the tower and old songs/books with the help of the literate tribe elder, not realizing these books/songs are the last remaining copies of banned seditious/pornographic/anti-equestrian novels.
The idiots in this tower act like the baddies from a poorly-written anti-equestrian novel written by a zebra sympathizer who thought "Rich ponies=bad and snooty meanies who eat small portions of food in fancy restaurants" because that's the only source they got their view of how civilized ponies "should" act from.
The tower's leader and basically the only smart person here is able to play them like fiddles by bullshitting them. Like something out of a "I meet a tribe of retards and become their god" fantasy.
Homage showed up recently and got the radio host job by threatening to expose the boss or something. Or she was born here but learned more about the world watching the M.A.S.T.U.R.B.A.T.O.R. surveillance screens and wanted to help save the world even though she's a weakling whose only talent is auditory illusion magic, letting her put on DJ Pon3's voice. and make spooky/loud noises in firefights, and put on radio dramas by providing her own sound effects but that's it.
why?
because it would be really clever and ironic if "The truthful voice of the wasteland" was born with the talent to magically lie to its ears, especially while broadcasting her "fuck the power!" message from a 1984's-wet-dream super-Big Brother tower.
And the all-new asshole Grim Star...
would it be unrealistic for an Enclave operative here to infiltrate this society to try and take it over, knowing it's a pre-war surveillance system with bonus emergency broadcast radio place?
That would help tie things together and encourage Calamity to tell Team LP more about the Enclave
Anyway up until this point Velvet has been inconsistently shit but introducing her to team LP now skips all the moments where she was shit. But if she's supposed to be shit the only good scenes can be redone later now that LP's been made more mature by the wasteland, letting her see how shit her ex-crush really is.
And instead of wasting LP's time sending her hunting for records, Homage immediately says "This fucking place, Splendid Valley, important shit's there so get it done for me" or says "I can only be useful to you as your eyes and ears if you foil Commander Grim Star's plan to take over this place but after that you're headed to Splendid Valley"
and Steelhooves is all "I'm not going to Splendid Valley, my true goals lie elsewhere"
and Homage says "I've seen you on my cameras, I know your true goals and I can tell you exactly where to go after you help me. Also, there are Alicorns at Splendid Valley"
and Steelhooves says "Team, we're going to Splendid Valley to kill all the Alicorns"
plz rate my revision idea attempt
also fuk kkat for ripping off Mr House's "I am the mysterious Mr House and I don't want just anypony seeing me" gimmick for Homage. Makes no sense for her to want anonymity as a shield when you couldn't possibly maintain that anonymity using the tower's penthouse suite and radio/all-seeing eyes unless the tower's retarded
also I still think making that Pinkie Pie knockoff "Silver Bell" a full-time party member would have been more interesting than shoving her out of the story to a designated safe place for orphans (which LP forgets about when she has to save MJ's kids) especially since Steelhooves knew Applejack and Pinkie Pie and the others. What would Silver Bell have to say about Steelhooves if she'd only been alive long enough to know of the Steelhooves Knights (or whatever they were called) after they'd lost their way? What would this child of the wasteland, burdened by its horrors, have to say to a pony from the generation that allowed Equestria to die and has made little progress unfucking it even with 200 years of time and power armour and the biggest guns this side of alicornicopia or whatever alicorn-town is called? Plus the interesting character dynamic goes both ways. This guy knew Pinkie Pie, after all. If anyone's qualified to say "You are no Pinkie Pie" to her face it's him, and if anyone's qualified to talk her down from a crazy moment by empathizing with her about the loved ones they've lost it's him. Plus the party could use some comic relief kid who cries during the sad parts. A competent author can even make comic relief kid characters interesting and beloved. Kkat's not a competent writer but if he ever played Fire Emblem Awakening he could rip off Nowi and change her name and outfit and call it a day.
LP meets Velvet in the tower, the addiction plotline is dropped because it sucked and even LP realizes her drug problem only started because Calamity said "lmao take these pills they're a hangover cure... a temporary one lol fuck you..."
It doesn't even make sense that shr got drunk at a bar just because the fact that coal-carrying steam trains run on steam generated by burning coal bothered her so much
anyway
LP does some job for the club guy to gain ownership of Velvet (even though she plans on freeing her) and by interacting with a named tower citizen besides Homage/Monterry Jack (Maybe even completing a series of sidequests for him that force her to travel around the tower and meet more characters!) she lets the author show the Tenpony Tower Citizen mindset from its assorted angles and perspectives on the different floors. We get to learn more about the tower, who lives here, what they're like, what they think of its rule and the world outside, and so on.
personally I'd either rewrite absolutely everything to make them coherent and smart or keep them in their stupid state and let characters notice how dense they are. I'd make them hilariously-wrong idiots who are wrong about what the pre-war world was like specifically because they're just the result of a family of post-nuke illiterate tribals who entered the tower and started acting fancy, putting together what they could from the shit in the tower and old songs/books with the help of the literate tribe elder, not realizing these books/songs are the last remaining copies of banned seditious/pornographic/anti-equestrian novels.
The idiots in this tower act like the baddies from a poorly-written anti-equestrian novel written by a zebra sympathizer who thought "Rich ponies=bad and snooty meanies who eat small portions of food in fancy restaurants" because that's the only source they got their view of how civilized ponies "should" act from.
The tower's leader and basically the only smart person here is able to play them like fiddles by bullshitting them. Like something out of a "I meet a tribe of retards and become their god" fantasy.
Homage showed up recently and got the radio host job by threatening to expose the boss or something. Or she was born here but learned more about the world watching the M.A.S.T.U.R.B.A.T.O.R. surveillance screens and wanted to help save the world even though she's a weakling whose only talent is auditory illusion magic, letting her put on DJ Pon3's voice. and make spooky/loud noises in firefights, and put on radio dramas by providing her own sound effects but that's it.
why?
because it would be really clever and ironic if "The truthful voice of the wasteland" was born with the talent to magically lie to its ears, especially while broadcasting her "fuck the power!" message from a 1984's-wet-dream super-Big Brother tower.
And the all-new asshole Grim Star...
would it be unrealistic for an Enclave operative here to infiltrate this society to try and take it over, knowing it's a pre-war surveillance system with bonus emergency broadcast radio place?
That would help tie things together and encourage Calamity to tell Team LP more about the Enclave
Anyway up until this point Velvet has been inconsistently shit but introducing her to team LP now skips all the moments where she was shit. But if she's supposed to be shit the only good scenes can be redone later now that LP's been made more mature by the wasteland, letting her see how shit her ex-crush really is.
And instead of wasting LP's time sending her hunting for records, Homage immediately says "This fucking place, Splendid Valley, important shit's there so get it done for me" or says "I can only be useful to you as your eyes and ears if you foil Commander Grim Star's plan to take over this place but after that you're headed to Splendid Valley"
and Steelhooves is all "I'm not going to Splendid Valley, my true goals lie elsewhere"
and Homage says "I've seen you on my cameras, I know your true goals and I can tell you exactly where to go after you help me. Also, there are Alicorns at Splendid Valley"
and Steelhooves says "Team, we're going to Splendid Valley to kill all the Alicorns"
plz rate my revision idea attempt
>>303084
>Also, on the topic of writing and reading and stuff. I'm not sure what I think right now. But I do listen to what you have said (and other anons) and will take it into consideration. I'll see what conclusions I'll come up with in the future.
I actually heard something on Fash the Nation recently that relates to this:
https://therightstuff.biz/2021/03/14/ftn-390-nog-whisperer/
Listen from about 02:05:00 until about 02:30:00. A lot of what they point out about literacy and the value of books is kind of what I was trying to get at. They actually do a much better job of explaining it than I do.
>>304001
>>304003
>"It was under E!" is from the second episode of MLP, wherein Pinkie Pie finds the Elements of Harmony book for Twilight. Awareness! denotes the fact these are analogues to the stat-raising bobbleheads in Fallout 3, in this case you can assume Pinkie's is Perception, since she is a sort of clairvoyant.
That's what I thought (about the 'under E' thing anyway). I remembered Pinkie saying that somewhere in the show but I couldn't remember where or in what context.
This actually relates to one of my frequent grumbles about a story making references outside of itself. There's nothing inherently wrong with making a joke that references MLP or Fallout in a fanfiction of both MLP and Fallout; if anything, your readers are going to expect that sort of thing. However, you can't just drop obscure references without any context and just trust that everyone reading will be familiar enough with whatever you're referencing to get the joke you were trying to make. Let's take a quick look at exactly what this inscription says:
>“Awareness! It was under ‘E’!”
This is inscribed on the base of a statue. Thanks to you guys, I now know what this means: "awareness" refers to the attribute that this statue boosts, and is a reference to some kind of bobblehead thing in Fallout 3, where each bobblehead boosts a particular stat. "It was under 'E'!" is a reference to a line that Pinkie Pie says in the show. The second phrase, "it's under 'E'," is meant to be read as kind of a subtitle of the "awareness" part; sort of like the BIG TEXT little text format of those demotivational memes from way back.
Once you understand all of this, the inscription makes sense; however, there's nothing in the text to explain any of it. The phrase "it was under 'E'!" is meaningless unless we know what was under 'E'. In the context of the MLP episode, "it" refers to a book on the Elements of Harmony that the group is looking for in Twilight's library. It stands to reason that this book would be filed under 'E', so the statement makes sense. However, here we just have "Awareness! It was under 'E'!" No in-world explanation is offered as to what this phrase is supposed to mean, so we have no choice but to take it literally. Since there's nothing for "it" to refer to besides "awareness," we can only assume this is saying that that "awareness" was under 'E'. What in the holy name of assfuck is that supposed to mean? It doesn't make a lick of sense any way you think about it. We are given no clue as to what "awareness" refers to in the first place, and in any event, "awareness" should be under 'A', not 'E'.
I know it sounds like I'm splitting some pretty ridiculous hairs here, but I really want to make sure everyone reading understands why I consider this a big deal. What the author does here is, in my opinion, the absolute worst possible thing hurr durr that's what Rarity said in the show that one time, see what I did there? :DDDDD you can do in fanfiction. Kkat basically inserts a line that is completely nonsensical in the context of his own story, just to make an esoteric reference to not one, but two external media sources, neither of which has fuck-all to do with anything currently going on. To make matters worse, there is absolutely no reason this phrase should make sense to any of his characters. Even if Littlepoop understands that the inscription means that the statue is going to boost her awareness, the bit about awareness being found under 'E' should still puzzle her, as it should rightly puzzle anyone.
As an example, let's use the old classic "le 20% cooler" meme. Here is an example of an acceptable way to make this reference, ie how a good writer would do it:
>group of ponies are managing the temperature of a nuclear reactor
>Pony A looks at temperature gage and says to Pony B:
"Sir! The reactor has just cooled by 20%!"
See how it works? The character just referenced MLP the TV series, but the line he spoke makes sense in the context of the current story, independent of MLP the TV series. Someone familiar with the show would read this and get the joke, but at the same time, someone unfamiliar with it could read it and simply understand that Pony A is telling Pony B that the reactor has cooled by a specific amount. Even if the joke goes over the reader's head, it still makes sense.
Now, let's look at how a complete faggot would approach that joke, ie how kkat would do it:
>group of gay ponies are having gay pony sex with each other
>pony-kkat, the gayest pony of them all, enters the room
>pony-kkat says to Gay Pony A:
"Hurr durr 20% cooler! I love dicks in my ass!!"
>pony-kkat then shits all over the floor, because his anus is so stretched out that he literally can't exercise proper bowel control anymore
In this case, you have a situation very similar to what kkat does with this statue inscription. The author is just having his character randomly spout some piece of absolute gibberish that has no situational context, and that no character presently listening could be expected to understand, for no other reason than to elicit a few tepid chuckles from the literal worst kind of brainlet in his chosen fandom. Please, if any of you ever plan on writing any kind of fanfiction, I really want to hammer this message home:
Don't do shit like this.
>Also, on the topic of writing and reading and stuff. I'm not sure what I think right now. But I do listen to what you have said (and other anons) and will take it into consideration. I'll see what conclusions I'll come up with in the future.
I actually heard something on Fash the Nation recently that relates to this:
https://therightstuff.biz/2021/03/14/ftn-390-nog-whisperer/
Listen from about 02:05:00 until about 02:30:00. A lot of what they point out about literacy and the value of books is kind of what I was trying to get at. They actually do a much better job of explaining it than I do.
>>304001
>>304003
>"It was under E!" is from the second episode of MLP, wherein Pinkie Pie finds the Elements of Harmony book for Twilight. Awareness! denotes the fact these are analogues to the stat-raising bobbleheads in Fallout 3, in this case you can assume Pinkie's is Perception, since she is a sort of clairvoyant.
That's what I thought (about the 'under E' thing anyway). I remembered Pinkie saying that somewhere in the show but I couldn't remember where or in what context.
This actually relates to one of my frequent grumbles about a story making references outside of itself. There's nothing inherently wrong with making a joke that references MLP or Fallout in a fanfiction of both MLP and Fallout; if anything, your readers are going to expect that sort of thing. However, you can't just drop obscure references without any context and just trust that everyone reading will be familiar enough with whatever you're referencing to get the joke you were trying to make. Let's take a quick look at exactly what this inscription says:
>“Awareness! It was under ‘E’!”
This is inscribed on the base of a statue. Thanks to you guys, I now know what this means: "awareness" refers to the attribute that this statue boosts, and is a reference to some kind of bobblehead thing in Fallout 3, where each bobblehead boosts a particular stat. "It was under 'E'!" is a reference to a line that Pinkie Pie says in the show. The second phrase, "it's under 'E'," is meant to be read as kind of a subtitle of the "awareness" part; sort of like the BIG TEXT little text format of those demotivational memes from way back.
Once you understand all of this, the inscription makes sense; however, there's nothing in the text to explain any of it. The phrase "it was under 'E'!" is meaningless unless we know what was under 'E'. In the context of the MLP episode, "it" refers to a book on the Elements of Harmony that the group is looking for in Twilight's library. It stands to reason that this book would be filed under 'E', so the statement makes sense. However, here we just have "Awareness! It was under 'E'!" No in-world explanation is offered as to what this phrase is supposed to mean, so we have no choice but to take it literally. Since there's nothing for "it" to refer to besides "awareness," we can only assume this is saying that that "awareness" was under 'E'. What in the holy name of assfuck is that supposed to mean? It doesn't make a lick of sense any way you think about it. We are given no clue as to what "awareness" refers to in the first place, and in any event, "awareness" should be under 'A', not 'E'.
I know it sounds like I'm splitting some pretty ridiculous hairs here, but I really want to make sure everyone reading understands why I consider this a big deal. What the author does here is, in my opinion, the absolute worst possible thing hurr durr that's what Rarity said in the show that one time, see what I did there? :DDDDD you can do in fanfiction. Kkat basically inserts a line that is completely nonsensical in the context of his own story, just to make an esoteric reference to not one, but two external media sources, neither of which has fuck-all to do with anything currently going on. To make matters worse, there is absolutely no reason this phrase should make sense to any of his characters. Even if Littlepoop understands that the inscription means that the statue is going to boost her awareness, the bit about awareness being found under 'E' should still puzzle her, as it should rightly puzzle anyone.
As an example, let's use the old classic "le 20% cooler" meme. Here is an example of an acceptable way to make this reference, ie how a good writer would do it:
>group of ponies are managing the temperature of a nuclear reactor
>Pony A looks at temperature gage and says to Pony B:
"Sir! The reactor has just cooled by 20%!"
See how it works? The character just referenced MLP the TV series, but the line he spoke makes sense in the context of the current story, independent of MLP the TV series. Someone familiar with the show would read this and get the joke, but at the same time, someone unfamiliar with it could read it and simply understand that Pony A is telling Pony B that the reactor has cooled by a specific amount. Even if the joke goes over the reader's head, it still makes sense.
Now, let's look at how a complete faggot would approach that joke, ie how kkat would do it:
>group of gay ponies are having gay pony sex with each other
>pony-kkat, the gayest pony of them all, enters the room
>pony-kkat says to Gay Pony A:
"Hurr durr 20% cooler! I love dicks in my ass!!"
>pony-kkat then shits all over the floor, because his anus is so stretched out that he literally can't exercise proper bowel control anymore
In this case, you have a situation very similar to what kkat does with this statue inscription. The author is just having his character randomly spout some piece of absolute gibberish that has no situational context, and that no character presently listening could be expected to understand, for no other reason than to elicit a few tepid chuckles from the literal worst kind of brainlet in his chosen fandom. Please, if any of you ever plan on writing any kind of fanfiction, I really want to hammer this message home:
Don't do shit like this.
>>304052
Is the following a good example of what you mean?
As a kid I read a short Sonic fanfic where a Sonic poses in front of a waterfall in Green Hill Zone but a green demon hedgehog called Ashura shows up in his reflection and leaps out of the waterfall. The demon blows stuff up and mwahahas and beats up Sonic and his friends but is eventually defeated by Sonic kicking him really hard
Tails is also there and explains "It's Ashura, an evil demon from the mirror dimension!" before ashura kicks him
It was like if a child saw three of the shit Dragon Ball Z movies and tried to write a sonic fanfic like those. A baddie comes out of nowhere and is eventually beaten once all the minor heroes get their asses kicked so the main hero can save the day.
however
Ashura technically isn't an OC
in the old Sonic 1-3 games on the Sega Genesis if you use Debug Mode to spawn a fuckton of waterfalls Sonic's pallete glitches out, making him green and black
at least I think that's how it works
Ashura is the name the Sonic community gave to how Sonic looks in this state.
I have no idea why because it's azure said wrong and azure means blue
Anyway the presence of the waterfalls references "ashura's origin"
but even if you aren't familiar with the Sonic iceberg's deep lore and you don't get why ashura showed up in water instead of a hall of mirrors the scene still works on its own
Is the following a good example of what you mean?
As a kid I read a short Sonic fanfic where a Sonic poses in front of a waterfall in Green Hill Zone but a green demon hedgehog called Ashura shows up in his reflection and leaps out of the waterfall. The demon blows stuff up and mwahahas and beats up Sonic and his friends but is eventually defeated by Sonic kicking him really hard
Tails is also there and explains "It's Ashura, an evil demon from the mirror dimension!" before ashura kicks him
It was like if a child saw three of the shit Dragon Ball Z movies and tried to write a sonic fanfic like those. A baddie comes out of nowhere and is eventually beaten once all the minor heroes get their asses kicked so the main hero can save the day.
however
Ashura technically isn't an OC
in the old Sonic 1-3 games on the Sega Genesis if you use Debug Mode to spawn a fuckton of waterfalls Sonic's pallete glitches out, making him green and black
at least I think that's how it works
Ashura is the name the Sonic community gave to how Sonic looks in this state.
I have no idea why because it's azure said wrong and azure means blue
Anyway the presence of the waterfalls references "ashura's origin"
but even if you aren't familiar with the Sonic iceberg's deep lore and you don't get why ashura showed up in water instead of a hall of mirrors the scene still works on its own
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>>304059
Sonic is too fast. We can never escape him in this thread.
You don't actually have to take this into consideration because you aren't breaking any rules and this might just be me. But I'm sick of hearing about sonic, then again can I really judge you for your tastes when I like poners? Probably not.
Also, you bring up this is example in relation to something being discussed so I'm not saying "muh no-related" spiel that I have done before either here.
I guess my complaints here amounts something like a hypthetical person being angry at someone for posting Starlight Glimmer when it is completely within the rules to do so. ;^P
>Something Sonic
>Something Fallout Equestria
>Something Sonic gets raped by raiders trollfic
>pic was something I found long ago when I was... uhm... researching. Might as well post it now when it somewhat related.
Sonic is too fast. We can never escape him in this thread.
You don't actually have to take this into consideration because you aren't breaking any rules and this might just be me. But I'm sick of hearing about sonic, then again can I really judge you for your tastes when I like poners? Probably not.
Also, you bring up this is example in relation to something being discussed so I'm not saying "muh no-related" spiel that I have done before either here.
I guess my complaints here amounts something like a hypthetical person being angry at someone for posting Starlight Glimmer when it is completely within the rules to do so. ;^P
>Something Sonic
>Something Fallout Equestria
>Something Sonic gets raped by raiders trollfic
>pic was something I found long ago when I was... uhm... researching. Might as well post it now when it somewhat related.
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1616045737_3.png (75.7 KB, 1169x791, 1862690__safe_female_oc_filly_crossover_source+needed_sonic+the+hedgehog+(series)_oc-colon-filly+anon_doctor+eggman_artist-colon-lazynore.png)
Might as well throw my two cents in. Although it's not really needed.
Fanfiction is some of the few fictional works that demand prerequisite knowledge or else all the shit makes no sense at all. As a stand alone story without the source material (some) are garbage without that. Akin to broken proteins or a third of a painting.
Some memes are like that. A required shared experience to enjoy that. Or an in joke with some friends.
I could say boxen as an explicitive, but that has no meaning and frankly anyone who does remember from the same source is unlikely and the basis other sources it could come from would distort the original intent. Locking the true meaning away unless through context and pulling everything apart to reconstruct that key context, it's more or less lost.
>Pics 2-5
We see a worn vehicle
A pony in rags of some sort in the snow going through it with determination
A better look at the pony
Then a shadow of another creature that has the original pony in confusion.
From this without anything to go off of multiple options could be happening. Maybe the pony was a pet of an alien race. Maybe this is a mystery and the pictures are out of order. She's running away from the shadow to the strange vehicle. Anything is possible at this point.
As someone who only knows mlp fim the pony is not wearing clothing indicative of its species. In fact the shadow has a resemblance to a princess. Princess Twilight actually.
Due to the heavy snow and winter wrap up it could be anywhere even by the crystal empire. Still a mysterious contraption. Maybe it's a time machine?
As a person who's experience lies with the sonic the first thing is that the machine is used by Dr. Ivo Robotnik. The next piece of information is the cloths akin to what the Eggman wears. It's perhaps one of the most distinctive style besides the body proportions. Now the questions happen to be what happened to him? What the fuck is that shadow? That small creature could be used in on of his machines, did he die?
As someone in the Anonfilly thread would note. That is an Anonfilly.
With all of those pieces of information the most likely occurrence is that Dr Robotnik turned into a filly, after some sort of cataclysmic happen stance which he survives after the crash. Unused to the young form he is found byPurple Twilight Sparkle.
The requirements are specific, but finding the information to supplement the current state of affairs ranges in difficulty.
No one from either fandom alone would know what an anonfilly is, but a sudden change in form and species can happen.
The issue is this out of context knowledge has to be addressed in a way the characters of either would understand it. Thus latter on the explanation for the circumstance can be explained. Except the issue there is that the same explanation occurs time and time again for varying reasons and degrees.
<Back to Equestria: My Little Taintgator
>TLDR GlimGlam said it better.
"Awareness! It was under 'E'!"
That's kind of scary the sort of thought process that goes into carving that and mass production.
Seriously that is one occurrence that is solely private between the elements of harmony (Twilight, Pinkie, Fluttershy, Rarity, Applejack, Rainbow). For propaganda it's worthless, even if they spill their whole life story to everyone. As a tastless injoke it may be the start of them working together. To really needle it in that shows Pinkie Pie as the one who foresaw the book while everyone else missed it.
In terms of magic that it's a requirement? Well fine, but that never is stated that such a moment is required. Even different one's would be better. As an ability score modifier it's a small joke, but as an object in that fucked up half world its shit without proper reactions to the character's lack of knowledge and context.
The Fallout game aspect is all over the place and the bonuses at the end of every chapter is insane really if any pony had three of them and they did something it would be crazy. Instead it just fills up space.
These little bobbles that ties into a nonexistent game system who's native worth is the same as everything else, half baked crap. On the very surface level it's shiny. A shiny decayed turd.
Actually what I want is a full on possession story with those things, that would give an underlying motive to gather them a way for Watcher fucking Spike to have a life and actual whole characters!
But all I really wanted was a story. At the very least something I could touch in a meaningful way.
>>304059
Ashura is also Indian, Buddist, Hindu stuff. (IE a search engine search) (technically is also a Naruto reference)
So no it's not just azure but wrong (to be fair that could be the origin from that community). While technically this counts as another failure point (one of some research) it provides some depth without actually having it on its own.
It's just a name in that context with multiple reasons for its name that may or may not matter. The reason for a specific name can be contentious (does it makes sense in the story and that world), but that's a whole topic for a different time.
Fanfiction is some of the few fictional works that demand prerequisite knowledge or else all the shit makes no sense at all. As a stand alone story without the source material (some) are garbage without that. Akin to broken proteins or a third of a painting.
Some memes are like that. A required shared experience to enjoy that. Or an in joke with some friends.
I could say boxen as an explicitive, but that has no meaning and frankly anyone who does remember from the same source is unlikely and the basis other sources it could come from would distort the original intent. Locking the true meaning away unless through context and pulling everything apart to reconstruct that key context, it's more or less lost.
>Pics 2-5
We see a worn vehicle
A pony in rags of some sort in the snow going through it with determination
A better look at the pony
Then a shadow of another creature that has the original pony in confusion.
From this without anything to go off of multiple options could be happening. Maybe the pony was a pet of an alien race. Maybe this is a mystery and the pictures are out of order. She's running away from the shadow to the strange vehicle. Anything is possible at this point.
As someone who only knows mlp fim the pony is not wearing clothing indicative of its species. In fact the shadow has a resemblance to a princess. Princess Twilight actually.
Due to the heavy snow and winter wrap up it could be anywhere even by the crystal empire. Still a mysterious contraption. Maybe it's a time machine?
As a person who's experience lies with the sonic the first thing is that the machine is used by Dr. Ivo Robotnik. The next piece of information is the cloths akin to what the Eggman wears. It's perhaps one of the most distinctive style besides the body proportions. Now the questions happen to be what happened to him? What the fuck is that shadow? That small creature could be used in on of his machines, did he die?
As someone in the Anonfilly thread would note. That is an Anonfilly.
With all of those pieces of information the most likely occurrence is that Dr Robotnik turned into a filly, after some sort of cataclysmic happen stance which he survives after the crash. Unused to the young form he is found by
The requirements are specific, but finding the information to supplement the current state of affairs ranges in difficulty.
No one from either fandom alone would know what an anonfilly is, but a sudden change in form and species can happen.
The issue is this out of context knowledge has to be addressed in a way the characters of either would understand it. Thus latter on the explanation for the circumstance can be explained. Except the issue there is that the same explanation occurs time and time again for varying reasons and degrees.
<Back to Equestria: My Little Taintgator
>TLDR GlimGlam said it better.
"Awareness! It was under 'E'!"
That's kind of scary the sort of thought process that goes into carving that and mass production.
Seriously that is one occurrence that is solely private between the elements of harmony (Twilight, Pinkie, Fluttershy, Rarity, Applejack, Rainbow). For propaganda it's worthless, even if they spill their whole life story to everyone. As a tastless injoke it may be the start of them working together. To really needle it in that shows Pinkie Pie as the one who foresaw the book while everyone else missed it.
In terms of magic that it's a requirement? Well fine, but that never is stated that such a moment is required. Even different one's would be better. As an ability score modifier it's a small joke, but as an object in that fucked up half world its shit without proper reactions to the character's lack of knowledge and context.
The Fallout game aspect is all over the place and the bonuses at the end of every chapter is insane really if any pony had three of them and they did something it would be crazy. Instead it just fills up space.
These little bobbles that ties into a nonexistent game system who's native worth is the same as everything else, half baked crap. On the very surface level it's shiny. A shiny decayed turd.
Actually what I want is a full on possession story with those things, that would give an underlying motive to gather them a way for Watcher fucking Spike to have a life and actual whole characters!
But all I really wanted was a story. At the very least something I could touch in a meaningful way.
>>304059
Ashura is also Indian, Buddist, Hindu stuff. (IE a search engine search) (technically is also a Naruto reference)
So no it's not just azure but wrong (to be fair that could be the origin from that community). While technically this counts as another failure point (one of some research) it provides some depth without actually having it on its own.
It's just a name in that context with multiple reasons for its name that may or may not matter. The reason for a specific name can be contentious (does it makes sense in the story and that world), but that's a whole topic for a different time.
>>304059
Well, if I understood all of that correctly, it sounds like this is the basic plot:
>protagonist (Sonic) stands in front of a waterfall
>an enemy emerges from the waterfall
>Sonic fights the enemy, defeats him
>supporting character (Tails) apparently knows this enemy
>Tails explains who the enemy is and where he comes from
The reference here is to a glitch in the original game that caused the player sprite to change colors, and the fan community began calling this differently-colored Sonic by the name of Ashura. The author of this story included a character named Ashura who is colored this way.
The story outlined above can be followed and understood without the reader being aware of any of the game-glitch stuff or the significance of the name Ashura, so yes, this is basically in line with what I was talking about.
>>304072
Ashura the name of an Islamic holiday, and in Hindu mythology there is a type of god or heavenly being or something called asura. I have little faith that the kind of people writing Sonic the Hedgehog fanfiction would be familiar with either concept; my guess is they just picked the name because they heard it somewhere and it sounded cool.
Well, if I understood all of that correctly, it sounds like this is the basic plot:
>protagonist (Sonic) stands in front of a waterfall
>an enemy emerges from the waterfall
>Sonic fights the enemy, defeats him
>supporting character (Tails) apparently knows this enemy
>Tails explains who the enemy is and where he comes from
The reference here is to a glitch in the original game that caused the player sprite to change colors, and the fan community began calling this differently-colored Sonic by the name of Ashura. The author of this story included a character named Ashura who is colored this way.
The story outlined above can be followed and understood without the reader being aware of any of the game-glitch stuff or the significance of the name Ashura, so yes, this is basically in line with what I was talking about.
>>304072
Ashura the name of an Islamic holiday, and in Hindu mythology there is a type of god or heavenly being or something called asura. I have little faith that the kind of people writing Sonic the Hedgehog fanfiction would be familiar with either concept; my guess is they just picked the name because they heard it somewhere and it sounded cool.
>>304011
I'm willing to grudgingly acknowledge that this is a clever use of the source material. I don't think I would have caught that bit about the four stars in the opening episode if I watched it a hundred times in a row, but now that it's been pointed out I see it. I'll grant that kkat's using this minor detail from MLP as a major plot point in his own story is rather imaginative.
The problem though is that he's once again assuming the reader's knowledge of the show, in fact in this case he's assuming that the reader would have noticed this particular obscure detail from the show. His idea isn't bad, but he needs to develop it naturally as part of his own story, rather than just bluntly dropping it into the text and assuming the reader will be an obsessive enough brony to fill in the blanks with their own knowledge. Also, there is once again the issue of Littlepoop having seemingly inappropriate knowledge:
>I opened my muzzle, the suggestion that the zebras were a bit batty dying on my lips. Yes, it sounded insane. But didn’t we have legends that suggested the same? I recalled the story of The Mare on the Moon. (The real version, not that “Stallion on the Moon” nonsense.)
>The stars will aid in her escape.
Why does Littlepoop know this story? Is it part of her religion? Is this a common piece of historical lore that she would have learned about in school? Did she even go to school? If not, where did she learn this? Kkat really needed to put a little more thought into things like this before he even started writing. Considering that all of these characters live in a post-apocalyptic hellhole 200 years after the death of civilization, it seems reasonable that knowledge of the past would be spotty.
Actually, if I remember correctly, the Mare in the Moon story was a fairly obscure legend even in the world of the show. Twilight only knew about it because she spent all of her time studying and reading books; the average pony on the street had probably never heard the phrase "the stars will aid in her escape." So why is this literal nopony who had some shit job fixing PipBucks walking around quoting ancient prophecies from 1200 years in the past? It would be like some teenage fast-food worker in our world quoting the Epic of Gilgamesh. It wouldn't necessarily be impossible for him to know a story like that, but it's not common, and if you wanted him to be a believable character you'd need to provide some plausible explanation for why he does; maybe he's a history buff or his dad is an archaeologist or something.
I'm willing to grudgingly acknowledge that this is a clever use of the source material. I don't think I would have caught that bit about the four stars in the opening episode if I watched it a hundred times in a row, but now that it's been pointed out I see it. I'll grant that kkat's using this minor detail from MLP as a major plot point in his own story is rather imaginative.
The problem though is that he's once again assuming the reader's knowledge of the show, in fact in this case he's assuming that the reader would have noticed this particular obscure detail from the show. His idea isn't bad, but he needs to develop it naturally as part of his own story, rather than just bluntly dropping it into the text and assuming the reader will be an obsessive enough brony to fill in the blanks with their own knowledge. Also, there is once again the issue of Littlepoop having seemingly inappropriate knowledge:
>I opened my muzzle, the suggestion that the zebras were a bit batty dying on my lips. Yes, it sounded insane. But didn’t we have legends that suggested the same? I recalled the story of The Mare on the Moon. (The real version, not that “Stallion on the Moon” nonsense.)
>The stars will aid in her escape.
Why does Littlepoop know this story? Is it part of her religion? Is this a common piece of historical lore that she would have learned about in school? Did she even go to school? If not, where did she learn this? Kkat really needed to put a little more thought into things like this before he even started writing. Considering that all of these characters live in a post-apocalyptic hellhole 200 years after the death of civilization, it seems reasonable that knowledge of the past would be spotty.
Actually, if I remember correctly, the Mare in the Moon story was a fairly obscure legend even in the world of the show. Twilight only knew about it because she spent all of her time studying and reading books; the average pony on the street had probably never heard the phrase "the stars will aid in her escape." So why is this literal nopony who had some shit job fixing PipBucks walking around quoting ancient prophecies from 1200 years in the past? It would be like some teenage fast-food worker in our world quoting the Epic of Gilgamesh. It wouldn't necessarily be impossible for him to know a story like that, but it's not common, and if you wanted him to be a believable character you'd need to provide some plausible explanation for why he does; maybe he's a history buff or his dad is an archaeologist or something.
>>304072
>>304120
You're right. Thank you.
I forgot about the Ashura path from Naruto, but a surprising number of fans struggled to remember which path was which if they were unfamiliar with their buddist namesakes.
>304126
I always assumed the four stars in that scene was an animation error and there were supposed to be six in a shape that reminded the audience of Twilight's Cutie Mark for bonus foreshadowing. If not, then what do those four stars have to do with anything? Did Faust plan on doing something with those four stars only for Hasbro to reject that idea? Was Discord going to be one of four evil stars? Was Twilight going to get a strong evil counterpart with four stars in her cutie mark?
Either "The stars will aid in her escape" never really meant anything because NMM escaped from the moon on her own offscreen or "the stars will aid in her escape" meant "Twilight and friends will aid Luna in escaping her negativity".
I guess referencing those four stars that twinkled once makes sense if you assume they're a constant part of the night sky that sparkle so often the Zebras made myths about them in particular. But why? Why out of all the creatures would the black and white striped creatures assume something dark must be evil? They're black! With white stripes but still black! Wouldn't it make more sense for them to love the night since the deadliest animals only hunt during the day? Is the old "stars are monsters" thing supposed to be some kind of porquoi story old wives told their kids to explain why they must sleep inside the mud huts instead of outside, like stories of forest wolves getting little girls in red hoods who take shortcuts through the woods? Who would choose to believe in a religion with no good god to make you feel good about yourself and dictate what's right and wrong? The Zebras are certainly written like greedy hypocritical underhanded savage nihilists who believe in nothing beyond the certainty that the night sky and anything connected to it is mondo evil but that doesn't seem like good writing.
In stories where war is treated as a bad thing, aren't the two sides in conflicts that destroyed stuff supposed to be morally grey or equally evil or stupid and greedy while having equally good points?
I get that for this story to function the way it did, the zebras have to believe something that religiously opposes ponies to explain why Zebras did what they did but this seems like a stretch so massive not even Pinkie Pie could do it.
Couldn't the author think of anything else for the zebras to believe?
The Zebras needed to religiously believe something that necessitates opposing FIM ponies before the bad writing kicked in but why choose something fundamentally wrong instead of a religion incompatible with ponykind's kindness?
Hell, he already gave zebras before the war a Caesar's Legion style Caesar and "roaman" outfits and Fallout's Chinese Communist gear so why not rip off some other religion like Skyrim stuff or Werewolf Mormonism or Boat Mormonism or make up new religions out of Legendary Pokemon?
Btw is it bad writing that made this story drag its hooves for so long without getting to the point? In good Fallout games major story locations have their own stories you can take part in.
Everything's focused on Goodsprings at the start but you can still talk to people about The Strip, Hoover Dam, and so on. Going to Primm tells you the NCR kinda sucks and gave us Powder Gangers but can take over towns with your help. Going to Novac tells you the Legion is evil slavers and Ghouls exist. Going to Nipton tells you the Legion is dicks who lie sometimes (exploring the ruins provides clues that some fought back). Going to Boulder City lets you meet the Khans. World info is drip-fed to you in optional dialogue with NPCs. By the time you get to Vegas the long way (not making a beeline through deathclaw cumzone or mount invisifag) and possibly help with NCR/Westside and NCR/Freeside shit to get a favor from the King or enough cash to get into The Strip you know enough about the Legion or NCR to be surprised when they offer you amnesty for any misdeeds if you take their side now that you've been let inside House's Lucky 38.
but instead of giving the NPCs LP talks to views on major factions and important locations the author keeps throwing in Fallout 3's optional dungeons with """environmental storytelling""" where notes tell you exactly what happened to justify this skyrim dungeon style shithole's current state at the end of the skyrim dungeon for anyone who cares.
Is it bad writing for the author to throw in occasional filler missions that don't advance the main plot or meaningfully advance side plots like romance or drug addiction stories and solely exist so LP can shoot more baddies for a bit and get rewarded at the end?
Also would it make the world seem grimmer and darker and bleaker if LP sometimes tried to do the right thing and failed because she wasn't strong and shooty and killy enough, or successfully did the right thing and got punished for it by the universe and unforseen consequences down the line somehow?
>>304120
You're right. Thank you.
I forgot about the Ashura path from Naruto, but a surprising number of fans struggled to remember which path was which if they were unfamiliar with their buddist namesakes.
>304126
I always assumed the four stars in that scene was an animation error and there were supposed to be six in a shape that reminded the audience of Twilight's Cutie Mark for bonus foreshadowing. If not, then what do those four stars have to do with anything? Did Faust plan on doing something with those four stars only for Hasbro to reject that idea? Was Discord going to be one of four evil stars? Was Twilight going to get a strong evil counterpart with four stars in her cutie mark?
Either "The stars will aid in her escape" never really meant anything because NMM escaped from the moon on her own offscreen or "the stars will aid in her escape" meant "Twilight and friends will aid Luna in escaping her negativity".
I guess referencing those four stars that twinkled once makes sense if you assume they're a constant part of the night sky that sparkle so often the Zebras made myths about them in particular. But why? Why out of all the creatures would the black and white striped creatures assume something dark must be evil? They're black! With white stripes but still black! Wouldn't it make more sense for them to love the night since the deadliest animals only hunt during the day? Is the old "stars are monsters" thing supposed to be some kind of porquoi story old wives told their kids to explain why they must sleep inside the mud huts instead of outside, like stories of forest wolves getting little girls in red hoods who take shortcuts through the woods? Who would choose to believe in a religion with no good god to make you feel good about yourself and dictate what's right and wrong? The Zebras are certainly written like greedy hypocritical underhanded savage nihilists who believe in nothing beyond the certainty that the night sky and anything connected to it is mondo evil but that doesn't seem like good writing.
In stories where war is treated as a bad thing, aren't the two sides in conflicts that destroyed stuff supposed to be morally grey or equally evil or stupid and greedy while having equally good points?
I get that for this story to function the way it did, the zebras have to believe something that religiously opposes ponies to explain why Zebras did what they did but this seems like a stretch so massive not even Pinkie Pie could do it.
Couldn't the author think of anything else for the zebras to believe?
The Zebras needed to religiously believe something that necessitates opposing FIM ponies before the bad writing kicked in but why choose something fundamentally wrong instead of a religion incompatible with ponykind's kindness?
Hell, he already gave zebras before the war a Caesar's Legion style Caesar and "roaman" outfits and Fallout's Chinese Communist gear so why not rip off some other religion like Skyrim stuff or Werewolf Mormonism or Boat Mormonism or make up new religions out of Legendary Pokemon?
Btw is it bad writing that made this story drag its hooves for so long without getting to the point? In good Fallout games major story locations have their own stories you can take part in.
Everything's focused on Goodsprings at the start but you can still talk to people about The Strip, Hoover Dam, and so on. Going to Primm tells you the NCR kinda sucks and gave us Powder Gangers but can take over towns with your help. Going to Novac tells you the Legion is evil slavers and Ghouls exist. Going to Nipton tells you the Legion is dicks who lie sometimes (exploring the ruins provides clues that some fought back). Going to Boulder City lets you meet the Khans. World info is drip-fed to you in optional dialogue with NPCs. By the time you get to Vegas the long way (not making a beeline through deathclaw cumzone or mount invisifag) and possibly help with NCR/Westside and NCR/Freeside shit to get a favor from the King or enough cash to get into The Strip you know enough about the Legion or NCR to be surprised when they offer you amnesty for any misdeeds if you take their side now that you've been let inside House's Lucky 38.
but instead of giving the NPCs LP talks to views on major factions and important locations the author keeps throwing in Fallout 3's optional dungeons with """environmental storytelling""" where notes tell you exactly what happened to justify this skyrim dungeon style shithole's current state at the end of the skyrim dungeon for anyone who cares.
Is it bad writing for the author to throw in occasional filler missions that don't advance the main plot or meaningfully advance side plots like romance or drug addiction stories and solely exist so LP can shoot more baddies for a bit and get rewarded at the end?
Also would it make the world seem grimmer and darker and bleaker if LP sometimes tried to do the right thing and failed because she wasn't strong and shooty and killy enough, or successfully did the right thing and got punished for it by the universe and unforseen consequences down the line somehow?
1616294641.png (184.2 KB, 894x1007, 0AE50F41B0091FA2211C72D11472344D-188637.png)
>>304255
So the writing is similar to lefty meme walls on walls of text. Never ever does anything resolve big or small, the fact there is an ending at all is a miracle.
The points that lead to entertainment are dead on arrival (besides meta enjoyment or world view twisting).
Actually this extends into psychopathy and ponerology with the characters. They are shallow, and incomplete on a fundamental level.
Everything is in service for LittlePip, her understanding of the world is shallow just like the author's. It's not a fun twisted it's... frustrating for me.
It's virtue signaling the story. "Woe is me I is flawed, but I is also awesome. See everyone else says the same. See? I may be bad, but world is badderer. So I is good!" -LittlePoop
The interest cycle never competes. LittlePoop sees a thing, snarks, does a thing sometimes, THEN it cuts off. No reaction. Zero zip nada. Only Deus Ex Author occurrs to say "hey guisss look at littlepip!"
The 'fundamental' fiction loop is broken in an unsatisfying way. Then nothing on the small scale from sentence to sentence resolves. It keeps going bigger and bigger things being being broken.
So the writing is similar to lefty meme walls on walls of text. Never ever does anything resolve big or small, the fact there is an ending at all is a miracle.
The points that lead to entertainment are dead on arrival (besides meta enjoyment or world view twisting).
Actually this extends into psychopathy and ponerology with the characters. They are shallow, and incomplete on a fundamental level.
Everything is in service for LittlePip, her understanding of the world is shallow just like the author's. It's not a fun twisted it's... frustrating for me.
It's virtue signaling the story. "Woe is me I is flawed, but I is also awesome. See everyone else says the same. See? I may be bad, but world is badderer. So I is good!" -LittlePoop
The interest cycle never competes. LittlePoop sees a thing, snarks, does a thing sometimes, THEN it cuts off. No reaction. Zero zip nada. Only Deus Ex Author occurrs to say "hey guisss look at littlepip!"
The 'fundamental' fiction loop is broken in an unsatisfying way. Then nothing on the small scale from sentence to sentence resolves. It keeps going bigger and bigger things being being broken.
>>303997
So anyway it appears that this black opal thing that Frank wants is also a memory orb, because LP decides to connect to it and see what's on it.
>It was only reluctantly that I touched the opal with my magic and let it take Homage and her Athenaeum away from me…
Why is she reluctant? She connects to these silly things all the time. Is it just because she doesn't want to be away from DJ Boxmuncher for all of five minutes? This is dumb.
Anyway, she zoops into the orb. She finds herself looking through Spike's eyes. Spike in this scene appears to be fully grown, or an adolescent or something. He is walking along with the mane 6, who in this scene appear slightly younger than when we've encountered them before, but are still older versions than the versions that appear in the show. Rainbow Dash is notably absent, but the remaining five are all mentioned by name. Rarity appears to be leading them somewhere to show them some project she's working on. Spike, naturally, spends most of the scene eye-humping Rarity.
Rarity briefly explains that the thing she has been working on is some kind of new type of armor. It is less powerful than the steel ranger suits developed by AJ's ministry, but apparently has other advantages. After this explanation concludes, she calls out to Rainbow Dash, who emerges wearing the armor:
>Around the curtained partition stepped the shadow out of a nightmare. A blue pegasus pony who was encased in a black, insectoid carapace, with only the front of her muzzle and the undersides of her wings showing. Her tail was hidden within a scorpion-like sheath with a vicious, barbed stinger. The ebony suit of armor was sleek and wicked. Yellow-orange protective goggles with a bug-like compound eye-pattern completed the look. Built into the sides of the suit were antenna-like protrusions; the crystals that tipped those magical-energy weapons shimmered with shifting rainbow light.
We've seen this same armor before, on a poster. From some comments made by Calamity, we can presume that this is the battle uniform of some outfit called the Grand Pegasus Enclave.
The group oohs and aahs over the battle armor, and then the memory ends.
>Reality reasserted itself, leaving me feeling very strange. It was good to be back in my own hooves. I didn’t ever want to be that… thing again.
Apparently, Littlepoop did not enjoy being Spike for the day.
Page break. Littlepoop goes back to the monorail station at Tenpony, and bumps into SteelHooves along the way. He somehow intuits that LP is going to see Frank. LP seems surprised that he knows who Frank is, even though I'm fairly certain he has witnessed her meeting with him before.
>“I know of Watcher,” SteelHooves intoned. “You don’t live as long as we have without crossing each other’s wake.”
>It took me a moment to parse what he had said, but then I nodded.
Why would it take her a moment to parse this? It's a completely straightforward statement. However, I think the implication is that she has either momentarily forgotten how old SteelHooves is, or else she is surprised to learn that Frank may also be quite old.
Anyway, we get a little bit more information on Frank here. Unfortunately, like most of this story's big reveals, it's a bit of a letdown. The author mostly uses this as an opportunity to subtly talk up how great his Mary Sue OC is:
>“Watcher finds ponies who are better ponies. And sets them on a path to find others, to create teams of friends.”
Author's italics preserved. Yes, you heard it here, folks: Littlepoop's destiny as Great Hero of the Wasteland has just been confirmed. I'd actually like to examine this a little closer.
If I'm following this correctly, Frank is some kind of ageless entity that wanders the wasteland seeking out heroes and aiding them in their quests. Since it's been established that he can use the omnipresent sprite bots as eyes, we'll just go ahead and assume he has near omniscience for now.
His first appearance in the story is in Ponyville, the morning after LP slept in Rarity's shop. He apparently singled her out as a "better pony" and thus began the task of guiding her along the path to heroism. But how did he make that determination about her? Even if we assume he was able to see every single thing that LP did in the story up to that point, nothing she did seems remarkable enough for her to be singled out.
She escaped the stable, poked around the ruins of AJ's farm, bumped into some slavers, was taken captive by said slavers, was able to escape when the slavers were attacked by raiders, defeated the raiders, was robbed by Monterrey Jack, and then went upstairs to sleep in Rarity's old store. If you were an ageless entity using a massive bot network to spy on literally every single pony in the wasteland in hopes of finding a "better pony," what about Littlepoop's actions would make her stand out to you? She didn't do anything particularly remarkable or heroic to my recollection. Yet it's evident that Frank was looking out for her from that morning onwards; he warned her about a landmine placed outside Rarity's door and helped her escape the raider group in Ponyville.
To begin with, the Gandalf-type wise man who seeks out the mundane protagonist because he has some secret knowledge of his/her true destiny is a pretty worn out trope at this point. If you're going to use this type of setup, it's best to at least come up with some halfway-plausible explanation for why the wise man chooses the hero. There are more than enough fantasy stories out there about some humble onion farmer who is suddenly informed by a wizard that he is the fulfillment of an ancient prophecy; the world really doesn't need any more of them.
So far, in FoE, we don't have a setup with even that level of creativity; Frank just sees LP doing the kind of shit that ponies in the wasteland do every day, and somehow just knows that she is a "better pony." This is hack writing, pure and simple.
So anyway it appears that this black opal thing that Frank wants is also a memory orb, because LP decides to connect to it and see what's on it.
>It was only reluctantly that I touched the opal with my magic and let it take Homage and her Athenaeum away from me…
Why is she reluctant? She connects to these silly things all the time. Is it just because she doesn't want to be away from DJ Boxmuncher for all of five minutes? This is dumb.
Anyway, she zoops into the orb. She finds herself looking through Spike's eyes. Spike in this scene appears to be fully grown, or an adolescent or something. He is walking along with the mane 6, who in this scene appear slightly younger than when we've encountered them before, but are still older versions than the versions that appear in the show. Rainbow Dash is notably absent, but the remaining five are all mentioned by name. Rarity appears to be leading them somewhere to show them some project she's working on. Spike, naturally, spends most of the scene eye-humping Rarity.
Rarity briefly explains that the thing she has been working on is some kind of new type of armor. It is less powerful than the steel ranger suits developed by AJ's ministry, but apparently has other advantages. After this explanation concludes, she calls out to Rainbow Dash, who emerges wearing the armor:
>Around the curtained partition stepped the shadow out of a nightmare. A blue pegasus pony who was encased in a black, insectoid carapace, with only the front of her muzzle and the undersides of her wings showing. Her tail was hidden within a scorpion-like sheath with a vicious, barbed stinger. The ebony suit of armor was sleek and wicked. Yellow-orange protective goggles with a bug-like compound eye-pattern completed the look. Built into the sides of the suit were antenna-like protrusions; the crystals that tipped those magical-energy weapons shimmered with shifting rainbow light.
We've seen this same armor before, on a poster. From some comments made by Calamity, we can presume that this is the battle uniform of some outfit called the Grand Pegasus Enclave.
The group oohs and aahs over the battle armor, and then the memory ends.
>Reality reasserted itself, leaving me feeling very strange. It was good to be back in my own hooves. I didn’t ever want to be that… thing again.
Apparently, Littlepoop did not enjoy being Spike for the day.
Page break. Littlepoop goes back to the monorail station at Tenpony, and bumps into SteelHooves along the way. He somehow intuits that LP is going to see Frank. LP seems surprised that he knows who Frank is, even though I'm fairly certain he has witnessed her meeting with him before.
>“I know of Watcher,” SteelHooves intoned. “You don’t live as long as we have without crossing each other’s wake.”
>It took me a moment to parse what he had said, but then I nodded.
Why would it take her a moment to parse this? It's a completely straightforward statement. However, I think the implication is that she has either momentarily forgotten how old SteelHooves is, or else she is surprised to learn that Frank may also be quite old.
Anyway, we get a little bit more information on Frank here. Unfortunately, like most of this story's big reveals, it's a bit of a letdown. The author mostly uses this as an opportunity to subtly talk up how great his Mary Sue OC is:
>“Watcher finds ponies who are better ponies. And sets them on a path to find others, to create teams of friends.”
Author's italics preserved. Yes, you heard it here, folks: Littlepoop's destiny as Great Hero of the Wasteland has just been confirmed. I'd actually like to examine this a little closer.
If I'm following this correctly, Frank is some kind of ageless entity that wanders the wasteland seeking out heroes and aiding them in their quests. Since it's been established that he can use the omnipresent sprite bots as eyes, we'll just go ahead and assume he has near omniscience for now.
His first appearance in the story is in Ponyville, the morning after LP slept in Rarity's shop. He apparently singled her out as a "better pony" and thus began the task of guiding her along the path to heroism. But how did he make that determination about her? Even if we assume he was able to see every single thing that LP did in the story up to that point, nothing she did seems remarkable enough for her to be singled out.
She escaped the stable, poked around the ruins of AJ's farm, bumped into some slavers, was taken captive by said slavers, was able to escape when the slavers were attacked by raiders, defeated the raiders, was robbed by Monterrey Jack, and then went upstairs to sleep in Rarity's old store. If you were an ageless entity using a massive bot network to spy on literally every single pony in the wasteland in hopes of finding a "better pony," what about Littlepoop's actions would make her stand out to you? She didn't do anything particularly remarkable or heroic to my recollection. Yet it's evident that Frank was looking out for her from that morning onwards; he warned her about a landmine placed outside Rarity's door and helped her escape the raider group in Ponyville.
To begin with, the Gandalf-type wise man who seeks out the mundane protagonist because he has some secret knowledge of his/her true destiny is a pretty worn out trope at this point. If you're going to use this type of setup, it's best to at least come up with some halfway-plausible explanation for why the wise man chooses the hero. There are more than enough fantasy stories out there about some humble onion farmer who is suddenly informed by a wizard that he is the fulfillment of an ancient prophecy; the world really doesn't need any more of them.
So far, in FoE, we don't have a setup with even that level of creativity; Frank just sees LP doing the kind of shit that ponies in the wasteland do every day, and somehow just knows that she is a "better pony." This is hack writing, pure and simple.
>>304275
>There are more than enough fantasy stories out there about some humble onion farmer who is suddenly informed by a wizard that he is the fulfillment of an ancient prophecy; the world really doesn't need any more of them.
I wonder about statements like this.
I can sorta see both sides of things. Afterall, one could argue with the classical arguement that nothing is new under the sun and it is all about how you do it that seprates things from other things. There is also the idea of things don't have to be new to be enjoyed. I have rewatched movies, for example.
Here I am writing my opinion again instead of focusing on my own projects. Lol, no. This needs to end. I will change. I will not be stuck in the swamp that is media reviews. I will become a writer.
From now on, I will stop visit this thread. For the time being cya guise. Love you all<3
>There are more than enough fantasy stories out there about some humble onion farmer who is suddenly informed by a wizard that he is the fulfillment of an ancient prophecy; the world really doesn't need any more of them.
I wonder about statements like this.
I can sorta see both sides of things. Afterall, one could argue with the classical arguement that nothing is new under the sun and it is all about how you do it that seprates things from other things. There is also the idea of things don't have to be new to be enjoyed. I have rewatched movies, for example.
Here I am writing my opinion again instead of focusing on my own projects. Lol, no. This needs to end. I will change. I will not be stuck in the swamp that is media reviews. I will become a writer.
From now on, I will stop visit this thread. For the time being cya guise. Love you all<3
>>294032
The raw amount of effort, time and knowledge put into each of these threads is simply atouning.
I applaud Glim for all of this incredible display of autism, these threads are a goldmine of writing advice.
The raw amount of effort, time and knowledge put into each of these threads is simply atouning.
I applaud Glim for all of this incredible display of autism, these threads are a goldmine of writing advice.
>>304275
Anyway, SteelHooves also helpfully informs Littlepoop that the ponies Frank singles out for quests usually end up dead. Though this predictably upsets her and might seem like it's adding an element of danger to the story, it's really just more hack writing. Essentially, the author is saying that not only is LP the legendary hero who was hand-picked by Fate for greatness, but the quest she is on is a perilous one, that many before her have attempted and failed.
"The heroic knight arrives at the dragon's cave, and finds it littered with the bones of all the knights who have tried and failed to defeat it. And then he goes in and slays the dragon, and saves the princess and takes the treasure and is hailed by all the land." If you're writing a fantasy cartoon for six year olds or the plot of a 1980s Nintendo RPG, this is fine; however, if you expect someone to slog their way through your 600,000-word-long novel about ponies and nuclear war, you really should try and put a little more effort into your premise.
Anyway, after this conversation she takes her leave of SteelHooves, goes out on the monorail tracks, and immediately bumps into one of Frank's sprite bots. She tells him that she has his opal thingy, but refuses to give it to him. She tells him that she will only hand it to him in person. Even though this is technically in violation of their agreement, of which Frank has already held up his end, Frank indulges her and gives her his physical location. However, it is a long distance away.
So, it looks as if once again she will be putting off traveling to Fillydelphia to go on a pointless side quest. This time, she is off to "the middle of nowhere," to hand off some black opal thing to some neet sprite-bot hacker. This story just keeps getting more and more exciting.
Page break. Although the journey to Frank's will take weeks on hoof, Calamity has conveniently finished making the required repairs to the flying coach thing he was trying to build, so now they can fly instead of walk. This shortens the journey down to a mere two days.
They all climb into the flying wagon, and out of absolutely nowhere the balefire phoenix that has been following them around suddenly flies inside and lands on the passenger seat. Nothing else happens.
Page break. We learn that Velvet Remedy has named the balefire phoenix Pyrelight. I guess it's her pet now or something. Also, as if the storyline about LP's crack mint addiction wasn't phoned in enough, SteelHooves is now concerned that Velvet may have an addiction to memory orbs. Not making this up.
Specifically, he is concerned because the memory she keeps going into, the one belonging to Fluttershy, is not a good memory (according to him). He now feeds us this preposterous bit of autism:
>“Fluttershy wasn’t like the others. Rainbow Dash wanted to win the war. Applejack just wanted to protect other ponies. Especially after Big Macintosh died. Twilight Sparkle wanted to please the Princesses, especially Celestia,” SteelHooves intoned. “But Fluttershy just wanted the war to end. That memory is the moment she put her whole Ministry to that purpose of finding a way to end the conflict. And she did.”
I'll save you the lengthy buildup and just give you the quick rundown: Fluttershy, yes Fluttershy, apparently was responsible for developing Equestria's version of the atomic bomb.
Anyway, Littlepoop is now deeply concerned, because Velvet idolizes Fluttershy and this knowledge would destroy her hero worship and blah blah blah. Nothing else happens. However, I would like to highlight this line simply because it's hilarious:
>SteelHooves turned to me behind his helmet’s visor. “That memory: that is the beginning of the end of the world. Ultimately, Fluttershy killed us all.”
Imagine typing that with a straight face.
Page break. Apparently Frank lives at the peak of a giant mountain. Calamity announces that they are going to have to break through the cloud cover in order to get there, and they may encounter some trouble up there. My guess is that this trouble will have something to do with the pegasi and whatever sort of above-cloud civilization they have going.
They emerge through the cloud cover and Littlepoop gets the first actual glimpse she's ever had of the night sky. This scene could have made for some nice visuals and elegant description, but instead we just get LP complaining about her vertigo. You may recall that she has a severe fear of heights. If you don't, you can't be blamed; like her crack mint addiction, it is only mentioned sporadically, and thus far has not factored into the story in any meaningful way. It's a little curious that it didn't bother her at any point before now, since they would have had to ascend fairly high in order to break through the clouds in the first place.
>My eyes (“It was under ‘E’!”) spotted a glint of metal on one of the cliffs.
Once again, the phrase "it was under 'E'" has no significant meaning to LP or anyone else in this story; it's just a random line of dialogue from the show that the author referenced to score brony points. I really can't stress enough how much I hate it when authors do shit like this. References are fine, but they need to make sense. Having LP thinking "it was under 'E'" right here makes about as much sense as having her suddenly exclaim "Yippee-ki-yay motherfucker!" or "I just lost the game!" Readers might get what the author is referencing, but that doesn't mean it makes any goddamn sense in the context of the story. Presumably the significance here is that LP is able to spot this glint of metal due to her newly-heightened powers of awareness, but there are better ways to say that.
Anyway, the glint of metal that she saw turns out to be an "audio recorder" that is floating nearby. There is no explanation of what that means or any description of the device. It is at this point that LP's EFS informs her that she's "found the dragon cave."
Anyway, SteelHooves also helpfully informs Littlepoop that the ponies Frank singles out for quests usually end up dead. Though this predictably upsets her and might seem like it's adding an element of danger to the story, it's really just more hack writing. Essentially, the author is saying that not only is LP the legendary hero who was hand-picked by Fate for greatness, but the quest she is on is a perilous one, that many before her have attempted and failed.
"The heroic knight arrives at the dragon's cave, and finds it littered with the bones of all the knights who have tried and failed to defeat it. And then he goes in and slays the dragon, and saves the princess and takes the treasure and is hailed by all the land." If you're writing a fantasy cartoon for six year olds or the plot of a 1980s Nintendo RPG, this is fine; however, if you expect someone to slog their way through your 600,000-word-long novel about ponies and nuclear war, you really should try and put a little more effort into your premise.
Anyway, after this conversation she takes her leave of SteelHooves, goes out on the monorail tracks, and immediately bumps into one of Frank's sprite bots. She tells him that she has his opal thingy, but refuses to give it to him. She tells him that she will only hand it to him in person. Even though this is technically in violation of their agreement, of which Frank has already held up his end, Frank indulges her and gives her his physical location. However, it is a long distance away.
So, it looks as if once again she will be putting off traveling to Fillydelphia to go on a pointless side quest. This time, she is off to "the middle of nowhere," to hand off some black opal thing to some neet sprite-bot hacker. This story just keeps getting more and more exciting.
Page break. Although the journey to Frank's will take weeks on hoof, Calamity has conveniently finished making the required repairs to the flying coach thing he was trying to build, so now they can fly instead of walk. This shortens the journey down to a mere two days.
They all climb into the flying wagon, and out of absolutely nowhere the balefire phoenix that has been following them around suddenly flies inside and lands on the passenger seat. Nothing else happens.
Page break. We learn that Velvet Remedy has named the balefire phoenix Pyrelight. I guess it's her pet now or something. Also, as if the storyline about LP's crack mint addiction wasn't phoned in enough, SteelHooves is now concerned that Velvet may have an addiction to memory orbs. Not making this up.
Specifically, he is concerned because the memory she keeps going into, the one belonging to Fluttershy, is not a good memory (according to him). He now feeds us this preposterous bit of autism:
>“Fluttershy wasn’t like the others. Rainbow Dash wanted to win the war. Applejack just wanted to protect other ponies. Especially after Big Macintosh died. Twilight Sparkle wanted to please the Princesses, especially Celestia,” SteelHooves intoned. “But Fluttershy just wanted the war to end. That memory is the moment she put her whole Ministry to that purpose of finding a way to end the conflict. And she did.”
I'll save you the lengthy buildup and just give you the quick rundown: Fluttershy, yes Fluttershy, apparently was responsible for developing Equestria's version of the atomic bomb.
Anyway, Littlepoop is now deeply concerned, because Velvet idolizes Fluttershy and this knowledge would destroy her hero worship and blah blah blah. Nothing else happens. However, I would like to highlight this line simply because it's hilarious:
>SteelHooves turned to me behind his helmet’s visor. “That memory: that is the beginning of the end of the world. Ultimately, Fluttershy killed us all.”
Imagine typing that with a straight face.
Page break. Apparently Frank lives at the peak of a giant mountain. Calamity announces that they are going to have to break through the cloud cover in order to get there, and they may encounter some trouble up there. My guess is that this trouble will have something to do with the pegasi and whatever sort of above-cloud civilization they have going.
They emerge through the cloud cover and Littlepoop gets the first actual glimpse she's ever had of the night sky. This scene could have made for some nice visuals and elegant description, but instead we just get LP complaining about her vertigo. You may recall that she has a severe fear of heights. If you don't, you can't be blamed; like her crack mint addiction, it is only mentioned sporadically, and thus far has not factored into the story in any meaningful way. It's a little curious that it didn't bother her at any point before now, since they would have had to ascend fairly high in order to break through the clouds in the first place.
>My eyes (“It was under ‘E’!”) spotted a glint of metal on one of the cliffs.
Once again, the phrase "it was under 'E'" has no significant meaning to LP or anyone else in this story; it's just a random line of dialogue from the show that the author referenced to score brony points. I really can't stress enough how much I hate it when authors do shit like this. References are fine, but they need to make sense. Having LP thinking "it was under 'E'" right here makes about as much sense as having her suddenly exclaim "Yippee-ki-yay motherfucker!" or "I just lost the game!" Readers might get what the author is referencing, but that doesn't mean it makes any goddamn sense in the context of the story. Presumably the significance here is that LP is able to spot this glint of metal due to her newly-heightened powers of awareness, but there are better ways to say that.
Anyway, the glint of metal that she saw turns out to be an "audio recorder" that is floating nearby. There is no explanation of what that means or any description of the device. It is at this point that LP's EFS informs her that she's "found the dragon cave."
1616342217.png (882.2 KB, 1301x1379, 3604802 - Fluttershy Friendship_is_Magic My_Little_Pony Tentacless.png)
>>304306
Page break. Despite the author’s foreshadowing of potential opposition they might encounter above the cloud cover, the group is able to land at the Dragon Cave without incident. There is some trepidation as to the identity of the creature who dwells within. tl;dr it's Spike, who was actually Frank/Watcher the whole time. The long lifespan of dragons seems to settle the question of how Frank was able to live for so long though it's really only been a question for a couple of microscenes, since we heard nothing about Frank's age until SteelHooves mentioned it. I'll admit to actually being a little surprised; my money was on him turning out to be Derpy or another ghoul.
Anyway, nothing else happens, and that's the end of the chapter.
---
The footnote of this chapter contains a link to an external story, written by another author, that details the sex scene between LP and Homage that kkat tastefully left to the reader's imagination. I'm not going to review it in detail as it is not part of this story and also because this bloody train wreck is long enough without adding an extra 5,000 some-odd words of badly-written lesbian sex to the pile, but I did skim through it and thought it bore some brief mention, as kkat seems to consider it important enough to link to.
The writer actually does a pretty good imitation of kkat's clunky but basically functional prose, and the dialogue is of roughly the same quality as FoE. If this scene had been included as part of the text without mentioning that it was written by someone else, I probably wouldn't have noticed any jarring change in writing styles, so that goes to the author's credit ("pacce" is the guy's name). This could either mean that he is talented enough to imitate the style of another writer, or that he is at roughly the same skill level as kkat, which is to say above average for fimfiction, but not tremendously high on the grand totem pole of literature.
Anyway, the whole thing is about as cringe-inducing and hilarious as you'd expect. Here are some choice selections that I think paint an accurate picture of what an adventurous reader might find:
>I cried out. I’m pretty sure I wasn’t speaking any known language. Somehow the entire universe had collapsed between my haunches and the only thing left was that hot slippery bit of mare boldly going where no mare had gone before.
>"Of course, when I found out you were actually a gorgeous mare with a rump that just wouldn't quit, I was head-over-heels. I mean who wouldn't be?"
>I, Littlepip, short for Pipsqueak, had an honest to Goddesses relationship. I was grinning like it was my birthday and Homage had just popped out of the cake. I had a relationship. She could shove whatever she wanted in me because I had a relationship!
Probably the most interesting I use the word fairly loosely here thing about this is a bit of conversation that takes place between all the awkward descriptions of slurping and moaning. The author attempts to explore the reasons behind Littlepoop's attraction to Homage, and her previous attraction to Velvet Remedy. Again, the author does an admirable ??? job of sounding more or less like kkat, and demonstrates a solid understanding of both of these characters to the extent that there is anything to understand as well as kkat's own probable view of them.
There is, of course, the obligatory stroking of Littlepoop's literal and metaphorical clit, with Homage paying the obligatory compliments to how noble and heroic her actions in the wasteland are. Littlepoop vents an appropriate amount of angst over all the killing and darkness and icky stuff she's had to endure in the name of...whatever the hell her wandering murder spree across the wasteland is supposed to achieve exactly. To her credit, LP actually expresses a degree of interest in Homage's thoughts, and asks her about her own attractions. Unfortunately, the exploration of their respective attractions to each other add little depth to either of these characters; Homage's attraction to Littlepoop is just more thinly-veiled praise heaped upon kkat's shitty Mary Sue OC, and Littlepoop's attraction to Homage can pretty much be summarized as "you had a nice ass and you were into me."
The descriptions of the sex itself range from faintly nauseating to downright hilarious, though I can't say it ever crosses the threshold of eroticism. I can't imagine anyone actually getting off to any of this, though I'm sure there are people who do. One of the author's more questionable choices was to have both of them consuming food throughout their lovemaking. Not erotic eating, like feeding each other strawberries and whipped cream and that kind of shit; just regular, idle snacking in between spirited bouts of ponut-munching. I suppose I could give the author some credit for eschewing the kind of over-the-top pornographic writing that most people who do this kind of thing tend to veer into. This story makes an admirable effort at portraying ordinary intimacy, complete with all of its awkward and occasionally gross moments. Unfortunately, the stilted, corny dialogue saps most of this away, and a lengthy segment detailing LP's angsty visions of wasteland horror saps the rest of it.
Anyway, I've probably spent about as much time on this side-story as it deserves. Since this is probably a decent enough stopping point, I'm going to take a break and do Sven's thing before moving on to the next chapter.
And so, on that note, I leave you all with this one last passage from A Mare Worth Fighting For:
>"I thought I’d seen heroes before. I thought I’d seen everything before.” Tears streamed down her face, she ignored them. “But I’d never seen you before. I believe you, Littlepip. I believe in you. Things can change, and when they do, it’ll be because you reminded us all that darkness is just a passing thing and that our true nature is good."
It's not the real kkat, but an incredible simulation.
Page break. Despite the author’s foreshadowing of potential opposition they might encounter above the cloud cover, the group is able to land at the Dragon Cave without incident. There is some trepidation as to the identity of the creature who dwells within. tl;dr it's Spike, who was actually Frank/Watcher the whole time. The long lifespan of dragons seems to settle the question of how Frank was able to live for so long though it's really only been a question for a couple of microscenes, since we heard nothing about Frank's age until SteelHooves mentioned it. I'll admit to actually being a little surprised; my money was on him turning out to be Derpy or another ghoul.
Anyway, nothing else happens, and that's the end of the chapter.
---
The footnote of this chapter contains a link to an external story, written by another author, that details the sex scene between LP and Homage that kkat tastefully left to the reader's imagination. I'm not going to review it in detail as it is not part of this story and also because this bloody train wreck is long enough without adding an extra 5,000 some-odd words of badly-written lesbian sex to the pile, but I did skim through it and thought it bore some brief mention, as kkat seems to consider it important enough to link to.
The writer actually does a pretty good imitation of kkat's clunky but basically functional prose, and the dialogue is of roughly the same quality as FoE. If this scene had been included as part of the text without mentioning that it was written by someone else, I probably wouldn't have noticed any jarring change in writing styles, so that goes to the author's credit ("pacce" is the guy's name). This could either mean that he is talented enough to imitate the style of another writer, or that he is at roughly the same skill level as kkat, which is to say above average for fimfiction, but not tremendously high on the grand totem pole of literature.
Anyway, the whole thing is about as cringe-inducing and hilarious as you'd expect. Here are some choice selections that I think paint an accurate picture of what an adventurous reader might find:
>I cried out. I’m pretty sure I wasn’t speaking any known language. Somehow the entire universe had collapsed between my haunches and the only thing left was that hot slippery bit of mare boldly going where no mare had gone before.
>"Of course, when I found out you were actually a gorgeous mare with a rump that just wouldn't quit, I was head-over-heels. I mean who wouldn't be?"
>I, Littlepip, short for Pipsqueak, had an honest to Goddesses relationship. I was grinning like it was my birthday and Homage had just popped out of the cake. I had a relationship. She could shove whatever she wanted in me because I had a relationship!
Probably the most interesting I use the word fairly loosely here thing about this is a bit of conversation that takes place between all the awkward descriptions of slurping and moaning. The author attempts to explore the reasons behind Littlepoop's attraction to Homage, and her previous attraction to Velvet Remedy. Again, the author does an admirable ??? job of sounding more or less like kkat, and demonstrates a solid understanding of both of these characters to the extent that there is anything to understand as well as kkat's own probable view of them.
There is, of course, the obligatory stroking of Littlepoop's literal and metaphorical clit, with Homage paying the obligatory compliments to how noble and heroic her actions in the wasteland are. Littlepoop vents an appropriate amount of angst over all the killing and darkness and icky stuff she's had to endure in the name of...whatever the hell her wandering murder spree across the wasteland is supposed to achieve exactly. To her credit, LP actually expresses a degree of interest in Homage's thoughts, and asks her about her own attractions. Unfortunately, the exploration of their respective attractions to each other add little depth to either of these characters; Homage's attraction to Littlepoop is just more thinly-veiled praise heaped upon kkat's shitty Mary Sue OC, and Littlepoop's attraction to Homage can pretty much be summarized as "you had a nice ass and you were into me."
The descriptions of the sex itself range from faintly nauseating to downright hilarious, though I can't say it ever crosses the threshold of eroticism. I can't imagine anyone actually getting off to any of this, though I'm sure there are people who do. One of the author's more questionable choices was to have both of them consuming food throughout their lovemaking. Not erotic eating, like feeding each other strawberries and whipped cream and that kind of shit; just regular, idle snacking in between spirited bouts of ponut-munching. I suppose I could give the author some credit for eschewing the kind of over-the-top pornographic writing that most people who do this kind of thing tend to veer into. This story makes an admirable effort at portraying ordinary intimacy, complete with all of its awkward and occasionally gross moments. Unfortunately, the stilted, corny dialogue saps most of this away, and a lengthy segment detailing LP's angsty visions of wasteland horror saps the rest of it.
Anyway, I've probably spent about as much time on this side-story as it deserves. Since this is probably a decent enough stopping point, I'm going to take a break and do Sven's thing before moving on to the next chapter.
And so, on that note, I leave you all with this one last passage from A Mare Worth Fighting For:
>"I thought I’d seen heroes before. I thought I’d seen everything before.” Tears streamed down her face, she ignored them. “But I’d never seen you before. I believe you, Littlepip. I believe in you. Things can change, and when they do, it’ll be because you reminded us all that darkness is just a passing thing and that our true nature is good."
It's not the real kkat, but an incredible simulation.
>>304286
>I can sorta see both sides of things. Afterall, one could argue with the classical arguement that nothing is new under the sun and it is all about how you do it that seprates things from other things. There is also the idea of things don't have to be new to be enjoyed. I have rewatched movies, for example.
My point was not so much that everything needs to be completely original or new; in fact I've argued in defense of using tropes and such before. However, there are some things that have become such total cliches that you will invariably be called out on them if you try to use them, so if you can't use them creatively it's better to not use them at all. Having the eyes in a painting following the protagonist as she explores a creepy haunted mansion; shit like that. Also, if you're going to use a well-traveled, hackneyed premise, you want to make sure you're offering the reader some level of depth and originality that justifies reading something they've read a million times before.
For instance the premise I outlined, where you have a hero of humble beginnings who meets a wise man who reveals to him his heroic destiny, is a well traveled story format, but there have been plenty of great things done with it. The Hobbit and Star Wars are both examples of this, and those titles seem to have done fairly well for themselves. You could certainly use one of those stories as a framework from which to spin something original, but you can't rely on the framework alone. If you just shit out some generic fantasy about a generic peasant who is suddenly approached by a generic wizard and informed that he is the generic hero who must rise up and defeat the generic villain whose generic evil threatens to overrun the peaceful land of Generic Fantasy Setting, nobody will give a shit, for the same reason that nobody is going to play your Angry Birds knockoff when they could just play Angry Birds. That is, of course, unless your knockoff can offer them something that Angry Birds can't.
Best of luck to you on your writing endeavors; as ever I am happy to offer my opinion on anything you might come up with. You might want to stick around another day or two at least, however, because I was just about to have a look at that thing you posted awhile ago that I said I'd look at.
>>304301
Thanks.
>I can sorta see both sides of things. Afterall, one could argue with the classical arguement that nothing is new under the sun and it is all about how you do it that seprates things from other things. There is also the idea of things don't have to be new to be enjoyed. I have rewatched movies, for example.
My point was not so much that everything needs to be completely original or new; in fact I've argued in defense of using tropes and such before. However, there are some things that have become such total cliches that you will invariably be called out on them if you try to use them, so if you can't use them creatively it's better to not use them at all. Having the eyes in a painting following the protagonist as she explores a creepy haunted mansion; shit like that. Also, if you're going to use a well-traveled, hackneyed premise, you want to make sure you're offering the reader some level of depth and originality that justifies reading something they've read a million times before.
For instance the premise I outlined, where you have a hero of humble beginnings who meets a wise man who reveals to him his heroic destiny, is a well traveled story format, but there have been plenty of great things done with it. The Hobbit and Star Wars are both examples of this, and those titles seem to have done fairly well for themselves. You could certainly use one of those stories as a framework from which to spin something original, but you can't rely on the framework alone. If you just shit out some generic fantasy about a generic peasant who is suddenly approached by a generic wizard and informed that he is the generic hero who must rise up and defeat the generic villain whose generic evil threatens to overrun the peaceful land of Generic Fantasy Setting, nobody will give a shit, for the same reason that nobody is going to play your Angry Birds knockoff when they could just play Angry Birds. That is, of course, unless your knockoff can offer them something that Angry Birds can't.
Best of luck to you on your writing endeavors; as ever I am happy to offer my opinion on anything you might come up with. You might want to stick around another day or two at least, however, because I was just about to have a look at that thing you posted awhile ago that I said I'd look at.
>>304301
Thanks.
>>304310
>"Of course, when I found out you were actually a gorgeous mare with a rump that just wouldn't quit, I was head-over-heels. I mean who wouldn't be?"
Kek, this was ripped from Benny's line in FO:NV. In that game if you're playing a female character with the "black widow" trait you can seduce Benny who previously shot you and buried you in a shallow grave you can seduce him instead of fighting him. In that game it's an interesting alternate path and this line goes along with his unique way of speaking (his favorite line is "Ring-a-ding-ding, baby"). In this setting it makes no sense except as a reference that exists because "IS Fallout AND IS Romantic THEREFORE...."
>"Of course, when I found out you were actually a gorgeous mare with a rump that just wouldn't quit, I was head-over-heels. I mean who wouldn't be?"
Kek, this was ripped from Benny's line in FO:NV. In that game if you're playing a female character with the "black widow" trait you can seduce Benny who previously shot you and buried you in a shallow grave you can seduce him instead of fighting him. In that game it's an interesting alternate path and this line goes along with his unique way of speaking (his favorite line is "Ring-a-ding-ding, baby"). In this setting it makes no sense except as a reference that exists because "IS Fallout AND IS Romantic THEREFORE...."
>>304323
>>"Of course, when I found out you were actually a gorgeous mare with a rump that just wouldn't quit, I was head-over-heels. I mean who wouldn't be?"
>Kek, this was ripped from Benny's line in FO:NV.
Which, in turn, ripped it from The Simpsons.
>>"Of course, when I found out you were actually a gorgeous mare with a rump that just wouldn't quit, I was head-over-heels. I mean who wouldn't be?"
>Kek, this was ripped from Benny's line in FO:NV.
Which, in turn, ripped it from The Simpsons.
1616374013.png (221.9 KB, 650x1089, TEAM LITTLEPIP WHENEVER VELVET USES HER TRANQ DART GUN.png)
>>304263
>fundamental fiction loop
fundamental fiction loop? Never heard of it, what's that?
>>304275
>ageless entity that wanders the wasteland seeking out heroes and aiding them in their quests
mother of god I was kidding with the DMPC memes but I forgot how accurate they were This guy isn't an interesting individual with his own goals and agenda
he is a plot device that has spent over 200 years hacking into Pinkie Pie's Polka-Playing SpriteBots(TM)
(haha good thing they all still run ok after 200 years and nobody scrapped them for parts or shot them down eh?)
and what does he do with these bots?
nudges Player Characters in the right direction but only if the Dungeon Master thinks they're important enough
for 200 years
this fucker
has basically been like Victor from FNV
except Victor was an AI that jumped between securitrons
and can save the player early on but doesn't just spontaneously appear whenever the author's stumped and needs an omniscient presence to manifest and get Littlepip out of the corner Kkunt painted her into
>There are more than enough fantasy stories out there about some humble onion farmer who is suddenly informed by a wizard that he is the fulfillment of an ancient prophecy; the world really doesn't need any more of them
The world needs authors willing to play with these tropes and innovate.
Like a story I once read where "the great chosen-one-choosing wizard" was an old bastard who happily sent ordinary children to their deaths to stall an enemy who was actually a good guy trying to conquer the shitty medieval kingdom specifically because it loves using slavery and child soldiers. I wish I remembered its name.
But this old cliche...
It's shite here because like you said, LP didn't do anything particularly impressive or "better pony"ish so far.
It's not like there was a third captive of the slavers, some heavily wounded crippled guy/gal/tiny littlest orphan girl and MJ wanted to abandon or kill him but LP insisted on trying her hardest to save him, even though raiders or slavers eventually kill him which gives her a permanent hateboner for raiders/slavers.
That would be better writing, right?
At the very least it would give Watcher (and DJ Cuntmachine if she's watching) a good show and a reason to say "Holy shit, she's fundamentally good even when the going gets tough and even if she fails sometimes".
>The heroic knight arrives at the dragon's cave
spongebob_tryingnottolaugh.gif
>She tells him that she will only hand it to him in person and he immediately says "ok"
This reminds me of the scene in Fallout New Vegas where, when you have the INCREDIBLY IMPORTANT platinum chip, you can choose not to give it to its rightful owner Mr House when talking to him https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1es3LNq3zL8
You can talk him into offering to pay you FIVE TIMES the delivery bonus stipulated in your contract and not a penny more (before you get the chip, when the chip's location isn't right in front of him)
but if you ask for more money when you have the chip he gets FUCKING PISSED
because when the chip's in your possession, trying to """re-negotiate""" payment would basically be blackmail
and he could always have his securitrons open fire on you, getting that chip for himself
He built a vast economic empire because the one he was supposed to inherit was stolen from him
he saved Vegas from the nukes(mostly)
and the robots he designed as a teenager can get shit done.
House isn't a fool. He wants that chip, but he won't embarass himself for it
obody blackmails Robert Edwin House in his own fucking penthouse with his own fucking property.
but of course
Shittlepip, the giga-Sue that she is, is effortlessly able to negotiate with the man behind the curtain and get him to reveal himself
House wasn't willing to reveal himself and ruin the mystery around him, not even for the McGuffin his plans relied on
But this little memory orb with some unimportant faggot's utterly unimportant memories on it? It's just the first time he saw Enclave armour and the billionth time he stared at Rarity's plump fuckable marshmallow ass
No character gets to have principles or pride when Littlesue wants something from them, after all
The man behind the curtain will happily stride right in front of Dorothy and suck his own dick if it means getting an ultra-rare shiny black charizard- i mean ultra-rare black memory orb
>she is off to "the middle of nowhere,"
THIS AUTHOR SUCKS DICK FOR DOING THIS
Smart authors NEVER fuck up the map
Even if the location is basically in the middle of nowhere, you can keep the reader's mental map of the place functional and make this world feel real by saying something like "5000 meters south from Trottingham" or if you're pushing it, "About three days worth of travel to trashtown's north-east".
how is anyone supposed to mentally keep track of where LP is on the World Map if the author forgets not everyone can see inside his head?
>Fluttershy killed us all
This might be the stupidest thing
besides Littlepip
Then again, FIM only dies so Littlepip can have Fallout enemies to kill without just getting teleported into Fallout America by a spell that goes wrong
The author's best explanation for how equestria might become like the worst Fallout game with occasional references to 1/2/NV was "Ponies believed in M.A.D. but their enemies didn't"
no wait, it's dumber than that.
"Fluttershy, after inventing a magic nuke that x1000s any spell inside it, made heal missiles and gave them to both sides, not expecting the enemies to turn them into nukes+aloha snackbar not just major pony cities but all of equestria". if ziggers werent allowed in equestria they would have been unable to nuke it
All because Ziggers thought the night sky and its stars were spooky just like Luna
Flutters thought peace was an option with the ziggers
Better wiped than striped
>turns out the watcher is spike
I thought you'd have a bigger reaction to this
this fucker could be king of thewasteland
>shitty lesban porn
homage's pillow talk was funny
>Homage: ur gonna die lol
>fundamental fiction loop
fundamental fiction loop? Never heard of it, what's that?
>>304275
>ageless entity that wanders the wasteland seeking out heroes and aiding them in their quests
mother of god I was kidding with the DMPC memes but I forgot how accurate they were This guy isn't an interesting individual with his own goals and agenda
he is a plot device that has spent over 200 years hacking into Pinkie Pie's Polka-Playing SpriteBots(TM)
(haha good thing they all still run ok after 200 years and nobody scrapped them for parts or shot them down eh?)
and what does he do with these bots?
nudges Player Characters in the right direction but only if the Dungeon Master thinks they're important enough
for 200 years
this fucker
has basically been like Victor from FNV
except Victor was an AI that jumped between securitrons
and can save the player early on but doesn't just spontaneously appear whenever the author's stumped and needs an omniscient presence to manifest and get Littlepip out of the corner Kkunt painted her into
>There are more than enough fantasy stories out there about some humble onion farmer who is suddenly informed by a wizard that he is the fulfillment of an ancient prophecy; the world really doesn't need any more of them
The world needs authors willing to play with these tropes and innovate.
Like a story I once read where "the great chosen-one-choosing wizard" was an old bastard who happily sent ordinary children to their deaths to stall an enemy who was actually a good guy trying to conquer the shitty medieval kingdom specifically because it loves using slavery and child soldiers. I wish I remembered its name.
But this old cliche...
It's shite here because like you said, LP didn't do anything particularly impressive or "better pony"ish so far.
It's not like there was a third captive of the slavers, some heavily wounded crippled guy/gal/tiny littlest orphan girl and MJ wanted to abandon or kill him but LP insisted on trying her hardest to save him, even though raiders or slavers eventually kill him which gives her a permanent hateboner for raiders/slavers.
That would be better writing, right?
At the very least it would give Watcher (and DJ Cuntmachine if she's watching) a good show and a reason to say "Holy shit, she's fundamentally good even when the going gets tough and even if she fails sometimes".
>The heroic knight arrives at the dragon's cave
spongebob_tryingnottolaugh.gif
>She tells him that she will only hand it to him in person and he immediately says "ok"
This reminds me of the scene in Fallout New Vegas where, when you have the INCREDIBLY IMPORTANT platinum chip, you can choose not to give it to its rightful owner Mr House when talking to him https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1es3LNq3zL8
You can talk him into offering to pay you FIVE TIMES the delivery bonus stipulated in your contract and not a penny more (before you get the chip, when the chip's location isn't right in front of him)
but if you ask for more money when you have the chip he gets FUCKING PISSED
because when the chip's in your possession, trying to """re-negotiate""" payment would basically be blackmail
and he could always have his securitrons open fire on you, getting that chip for himself
He built a vast economic empire because the one he was supposed to inherit was stolen from him
he saved Vegas from the nukes(mostly)
and the robots he designed as a teenager can get shit done.
House isn't a fool. He wants that chip, but he won't embarass himself for it
obody blackmails Robert Edwin House in his own fucking penthouse with his own fucking property.
but of course
Shittlepip, the giga-Sue that she is, is effortlessly able to negotiate with the man behind the curtain and get him to reveal himself
House wasn't willing to reveal himself and ruin the mystery around him, not even for the McGuffin his plans relied on
But this little memory orb with some unimportant faggot's utterly unimportant memories on it? It's just the first time he saw Enclave armour and the billionth time he stared at Rarity's plump fuckable marshmallow ass
No character gets to have principles or pride when Littlesue wants something from them, after all
The man behind the curtain will happily stride right in front of Dorothy and suck his own dick if it means getting an ultra-rare shiny black charizard- i mean ultra-rare black memory orb
>she is off to "the middle of nowhere,"
THIS AUTHOR SUCKS DICK FOR DOING THIS
Smart authors NEVER fuck up the map
Even if the location is basically in the middle of nowhere, you can keep the reader's mental map of the place functional and make this world feel real by saying something like "5000 meters south from Trottingham" or if you're pushing it, "About three days worth of travel to trashtown's north-east".
how is anyone supposed to mentally keep track of where LP is on the World Map if the author forgets not everyone can see inside his head?
>Fluttershy killed us all
This might be the stupidest thing
besides Littlepip
Then again, FIM only dies so Littlepip can have Fallout enemies to kill without just getting teleported into Fallout America by a spell that goes wrong
The author's best explanation for how equestria might become like the worst Fallout game with occasional references to 1/2/NV was "Ponies believed in M.A.D. but their enemies didn't"
no wait, it's dumber than that.
"Fluttershy, after inventing a magic nuke that x1000s any spell inside it, made heal missiles and gave them to both sides, not expecting the enemies to turn them into nukes+aloha snackbar not just major pony cities but all of equestria". if ziggers werent allowed in equestria they would have been unable to nuke it
All because Ziggers thought the night sky and its stars were spooky just like Luna
Flutters thought peace was an option with the ziggers
Better wiped than striped
>turns out the watcher is spike
I thought you'd have a bigger reaction to this
this fucker could be king of thewasteland
>shitty lesban porn
homage's pillow talk was funny
>Homage: ur gonna die lol
>>304333
Is it bad writing that this story's ponies like giving edgy Fallout 3ish names like Gutterville or ponified Fallout names like Tenpenny/Tenpony Tower to places unless they were already given nice-sounding pony names before the nukes went off like Appleoosa and Pleasant Valley?
Surely in a post apocalyptic scenario the ponies would try to give sweet-sounding names to their new hometowns to try and make them sound sweeter and kinder and nicer than the hellish wastelands around them.
Also is it bad writing that the "Crusaders Maneframe AI killed everypony" vault's AI didn't try to kill or permanently capture Team Littlepip, forcing LP or Velvet to convince the AI to become a safe Home Base for them or a safe settlement for ponies who need it?
It seems like a missed opportunity for them to not turn that location into something useful for them or the Wasteland. Who knows what might happen to the next ponies to wander into that place if the AI isn't under LP's control?
And surely if they have all those medical supplies they must also have the tools needed to manufacture them and hydroponics labs with rad-free soil to grow whatever plants are necessary to produce healing potions.
The player of F3 is encouraged to view the world like a playground full of vidyagaem dungeons but this robs Littlepip of the chance to distinguish herself from all the other "wasteland badasses" by trying to build a better world in the ashes of the old world.
Is it bad writing that this story's ponies like giving edgy Fallout 3ish names like Gutterville or ponified Fallout names like Tenpenny/Tenpony Tower to places unless they were already given nice-sounding pony names before the nukes went off like Appleoosa and Pleasant Valley?
Surely in a post apocalyptic scenario the ponies would try to give sweet-sounding names to their new hometowns to try and make them sound sweeter and kinder and nicer than the hellish wastelands around them.
Also is it bad writing that the "Crusaders Maneframe AI killed everypony" vault's AI didn't try to kill or permanently capture Team Littlepip, forcing LP or Velvet to convince the AI to become a safe Home Base for them or a safe settlement for ponies who need it?
It seems like a missed opportunity for them to not turn that location into something useful for them or the Wasteland. Who knows what might happen to the next ponies to wander into that place if the AI isn't under LP's control?
And surely if they have all those medical supplies they must also have the tools needed to manufacture them and hydroponics labs with rad-free soil to grow whatever plants are necessary to produce healing potions.
The player of F3 is encouraged to view the world like a playground full of vidyagaem dungeons but this robs Littlepip of the chance to distinguish herself from all the other "wasteland badasses" by trying to build a better world in the ashes of the old world.
>>298205
I read and reviewd this. Sorry it took so long to get to it, for whatever reason I remember looking at it and seeing it being like 20 or 30 pages, and figured it would take more time to review. Anyway, in the interest of keeping the thread on topic, I went ahead and posted in the thread you made:
>>304349 →
I read and reviewd this. Sorry it took so long to get to it, for whatever reason I remember looking at it and seeing it being like 20 or 30 pages, and figured it would take more time to review. Anyway, in the interest of keeping the thread on topic, I went ahead and posted in the thread you made:
>>304349 →
>>304361
Yeah that kind of gets me thinking. Glime, if you read this, keep in mind these stables are based on vaults, which in fallout were massive, communal bomb shelters as i'm sure you already know. The reason i'm reiterating this is in reference to that water chip massacre vault earlier. See, in the games vaults were more abstracted. You wouldn't want the player slogging through 10 hours of exploring a vault that was built to provide for hundreds or thousands of people. Typically they were whittled down to a few floors holding under 100 people. If this setting were to aim for a realistic take, which it TRIES to do sometimes, then this vault in good repair would be an insane resource: room to hold hundreds or thousands of people, presumably places and the means to grow food and fix things, medical equipment, and protection, and so forth.
So thinking back on it now, it seems odd that this vault wasn't touched upon more.
Yeah that kind of gets me thinking. Glime, if you read this, keep in mind these stables are based on vaults, which in fallout were massive, communal bomb shelters as i'm sure you already know. The reason i'm reiterating this is in reference to that water chip massacre vault earlier. See, in the games vaults were more abstracted. You wouldn't want the player slogging through 10 hours of exploring a vault that was built to provide for hundreds or thousands of people. Typically they were whittled down to a few floors holding under 100 people. If this setting were to aim for a realistic take, which it TRIES to do sometimes, then this vault in good repair would be an insane resource: room to hold hundreds or thousands of people, presumably places and the means to grow food and fix things, medical equipment, and protection, and so forth.
So thinking back on it now, it seems odd that this vault wasn't touched upon more.
>>304388
This is an issue that Fallout 3 and FoE share. The control vaults, and by extension the stables, were designed not just as oversized bomb shelters but as self-contained communities capable of surviving decades or even centuries without outside resources. We know this is possible in both settings because Vault 101 and Stable 2 are both fully functional, as far as we can tell, many generations after they were first occupied.
Logically speaking, a vault/stable would have to contain renewable, or at least extremely efficient sources of energy, food and drinkable water. In addition, their nature as fortified underground structures would render them extremely defensible in case of an attack from outside. As such, and considering the state of the outside world, even a semi-functional stable would be a priceless resource to anyone looking to house and feed a community. In fact, Fallout 2 explicitly presented a vault this way with Vault City. The original Fallout touched on it with Necropolis - a vault populated entirely by ghouls who rely on the water chip there. From Fallout 3 onwards though (and in FoE), vaults are just spooky dungeons full of monsters and the occasional lost treasure. People would rather live in tin shacks and drink irradiated puddle water than try and liberate one of these purpose-built shelters for themselves.
This will come up again later in FoE, when a certain stable has issues that need resolving.
>>304310
>There is some trepidation as to the identity of the creature who dwells within. tl;dr it's Spike, who was actually Frank/Watcher the whole time.
Finally! Littlepip actually managed to stumble across the story's main plot! Sort of. FoE seems to run with the classical western conception of dragons being massive and extremely long-lived, which is at least a small step up from the latter seasons of FiM turning them into goofy little lizard people.
I'm going to disagree with>>304333 here and say that I actually quite like Spike's role in the story, at least in concept. As we'll soon see, he has a pretty good reason to hang out in his cave interacting with the world through robots rather than doing... pretty much anything else. His role as the enigmatic 'look for good people and help them not die' mentor figure makes a degree of sense under the circumstances. Yes, his simping for Littlepip is dumb but - sadly - it's been well established by now that sucking off Pip's ego is a universal constant of this setting.
As for how he's used as the story progresses... we'll get to that.
>>304310
>A Mare Worth Fighting For
Only in FoE could the main character segue directly from lesbian sex to imagining a zombie's tongue getting cut out to screaming nonsense about "GOOD PEOPLE NOT BAD" and expect to be taken seriously.
This is an issue that Fallout 3 and FoE share. The control vaults, and by extension the stables, were designed not just as oversized bomb shelters but as self-contained communities capable of surviving decades or even centuries without outside resources. We know this is possible in both settings because Vault 101 and Stable 2 are both fully functional, as far as we can tell, many generations after they were first occupied.
Logically speaking, a vault/stable would have to contain renewable, or at least extremely efficient sources of energy, food and drinkable water. In addition, their nature as fortified underground structures would render them extremely defensible in case of an attack from outside. As such, and considering the state of the outside world, even a semi-functional stable would be a priceless resource to anyone looking to house and feed a community. In fact, Fallout 2 explicitly presented a vault this way with Vault City. The original Fallout touched on it with Necropolis - a vault populated entirely by ghouls who rely on the water chip there. From Fallout 3 onwards though (and in FoE), vaults are just spooky dungeons full of monsters and the occasional lost treasure. People would rather live in tin shacks and drink irradiated puddle water than try and liberate one of these purpose-built shelters for themselves.
This will come up again later in FoE, when a certain stable has issues that need resolving.
>>304310
>There is some trepidation as to the identity of the creature who dwells within. tl;dr it's Spike, who was actually Frank/Watcher the whole time.
Finally! Littlepip actually managed to stumble across the story's main plot! Sort of. FoE seems to run with the classical western conception of dragons being massive and extremely long-lived, which is at least a small step up from the latter seasons of FiM turning them into goofy little lizard people.
I'm going to disagree with>>304333 here and say that I actually quite like Spike's role in the story, at least in concept. As we'll soon see, he has a pretty good reason to hang out in his cave interacting with the world through robots rather than doing... pretty much anything else. His role as the enigmatic 'look for good people and help them not die' mentor figure makes a degree of sense under the circumstances. Yes, his simping for Littlepip is dumb but - sadly - it's been well established by now that sucking off Pip's ego is a universal constant of this setting.
As for how he's used as the story progresses... we'll get to that.
>>304310
>A Mare Worth Fighting For
Only in FoE could the main character segue directly from lesbian sex to imagining a zombie's tongue getting cut out to screaming nonsense about "GOOD PEOPLE NOT BAD" and expect to be taken seriously.
>>304306
>Once again, the phrase "it was under 'E'" has no significant meaning to LP or anyone else in this story; it's just a random line of dialogue from the show that the author referenced to score brony points.
I believe that the Perception statuette of Pinkie Pie has the quote "Awareness! It was under "E"!" on it, so LP does have a reason to be thinking this - attributing her noticing of the audio recorder to having picked up the statuette.
>Once again, the phrase "it was under 'E'" has no significant meaning to LP or anyone else in this story; it's just a random line of dialogue from the show that the author referenced to score brony points.
I believe that the Perception statuette of Pinkie Pie has the quote "Awareness! It was under "E"!" on it, so LP does have a reason to be thinking this - attributing her noticing of the audio recorder to having picked up the statuette.
>>304417
LP has an excuse to think of The Designated Awareness Quote when demonstrating awareness
But the author had no reason to choose that show dialogue line as The Designated Awareness Quote.
Pinkie Pie once said the line
But would anyone looking at the statuette get that reference?
Is this something she would realistically think of when trying to decide what she wants her statuette to say?
It's just something Pinkie said involving awareness late at night during the day she met Twilight and the others.
Can you see Pinkie thinking back on this line above any others she's ever said in S1 or from the fanfic timeline's start to the end of Equestria?
See, this is what happens when you arbitrarily decide Pinkie Pie needs to be Awareness just because you already made Fluttershy the Charisma bobblehead.
You need to arbitrarily reference a line from the show for it because you decided you need a line there. More fucking bronybait.
Fluttershy is shy. Naturally cute (probably, considering her modelling career) but not charismatic like Rarity can be when she wants something.
It would make more sense to make Rarity perception since she has to get the tiny details right when making her dresses.
The Mane Six do not neatly match up to the SEVEN Fallout character attributes.
LP has an excuse to think of The Designated Awareness Quote when demonstrating awareness
But the author had no reason to choose that show dialogue line as The Designated Awareness Quote.
Pinkie Pie once said the line
But would anyone looking at the statuette get that reference?
Is this something she would realistically think of when trying to decide what she wants her statuette to say?
It's just something Pinkie said involving awareness late at night during the day she met Twilight and the others.
Can you see Pinkie thinking back on this line above any others she's ever said in S1 or from the fanfic timeline's start to the end of Equestria?
See, this is what happens when you arbitrarily decide Pinkie Pie needs to be Awareness just because you already made Fluttershy the Charisma bobblehead.
You need to arbitrarily reference a line from the show for it because you decided you need a line there. More fucking bronybait.
Fluttershy is shy. Naturally cute (probably, considering her modelling career) but not charismatic like Rarity can be when she wants something.
It would make more sense to make Rarity perception since she has to get the tiny details right when making her dresses.
The Mane Six do not neatly match up to the SEVEN Fallout character attributes.
>>304310
Chapter Twenty One: The Heart of Twilight Sparkle
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>“Have you ever watched the moon rise over the Wasteland? I wish I could have given you something as wonderful as that.”
Ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight? Seriously, though, I'm beginning to run out of things to say about these epitaphs. Thus far my original complaint against them seems to stand: they are disjointed statements, attributed to no one, that usually have little or nothing to do with the chapter they precede.
In the case of the previous chapter, the same is true of both the epitaph and the chapter title itself. "Behind the Curtain" refers to Littlepoop's impression of Monterrey Jack:
>I felt I was finally seeing behind the curtain. Monterey Jack’s execution made me, the heroine his children worshiped, into the pony stealing their home from them just after their father died. The ultimate buck when they’re down.
I still don't completely understand where the author is trying to go with this. Monterrey Jack fucked over his own kids, because...he was mad that they worshipped Littlepoop? She's mad at him about this because...he left her holding the bag? I guess? Whatever's supposed to be "behind the curtain," I guess I'm just not not seeing it.
Anyway, moving on. As we learned in our last adventure, Frank/Watcher is actually Spike. He is described thusly:
>Really big, gigantic, enormous purple dragon with green spines and with claws and spikes and very, very sharp teeth and a huge mouth that had just promised not to eat us.
Dragon big! Hope not eat pony. Seriously, what's with the caveman speak? Is Littlepoop supposed to be a yak now?
Anyway, the entire first microscene of the chapter consists of completely pointless remarks about how big and scary Spike is, and there is nothing here worth going over.
Page break. Spike welcomes Littlepoop, Velvet and Calamity into his home, but insists that SteelHooves remain outside. He also refers to him as a "that" instead of a "he," an experience that kkat himself has likely been through on more than one occasion. Littlepoop does not seem at all interested in why exactly Spike does not like SteelHooves, she merely seems upset at his display of general prejudice. However, SteelHooves agrees to wait in the bus with the balefire phoenix, and the matter appears settled.
>Velvet Remedy was more gracious and diplomatic, giving Spike a courteous bow. "Thank you, mighty Spike, for allowing us into your house!" she barely paused before choosing to use the word he had.
>Do dragons blush? Spike seemed to.
Poor Spike. Even after 200 years he's still a simp.
>A pony in my head stomped insistently, wanting to know why I had just been required to leave a friend outside.
This seems like it would have been a relevant and appropriate question to ask.
Page break.
>A dragon? Watcher was... a dragon?
We've already covered this. Let's get on with it.
Anyway, the inside of Spike's cave is filled with books, which he explains used to belong to Twilight Sparkle. At this point, Littlepoop belatedly asks what Spike's problem with SteelHooves was, and Spike replies that he does not like Steel Rangers.
>Okay, Spike didn't have a problem with ghouls. He had a problem with Steel Rangers.
This much was fairly obvious. SteelHooves being a ghoul is not something you could tell just from looking at him, and there is no reason to assume that Spike would even know this about him; therefore, it would make far more sense to just assume that he doesn't like Steel Rangers. The pertinent question here is why doesn't he like Steel Rangers? Once again, Littlepoop declines to ask.
Anyway, Velvet wanders around Spike's lair complimenting him on his sense of decor, which he laps up like a simp. Littlepoop, meanwhile, is inexplicably angry but keeps it to herself. At this point, Spike demands the black opal which Littlepoop had agreed to give him, and Littlepoop hands it over. She asks him why he wanted it, and the answer is mundane but fairly obvious: he wants a recorded memory of the last time the mane 6 were together. What I assume he's not telling is that he wants this specific orb because it contains some choice shots of Rarity's can. Welcome to Simptown, population 1.
Page break. The next microscene deals with the mane 6, and how their world-uniting friendship began to unravel, ultimately culminating in the end of the world. There isn't really any new information presented, it's mostly just Spike's perspective on some things we already more or less know. The mane 6 used to be great friends, but the war and their responsibilities within their respective ministries began to pull them apart. Spike maintains that what ultimately happened was not entirely, or even mostly, their fault.
The main interesting tidbit here is this:
>“Of the six of them, only two even tried to run their Ministries. Those were Twilight Sparkle and Rarity. The others pretty much just threw suggestions at their Ministries and hoped for the best.”
I'd already formed an impression that AJ's Ministry of Whatever Technology operated this way, and Dash's ministry seemed to barely even exist as an organization, but I didn't realize this about the others. In particular, this contrasts with what we've heard so far about Pinkie Pie turning into some kind of coked-out lunatic who made it her personal mission to spy on the entire population.
>“Democracies tend t’ make a mess outta everything,” Calamity said with clear bitterness.
Surprisingly redpilled statement out of absolutely nowhere.
Anyway, nothing else really happens here.
Page break. At this point, Littlepoop suddenly explodes and starts yelling at Spike. Her view is basically that since Spike is a dragon, he's all big and stuff, and he could have been out there helping ponies and blah blah blah, instead of just sitting up here with his computers watching everyone through his botnet. Running out of space, will continue.
Chapter Twenty One: The Heart of Twilight Sparkle
Today's Fortune Cookie:
>“Have you ever watched the moon rise over the Wasteland? I wish I could have given you something as wonderful as that.”
Ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight? Seriously, though, I'm beginning to run out of things to say about these epitaphs. Thus far my original complaint against them seems to stand: they are disjointed statements, attributed to no one, that usually have little or nothing to do with the chapter they precede.
In the case of the previous chapter, the same is true of both the epitaph and the chapter title itself. "Behind the Curtain" refers to Littlepoop's impression of Monterrey Jack:
>I felt I was finally seeing behind the curtain. Monterey Jack’s execution made me, the heroine his children worshiped, into the pony stealing their home from them just after their father died. The ultimate buck when they’re down.
I still don't completely understand where the author is trying to go with this. Monterrey Jack fucked over his own kids, because...he was mad that they worshipped Littlepoop? She's mad at him about this because...he left her holding the bag? I guess? Whatever's supposed to be "behind the curtain," I guess I'm just not not seeing it.
Anyway, moving on. As we learned in our last adventure, Frank/Watcher is actually Spike. He is described thusly:
>Really big, gigantic, enormous purple dragon with green spines and with claws and spikes and very, very sharp teeth and a huge mouth that had just promised not to eat us.
Dragon big! Hope not eat pony. Seriously, what's with the caveman speak? Is Littlepoop supposed to be a yak now?
Anyway, the entire first microscene of the chapter consists of completely pointless remarks about how big and scary Spike is, and there is nothing here worth going over.
Page break. Spike welcomes Littlepoop, Velvet and Calamity into his home, but insists that SteelHooves remain outside. He also refers to him as a "that" instead of a "he," an experience that kkat himself has likely been through on more than one occasion. Littlepoop does not seem at all interested in why exactly Spike does not like SteelHooves, she merely seems upset at his display of general prejudice. However, SteelHooves agrees to wait in the bus with the balefire phoenix, and the matter appears settled.
>Velvet Remedy was more gracious and diplomatic, giving Spike a courteous bow. "Thank you, mighty Spike, for allowing us into your house!" she barely paused before choosing to use the word he had.
>Do dragons blush? Spike seemed to.
Poor Spike. Even after 200 years he's still a simp.
>A pony in my head stomped insistently, wanting to know why I had just been required to leave a friend outside.
This seems like it would have been a relevant and appropriate question to ask.
Page break.
>A dragon? Watcher was... a dragon?
We've already covered this. Let's get on with it.
Anyway, the inside of Spike's cave is filled with books, which he explains used to belong to Twilight Sparkle. At this point, Littlepoop belatedly asks what Spike's problem with SteelHooves was, and Spike replies that he does not like Steel Rangers.
>Okay, Spike didn't have a problem with ghouls. He had a problem with Steel Rangers.
This much was fairly obvious. SteelHooves being a ghoul is not something you could tell just from looking at him, and there is no reason to assume that Spike would even know this about him; therefore, it would make far more sense to just assume that he doesn't like Steel Rangers. The pertinent question here is why doesn't he like Steel Rangers? Once again, Littlepoop declines to ask.
Anyway, Velvet wanders around Spike's lair complimenting him on his sense of decor, which he laps up like a simp. Littlepoop, meanwhile, is inexplicably angry but keeps it to herself. At this point, Spike demands the black opal which Littlepoop had agreed to give him, and Littlepoop hands it over. She asks him why he wanted it, and the answer is mundane but fairly obvious: he wants a recorded memory of the last time the mane 6 were together. What I assume he's not telling is that he wants this specific orb because it contains some choice shots of Rarity's can. Welcome to Simptown, population 1.
Page break. The next microscene deals with the mane 6, and how their world-uniting friendship began to unravel, ultimately culminating in the end of the world. There isn't really any new information presented, it's mostly just Spike's perspective on some things we already more or less know. The mane 6 used to be great friends, but the war and their responsibilities within their respective ministries began to pull them apart. Spike maintains that what ultimately happened was not entirely, or even mostly, their fault.
The main interesting tidbit here is this:
>“Of the six of them, only two even tried to run their Ministries. Those were Twilight Sparkle and Rarity. The others pretty much just threw suggestions at their Ministries and hoped for the best.”
I'd already formed an impression that AJ's Ministry of Whatever Technology operated this way, and Dash's ministry seemed to barely even exist as an organization, but I didn't realize this about the others. In particular, this contrasts with what we've heard so far about Pinkie Pie turning into some kind of coked-out lunatic who made it her personal mission to spy on the entire population.
>“Democracies tend t’ make a mess outta everything,” Calamity said with clear bitterness.
Surprisingly redpilled statement out of absolutely nowhere.
Anyway, nothing else really happens here.
Page break. At this point, Littlepoop suddenly explodes and starts yelling at Spike. Her view is basically that since Spike is a dragon, he's all big and stuff, and he could have been out there helping ponies and blah blah blah, instead of just sitting up here with his computers watching everyone through his botnet. Running out of space, will continue.
>>304458
Spike protests that he has a very good reason for staying in his cave, but he will only share it with Littlepoop because reasons. Velvet asks what those reasons might be, and Spike explains that since alicorns can steal memories and put them in orbs, he doesn't want to tell anyone why he stays in his cave all the time, because the ponies he tells might get captured by alicorns and have their memories extracted. Wew.
I see two major holes here: the first is that he has already revealed his identity and the location of his home to all four of them, and it seems like this information would be more potentially damaging in the wrong hands hooves, whatever than something as presumably trivial as his reasons for being merely "Watcher" instead of "Participant." Second, if Velvet and Calamity could have their memories extracted, why not Littlepoop? This whole thing seems pretty screwy to me.
Anyway, as a side note, we receive confirmation that the alicorns do operate as some kind of hivemind, and that if one alicorn learns something then they all learn it. We also learn that the alicorns are commanded by a mysterious Goddess. At this point, I would like to make another prediction: the alicorn Goddess is going to turn out to be either Celestia or Luna, who has been somehow corrupted and turned to the dark side.
Spike now asks Littlepoop to follow him, and for Velvet and Calamity to stay behind, so that Spike can reveal his big secret.
Page break. Spike takes Littlepoop inside his cave and shows her a gigantic array of supercomputers (or "maneframes" as they are regrettably called). He informs her that this one is a Crusader Maneframe, an apparently significant term that has no significance to the reader, and upon which Spike does not elaborate. Littlepoop, however, seems to magically know exactly what it is:
>The ultimate arcano-technological maneframe. So powerful it could think for itself. Learn. It could even hold the imprint of a pony’s mind. Only three had ever been built, I remembered. One was installed in Stable Twenty-Nine. One went to the Ministry of Awesome. And one... this one… came here.
How does she know any of this?
Anyway, the long and short of it is that this big-ass computer array was some kind of final project of Twilight Sparkle's. Six talismanic objects, which are revealed to be the Elements of Harmony, are hooked up to it. Spike explains that the computer's purpose was to cast a single powerful spell, called the Gardens of Equestria:
>“A single spell, powered by the Elements of Harmony, calculated and cast by a magically augmented Crusader Maneframe. A single spell that would affect the entirety of Equestria, cleansing it of radiation and taint, restoring it to the beautiful paradise it once was before the other megaspells twisted and poisoned it.”
Literally deus ex machina. I mean, literally deus ex machina; not only does this plot device fit the concept to a tee, but the literal translation of the phrase is "god from the machine," which is quite literally what this thing is. Kkat has officially reached super-Saiyan levels of hackiness.
This actually seems like a good time to reference an earlier prediction I made:
>>300711
>Littlepoop turns out to be either the descendent or some distant relative of Twilight Sparkle. Watcher/Frank's allusions to finding her "element" or "destiny" or however he worded it are meant to be subtle foreshadowing for her eventual discovery of this fact. As the rightful heir to the Element of Magic, it will fall upon her to unite her friends (so far each friend LP has made has turned out to be an analog of an M6 character, so assuming the pattern holds she should still have two more friends to find) and right the wrongs of the past. The "real" Twilight Sparkle will, of course, be proven to have fallen into some kind of corruption along with the others; despite having the very bestest of intentions, she made horrible mistakes that resulted in the destruction of the world. As the Author's Chosen, it will be up to Littlesue to arrogantly and effortlessly do what the most powerful canon protagonist in the series could not, and bring about some grandiose deus ex machina event that will fix everything. This will take the form of either a mass-purification of all the radiation or taint or whatever, or else it will involve somehow altering the flow of history and preventing the war from ever happening.
Is this machine the fulfillment of this prophecy? The particulars aren't all there, but the story certainly seems to be moving in this direction.
Anyway, the rest of the scene is predictable. Littlepoop asks why the spell hasn't been cast yet, and Spike explains that the ponies who can use the Elements of Harmony are all dead. We can fill in the rest of it easily enough: Spike has assumed the role of Watcher (Frank) in order to scour the wasteland for the most heroic of heroes, in the hope of their eventually forming a group of exactly six friends, whose friendship is friendshippy enough to justify their wielding the six Elements of Harmony, and thus completing the spell.
Page break. The scene resumes exactly where it left off. Littlepoop is still examining the crusader computer, specifically the Elements plugged into it. She stops at Pinkie's and remembers something:
>I went to the get-together at Spike’s place and brought It just like you asked. All of my friends were there but you…
I remember this from somewhere, but I don't recall the specifics. I think this was Twilight chiding Pinkie Pie during that party scene; I guess Ponk got all coked up and forgot to attend Twilight's let's-save-the-world party or something.
Anyway, the rest of it falls into place more or less logically: Spike can't leave this cave, because he has to guard this machine, so he dedicates his time to using the sprite-bots to seek out ponies who might be worthy of wielding the Elements.
Spike protests that he has a very good reason for staying in his cave, but he will only share it with Littlepoop because reasons. Velvet asks what those reasons might be, and Spike explains that since alicorns can steal memories and put them in orbs, he doesn't want to tell anyone why he stays in his cave all the time, because the ponies he tells might get captured by alicorns and have their memories extracted. Wew.
I see two major holes here: the first is that he has already revealed his identity and the location of his home to all four of them, and it seems like this information would be more potentially damaging in the wrong hands hooves, whatever than something as presumably trivial as his reasons for being merely "Watcher" instead of "Participant." Second, if Velvet and Calamity could have their memories extracted, why not Littlepoop? This whole thing seems pretty screwy to me.
Anyway, as a side note, we receive confirmation that the alicorns do operate as some kind of hivemind, and that if one alicorn learns something then they all learn it. We also learn that the alicorns are commanded by a mysterious Goddess. At this point, I would like to make another prediction: the alicorn Goddess is going to turn out to be either Celestia or Luna, who has been somehow corrupted and turned to the dark side.
Spike now asks Littlepoop to follow him, and for Velvet and Calamity to stay behind, so that Spike can reveal his big secret.
Page break. Spike takes Littlepoop inside his cave and shows her a gigantic array of supercomputers (or "maneframes" as they are regrettably called). He informs her that this one is a Crusader Maneframe, an apparently significant term that has no significance to the reader, and upon which Spike does not elaborate. Littlepoop, however, seems to magically know exactly what it is:
>The ultimate arcano-technological maneframe. So powerful it could think for itself. Learn. It could even hold the imprint of a pony’s mind. Only three had ever been built, I remembered. One was installed in Stable Twenty-Nine. One went to the Ministry of Awesome. And one... this one… came here.
How does she know any of this?
Anyway, the long and short of it is that this big-ass computer array was some kind of final project of Twilight Sparkle's. Six talismanic objects, which are revealed to be the Elements of Harmony, are hooked up to it. Spike explains that the computer's purpose was to cast a single powerful spell, called the Gardens of Equestria:
>“A single spell, powered by the Elements of Harmony, calculated and cast by a magically augmented Crusader Maneframe. A single spell that would affect the entirety of Equestria, cleansing it of radiation and taint, restoring it to the beautiful paradise it once was before the other megaspells twisted and poisoned it.”
Literally deus ex machina. I mean, literally deus ex machina; not only does this plot device fit the concept to a tee, but the literal translation of the phrase is "god from the machine," which is quite literally what this thing is. Kkat has officially reached super-Saiyan levels of hackiness.
This actually seems like a good time to reference an earlier prediction I made:
>>300711
>Littlepoop turns out to be either the descendent or some distant relative of Twilight Sparkle. Watcher/Frank's allusions to finding her "element" or "destiny" or however he worded it are meant to be subtle foreshadowing for her eventual discovery of this fact. As the rightful heir to the Element of Magic, it will fall upon her to unite her friends (so far each friend LP has made has turned out to be an analog of an M6 character, so assuming the pattern holds she should still have two more friends to find) and right the wrongs of the past. The "real" Twilight Sparkle will, of course, be proven to have fallen into some kind of corruption along with the others; despite having the very bestest of intentions, she made horrible mistakes that resulted in the destruction of the world. As the Author's Chosen, it will be up to Littlesue to arrogantly and effortlessly do what the most powerful canon protagonist in the series could not, and bring about some grandiose deus ex machina event that will fix everything. This will take the form of either a mass-purification of all the radiation or taint or whatever, or else it will involve somehow altering the flow of history and preventing the war from ever happening.
Is this machine the fulfillment of this prophecy? The particulars aren't all there, but the story certainly seems to be moving in this direction.
Anyway, the rest of the scene is predictable. Littlepoop asks why the spell hasn't been cast yet, and Spike explains that the ponies who can use the Elements of Harmony are all dead. We can fill in the rest of it easily enough: Spike has assumed the role of Watcher (Frank) in order to scour the wasteland for the most heroic of heroes, in the hope of their eventually forming a group of exactly six friends, whose friendship is friendshippy enough to justify their wielding the six Elements of Harmony, and thus completing the spell.
Page break. The scene resumes exactly where it left off. Littlepoop is still examining the crusader computer, specifically the Elements plugged into it. She stops at Pinkie's and remembers something:
>I went to the get-together at Spike’s place and brought It just like you asked. All of my friends were there but you…
I remember this from somewhere, but I don't recall the specifics. I think this was Twilight chiding Pinkie Pie during that party scene; I guess Ponk got all coked up and forgot to attend Twilight's let's-save-the-world party or something.
Anyway, the rest of it falls into place more or less logically: Spike can't leave this cave, because he has to guard this machine, so he dedicates his time to using the sprite-bots to seek out ponies who might be worthy of wielding the Elements.
>>304465
Anyway, the rest of the microscene is just Spike explaining how statistically improbable it is to find exactly six friends who are each capable of wielding the magic of an Element of Harmony, and thus he has been cooped up in this cave for the last 200 years, because apparently it never occurred to him to just seal up the cave, or get a heavy lock on his door, or cast an enchantment to hide the maneframe, or move the it to a more secure location, or to hire the Talons to guard it, or to do any number of things that he could logically have done to ensure that the computer was guarded while he went out to find six ponies.
>I stared up at the nearest dais. The tiara, Spike had informed me earlier, was the Element of Magic. I found myself reminded just how pathetically un-magical I was. For all the raw power I had learned to tap, I was truly a one-trick pony.
>“It… it’s not us, is it?” I looked around at the daises and then back to Spike. “We’re not the right group of friends either. We can’t bring Equestria back.” I felt my heart tearing. “You’re still looking.”
>Spike nodded sorrowfully. “No. You’re not.” He snorted laughter again. “Don’t feel bad about it though. You’re an amazing pony, and you have amazing friends. I have no doubt that the group of you will do a lot of good for the Equestrian Wasteland. It’s just not your destiny to heal it.”
This all but confirms that Littlepoop actually is the Element of Magic, and that her friends actually arethe group that will heal Equestria. Either that, or this entire trip was just a huge waste of everyone's time. And I say that completely without sarcasm; you literally never know what kind of autistic turn this story will take.
>A beautiful, green, healthy Equestria… full of life… just a spell away. And I was… insufficient. I’d never felt more worthless.
Aww, the poor heroic hero is having her moment of doubt. She's so noble and humble.
>“Hey,” Spike scolded, reading my expression. “It’s not your fault. Hell, imagine how hard it is to find a pony with the virtue of laughter in the Equestrian Wasteland.”
I honestly can't imagine it's that hard; I've been laughing my ass off through most of this.
>I thought of Ditzy Doo, and felt a spark of hope. We might be the wrong ponies. But maybe I could start Spike on the right path to finding the ones who are. “I think I know who you’re looking for.”
See, this is basically what I was talking about. If kkat were at least a mildly competent writer (not even good; just competent enough to write his name), he would just fill in the blanks with the appropriate names and finish the childishly straightforward plot he appears to be laying out: Littlepoop is the new Element of Magic, Velvet is the Element of Kindness, Calamity is the rootin' tootin' whatever Applejack's Element was, SteelHooves is the Element of Something; who cares, take your pick, and whatever two friends they haven't met yet would fill in the others. They plug the elements into the computer, maybe have to fight a boss battle or something, and then hooray; the world is saved. However, that's just how a normal, competent, sane, writer would finish this; at this point, I've come to accept that I'm in completely uncharted territory with FoE. I want to take the above greentexted passage as satire or a red herring or something, but kkat seems like the kind of guy who actually would do some kind of insane Princess Zombie Derpy ending. There are footballs everywhere, and I don't even know which one to charge at.
Page break. Littlepoop agrees to Spike's condition of secrecy. She notices that he has a complete collection of those stupid mane 6 statues that she's been collecting, and asks what happened to the actual mane 6. This touches on a raw nerve; Spike claims he has no idea what happened, and that he was asleep during the apocalypse. Yes, this autism is actually in the text.
>Spike just stood there, unmoving, lost in an ocean of his own regrets. He didn’t cry. I suspect that the tears this pain could wring from him had all been shed over a century ago. So I cried for him.
The real tragedy is that kkat will never realize he's written a comedy.
Anyway, nothing else happens in this microscene.
Page break. Spike and Littlepoop are apparently still walking back to the main room; it must be a pretty long hallway. Spike gives Littlepoop just one last admonition: that she remember that the computer she saw, with it's magical powers of deus ex machina, was Twilight's true gift to the world. Whatever other icky-wicky things she may hear about Twilight from here on out, he asks that she remember the gift that she gave the world. To Twilight's credit, there is no greater gift she could possibly have given us than a way out of this ridiculous clusterfuck of a story; too bad it's going to take us another 400,000 words to get there. Poor Twily; she did what she could. F.
Anyway, they return to the main room. LP proclaims to her subjects that Spike's reason for keeping his activity a secret is valid, and that settles the matter.
>Calamity glanced nervously towards the entrance. Somewhere out there were the other pegasi, a whole civilization that had once been his home. To his family and friends, he was now a Dashite. A traitor. Was he thinking about them? Missing them? Or was he worried about what his own kind would do, not to himself but to his friends, should they catch us up here?
That reminds me, we still know very little about any of this business with the pegasi. At this point I have little hope that it will be explained; the author has an annoying habit of just assuming everyone reading this is intimately familiar with whatever Fallout thing he's referencing, and that this releases him from any obligation to explain what the fuck is going on.
Littlepoop asks Spike to regale them with stories about the mane 6 in their glory days, and the scene ends in a page break.
Anyway, the rest of the microscene is just Spike explaining how statistically improbable it is to find exactly six friends who are each capable of wielding the magic of an Element of Harmony, and thus he has been cooped up in this cave for the last 200 years, because apparently it never occurred to him to just seal up the cave, or get a heavy lock on his door, or cast an enchantment to hide the maneframe, or move the it to a more secure location, or to hire the Talons to guard it, or to do any number of things that he could logically have done to ensure that the computer was guarded while he went out to find six ponies.
>I stared up at the nearest dais. The tiara, Spike had informed me earlier, was the Element of Magic. I found myself reminded just how pathetically un-magical I was. For all the raw power I had learned to tap, I was truly a one-trick pony.
>“It… it’s not us, is it?” I looked around at the daises and then back to Spike. “We’re not the right group of friends either. We can’t bring Equestria back.” I felt my heart tearing. “You’re still looking.”
>Spike nodded sorrowfully. “No. You’re not.” He snorted laughter again. “Don’t feel bad about it though. You’re an amazing pony, and you have amazing friends. I have no doubt that the group of you will do a lot of good for the Equestrian Wasteland. It’s just not your destiny to heal it.”
This all but confirms that Littlepoop actually is the Element of Magic, and that her friends actually arethe group that will heal Equestria. Either that, or this entire trip was just a huge waste of everyone's time. And I say that completely without sarcasm; you literally never know what kind of autistic turn this story will take.
>A beautiful, green, healthy Equestria… full of life… just a spell away. And I was… insufficient. I’d never felt more worthless.
Aww, the poor heroic hero is having her moment of doubt. She's so noble and humble.
>“Hey,” Spike scolded, reading my expression. “It’s not your fault. Hell, imagine how hard it is to find a pony with the virtue of laughter in the Equestrian Wasteland.”
I honestly can't imagine it's that hard; I've been laughing my ass off through most of this.
>I thought of Ditzy Doo, and felt a spark of hope. We might be the wrong ponies. But maybe I could start Spike on the right path to finding the ones who are. “I think I know who you’re looking for.”
See, this is basically what I was talking about. If kkat were at least a mildly competent writer (not even good; just competent enough to write his name), he would just fill in the blanks with the appropriate names and finish the childishly straightforward plot he appears to be laying out: Littlepoop is the new Element of Magic, Velvet is the Element of Kindness, Calamity is the rootin' tootin' whatever Applejack's Element was, SteelHooves is the Element of Something; who cares, take your pick, and whatever two friends they haven't met yet would fill in the others. They plug the elements into the computer, maybe have to fight a boss battle or something, and then hooray; the world is saved. However, that's just how a normal, competent, sane, writer would finish this; at this point, I've come to accept that I'm in completely uncharted territory with FoE. I want to take the above greentexted passage as satire or a red herring or something, but kkat seems like the kind of guy who actually would do some kind of insane Princess Zombie Derpy ending. There are footballs everywhere, and I don't even know which one to charge at.
Page break. Littlepoop agrees to Spike's condition of secrecy. She notices that he has a complete collection of those stupid mane 6 statues that she's been collecting, and asks what happened to the actual mane 6. This touches on a raw nerve; Spike claims he has no idea what happened, and that he was asleep during the apocalypse. Yes, this autism is actually in the text.
>Spike just stood there, unmoving, lost in an ocean of his own regrets. He didn’t cry. I suspect that the tears this pain could wring from him had all been shed over a century ago. So I cried for him.
The real tragedy is that kkat will never realize he's written a comedy.
Anyway, nothing else happens in this microscene.
Page break. Spike and Littlepoop are apparently still walking back to the main room; it must be a pretty long hallway. Spike gives Littlepoop just one last admonition: that she remember that the computer she saw, with it's magical powers of deus ex machina, was Twilight's true gift to the world. Whatever other icky-wicky things she may hear about Twilight from here on out, he asks that she remember the gift that she gave the world. To Twilight's credit, there is no greater gift she could possibly have given us than a way out of this ridiculous clusterfuck of a story; too bad it's going to take us another 400,000 words to get there. Poor Twily; she did what she could. F.
Anyway, they return to the main room. LP proclaims to her subjects that Spike's reason for keeping his activity a secret is valid, and that settles the matter.
>Calamity glanced nervously towards the entrance. Somewhere out there were the other pegasi, a whole civilization that had once been his home. To his family and friends, he was now a Dashite. A traitor. Was he thinking about them? Missing them? Or was he worried about what his own kind would do, not to himself but to his friends, should they catch us up here?
That reminds me, we still know very little about any of this business with the pegasi. At this point I have little hope that it will be explained; the author has an annoying habit of just assuming everyone reading this is intimately familiar with whatever Fallout thing he's referencing, and that this releases him from any obligation to explain what the fuck is going on.
Littlepoop asks Spike to regale them with stories about the mane 6 in their glory days, and the scene ends in a page break.
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>>304465
>How does she know any of this?
Kkat never established LP as the type to memorize random computer trivia. He could have established that early on by making her read a magazine on ZAX computers during chapter 1 she'd stolen from a made-up boss at a made-up computer repair store to try and flesh out the world and say "she reads when bored and her job is boring".
The author seems to be ripping off the ZAX computers in Fallout. Possibly the "John Henry Eden" ZAX supercomputer in charge of the Enclave in 3 (which you can effortlessly talk into self-destructing because it's as retarded as the rest of the world but because the rest of the world is retarded nobody finds it odd that you could easily talk the robo-commander of the enclave into going boom) or the ZAX Mainframe from the cancelled "Fallout Van Buren" aka what Fallout 3 would have been if Black Isle Studios/Obsidian got to make it without Bethesda stealing it. Fun trivia:
>The original ZAX unit in Fallout garnered its name as a derivative of VAX, a non-player character from Wasteland(one of Fallout 1's inspirations). The VAX series of mainframes and supercomputers were a successful series of machines sold by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) and first introduced in 1977 which ran an operating system called VAX/VMS.
Funny how the ZAX computers were references to the VAX character, whose name was a reference to the VAX computer
All of this was lost on Kkat when he said "Mainframe? hmmmmm... moar like mane-frame!"
>Gardens of Equestria
Hey, just like the Garden Of Eden Creation Kit or "GECK" from Fallout!
Except depending on whether the game was made by people or BugthEAsdrones, the GECK is a device that helps "Open up and unfold" your Vault into a functional above-ground town with seeds and a library and water purifiers and a cold fusion generator and atmospheric purifiers and so on(The GECK's makers had no idea what post-nuking america would be like so they shoved EVERYTHING in there. Vault City was able to become a thriving settlement quickly thanks to their GECK's help)...
or a magical matter-reconstitution device that absorbs everything around it and recreates it, and can somehow be used as the magical secret ingredient that makes a gigantic water purifier (which exclusively purifies water in the Ptolomac River and then dumps it back into the irradiated riverbed) and can only purify water in small doses able to magically shit out a magiscifi wave that un-irradiates damn near every last water source and puddle in the entire DC Wasteland.
Because when your IQ is lower than the number of women Kkunt has slept with and you work for the only company scummier than EA, Science Fiction is a magic word that lets you rip off Cthulhu and Blade Runner and all 5 of the other sci-fi/fantasy things you've seen and make up all the do-anything magic boxes you want and remake existing Fallout iconography into whatever you want if you think the result will sell more merch, and one magical do-anything box with sciencey words attached to it can do anything if the author says so.
Fallout 3 is the story of a faggot who chases after his father (played by liam neeson) as he does his plan to un-irradiate all water in DC for no reason and then dies just before he can finish it, meaning you have to march with the Power Rangers Brotherhood of Steel and their random giant fucking robot Liberty Prime (He's the only good thing to come out of F3) in a Call Of Duty segment where the real challenge is killing any Enclave baddies before your overpowered friends do.
In the end you sacrifice yourself to save the day or tell one of your friends to do it.
>Deus Ex Machina
To make this even funnier, the term "Deus ex machina" came from old plays that became such absolute unsolvable clusterfucks that the only way to resolve the story was for some kind of "God" (played by some dude lowered down to the stage by a crane machine and rope) to come down to the stage and magically fix everything. I think they were old Greek plays?
Anyway it's the same shit here.
Kkat fucked up the pony world so badly, only a deus ex machina machine can heal it.
Even though the existence of such a machine goes against Fallout and how it is supposed to be about people and survival and "the fallout" of choices made yesterday and today.
Gee, even though countless things the Mane Six did with their Ministries or allowed their Ministries to do fucked the Wasteland over, it sure is a good thing they made this one thing in particular that could fix everything they and their ministries and the zebras fucked up!
Hilariously, it seems the author forgot you don't actually need six ponies to wield the Elements of Harmony. Remember when Celestia used all six elements to seal NMM in the moon for a thousand years?
It's a shame this story's take on Spike isn't as kind, loyal, friendly and magical, cheerful/cheer-spread-ish, generous, or honest as Celestia was when she sealed away her own sister.
To explain away why Celly chose sealing over purification you'd have to assume Celly didn't think of that or assume her element-fu wasn't strong enough for such a high-level technique only lv999 friendship masters like the Mane Six could pull off.
>How does she know any of this?
Kkat never established LP as the type to memorize random computer trivia. He could have established that early on by making her read a magazine on ZAX computers during chapter 1 she'd stolen from a made-up boss at a made-up computer repair store to try and flesh out the world and say "she reads when bored and her job is boring".
The author seems to be ripping off the ZAX computers in Fallout. Possibly the "John Henry Eden" ZAX supercomputer in charge of the Enclave in 3 (which you can effortlessly talk into self-destructing because it's as retarded as the rest of the world but because the rest of the world is retarded nobody finds it odd that you could easily talk the robo-commander of the enclave into going boom) or the ZAX Mainframe from the cancelled "Fallout Van Buren" aka what Fallout 3 would have been if Black Isle Studios/Obsidian got to make it without Bethesda stealing it. Fun trivia:
>The original ZAX unit in Fallout garnered its name as a derivative of VAX, a non-player character from Wasteland(one of Fallout 1's inspirations). The VAX series of mainframes and supercomputers were a successful series of machines sold by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) and first introduced in 1977 which ran an operating system called VAX/VMS.
Funny how the ZAX computers were references to the VAX character, whose name was a reference to the VAX computer
All of this was lost on Kkat when he said "Mainframe? hmmmmm... moar like mane-frame!"
>Gardens of Equestria
Hey, just like the Garden Of Eden Creation Kit or "GECK" from Fallout!
Except depending on whether the game was made by people or BugthEAsdrones, the GECK is a device that helps "Open up and unfold" your Vault into a functional above-ground town with seeds and a library and water purifiers and a cold fusion generator and atmospheric purifiers and so on(The GECK's makers had no idea what post-nuking america would be like so they shoved EVERYTHING in there. Vault City was able to become a thriving settlement quickly thanks to their GECK's help)...
or a magical matter-reconstitution device that absorbs everything around it and recreates it, and can somehow be used as the magical secret ingredient that makes a gigantic water purifier (which exclusively purifies water in the Ptolomac River and then dumps it back into the irradiated riverbed) and can only purify water in small doses able to magically shit out a magiscifi wave that un-irradiates damn near every last water source and puddle in the entire DC Wasteland.
Because when your IQ is lower than the number of women Kkunt has slept with and you work for the only company scummier than EA, Science Fiction is a magic word that lets you rip off Cthulhu and Blade Runner and all 5 of the other sci-fi/fantasy things you've seen and make up all the do-anything magic boxes you want and remake existing Fallout iconography into whatever you want if you think the result will sell more merch, and one magical do-anything box with sciencey words attached to it can do anything if the author says so.
Fallout 3 is the story of a faggot who chases after his father (played by liam neeson) as he does his plan to un-irradiate all water in DC for no reason and then dies just before he can finish it, meaning you have to march with the Power Rangers Brotherhood of Steel and their random giant fucking robot Liberty Prime (He's the only good thing to come out of F3) in a Call Of Duty segment where the real challenge is killing any Enclave baddies before your overpowered friends do.
In the end you sacrifice yourself to save the day or tell one of your friends to do it.
>Deus Ex Machina
To make this even funnier, the term "Deus ex machina" came from old plays that became such absolute unsolvable clusterfucks that the only way to resolve the story was for some kind of "God" (played by some dude lowered down to the stage by a crane machine and rope) to come down to the stage and magically fix everything. I think they were old Greek plays?
Anyway it's the same shit here.
Kkat fucked up the pony world so badly, only a deus ex machina machine can heal it.
Even though the existence of such a machine goes against Fallout and how it is supposed to be about people and survival and "the fallout" of choices made yesterday and today.
Gee, even though countless things the Mane Six did with their Ministries or allowed their Ministries to do fucked the Wasteland over, it sure is a good thing they made this one thing in particular that could fix everything they and their ministries and the zebras fucked up!
Hilariously, it seems the author forgot you don't actually need six ponies to wield the Elements of Harmony. Remember when Celestia used all six elements to seal NMM in the moon for a thousand years?
It's a shame this story's take on Spike isn't as kind, loyal, friendly and magical, cheerful/cheer-spread-ish, generous, or honest as Celestia was when she sealed away her own sister.
To explain away why Celly chose sealing over purification you'd have to assume Celly didn't think of that or assume her element-fu wasn't strong enough for such a high-level technique only lv999 friendship masters like the Mane Six could pull off.
>>304467
That reminds me, it's stupid that Spike has guarded this machine for so long instead of trying to take over land and create a town and build a civilization that can protect the machine until ponies are born with the elements necessary to power it.
Or, assuming you aren't a fatalist faggot like KKunt, until ponies GROW AND CHANGE and develop the positive characteristics and friendship that power the elements.
>imagine how hard it is to find a pony with the virtue of laughter in the Equestrian Wasteland
Silver Bell the wannabe-Pinkie knockoff
Seriously, this was a perfectly good opportunity for the story to rip off Tiny Tina from Borderlands aka a character stolen from Codehunters just like everything else in borderlands https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmeP1YkaeTo
and the chance to put a wannabe-optimistic sad child character in this sad wasteland who's there to get sad whenever bad things happen to kids and bond with kids and fit in small gaps and make da audience go "dawww" sometimes is right fucking there
Did Kkat decide to throw this character away because he thought a child with landmines and a sticky bomb launcher and a low-recoil rocket launcher wouldn't be "dark and edgy" enough?
Nothing's darker and edgier than a child forced to kill! What's sadder, the tears of a clown or a broken clown's forced laughter? The opportunity to make this character tug at our heartstrings by making this character desperately try to keep everyone's spirits up and crack horrifying gallows-humor puns way too soon after the deaths of innocents is right fucking there!
But of course that went right over Kkat's head like the rounds of jizz he couldn't catch from gay sailors in time. He was too busy trying to write about "le dark and le edgy" characters like Generic Protagonist and Cowboy Yeehaw and Sadamedic and Tin Can Cunt. Characters people are used to seeing in these kinds of situations and settings. Cowboy Yeehaw shoots his gun and the suit of armour shoots his gun. Littlepip shoots her gun while thinking because she's the protagonist and Velvet shoots her character-appropriate gun between moments of whining or crying or ranting or manipulating or generally being a poor fit for this setting
except Velvet's been done to death.
there have been a million sad pacifist medic characters in grim dark settings before
At least the cliche Silver Bell could have been hadn't been done as much as the cliche she ended up becoming.
>LP proclaims to her subjects that Spike's reason for keeping his activity a secret is valid, and that settles the matter
I once read a pretty good novelization of Fallout NV where the generic protagonist's companions talked a lot more and mattered more to the story.
When they got to House who only wanted the main hero to see him, they were fucking pissed that they didn't get to see and talk to him
It took a lot of arguing to get them to agree with House on everything and Boone still got sad over the NCR not ruling the Mojave despite all of canon's "trying to keep the mojave is hurting the NCR" moments
And whenever the hero solved a quest a certain way or said to his friends "We're solving the problem this way" the characters would argue over it
and that arguing was interesting to read
the friends of the hero weren't lumped together into a hive mind that sometimes required a Speech Skill Check before they'd do their jobs, they were individuals with their own views and beliefs
they were mature people who could compromise on unimportant shit but still had important parts of themselves they weren't willing to compromise
and they didn't just say shit to be wrong and stupid to make smarter characters look better, or address/minimize complaints the author expected commenters/readers to have before they were made into angry reviews. sometimes even smart characters like Veronica and Arcade were wrong.
those interesting, original, and dynamic arguments were easily the best and most original feature of the story.
since everything else (quests, setting, locations, weapons, etc) got ripped straight from FNV.
Kkunt could take a break from sucking gay penis flesh and flesh out Calamity and Steeltoes as characters through interesting, creative, and dynamic arguments.
...What am I saying? Kkunt couldn't do that because he's dumb and gay. A good writer would have tried to make the protagonists into interesting characters but LP's merry band of NPCs are just that: NPCs.
That reminds me, it's stupid that Spike has guarded this machine for so long instead of trying to take over land and create a town and build a civilization that can protect the machine until ponies are born with the elements necessary to power it.
Or, assuming you aren't a fatalist faggot like KKunt, until ponies GROW AND CHANGE and develop the positive characteristics and friendship that power the elements.
>imagine how hard it is to find a pony with the virtue of laughter in the Equestrian Wasteland
Silver Bell the wannabe-Pinkie knockoff
Seriously, this was a perfectly good opportunity for the story to rip off Tiny Tina from Borderlands aka a character stolen from Codehunters just like everything else in borderlands https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmeP1YkaeTo
and the chance to put a wannabe-optimistic sad child character in this sad wasteland who's there to get sad whenever bad things happen to kids and bond with kids and fit in small gaps and make da audience go "dawww" sometimes is right fucking there
Did Kkat decide to throw this character away because he thought a child with landmines and a sticky bomb launcher and a low-recoil rocket launcher wouldn't be "dark and edgy" enough?
Nothing's darker and edgier than a child forced to kill! What's sadder, the tears of a clown or a broken clown's forced laughter? The opportunity to make this character tug at our heartstrings by making this character desperately try to keep everyone's spirits up and crack horrifying gallows-humor puns way too soon after the deaths of innocents is right fucking there!
But of course that went right over Kkat's head like the rounds of jizz he couldn't catch from gay sailors in time. He was too busy trying to write about "le dark and le edgy" characters like Generic Protagonist and Cowboy Yeehaw and Sadamedic and Tin Can Cunt. Characters people are used to seeing in these kinds of situations and settings. Cowboy Yeehaw shoots his gun and the suit of armour shoots his gun. Littlepip shoots her gun while thinking because she's the protagonist and Velvet shoots her character-appropriate gun between moments of whining or crying or ranting or manipulating or generally being a poor fit for this setting
except Velvet's been done to death.
there have been a million sad pacifist medic characters in grim dark settings before
At least the cliche Silver Bell could have been hadn't been done as much as the cliche she ended up becoming.
>LP proclaims to her subjects that Spike's reason for keeping his activity a secret is valid, and that settles the matter
I once read a pretty good novelization of Fallout NV where the generic protagonist's companions talked a lot more and mattered more to the story.
When they got to House who only wanted the main hero to see him, they were fucking pissed that they didn't get to see and talk to him
It took a lot of arguing to get them to agree with House on everything and Boone still got sad over the NCR not ruling the Mojave despite all of canon's "trying to keep the mojave is hurting the NCR" moments
And whenever the hero solved a quest a certain way or said to his friends "We're solving the problem this way" the characters would argue over it
and that arguing was interesting to read
the friends of the hero weren't lumped together into a hive mind that sometimes required a Speech Skill Check before they'd do their jobs, they were individuals with their own views and beliefs
they were mature people who could compromise on unimportant shit but still had important parts of themselves they weren't willing to compromise
and they didn't just say shit to be wrong and stupid to make smarter characters look better, or address/minimize complaints the author expected commenters/readers to have before they were made into angry reviews. sometimes even smart characters like Veronica and Arcade were wrong.
those interesting, original, and dynamic arguments were easily the best and most original feature of the story.
since everything else (quests, setting, locations, weapons, etc) got ripped straight from FNV.
Kkunt could take a break from sucking gay penis flesh and flesh out Calamity and Steeltoes as characters through interesting, creative, and dynamic arguments.
...What am I saying? Kkunt couldn't do that because he's dumb and gay. A good writer would have tried to make the protagonists into interesting characters but LP's merry band of NPCs are just that: NPCs.
>>304428
Ah I see what you mean. LP probably wouldn't get that reference, unless maybe Spike tells her that story, but that scene is not until the next chapter IIRC and he doesn't mention it. LP does definitely associate the quotes with the statuettes - in chapter 15, she recalls the Applejack statuette as "Be Strong" when she sees the other one in SteelHooves' shack.
Keep in mind that Rarity produced the statuettes, so she probably picked a quote she thought exemplified Pinkie Pie's keen senses. Could she have picked a better one? Maybe, but I think it works. I actually would have liked the other statuettes to have more quotes like this - it makes them more personal of a gift for each of the Mane 6.
I do think Pinkie fits with perception, due to her Pinkie Sense and her Ministry's role in espionage. I'd imagine Kkat placed Fluttershy with charisma because of her ability to command a room despite her meek appearance (see Velvet's 'addictive' Fluttershy memory orb). Rarity is with endurance because of ... tearing her soul up for producing the statuettes? I guess? It is hard to put 6 characters under 7 attributes. Maybe Rarity should have made a Spike statuette to make it an even 7.
Ah I see what you mean. LP probably wouldn't get that reference, unless maybe Spike tells her that story, but that scene is not until the next chapter IIRC and he doesn't mention it. LP does definitely associate the quotes with the statuettes - in chapter 15, she recalls the Applejack statuette as "Be Strong" when she sees the other one in SteelHooves' shack.
Keep in mind that Rarity produced the statuettes, so she probably picked a quote she thought exemplified Pinkie Pie's keen senses. Could she have picked a better one? Maybe, but I think it works. I actually would have liked the other statuettes to have more quotes like this - it makes them more personal of a gift for each of the Mane 6.
I do think Pinkie fits with perception, due to her Pinkie Sense and her Ministry's role in espionage. I'd imagine Kkat placed Fluttershy with charisma because of her ability to command a room despite her meek appearance (see Velvet's 'addictive' Fluttershy memory orb). Rarity is with endurance because of ... tearing her soul up for producing the statuettes? I guess? It is hard to put 6 characters under 7 attributes. Maybe Rarity should have made a Spike statuette to make it an even 7.
>>304472
I've figured it out
The Mane Six were meant to be the six elements of harmony, with their own personal good and bad personality traits
While the Fallout SPECIAL stats were meant to rate your character's physical and mental capabilities
That's why the comparisons don't work
Both Twilight and AJ are Strong, Twilight and Pinkie and Rarity and Fluttershy are Perceptive, both AJ and Pinkie have a high physical endurance stat, Charisma is many things but in Fallout it's primarily the ability to express yourself and convince others to do what you want so Rarity's the perfect fit for that(I would suggest Pinkie for being able to charm and befriend just about anypony but she's guileless and many of fallout's charisma checks rely on guile), both Rarity and Twilight are Intelligent, both Pinkie and RD have a high Agility score, and all of the mane six are lucky to have found each other, lived the lives they've lived, and turned out great.
Who would call Fluttershy more charismatic than Rarity? Who would call the usually-comically-oblivious Pinkie Pie more perceptive than Rarity? Can anyone with a straight face say Rarity has more physical or mental endurance than AJ? But she already got the physical strength role, so Rarity is assigned that which means she can't be Perception or Charisma, so Fluttershy gets Charisma because potatoes while Pinkie gets Perception because of that Pinkie Sense episode and "Pinkie Pie sees everything beyond the fourth wall!" 2002-era brony memes.
If I had to match the mane six...
Applejack is Strength (FAITHFUL AND STRONG)
Rarity is Perception (got to get the details right when making dresses)
Spike is Endurance (he's tough and endures a lot for his friends/crush)
Pinkie Pie is Charisma (befriends everypony)
Twilight is Intelligence (smart poner)
Rainbow Dash is Agility (gotta go fast)
...wait this just leaves Luck for Fluttershy. She doesn't seem particularly lucky. Who among the Mane Six can be called luckiest? Perhaps Pinkie because she just happened to be born with Pinkie Sense. Things worked out perfectly for RD to get her to do the Sonic Rainboom but who's more agile than her, besides Pinkie?
what if Pinkie Pie got Luck and Rarity got Charisma while Fluttershy gets Perception?
Applejack is Strength (FAITHFUL AND STRONG)
Fluttershy is Perception (when you're a vet you need to be able to tell what's wrong with your animal friends)
Spike is Endurance (he's tough and endures a lot for his friends/crush)
Rarity is Charisma (usually gets what she wants)
Twilight is Intelligence (smart poner)
Rainbow Dash is Agility (gotta go fast)
Pinkie Pie is Luck (it's either her or Derpy Hooves)
I've figured it out
The Mane Six were meant to be the six elements of harmony, with their own personal good and bad personality traits
While the Fallout SPECIAL stats were meant to rate your character's physical and mental capabilities
That's why the comparisons don't work
Both Twilight and AJ are Strong, Twilight and Pinkie and Rarity and Fluttershy are Perceptive, both AJ and Pinkie have a high physical endurance stat, Charisma is many things but in Fallout it's primarily the ability to express yourself and convince others to do what you want so Rarity's the perfect fit for that(I would suggest Pinkie for being able to charm and befriend just about anypony but she's guileless and many of fallout's charisma checks rely on guile), both Rarity and Twilight are Intelligent, both Pinkie and RD have a high Agility score, and all of the mane six are lucky to have found each other, lived the lives they've lived, and turned out great.
Who would call Fluttershy more charismatic than Rarity? Who would call the usually-comically-oblivious Pinkie Pie more perceptive than Rarity? Can anyone with a straight face say Rarity has more physical or mental endurance than AJ? But she already got the physical strength role, so Rarity is assigned that which means she can't be Perception or Charisma, so Fluttershy gets Charisma because potatoes while Pinkie gets Perception because of that Pinkie Sense episode and "Pinkie Pie sees everything beyond the fourth wall!" 2002-era brony memes.
If I had to match the mane six...
Applejack is Strength (FAITHFUL AND STRONG)
Rarity is Perception (got to get the details right when making dresses)
Spike is Endurance (he's tough and endures a lot for his friends/crush)
Pinkie Pie is Charisma (befriends everypony)
Twilight is Intelligence (smart poner)
Rainbow Dash is Agility (gotta go fast)
...wait this just leaves Luck for Fluttershy. She doesn't seem particularly lucky. Who among the Mane Six can be called luckiest? Perhaps Pinkie because she just happened to be born with Pinkie Sense. Things worked out perfectly for RD to get her to do the Sonic Rainboom but who's more agile than her, besides Pinkie?
what if Pinkie Pie got Luck and Rarity got Charisma while Fluttershy gets Perception?
Applejack is Strength (FAITHFUL AND STRONG)
Fluttershy is Perception (when you're a vet you need to be able to tell what's wrong with your animal friends)
Spike is Endurance (he's tough and endures a lot for his friends/crush)
Rarity is Charisma (usually gets what she wants)
Twilight is Intelligence (smart poner)
Rainbow Dash is Agility (gotta go fast)
Pinkie Pie is Luck (it's either her or Derpy Hooves)
Anyone else feel like the backstory segments about the M6 and how Equestria went to shit are less shitty than the rest of this fic?
>>304469
>I think they were old Greek plays?
Probably Roman actually, "deus ex machina" is a Latin phrase, not Greek. Then again, the Greeks did really like plays, so it might've been a phrase the Romans translated and adopted from the Greeks, and the Latin variant became more popular since they left more writings.
>>304469
>I think they were old Greek plays?
Probably Roman actually, "deus ex machina" is a Latin phrase, not Greek. Then again, the Greeks did really like plays, so it might've been a phrase the Romans translated and adopted from the Greeks, and the Latin variant became more popular since they left more writings.
>>304465
>Literally deus ex machina. I mean, literally deus ex machina; not only does this plot device fit the concept to a tee, but the literal translation of the phrase is "god from the machine," which is quite literally what this thing is. Kkat has officially reached super-Saiyan levels of hackiness.
Gotta disagree here. The Gardens of Equestria isn't strictly a Deus ex Machina - a DEM is a plot element that's introduced into a narrative to arbitrarily resolve the conflict at the last minute. Classically, it would refer to literal last second divine intervention within the context of the story. So far FoE doesn't really have a conflict that needs resolving, aside from the fact that everything is shit, the Gardens isn't really doing anything to that end. The Gardens isn't any more of a DEM than the EoH were - it's a fix-everything solution, sure, but one that the characters at least need to earn somehow.
In theory, I think the Gardens is fine. It's key to resolving some of the major problems that Equestria's facing, and purifying/healing things is something that the Elements are canonically capable of doing. Nightmare Moon and the chaos Discord caused in the S2 opener are clear examples. Compared to a lot of things elsewhere in the story, it's a reasonably competent way of tying something from Fallout (the GECK) to something from FiM (the EoH).
Most importantly, this gives Littlepip and the others an actual objective - something they deserately need after 20 chapters of murderhobo wandering. If they can find or become a group of friends capable of wielding the Elements of Harmony, they can heal the world. Clumsy exposition and blatantly obvious foreshadowing aside, the story at least has something resembling a direction now. We've seen that the world is shit and full of shitty people, so the protagonists have now been challenged to find a way of rising above that. Perhaps they could learn where exactly the main six went wrong, create something positive out of Twilight's legacy, and learn a lesson that suits both FiM and Fallout. A more capable writer could probably spin something at least reasonably compelling out of this.
Way back when the story was first released, I distinctly remember that the reveal of the Gardens was the moment when I thought that FoE finally had the potential to rise above poorly emulating a videogame. With more writing experience and the benefit of hindsight, that optimism was obviously unwarranted. But the potential was there.
>Literally deus ex machina. I mean, literally deus ex machina; not only does this plot device fit the concept to a tee, but the literal translation of the phrase is "god from the machine," which is quite literally what this thing is. Kkat has officially reached super-Saiyan levels of hackiness.
Gotta disagree here. The Gardens of Equestria isn't strictly a Deus ex Machina - a DEM is a plot element that's introduced into a narrative to arbitrarily resolve the conflict at the last minute. Classically, it would refer to literal last second divine intervention within the context of the story. So far FoE doesn't really have a conflict that needs resolving, aside from the fact that everything is shit, the Gardens isn't really doing anything to that end. The Gardens isn't any more of a DEM than the EoH were - it's a fix-everything solution, sure, but one that the characters at least need to earn somehow.
In theory, I think the Gardens is fine. It's key to resolving some of the major problems that Equestria's facing, and purifying/healing things is something that the Elements are canonically capable of doing. Nightmare Moon and the chaos Discord caused in the S2 opener are clear examples. Compared to a lot of things elsewhere in the story, it's a reasonably competent way of tying something from Fallout (the GECK) to something from FiM (the EoH).
Most importantly, this gives Littlepip and the others an actual objective - something they deserately need after 20 chapters of murderhobo wandering. If they can find or become a group of friends capable of wielding the Elements of Harmony, they can heal the world. Clumsy exposition and blatantly obvious foreshadowing aside, the story at least has something resembling a direction now. We've seen that the world is shit and full of shitty people, so the protagonists have now been challenged to find a way of rising above that. Perhaps they could learn where exactly the main six went wrong, create something positive out of Twilight's legacy, and learn a lesson that suits both FiM and Fallout. A more capable writer could probably spin something at least reasonably compelling out of this.
Way back when the story was first released, I distinctly remember that the reveal of the Gardens was the moment when I thought that FoE finally had the potential to rise above poorly emulating a videogame. With more writing experience and the benefit of hindsight, that optimism was obviously unwarranted. But the potential was there.
>>304467
Honestly I think you could handwave Pip knowing what the computer was with a simple line of "Oh a Crusader Maneframe, like that one we encountered in the stable(of course have her interact with it there), or my home stable that I sometimes passed by on my way to the workshops!"
And the Gardens of Equestria is another reference to Fallout, but in this case, the specific game this story is heavily based upon: Fallout 3. I'm sure you've noticed a trend in our responses where ideas from Fallout 1 and 2 are reasonable and well-planned, and those in 3 are bombastic, cartoony, and nonsensical. In the second game, the GECK was a valued device that would help humanity grow and expand. What did it do? Did it magically fix the earth? No. It was actually a kind of advanced survival kit containing seed packets, farming techniques and instructions, and plans for simple, efficient housing iirc. The second game shows a thriving city built upon the instructions contained in one of these kits, and you set out to find them.
In Fallout 3, it's some magical purification expansion device that you use in tandem with a water purifier to purfity the ENTIRE wasteland's water.
Honestly I think you could handwave Pip knowing what the computer was with a simple line of "Oh a Crusader Maneframe, like that one we encountered in the stable(of course have her interact with it there), or my home stable that I sometimes passed by on my way to the workshops!"
And the Gardens of Equestria is another reference to Fallout, but in this case, the specific game this story is heavily based upon: Fallout 3. I'm sure you've noticed a trend in our responses where ideas from Fallout 1 and 2 are reasonable and well-planned, and those in 3 are bombastic, cartoony, and nonsensical. In the second game, the GECK was a valued device that would help humanity grow and expand. What did it do? Did it magically fix the earth? No. It was actually a kind of advanced survival kit containing seed packets, farming techniques and instructions, and plans for simple, efficient housing iirc. The second game shows a thriving city built upon the instructions contained in one of these kits, and you set out to find them.
In Fallout 3, it's some magical purification expansion device that you use in tandem with a water purifier to purfity the ENTIRE wasteland's water.
wow today is not my day I keep fucking up the spoiler tags
i hope i get it right this time
anyway
>>304492
Sure, but putting her sales pitch for it (It's so powerful! It can store an imprint of a pony's mind! It's the best!) right here instead of the last time one mattered to the story feels awkward.
What, did the author not trust his audience to remember enough about the "Killed by AI" vault's Crusader Maneframe? Because he's got LP thinking of new information that wasn't introduced back then.
Maybe it wasn't a smart move to make Littlepip a Vault Pony.
She's from a radiation-free bunker, and she presumably had a well-rounded education that could have covered pretty much anything.
This story would have still worked if she was an orphaned Tribal scavenger who lived in the area around the vault and was shocked to see Velvet leave the stable one day, deciding to follow her because she's never met a Stable Pony before and "Maybe it's friendly!"
it would go a long way towards making LP's god-tier lockpicking/repairing skills less retarded, and her initial absolute unfamiliarity with firearms and subsequent spontaneous mastery of them less retarded. Then again it wouldn't give her a pipbuck or hacking skills. Unless the pipbuck was passed down the family line for generations and she's descended from a pony who left that Stable, and the pipbuck had over 200TB of audiobooks stored on it about technology and hacking.
The story's Littlepip's knowledge of pre-war Equestria and the current era is random. She wasn't established to be a history nerd and her party lacks one, and she isn't even written to be much of a tech nerd, so these moments of "Oh wow a crusaders TI69 maneframe with new turbo kung-fu grip!" or "Oh, he's talking about Applejack who had two foals who died of ponio and the clop around the age of 20 before retiring to Vanhoofer. I knew this about AJ but somehow didn't know she made the Power Armour or Steel Rangers until now" just don't fit right.
Surely the audience's viewpoint character isn't supposed to know more than the audience for long, right?
Because every time LP herself dumps some exposition on the audience I find myself wondering "Why didn't you tell us this sooner, before it became a detail a NPC vomiting exposition at you decided to randomly skip over for no reason?"
Has the source of the Statuettes been revealed yet? If so...
If the Statuettes contain shards of the Mane Six's souls (Well, shards of Rarity's soul but the non-rarity statuettes have the Soul Data(TM) of the rest of the Mane Six copied into their respective rarity soul shards) to grant their holder stat-boosts... Why aren't these ever used in the Gardens Of Equestria? If the positive influence of the statuettes matters enough to physically enhance your toughness/charisma/perception/whatever, why don't they also enhance your kindness/generousity/friendliness and magicness/honesty?
It's incredibly reductive to think that if you picked up a doll enchanted an imitation of Applejack's soul made from a shard of Rarity's soul, it would only make you slightly physically stronger without doing anything good for your honesty/determination/work ethic/accent/desire for a big family/appreciation for life's simplest pleasures/love of country music.
Hell, why wouldn't the shard of Rarity soul those things are made from do anything to the end product? Would a Soul-Enchanted AJ Doll made from Rarity's soul inherit traits of both and encourage both of their traits within you, for better or for worse?
What would happen if Rarity attempted to make a statuette of the entire Mane Six physically combined into one pony, or for a less weird-looking result created a statuette containing all of the mane six posing together, and enchanted these statues with the soul data of all six poners?
I'm not asking for one of those fetishy transformation fanfics where a girl slowly turns into Twilight Sparkle or a faggoted man slowly turns into Rainbow Dash or some other human OC turns into the fandom's view of Derpy Hooves or the author's personal guess at what DJ Pon3 or Octavia is like. But the only reason we aren't getting this despite the soul-based magical attribute-changing shit going on is because picking up the bobbleheads in Fallout 3 just add minor stat boosts and don't directly make you more like Vault Boy.
i hope i get it right this time
anyway
>>304492
Sure, but putting her sales pitch for it (It's so powerful! It can store an imprint of a pony's mind! It's the best!) right here instead of the last time one mattered to the story feels awkward.
What, did the author not trust his audience to remember enough about the "Killed by AI" vault's Crusader Maneframe? Because he's got LP thinking of new information that wasn't introduced back then.
Maybe it wasn't a smart move to make Littlepip a Vault Pony.
She's from a radiation-free bunker, and she presumably had a well-rounded education that could have covered pretty much anything.
This story would have still worked if she was an orphaned Tribal scavenger who lived in the area around the vault and was shocked to see Velvet leave the stable one day, deciding to follow her because she's never met a Stable Pony before and "Maybe it's friendly!"
it would go a long way towards making LP's god-tier lockpicking/repairing skills less retarded, and her initial absolute unfamiliarity with firearms and subsequent spontaneous mastery of them less retarded. Then again it wouldn't give her a pipbuck or hacking skills. Unless the pipbuck was passed down the family line for generations and she's descended from a pony who left that Stable, and the pipbuck had over 200TB of audiobooks stored on it about technology and hacking.
The story's Littlepip's knowledge of pre-war Equestria and the current era is random. She wasn't established to be a history nerd and her party lacks one, and she isn't even written to be much of a tech nerd, so these moments of "Oh wow a crusaders TI69 maneframe with new turbo kung-fu grip!" or "Oh, he's talking about Applejack who had two foals who died of ponio and the clop around the age of 20 before retiring to Vanhoofer. I knew this about AJ but somehow didn't know she made the Power Armour or Steel Rangers until now" just don't fit right.
Surely the audience's viewpoint character isn't supposed to know more than the audience for long, right?
Because every time LP herself dumps some exposition on the audience I find myself wondering "Why didn't you tell us this sooner, before it became a detail a NPC vomiting exposition at you decided to randomly skip over for no reason?"
Has the source of the Statuettes been revealed yet? If so...
If the Statuettes contain shards of the Mane Six's souls (Well, shards of Rarity's soul but the non-rarity statuettes have the Soul Data(TM) of the rest of the Mane Six copied into their respective rarity soul shards) to grant their holder stat-boosts... Why aren't these ever used in the Gardens Of Equestria? If the positive influence of the statuettes matters enough to physically enhance your toughness/charisma/perception/whatever, why don't they also enhance your kindness/generousity/friendliness and magicness/honesty?
It's incredibly reductive to think that if you picked up a doll enchanted an imitation of Applejack's soul made from a shard of Rarity's soul, it would only make you slightly physically stronger without doing anything good for your honesty/determination/work ethic/accent/desire for a big family/appreciation for life's simplest pleasures/love of country music.
Hell, why wouldn't the shard of Rarity soul those things are made from do anything to the end product? Would a Soul-Enchanted AJ Doll made from Rarity's soul inherit traits of both and encourage both of their traits within you, for better or for worse?
What would happen if Rarity attempted to make a statuette of the entire Mane Six physically combined into one pony, or for a less weird-looking result created a statuette containing all of the mane six posing together, and enchanted these statues with the soul data of all six poners?
I'm not asking for one of those fetishy transformation fanfics where a girl slowly turns into Twilight Sparkle or a faggoted man slowly turns into Rainbow Dash or some other human OC turns into the fandom's view of Derpy Hooves or the author's personal guess at what DJ Pon3 or Octavia is like. But the only reason we aren't getting this despite the soul-based magical attribute-changing shit going on is because picking up the bobbleheads in Fallout 3 just add minor stat boosts and don't directly make you more like Vault Boy.
Glim would it be good writing if Littlepip went to a rock concert but it is literally a family of Tribals slamming rocks together while living inside a music stadium that was meant to be 3x bigger than anything on earth and double as a bomb shelter?
If this is supposed to be a silly world and silly setting, a "family of musicians" that don't know what instruments and music are would fit the "everyone is retarded" tone
better than a random scene where Littlepip gets so mad she forgets what drawings are
yeah
Also is it bad writing that LP started the story with no flaws and had to do drugs to get one?
Media is full of positive character arcs where a coward grows braver or a hothead grows calmer or an amateur gits gud. And flat character arcs where someone is already perfect or at least good enough for the story being told. Flat character arcs where characters know the truth and help others find it are great. Then there are negative character arcs where the workaholic spirals out of control, someone falls in with a bad crowd and gets corrupted, good guys go bad and bad guys get worse.
But Littlepip...
She doesn't have to learn to stop trusting others and assuming the best in them. She doesn't have to stop doing whatever pretty faces say. She doesn't have to watch herself and make sure she doesn't get played like a fiddle by anyone who strokes her ego and calls her important or heroic.
She doesn't need to learn restraint when dealing with enemies. Or learn to stop jumping at shadows and almost shooting innocents. But Calamity assumed LP was a raider on sight just for dressing like a mad max character.
She doesn't need to learn to stop doing something she's good at. Velvet should stop manipulating friends tho
Steelhooves is the armor that goes beep and his guns that go brrrr so he doesn't have a character arc. Ghoul in power armour with big guns who once dated AJ... it's like a RPG character thrown together at random.
From the moment this story starts LP is treated by the author as if she is perfect or just seconds and a tiny amout of EXecution Points away from hitting max level. She mastered guns instantly which is unrealistic.
It feels like I'm recognizing the mistake with LP because I used to make this mistake: make the hero too good at the start and you give him nowhere to go. Character arcs make a character more interesting and can carry a story.
If this is supposed to be a silly world and silly setting, a "family of musicians" that don't know what instruments and music are would fit the "everyone is retarded" tone
better than a random scene where Littlepip gets so mad she forgets what drawings are
yeah
Also is it bad writing that LP started the story with no flaws and had to do drugs to get one?
Media is full of positive character arcs where a coward grows braver or a hothead grows calmer or an amateur gits gud. And flat character arcs where someone is already perfect or at least good enough for the story being told. Flat character arcs where characters know the truth and help others find it are great. Then there are negative character arcs where the workaholic spirals out of control, someone falls in with a bad crowd and gets corrupted, good guys go bad and bad guys get worse.
But Littlepip...
She doesn't have to learn to stop trusting others and assuming the best in them. She doesn't have to stop doing whatever pretty faces say. She doesn't have to watch herself and make sure she doesn't get played like a fiddle by anyone who strokes her ego and calls her important or heroic.
She doesn't need to learn restraint when dealing with enemies. Or learn to stop jumping at shadows and almost shooting innocents. But Calamity assumed LP was a raider on sight just for dressing like a mad max character.
She doesn't need to learn to stop doing something she's good at. Velvet should stop manipulating friends tho
Steelhooves is the armor that goes beep and his guns that go brrrr so he doesn't have a character arc. Ghoul in power armour with big guns who once dated AJ... it's like a RPG character thrown together at random.
From the moment this story starts LP is treated by the author as if she is perfect or just seconds and a tiny amout of EXecution Points away from hitting max level. She mastered guns instantly which is unrealistic.
It feels like I'm recognizing the mistake with LP because I used to make this mistake: make the hero too good at the start and you give him nowhere to go. Character arcs make a character more interesting and can carry a story.
>>304467
Page break. I'll actually give the author a couple of points here, because he finally manages both an appropriate scene transition and an appropriate use of references from the show. When the camera fades in, it is implied that Spike has spent the interim period between scenes telling stories of Olde Equestria. The "stories" are mostly references to old show episodes:
>This was good. Calamity had cheered up immeasurably at the tale of how about Rainbow Dash had stood up against her own for the buffalo. Velvet Remedy had virtually fan-gasmed over Fluttershy’s caring for a sick phoenix. And I could tell that talking about all of them, especially Twilight Sparkle, was doing Spike a world of good.
I'm going to dock a point for "fan-gasmed," but apart from that, this is a pretty appropriate way to use source-material references in a fan work.
>I opened my saddlebags, pulling out Sparkle~Colas for each of us.
I'd ask how in the world she managed to fit at least five Sparkle-Colas inside her bag along with all of the other crap she's carrying, but at this point that would probably be a silly question.
>Part of me felt bad that SteelHooves couldn’t be in here with us sharing these memories. But I understood all too much why Spike didn’t want a knight of the Ministry of Technology poking around his lair.
Scratch that; four Sparkle-Colas. Hey, wait a minute. You mean to tell me that SteelHooves has been sitting outside this entire time? If Spike doesn't trust him and doesn't want him around when he's showing off his super-sekrit Cutie Mark V Supercomputer or whatever the fuck, then fine; asking him to step outside for a couple of minutes is not that unreasonable. But making him wait on the porch for hours while the rest of the group sits inside Spike's comfy lair, toasting marshmallows and swapping stories, is an incredibly shitty thing to do. "Friendship is magic" my ass.
To begin with, Spike's reasons for not wanting SteelHooves inside his lair still haven't really been clarified; all we know is that Spike doesn't like Steel Rangers for some yet-unexplained reason, and that he wants to keep his big fancy computer a secret. It's implied that all of this has something to do with the Steel Rangers' connection to the Ministry of Technology, but the author has done literally fuck all to explain what that connection is, or why that would make SteelHooves any more of a security risk than any of the rest of them.
From what others in the thread have explained, I think I have a general idea of what's going on here. The Steel Rangers are FoE's analog of the Brotherhood of Steel, which is some kind of ancient fraternal organization that believes advanced technology should be kept out of the hands of normies at all costs for the record, most of what's happened with the internet and smartphones over the last 20 years or so makes me think that these guys might actually be on to something. Following this logic, we can presume that Spike's concern is that SteelHooves will want to confiscate Twilight's computer and carry it off to the local Ranger Station, or whatever the fuck. However, again, none of this could be deduced from the details we've been given in the text itself. The author is simply assuming that the reader has played the same video games that he has, is as intimately familiar with the lore of said video games as he is, and will just instinctively understand which parts of Fallout correspond to which parts of FoE. This is extremely bad storytelling.
>Instead, I tried to memorize the stories so that we could share them with him.
Yeah, that will make it up to him. Make your friend stand out in the cold playing with his balls for four hours, and then bore the crap out of him with a bunch of contextless thirdhand stories the next time you see him. You've really got this "friendship" thing down, LP; no wonder you're the glorious hero that everypony loves to love.
Anyway, Spike launches into a story about the first winter wrap up that he and Twilight attended in Ponyville. Once more to the author's credit, the story is told in a way that the reader can follow it regardless of their level of familiarity with the MLP episode from which it's derived. Also to his credit, he manages to tie the event in to the lore of his own story: he explains that since earth ponies have no magic and no wings, they need to work harder to accomplish tasks that are simpler for unicorns and pegasi. As such, they were more inclined to develop technology in order to keep pace with the more naturally gifted types of ponies; hence, the Ministry of Technology was mainly an earth pony project.
Anyway, Spike stops mid-sentence to yell at SteelHooves, who has suddenly wandered into the cave. Presumably, he wants to know what the fuck is taking everypony so long, and how long they expect him to stand outside playing Tetris on his armor-visor-thingy while they hang out drinking soda and goofing around.
>SteelHooves was backing into the cave.
>Not good.
Is there some significance to his entering a room ass-first that I'm not aware of? My understanding is that among kkat's kind, a man presenting his ass to another man is taken as a gesture of trust and goodwill.
>“Sorry to intrude,” the Steel Ranger said. “But you have more company. Fry me if you must, but you might want to deal with them first.”
>Four pegasus ponies completely entombed in nightmarish black Pegasus Enclave armor flew into the room, landing in front of us.
Oh, I see. He was fighting enemies, I guess. He backed into the room because he was focused on fighting them. This is a pretty dumb way of describing something relatively simple, but whatever.
Anyway, Spike and the Enclave pegasi face off. Spike tells them they are not welcome in his cave, the Enclave informs him that his visitors are not welcome above the clouds, and they have come to escort them back to ground level.
Page break. I'll actually give the author a couple of points here, because he finally manages both an appropriate scene transition and an appropriate use of references from the show. When the camera fades in, it is implied that Spike has spent the interim period between scenes telling stories of Olde Equestria. The "stories" are mostly references to old show episodes:
>This was good. Calamity had cheered up immeasurably at the tale of how about Rainbow Dash had stood up against her own for the buffalo. Velvet Remedy had virtually fan-gasmed over Fluttershy’s caring for a sick phoenix. And I could tell that talking about all of them, especially Twilight Sparkle, was doing Spike a world of good.
I'm going to dock a point for "fan-gasmed," but apart from that, this is a pretty appropriate way to use source-material references in a fan work.
>I opened my saddlebags, pulling out Sparkle~Colas for each of us.
I'd ask how in the world she managed to fit at least five Sparkle-Colas inside her bag along with all of the other crap she's carrying, but at this point that would probably be a silly question.
>Part of me felt bad that SteelHooves couldn’t be in here with us sharing these memories. But I understood all too much why Spike didn’t want a knight of the Ministry of Technology poking around his lair.
Scratch that; four Sparkle-Colas. Hey, wait a minute. You mean to tell me that SteelHooves has been sitting outside this entire time? If Spike doesn't trust him and doesn't want him around when he's showing off his super-sekrit Cutie Mark V Supercomputer or whatever the fuck, then fine; asking him to step outside for a couple of minutes is not that unreasonable. But making him wait on the porch for hours while the rest of the group sits inside Spike's comfy lair, toasting marshmallows and swapping stories, is an incredibly shitty thing to do. "Friendship is magic" my ass.
To begin with, Spike's reasons for not wanting SteelHooves inside his lair still haven't really been clarified; all we know is that Spike doesn't like Steel Rangers for some yet-unexplained reason, and that he wants to keep his big fancy computer a secret. It's implied that all of this has something to do with the Steel Rangers' connection to the Ministry of Technology, but the author has done literally fuck all to explain what that connection is, or why that would make SteelHooves any more of a security risk than any of the rest of them.
From what others in the thread have explained, I think I have a general idea of what's going on here. The Steel Rangers are FoE's analog of the Brotherhood of Steel, which is some kind of ancient fraternal organization that believes advanced technology should be kept out of the hands of normies at all costs for the record, most of what's happened with the internet and smartphones over the last 20 years or so makes me think that these guys might actually be on to something. Following this logic, we can presume that Spike's concern is that SteelHooves will want to confiscate Twilight's computer and carry it off to the local Ranger Station, or whatever the fuck. However, again, none of this could be deduced from the details we've been given in the text itself. The author is simply assuming that the reader has played the same video games that he has, is as intimately familiar with the lore of said video games as he is, and will just instinctively understand which parts of Fallout correspond to which parts of FoE. This is extremely bad storytelling.
>Instead, I tried to memorize the stories so that we could share them with him.
Yeah, that will make it up to him. Make your friend stand out in the cold playing with his balls for four hours, and then bore the crap out of him with a bunch of contextless thirdhand stories the next time you see him. You've really got this "friendship" thing down, LP; no wonder you're the glorious hero that everypony loves to love.
Anyway, Spike launches into a story about the first winter wrap up that he and Twilight attended in Ponyville. Once more to the author's credit, the story is told in a way that the reader can follow it regardless of their level of familiarity with the MLP episode from which it's derived. Also to his credit, he manages to tie the event in to the lore of his own story: he explains that since earth ponies have no magic and no wings, they need to work harder to accomplish tasks that are simpler for unicorns and pegasi. As such, they were more inclined to develop technology in order to keep pace with the more naturally gifted types of ponies; hence, the Ministry of Technology was mainly an earth pony project.
Anyway, Spike stops mid-sentence to yell at SteelHooves, who has suddenly wandered into the cave. Presumably, he wants to know what the fuck is taking everypony so long, and how long they expect him to stand outside playing Tetris on his armor-visor-thingy while they hang out drinking soda and goofing around.
>SteelHooves was backing into the cave.
>Not good.
Is there some significance to his entering a room ass-first that I'm not aware of? My understanding is that among kkat's kind, a man presenting his ass to another man is taken as a gesture of trust and goodwill.
>“Sorry to intrude,” the Steel Ranger said. “But you have more company. Fry me if you must, but you might want to deal with them first.”
>Four pegasus ponies completely entombed in nightmarish black Pegasus Enclave armor flew into the room, landing in front of us.
Oh, I see. He was fighting enemies, I guess. He backed into the room because he was focused on fighting them. This is a pretty dumb way of describing something relatively simple, but whatever.
Anyway, Spike and the Enclave pegasi face off. Spike tells them they are not welcome in his cave, the Enclave informs him that his visitors are not welcome above the clouds, and they have come to escort them back to ground level.
>>304506
>“Well lookee who it is!” one of the female Enclave pegasi called out with a whistle. “We got ourselves a Dashite!”
That Calamity shore do got a purdy mouth, I tell ya whut. Seriously; the accents in this story are pretty atrocious. For one thing, almost all of the characters speak in pretty much the same dialect, with the exception of a handful of random characters who for some reason speak in this heavy-handed country patois. It's either all or nothing with the accents, and it's quite jarring.
Anyway, the Enclave pegasi all seem to recognize Calamity, calling him "Deadshot Calamity." We are treated to yet another glimpse at Calamity's past; no details have yet been revealed, but it's heavily implied that there's more to the story he told earlier, about being chased out of the settlement as a "Dashite" or whatever. One of them insinuates that he may have murdered someone (though this is hardly shocking in itself; this guy probably kills five or six ponies before breakfast every morning).
The pegasi seem to have no grievance with the rest of them, provided they agree to leave their territory, but they insist on taking Calamity into custody. Spike does not seem inclined to go along with this.
>“You seem to forget who is tasty and good with ketchup.”
As far as snappy, memorable lines go, this is not exactly "I am the one who knocks," but it's not "all your base are belong to us" either. Half a point here.
They attempt to reason with Spike by offering him the bounty that is apparently on Calamity's head, in exchange for letting them take him. Spike seems tempted for a moment, but ultimately tells them to pound sand.
>Spike snorted a gout of flame into the magical armor through the open visor, setting the Enclave mare on fire inside her enclosed suit. She screamed and thrashed for an unbearably long second or two before perishing. Smoke curled out of seems in the insectoid metal carapace.
This is a bit excessive, to say the least. Also, it's "seams," not "seems."
Anyway, the remaining pegasi flee, but Spike seems to believe that this is not the end of their trouble. The scene ends here.
I'll say that this is actually a pretty well-done scene overall. It begins and ends appropriately, everything that happens in the middle makes sense and is essential to the story in some way, the pacing is good, the show references are tasteful and well-utilized. Aside from a few moments of awkward description and some cornball dialogue here and there, I actually have very few objections. Congratulations, kkat; you finally managed to write a pretty decent scene, and I only had to slog through 200,000 some-odd words of pure shit to find it. Nice job.
Page break. Unfortunately, the next scene is a return to the usual mediocrity. The long slog continues.
Spike tells the group he can handle the pegasus whatever the fuck Enclave, assuring LP & Co. that they probably won't even bother him if they come back and see that Calamity is gone. Apparently they just want Calamity, and could care less that Spike just blatantly murdered one of their own, using an excessively cruel and gruesome method that was not even remotely necessary. Littlepoop's primary concern is that whatchamadoozit computer thingy, and wants to make sure that the Enclave doesn't get their hooves on it, because that would be bad, because reasons I guess. So, they decide to intentionally keep flying above the clouds in order to draw the Enclave's attention away from Spike.
Velvet, whose on-again-off-again compassion for all living things seems to be even more off-again than usual, has only one question: what's the deal with those white towers she saw while they were flying here? I, for one, don't recall any mention of any towers during the flight scene, which is odd, seeing as how Littlepoop was able to spot a beach-ball sized recording device floating around in the clouds, and the text made specific mention of that. You'd think some mysterious goddamn gigantic white towers sticking out of the clouds would draw her attention at least long enough to bear a quick mention; then again, this narrator has an established history of not mentioning gigantic fucking towers that would be nearly impossible to miss. Maybe they weren't under 'E'. Meanwhile, the corpse of the pegasus that Spike just roasted alive in her own armor for basically no reason is apparently just smoldering in the corner, completely forgotten by all.
Anyway, it turns out that the towers were related to something called either the Single Pony Project or the Sustainable Pegasus Project, depending on who you ask. Spike doesn't seem to know the particulars, but it was apparently the only official project that the Ministry of Awesome was involved in. We are treated to a long, rambling explanation of the project's function, prefaced by a long, rambling conversation about which name is correct. The whole thing is made even more excruciating by Calamity's exaggerated hillbilly drawl rendering most of it incomprehensible. As to the actual function of the towers, it has something to do with enabling pegasi to grow crops in the fucking sky or something, because that totally makes sense. I'm not even going to bother questioning this; I don't even remotely give a shit how any of this stuff is supposed to work at this point.
Oh, it also turns out that these towers are indeed the same towers that Homage uses to power her spy camera network, and I guess it also powers her radio broadcast, which wasn't mentioned. Also, Red Eye is using them for something I guess. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like these towers are PRETTY GODDAMNED FUCKING IMPORTANT. Seems like they ought to have been mentioned early and often throughout most of this story; at the very least, we should not be asking "wait a minute, what towers?" every time they come up. Particularly since, in addition to being apparently plot-critical, they are also a prominent part of the goddamn skyline.
>“Well lookee who it is!” one of the female Enclave pegasi called out with a whistle. “We got ourselves a Dashite!”
That Calamity shore do got a purdy mouth, I tell ya whut. Seriously; the accents in this story are pretty atrocious. For one thing, almost all of the characters speak in pretty much the same dialect, with the exception of a handful of random characters who for some reason speak in this heavy-handed country patois. It's either all or nothing with the accents, and it's quite jarring.
Anyway, the Enclave pegasi all seem to recognize Calamity, calling him "Deadshot Calamity." We are treated to yet another glimpse at Calamity's past; no details have yet been revealed, but it's heavily implied that there's more to the story he told earlier, about being chased out of the settlement as a "Dashite" or whatever. One of them insinuates that he may have murdered someone (though this is hardly shocking in itself; this guy probably kills five or six ponies before breakfast every morning).
The pegasi seem to have no grievance with the rest of them, provided they agree to leave their territory, but they insist on taking Calamity into custody. Spike does not seem inclined to go along with this.
>“You seem to forget who is tasty and good with ketchup.”
As far as snappy, memorable lines go, this is not exactly "I am the one who knocks," but it's not "all your base are belong to us" either. Half a point here.
They attempt to reason with Spike by offering him the bounty that is apparently on Calamity's head, in exchange for letting them take him. Spike seems tempted for a moment, but ultimately tells them to pound sand.
>Spike snorted a gout of flame into the magical armor through the open visor, setting the Enclave mare on fire inside her enclosed suit. She screamed and thrashed for an unbearably long second or two before perishing. Smoke curled out of seems in the insectoid metal carapace.
This is a bit excessive, to say the least. Also, it's "seams," not "seems."
Anyway, the remaining pegasi flee, but Spike seems to believe that this is not the end of their trouble. The scene ends here.
I'll say that this is actually a pretty well-done scene overall. It begins and ends appropriately, everything that happens in the middle makes sense and is essential to the story in some way, the pacing is good, the show references are tasteful and well-utilized. Aside from a few moments of awkward description and some cornball dialogue here and there, I actually have very few objections. Congratulations, kkat; you finally managed to write a pretty decent scene, and I only had to slog through 200,000 some-odd words of pure shit to find it. Nice job.
Page break. Unfortunately, the next scene is a return to the usual mediocrity. The long slog continues.
Spike tells the group he can handle the pegasus whatever the fuck Enclave, assuring LP & Co. that they probably won't even bother him if they come back and see that Calamity is gone. Apparently they just want Calamity, and could care less that Spike just blatantly murdered one of their own, using an excessively cruel and gruesome method that was not even remotely necessary. Littlepoop's primary concern is that whatchamadoozit computer thingy, and wants to make sure that the Enclave doesn't get their hooves on it, because that would be bad, because reasons I guess. So, they decide to intentionally keep flying above the clouds in order to draw the Enclave's attention away from Spike.
Velvet, whose on-again-off-again compassion for all living things seems to be even more off-again than usual, has only one question: what's the deal with those white towers she saw while they were flying here? I, for one, don't recall any mention of any towers during the flight scene, which is odd, seeing as how Littlepoop was able to spot a beach-ball sized recording device floating around in the clouds, and the text made specific mention of that. You'd think some mysterious goddamn gigantic white towers sticking out of the clouds would draw her attention at least long enough to bear a quick mention; then again, this narrator has an established history of not mentioning gigantic fucking towers that would be nearly impossible to miss. Maybe they weren't under 'E'. Meanwhile, the corpse of the pegasus that Spike just roasted alive in her own armor for basically no reason is apparently just smoldering in the corner, completely forgotten by all.
Anyway, it turns out that the towers were related to something called either the Single Pony Project or the Sustainable Pegasus Project, depending on who you ask. Spike doesn't seem to know the particulars, but it was apparently the only official project that the Ministry of Awesome was involved in. We are treated to a long, rambling explanation of the project's function, prefaced by a long, rambling conversation about which name is correct. The whole thing is made even more excruciating by Calamity's exaggerated hillbilly drawl rendering most of it incomprehensible. As to the actual function of the towers, it has something to do with enabling pegasi to grow crops in the fucking sky or something, because that totally makes sense. I'm not even going to bother questioning this; I don't even remotely give a shit how any of this stuff is supposed to work at this point.
Oh, it also turns out that these towers are indeed the same towers that Homage uses to power her spy camera network, and I guess it also powers her radio broadcast, which wasn't mentioned. Also, Red Eye is using them for something I guess. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like these towers are PRETTY GODDAMNED FUCKING IMPORTANT. Seems like they ought to have been mentioned early and often throughout most of this story; at the very least, we should not be asking "wait a minute, what towers?" every time they come up. Particularly since, in addition to being apparently plot-critical, they are also a prominent part of the goddamn skyline.
>>304511
Is it weird that a pony burning to a charred crisp inside that power armour suit doesn't melt it at all, yet nopony considers looting that sick enclave armour and giving it to Calamity or selling it to a mechanic/curio trader?
Sure he probably wouldn't want to wear their armour when wandering around the world. Someone might see it and assume he's Enclave like how he once assumed LP was a Raider just for wearing Raider clothes.
But if he painted it to look different and drew a crossed red circle over the Enclave symbol, maybe even painted a big symbol of his own onto the suit, nobody who saw him would assume he's Enclave.
Like the difference between Brotherhood Of Steel Power Armour and NCR Heavy Trooper armour: The NCR repainted it. And tore out the internal Power Armour mechanisms until it was basically just thick plate mail, so NCR troops without proper training can pilot it. But since Calamity is a Dashite, he'd know how to pilot power armour so that stage wouldn't be necessary.
It's bad writing that the author doesn't make the Enclave armour suit melt from the heat and stick to that chick as it kills her, right? Tons of bad authors assume just because Flame doesn't work on armoured enemies in Spyro, that must be how it works IRL.
Is it weird that a pony burning to a charred crisp inside that power armour suit doesn't melt it at all, yet nopony considers looting that sick enclave armour and giving it to Calamity or selling it to a mechanic/curio trader?
Sure he probably wouldn't want to wear their armour when wandering around the world. Someone might see it and assume he's Enclave like how he once assumed LP was a Raider just for wearing Raider clothes.
But if he painted it to look different and drew a crossed red circle over the Enclave symbol, maybe even painted a big symbol of his own onto the suit, nobody who saw him would assume he's Enclave.
Like the difference between Brotherhood Of Steel Power Armour and NCR Heavy Trooper armour: The NCR repainted it. And tore out the internal Power Armour mechanisms until it was basically just thick plate mail, so NCR troops without proper training can pilot it. But since Calamity is a Dashite, he'd know how to pilot power armour so that stage wouldn't be necessary.
It's bad writing that the author doesn't make the Enclave armour suit melt from the heat and stick to that chick as it kills her, right? Tons of bad authors assume just because Flame doesn't work on armoured enemies in Spyro, that must be how it works IRL.
>>304511
>Spike snorted a gout of flame into the magical armor through the open visor, setting the Enclave mare on fire inside her enclosed suit. She screamed and thrashed for an unbearably long second or two before perishing. Smoke curled out of seems in the insectoid metal carapace.
This is pretty out of character for Spike - though I suppose two hundred years and the importance of keeping the Gardens safe might constitute a vague excuse. Presumably his intent is to demonstrate how dangerous he is to the Enclave so that they decide he's not worth the trouble of hassling.
On the other hand, various things we see about the Enclave later on would seem to contradict this. The Enclave aren't just extremely reactionary, but they even have an arsenal of weapons designed specifically to kill dragons. Spike has to be aware of the possibility that the Enclave might act in reprisal for killing one of their soldiers, but doesn't consider it a problem because...?
Something bizarre about this particular scene is that it's referenced much, much later towards the end of the story. Spike's breath doesn't simply burn things - it teleports them to Celestia, as with the letters Twilight sends in FiM. When Littlepip gets teleported in the exact same way, she finds the fully intact corpse of this Enclave mare at the destination point. There should be nothing left of the mare aside from an empty suit of armor. But the presentation of this scene suggests that the Enclave mare burns painfully to death on the spot. There's no mention of a charred corpse - or conspicuous lack thereof - when either would be extremely awkward to leave lying around. As far as the narration is concerned, this pony ceases to exist immediately after dying.
And on that note, why do Pip and the others have no real objection to Spike murdering someone just for speaking out of line? Especially when he's just revealed their grand quest to live up to the moral legacy of the FiM-era main six?
>Spike snorted a gout of flame into the magical armor through the open visor, setting the Enclave mare on fire inside her enclosed suit. She screamed and thrashed for an unbearably long second or two before perishing. Smoke curled out of seems in the insectoid metal carapace.
This is pretty out of character for Spike - though I suppose two hundred years and the importance of keeping the Gardens safe might constitute a vague excuse. Presumably his intent is to demonstrate how dangerous he is to the Enclave so that they decide he's not worth the trouble of hassling.
On the other hand, various things we see about the Enclave later on would seem to contradict this. The Enclave aren't just extremely reactionary, but they even have an arsenal of weapons designed specifically to kill dragons. Spike has to be aware of the possibility that the Enclave might act in reprisal for killing one of their soldiers, but doesn't consider it a problem because...?
Something bizarre about this particular scene is that it's referenced much, much later towards the end of the story. Spike's breath doesn't simply burn things - it teleports them to Celestia, as with the letters Twilight sends in FiM. When Littlepip gets teleported in the exact same way, she finds the fully intact corpse of this Enclave mare at the destination point. There should be nothing left of the mare aside from an empty suit of armor. But the presentation of this scene suggests that the Enclave mare burns painfully to death on the spot. There's no mention of a charred corpse - or conspicuous lack thereof - when either would be extremely awkward to leave lying around. As far as the narration is concerned, this pony ceases to exist immediately after dying.
And on that note, why do Pip and the others have no real objection to Spike murdering someone just for speaking out of line? Especially when he's just revealed their grand quest to live up to the moral legacy of the FiM-era main six?
>>304506
>the author has done literally fuck all to explain what that connection is, or why that would make SteelHooves any more of a security risk than any of the rest of them
See chapter 18:
>“The Steel Rangers,” Homage explained over our glasses of wine, “Are the old guard of the Ministry of Wartime Technology. They see themselves as the knights of the greatness of the past, which they consider to be tied to Equestria’s advancements in technology and industry, and custodians of the technology that their Ministry helped create.
>“Honestly, most of them would be more interested in saving your PipBuck than saving you.”
>the author has done literally fuck all to explain what that connection is, or why that would make SteelHooves any more of a security risk than any of the rest of them
See chapter 18:
>“The Steel Rangers,” Homage explained over our glasses of wine, “Are the old guard of the Ministry of Wartime Technology. They see themselves as the knights of the greatness of the past, which they consider to be tied to Equestria’s advancements in technology and industry, and custodians of the technology that their Ministry helped create.
>“Honestly, most of them would be more interested in saving your PipBuck than saving you.”
>>304527
I think this author has spent longer describing safes and LP's process of lockpicking them than he's spent explaining who the "Steel Rangers" are.
When it comes to keeping a BOS Knockoff guy out of Spike's cave with the Semi-Deus Ex Machina machine, more dialogue should have been spent explaining this and reminding the audience what the BOS is.
...wait a fucking second
The Brotherhood of Steel want to hoard technology for themselves, getting their Scribes to maintain it and their Paladins to protect it+find new tech.
Kkat's bad copy of these guys... Their goal is to protect and hoard tech invented by AJ's ministry, right?
So why wouldn't Spike want them to get their hooves on this machine?
Protecting tech (magitech, in this case) is their goal. Maintaining it, preserving it, and protecting it from misuse. Their definition of misuse includes letting non-BOS members have it.
It's not like they'll tear the Gardens Of Equestria Cockfuckery Kitsch apart and reverse-engineer what it's made from into a bunch of grenades that lethally transform enemies caught in the blast into fresh fruit.
What, is Spike afraid the Steel Rangers/Rangerhood of Steel would want to keep this place off limits to outsiders? That makes no sense! The BOS isn't just the way they are because "hurr durr that's their gimmick", they are that way because they unironically believe the best way to prevent further nuclear devastation of the planet is to not let retards have any tech deadlier than a water purifier or laser pistol. Or they unironically believe the religious commandments of their silly little holy book named The Codex.
The Brotherhood Of Steel (when they're written well and they aren't just power rangers fighting baddies for no reason or one of two evil factions that randomly became "fashist" anti-mutant "racists") want to avert the next apocalypse through force. They're a fragment of the US Military that split off and decided this is the way to give humanity a future no retarded country with nukes could take away. The Mojave chapter nearly wiped itself out fighting the NCR while trying to take over a power plant that powered a death-ray space satellite. If you gave them a way to undo the apocalypse they'd love you forever.
I think this author has spent longer describing safes and LP's process of lockpicking them than he's spent explaining who the "Steel Rangers" are.
When it comes to keeping a BOS Knockoff guy out of Spike's cave with the Semi-Deus Ex Machina machine, more dialogue should have been spent explaining this and reminding the audience what the BOS is.
...wait a fucking second
The Brotherhood of Steel want to hoard technology for themselves, getting their Scribes to maintain it and their Paladins to protect it+find new tech.
Kkat's bad copy of these guys... Their goal is to protect and hoard tech invented by AJ's ministry, right?
So why wouldn't Spike want them to get their hooves on this machine?
Protecting tech (magitech, in this case) is their goal. Maintaining it, preserving it, and protecting it from misuse. Their definition of misuse includes letting non-BOS members have it.
It's not like they'll tear the Gardens Of Equestria Cockfuckery Kitsch apart and reverse-engineer what it's made from into a bunch of grenades that lethally transform enemies caught in the blast into fresh fruit.
What, is Spike afraid the Steel Rangers/Rangerhood of Steel would want to keep this place off limits to outsiders? That makes no sense! The BOS isn't just the way they are because "hurr durr that's their gimmick", they are that way because they unironically believe the best way to prevent further nuclear devastation of the planet is to not let retards have any tech deadlier than a water purifier or laser pistol. Or they unironically believe the religious commandments of their silly little holy book named The Codex.
The Brotherhood Of Steel (when they're written well and they aren't just power rangers fighting baddies for no reason or one of two evil factions that randomly became "fashist" anti-mutant "racists") want to avert the next apocalypse through force. They're a fragment of the US Military that split off and decided this is the way to give humanity a future no retarded country with nukes could take away. The Mojave chapter nearly wiped itself out fighting the NCR while trying to take over a power plant that powered a death-ray space satellite. If you gave them a way to undo the apocalypse they'd love you forever.
>>304530
The Steel Rangers seem to have a policy of "shoot first and ask questions later" when it comes to acquiring technology (see the invasion of Stable 2 and the Bucklyn Cross incident). Spike likely fears that, if the Steel Rangers learn of Gardens of Equestria, they will invade the cave and kill him without giving him a chance to talk, and possibly damaging Gardens in the process.
In addition, Spike's mission is to preserve Gardens so it can eventually be used to heal Equestria. The Rangers seem unlikely to ever bother to attempt to find new bearers of the Elements of Harmony and almost certainly will never allow it to be used, thus giving Spike a reason to maintain it himself.
Plus, its probably safer with him anyway - the Rangers don't have the numbers to adequately protect a cave in the middle of nowhere within the sphere of influence of the Enclave.
The Steel Rangers seem to have a policy of "shoot first and ask questions later" when it comes to acquiring technology (see the invasion of Stable 2 and the Bucklyn Cross incident). Spike likely fears that, if the Steel Rangers learn of Gardens of Equestria, they will invade the cave and kill him without giving him a chance to talk, and possibly damaging Gardens in the process.
In addition, Spike's mission is to preserve Gardens so it can eventually be used to heal Equestria. The Rangers seem unlikely to ever bother to attempt to find new bearers of the Elements of Harmony and almost certainly will never allow it to be used, thus giving Spike a reason to maintain it himself.
Plus, its probably safer with him anyway - the Rangers don't have the numbers to adequately protect a cave in the middle of nowhere within the sphere of influence of the Enclave.
>>304531
I guess it makes sense for the story to turn out this way considering what the author decided for its elements, but I think this is a missed opportunity to create an interesting take on the BOS: Making them actively try to un-nuke the world, something that could only be done in FIM.
Or in Fallout 5 if BugthEAsderp decide to jump that shark harder than they jumped it with the Zeta Mothership.
>>304511
Hey Glim can I add "The Spiderses" to your list of fanfics to review? I promise you'll hate it.
I guess it makes sense for the story to turn out this way considering what the author decided for its elements, but I think this is a missed opportunity to create an interesting take on the BOS: Making them actively try to un-nuke the world, something that could only be done in FIM.
Or in Fallout 5 if BugthEAsderp decide to jump that shark harder than they jumped it with the Zeta Mothership.
>>304511
Hey Glim can I add "The Spiderses" to your list of fanfics to review? I promise you'll hate it.
>>304531
>(see the invasion of Stable 2 and the Bucklyn Cross incident)
>The Rangers seem unlikely to ever bother to attempt to find new bearers of the Elements of Harmony and almost certainly will never allow it to be used, thus giving Spike a reason to maintain it himself.
Neither of these have happened yet, and won't for many chapters yet to come, so the problem remains that from the perspective of a new reader, virtually nothing has been presented that would justify distrust of the rangers. Steelhooves is the only steel ranger encountered thus far, and therefore our only direct source of information on them. Aside from generally being an asshole, he doesn't seem to be so dumb or evil as to jeopardize the only known hope for Equestria just because.
Granted, 'dumb and evil just because' is the default for antagonists in this story, but that doesn't resolve the issue. Once again, Kkat is relying on the reader to prejudge the factions in his setting based on specific knowledge of a videogame.
>(see the invasion of Stable 2 and the Bucklyn Cross incident)
>The Rangers seem unlikely to ever bother to attempt to find new bearers of the Elements of Harmony and almost certainly will never allow it to be used, thus giving Spike a reason to maintain it himself.
Neither of these have happened yet, and won't for many chapters yet to come, so the problem remains that from the perspective of a new reader, virtually nothing has been presented that would justify distrust of the rangers. Steelhooves is the only steel ranger encountered thus far, and therefore our only direct source of information on them. Aside from generally being an asshole, he doesn't seem to be so dumb or evil as to jeopardize the only known hope for Equestria just because.
Granted, 'dumb and evil just because' is the default for antagonists in this story, but that doesn't resolve the issue. Once again, Kkat is relying on the reader to prejudge the factions in his setting based on specific knowledge of a videogame.
>>304511
For some reason, Littlepoop chooses now of all times to blather out this random chain of pure autism:
>I hadn’t told Homage about SteelHooves’ deception. He’d used DJ Pon3’s radio broadcast to spread his lie about Chief Grim Star. (I had to wonder how somepony like SteelHooves managed to find himself in a romantic relationship with the mare of the Element of Honesty.) I expected that Homage would be personally offended. I didn’t want to be the bearer of a message that caused her pain. But I didn’t keep my mouth shut just because I didn’t want to upset her.
>She might feel provoked to air what I told her, even though I could offer no evidence to back it up. Yet what good would that serve?
>More likely, I suspected she would choose not to air it. Like my struggles with addiction, or her real identity, sometimes secrets had their place. Homage understood that. That wonderful unicorn had more personal integrity than any pony I’d ever met, and I couldn’t bear to put her in a morally uncomfortable position. Especially not after Monterey Jack.
Seriously; it's like this guy just lets his cat walk around on his keyboard.
Anyway, she says goodbye to Spike and they all climb aboard the Good Ship Lollipop to jet off to God knows where. The parting is given special emphasis:
>I trotted to the mouth of the cave and then looked back towards Spike. “I guess… this is it then?” Watcher had helped me; without him I might not have survived. He helped give me purpose, a goal… and ultimately friendship. But now it was clear that we were not the ponies he was looking for. And he needed to focus his attention elsewhere.
Does this mean that Frank/Spike/Watcher is out of the story for good? Will he be back? Will Littlepoop actually turn out to be the pony he's looking for, or is that a red herring? If not, was there even a point to any of this? I can't even pretend to know where this raging river of diarrhea is taking me at this point; I'm just holding on for dear life.
>I was about to step into the Sky Bandit when I was hit by an epiphany. Turning, I galloped back into the cave.
>Honesty. It was about more than just telling the truth. It was about integrity.
>“Spike!” I cried out. “I know one of the other ponies you’re looking for!”
Who will this mystery pony be? Is it Zombie Derpy? Silver Bell? Pinkie Pie's calcified skeleton? Officer Barbrady?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Taj7jP8cVGs
Page break. The party is in the flying sky wagon thingy, being chased by the Enclave. Calamity pulls the wagon into a nose dive in order to lose them. Nothing else happens.
Page break. Like most potentially exciting cliffhangers in this story, this one has no payoff and is a total letdown. Presumably the group survived both Calamity's insane flying and the barrage of laser beams or whatever from the flying bugman pegasus squad, because in the next scene everypony is perfectly fine, no one is chasing them, and they are back at New Appleoosa or the front gate at least, bartering with Derpy for spark batteries they can use to power up the gigantic fifteen foot vibrating dildo that this story keeps forcibly ramming into me every time I think it's about to develop a plot.
Also, Silver Bell is here:
>Silver Bell looked up, recognizing Velvet Remedy. She froze in her tracks.
>"Hello, Silver Bell," Velvet Remedy said gently. "You're looking beautiful this morning."
>Silver Bell looked everywhere but at Velvet.
These guys may want to start watching Velvet a little more closely around foals.
Anyway, Velvet shows Silver Bell her balefire phoenix and asks if she'd like to also see the back of her ice cream truck. Meanwhile, Calamity and Littlepoop have a an unrelated side conversation.
>I looked up at Calamity. The rust-colored pegasus with the orange mane and black desperado hat was probably the closest friend I had.
That's honestly pretty sad. She knows like three things total about this guy: he likes to shoot stuff, he says "yee-haw" a lot, and he has a dark and terrible secret. You could throw a pip-buck out the window and hit somepony upside the head who fits this same description.
She asks an appropriately vague question about what he was running away from back there (besides the enemies who were chasing them), and Calamity replies with an appropriately vague response:
>My friend turned his head towards the ever-present cloud cover. “Ah flew towards somethin’. They jus’ didn’t wanna let me go.”
Page break. After trading for batteries and anal lube, they go back to Junction R7 so Littlepoop can show off her cool hideout with the turret gun mounted on it to SteelHooves, whom she now apparently trusts with secrets. Calamity goes in the back somewhere and sets up his workshop, because that was a thing he said he was going to do at some point.
>I looked around, but could not see where Velvet Remedy had wandered off to.
Uh oh.
>Our next stop was going to be Fillydelphia.
Lmao. I'll believe that when I see it.
Anyway, Littlepoop's inner monologue rambles on for multiple paragraphs about everything and nothing, and finally arrives at the problem of what to do about Velvet Remedy. Not the problem of what to tell the cops when they come by to ask about what happened in the back of the ice cream truck, but the problem of what to tell Velvet about Fluttershy. She decides to ask SteelHooves how she died inb4 bitten by a rabid Angel Bunny. The short version is that nopony knows, but most assume she committed suicide. There is also an obigatory "Fluttershy became a tree" joke (though I'll give kkat a point for it being tastefully understated and at least somewhat in context).
>The Steel Ranger turned away. “Only thing everypony can agree on: Fluttershy lived through the Apocalypse… long enough, at least, for the full horror of it all -- the death of innumerable ponies and animals, the poisoning and disfiguring of the land itself -- to be ground into her soul.”
Imagine typing this with a straight face.
For some reason, Littlepoop chooses now of all times to blather out this random chain of pure autism:
>I hadn’t told Homage about SteelHooves’ deception. He’d used DJ Pon3’s radio broadcast to spread his lie about Chief Grim Star. (I had to wonder how somepony like SteelHooves managed to find himself in a romantic relationship with the mare of the Element of Honesty.) I expected that Homage would be personally offended. I didn’t want to be the bearer of a message that caused her pain. But I didn’t keep my mouth shut just because I didn’t want to upset her.
>She might feel provoked to air what I told her, even though I could offer no evidence to back it up. Yet what good would that serve?
>More likely, I suspected she would choose not to air it. Like my struggles with addiction, or her real identity, sometimes secrets had their place. Homage understood that. That wonderful unicorn had more personal integrity than any pony I’d ever met, and I couldn’t bear to put her in a morally uncomfortable position. Especially not after Monterey Jack.
Seriously; it's like this guy just lets his cat walk around on his keyboard.
Anyway, she says goodbye to Spike and they all climb aboard the Good Ship Lollipop to jet off to God knows where. The parting is given special emphasis:
>I trotted to the mouth of the cave and then looked back towards Spike. “I guess… this is it then?” Watcher had helped me; without him I might not have survived. He helped give me purpose, a goal… and ultimately friendship. But now it was clear that we were not the ponies he was looking for. And he needed to focus his attention elsewhere.
Does this mean that Frank/Spike/Watcher is out of the story for good? Will he be back? Will Littlepoop actually turn out to be the pony he's looking for, or is that a red herring? If not, was there even a point to any of this? I can't even pretend to know where this raging river of diarrhea is taking me at this point; I'm just holding on for dear life.
>I was about to step into the Sky Bandit when I was hit by an epiphany. Turning, I galloped back into the cave.
>Honesty. It was about more than just telling the truth. It was about integrity.
>“Spike!” I cried out. “I know one of the other ponies you’re looking for!”
Who will this mystery pony be? Is it Zombie Derpy? Silver Bell? Pinkie Pie's calcified skeleton? Officer Barbrady?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Taj7jP8cVGs
Page break. The party is in the flying sky wagon thingy, being chased by the Enclave. Calamity pulls the wagon into a nose dive in order to lose them. Nothing else happens.
Page break. Like most potentially exciting cliffhangers in this story, this one has no payoff and is a total letdown. Presumably the group survived both Calamity's insane flying and the barrage of laser beams or whatever from the flying bugman pegasus squad, because in the next scene everypony is perfectly fine, no one is chasing them, and they are back at New Appleoosa or the front gate at least, bartering with Derpy for spark batteries they can use to power up the gigantic fifteen foot vibrating dildo that this story keeps forcibly ramming into me every time I think it's about to develop a plot.
Also, Silver Bell is here:
>Silver Bell looked up, recognizing Velvet Remedy. She froze in her tracks.
>"Hello, Silver Bell," Velvet Remedy said gently. "You're looking beautiful this morning."
>Silver Bell looked everywhere but at Velvet.
These guys may want to start watching Velvet a little more closely around foals.
Anyway, Velvet shows Silver Bell her balefire phoenix and asks if she'd like to also see the back of her ice cream truck. Meanwhile, Calamity and Littlepoop have a an unrelated side conversation.
>I looked up at Calamity. The rust-colored pegasus with the orange mane and black desperado hat was probably the closest friend I had.
That's honestly pretty sad. She knows like three things total about this guy: he likes to shoot stuff, he says "yee-haw" a lot, and he has a dark and terrible secret. You could throw a pip-buck out the window and hit somepony upside the head who fits this same description.
She asks an appropriately vague question about what he was running away from back there (besides the enemies who were chasing them), and Calamity replies with an appropriately vague response:
>My friend turned his head towards the ever-present cloud cover. “Ah flew towards somethin’. They jus’ didn’t wanna let me go.”
Page break. After trading for batteries and anal lube, they go back to Junction R7 so Littlepoop can show off her cool hideout with the turret gun mounted on it to SteelHooves, whom she now apparently trusts with secrets. Calamity goes in the back somewhere and sets up his workshop, because that was a thing he said he was going to do at some point.
>I looked around, but could not see where Velvet Remedy had wandered off to.
Uh oh.
>Our next stop was going to be Fillydelphia.
Lmao. I'll believe that when I see it.
Anyway, Littlepoop's inner monologue rambles on for multiple paragraphs about everything and nothing, and finally arrives at the problem of what to do about Velvet Remedy. Not the problem of what to tell the cops when they come by to ask about what happened in the back of the ice cream truck, but the problem of what to tell Velvet about Fluttershy. She decides to ask SteelHooves how she died inb4 bitten by a rabid Angel Bunny. The short version is that nopony knows, but most assume she committed suicide. There is also an obigatory "Fluttershy became a tree" joke (though I'll give kkat a point for it being tastefully understated and at least somewhat in context).
>The Steel Ranger turned away. “Only thing everypony can agree on: Fluttershy lived through the Apocalypse… long enough, at least, for the full horror of it all -- the death of innumerable ponies and animals, the poisoning and disfiguring of the land itself -- to be ground into her soul.”
Imagine typing this with a straight face.
It's bad that LP has such great luck with locked safes, right?
She always seems to find good shit in them and never gets ripped off or triggers a shotgun inside the safe to fire at her.
The idea that you should save lockpicks for important things more likely to contain treasure never comes up.
LP always has enough lockpicks or just barely enough.
imagine being LP and
https://youtu.be/znbzbhIFThw
spending ages on a locked door only for it to just contain 11 cents in now-useless pony money.
She always seems to find good shit in them and never gets ripped off or triggers a shotgun inside the safe to fire at her.
The idea that you should save lockpicks for important things more likely to contain treasure never comes up.
LP always has enough lockpicks or just barely enough.
imagine being LP and
https://youtu.be/znbzbhIFThw
spending ages on a locked door only for it to just contain 11 cents in now-useless pony money.
>>304645
Littlepip easily opening safes full of useful goodies is less of a problem than the fact that she just finds stuff. We're supposed to believe that Equestria's been in a state of severe resource deprivation for the past 200 years. Scavenging has been a way of life in this setting for generations, yet Littlepip stumbles across food, weapons, ammunition and information constantly and with ease. The setting doesn't just sabotage its own attempt at a serious tone by behaving like a videogame - it behaves like a videogame that exists specifically for her.
Littlepip easily opening safes full of useful goodies is less of a problem than the fact that she just finds stuff. We're supposed to believe that Equestria's been in a state of severe resource deprivation for the past 200 years. Scavenging has been a way of life in this setting for generations, yet Littlepip stumbles across food, weapons, ammunition and information constantly and with ease. The setting doesn't just sabotage its own attempt at a serious tone by behaving like a videogame - it behaves like a videogame that exists specifically for her.
>>304648
Yeah, that too.
Same goes for LP's terrible tactics and equipment.
LP relies too much on surviving gunshots with her plot armour and absurdly cartoonish "I can take gunshots without screaming" toughness. It'd be more realistic if all bullets were deadly and she prioritized hiding and sniping over killing in all-out firefights.
From what I've seen in literature so far, it seems good stories that take place in hazardous hardcore settings where death happens often... If they don't want to armour and heavily arm their protagonists, they make up excuses for it
such as "We want to look unassuming and helpless so arming ourselves to the teeth in leather or plate mail while strapping no less than thirty concealed blades and throwing knives to our body while lugging around giant weapons would attract too much attention"
or "Armour is rare and really fucking expensive because it's so great and if you kill an armoured enemy it usually damages the armour, stopping you from taking it and wearing it yourself"
or "Us super-people are tougher than concrete and only magical lasers can harm us so it doesn't really matter if we wear plate mail or spandex or nothing at all"
or "We're facing opponents whose punches dent steel and guns pierce tanks when we aren't fighting giant monsters whose bites destroy concrete. Any armour tough enough to protect you from them would be too heavy for you to lift, it would slow you down and make you too heavy for long-distance travel/riding on giant bird-back/riding on horseback"
For another fanfiction example, stories where Naruto "gets hardcore" according to the author's definition of cool and overdresses for his job as a ninja are so common, it's difficult to parody how over-the-top things can get
Man, you should see how excessive the outfits of characters with silly names/codenames like DestructionBlood DarkGod (Hakaichi Yamikami in Japanese) could get
And these fuckers wouldn't just wear their spiked armour and fifty blades to raging battlefields, or even missions where they expected to encounter combat
They'd wear their spiked eyesore costumes to stealthy assassination missions and recon missions
They'd even wear these outfits around the ninja village on their time off, while getting smoothies and ramen noodles at the ninja mall and casually chatting about ninja politics.
They'd sleep in their serrated-spiked armour because the author put no thought into how comfortable this shit would be to wear
Naruto can be twelve or ten or less, "dripped out to the nines" (fucking kill me) in thick flexible leather and anachronistic kevlar body armour with random plates and velcro pockets for magically-weighted training weights and a leather Dante-Knockoff Longcoat with even more training weights to dramatically throw off before fights and a shitton of knives and katanas and other weapons strapped to him, on top of whatever crap is magically stored in Bag-Of-Holding Sealing Symbols he carries around in scrolls or has tattooed onto his body/painted onto his armour
Hell, there was one fic that focused on his mom surviving, yet she still dressed the boy in body armour constantly, making each of his birthday presents a new larger set of overdesigned gaudy eye-catching armour that got dumber every year
Still, authors that want to take the piss out of dressing like you're trying to impress older ninja who travel light for a reason made sure to do that, so they could justify why their characters don't dress like they're trying to out-edge Shadow the Hedgehog and one-up Fire Emblem characters in the excessive armour department.
Yeah, that too.
Same goes for LP's terrible tactics and equipment.
LP relies too much on surviving gunshots with her plot armour and absurdly cartoonish "I can take gunshots without screaming" toughness. It'd be more realistic if all bullets were deadly and she prioritized hiding and sniping over killing in all-out firefights.
From what I've seen in literature so far, it seems good stories that take place in hazardous hardcore settings where death happens often... If they don't want to armour and heavily arm their protagonists, they make up excuses for it
such as "We want to look unassuming and helpless so arming ourselves to the teeth in leather or plate mail while strapping no less than thirty concealed blades and throwing knives to our body while lugging around giant weapons would attract too much attention"
or "Armour is rare and really fucking expensive because it's so great and if you kill an armoured enemy it usually damages the armour, stopping you from taking it and wearing it yourself"
or "Us super-people are tougher than concrete and only magical lasers can harm us so it doesn't really matter if we wear plate mail or spandex or nothing at all"
or "We're facing opponents whose punches dent steel and guns pierce tanks when we aren't fighting giant monsters whose bites destroy concrete. Any armour tough enough to protect you from them would be too heavy for you to lift, it would slow you down and make you too heavy for long-distance travel/riding on giant bird-back/riding on horseback"
For another fanfiction example, stories where Naruto "gets hardcore" according to the author's definition of cool and overdresses for his job as a ninja are so common, it's difficult to parody how over-the-top things can get
Man, you should see how excessive the outfits of characters with silly names/codenames like DestructionBlood DarkGod (Hakaichi Yamikami in Japanese) could get
And these fuckers wouldn't just wear their spiked armour and fifty blades to raging battlefields, or even missions where they expected to encounter combat
They'd wear their spiked eyesore costumes to stealthy assassination missions and recon missions
They'd even wear these outfits around the ninja village on their time off, while getting smoothies and ramen noodles at the ninja mall and casually chatting about ninja politics.
They'd sleep in their serrated-spiked armour because the author put no thought into how comfortable this shit would be to wear
Naruto can be twelve or ten or less, "dripped out to the nines" (fucking kill me) in thick flexible leather and anachronistic kevlar body armour with random plates and velcro pockets for magically-weighted training weights and a leather Dante-Knockoff Longcoat with even more training weights to dramatically throw off before fights and a shitton of knives and katanas and other weapons strapped to him, on top of whatever crap is magically stored in Bag-Of-Holding Sealing Symbols he carries around in scrolls or has tattooed onto his body/painted onto his armour
Hell, there was one fic that focused on his mom surviving, yet she still dressed the boy in body armour constantly, making each of his birthday presents a new larger set of overdesigned gaudy eye-catching armour that got dumber every year
Still, authors that want to take the piss out of dressing like you're trying to impress older ninja who travel light for a reason made sure to do that, so they could justify why their characters don't dress like they're trying to out-edge Shadow the Hedgehog and one-up Fire Emblem characters in the excessive armour department.
>>304317
>>304593
Thank you for your review. I'm really grateful and I learnt several things about myself and my writing because of it. But I won't go in on here.
I still intend to focus my efforts mostly on my own writing. I don't wanna get stuck reading your reviews instead of writing and such. I want to get good and write my passion project at some point.
On that subject, I need life counselling. That's why I'm here. I'm wondering what you think I should do. There are some passion projects that I want to write but I never write them because they are both big and intemediating in scope and because I want to to be good I become indecisive while making them, I think. Should I just go for them anyway? Or should I write smaller stories that I care less about to prepare. Cycles anyone? It feels like I have had this conversation before but in the reverse or something.
I have decided to write one of my passion projects but I still want your advice on this matter.
I will bite the sour apple and just do it.
This thread has reached its bump limit btw.
>>304593
Thank you for your review. I'm really grateful and I learnt several things about myself and my writing because of it. But I won't go in on here.
I still intend to focus my efforts mostly on my own writing. I don't wanna get stuck reading your reviews instead of writing and such. I want to get good and write my passion project at some point.
On that subject, I need life counselling. That's why I'm here. I'm wondering what you think I should do. There are some passion projects that I want to write but I never write them because they are both big and intemediating in scope and because I want to to be good I become indecisive while making them, I think. Should I just go for them anyway? Or should I write smaller stories that I care less about to prepare. Cycles anyone? It feels like I have had this conversation before but in the reverse or something.
I have decided to write one of my passion projects but I still want your advice on this matter.
I will bite the sour apple and just do it.
This thread has reached its bump limit btw.
>>304486
These are all actually pretty good points. I've never been a huge fan of magic-wand endings that solve every problem in the story in one fell swoop it's a problem in MLP as well, but I'm more inclined to overlook stuff like that in a kids show, but strictly speaking not every ending like that is necessarily a deus ex machina. And yes, I'll grant that it is nice that the story at least has an objective that these characters can aspire to now.
>>304492
>Honestly I think you could handwave Pip knowing what the computer was with a simple line of "Oh a Crusader Maneframe, like that one we encountered in the stable(of course have her interact with it there), or my home stable that I sometimes passed by on my way to the workshops!"
It's not necessarily a problem that she has this knowledge, but it's not the sort of thing you could reasonably expect to be common knowledge. So yes, if the author at least provided some cursory explanation as to how she came across this knowledge it would pretty much be fine. A lot of this story relies on the reader remembering obscure things that were casually mentioned eons ago, so for all I know there was some explanation given a long time ago that's technically valid, but in that case the author would be better off providing a quick refresher. "Oh, the Crusader Supercomputer Whatever, I remember that from _______." Or something to that effect.
>>304501
>Glim would it be good writing if Littlepip went to a rock concert but it is literally a family of Tribals slamming rocks together while living inside a music stadium that was meant to be 3x bigger than anything on earth and double as a bomb shelter?
I don't see how this would add anything meaningful to the story.
>Also is it bad writing that LP started the story with no flaws and had to do drugs to get one?
Yes, though I'd argue that LP actually has many flaws; the problem is that the author doesn't seem to recognize them as such. Sanctimoniousness coupled with a complete lack of any identifiable moral code is not something I would consider a good quality.
One way to handle the kind of character development you're talking about is to give the character a "base" personality, and derive traits from that personality that are both positive and negative. Then, you create problems for the character based on that, that usually involve overcoming weaknesses and building upon strengths. The show does this with the mane 6 characters. For example, Fluttershy's base personality is that she's an introvert with a kind nature. This gives rise to the positive and negative aspects of her character: she's compassionate, empathetic, good with animals, etc, but on the other hand she's shy and tends to let ponies walk all over her. So, you start with that and build problems for her that allow her to develop her strengths while working on her weaknesses. Velvet for instance could have been a much more interesting character if the author had approached her this way.
>>304512
>It's bad writing that the author doesn't make the Enclave armour suit melt from the heat and stick to that chick as it kills her, right?
Not really; it's an irrelevant detail either way, and in terms of accuracy it's realistic enough. Whether or not the armor would melt depends on what it's made of. Does your skillet melt when you put it on the stove burner? Different substances have different melting points, and for most metals the melting point is pretty high. Unless dragon fire canonically burns at an intensely high heat, it's pretty unlikely that the armor would melt; however, the person inside would roast pretty easily.
The major issue here, from where I'm standing, is that Spike really had no reason to do this. If he just wanted to kill one of them to prove a point he could have just stomped on her and broken her neck; there was no reason to torture her to death like this. Also noteworthy is that the Enclave doesn't seem to care that he did this. They only came in there because they wanted to escort LP & Co. out of restricted airspace, and after that they just wanted to take Calamity into custody. I get the impression that Spike has a tenuous relationship with these guys, but they didn't really provoke him to the point that something this brutal would be justified. Realistically this ought to provoke retaliation against him, and if he's trying to protect his magic computer, that should be the last thing he wants.
>>304523
These are all excellent points. One way or the other this part of the story doesn't make much sense.
>>304527
I see. That sort of explains it, but at the same time this really just gives us a rough outline of what the Steel Rangers do and why they do it. The author still seems to be relying on the reader's presumed knowledge of Fallout lore to fill in the blanks here.
Also, if I'm following the details of this correctly, the Steel Rangers would be the knights of AJ's Ministry of Wartime Technology, while the computer was developed by Twilight and/or Twilight's ministry. So would they really be that interested in it? There's still quite a bit the author needs to clarify here in order for this to work.
>>304530
>I think this author has spent longer describing safes and LP's process of lockpicking them than he's spent explaining who the "Steel Rangers" are.
>When it comes to keeping a BOS Knockoff guy out of Spike's cave with the Semi-Deus Ex Machina machine, more dialogue should have been spent explaining this and reminding the audience what the BOS is.
This.
>why wouldn't Spike want them to get their hooves on this machine?
This is also a good point.
>>304532
>The Spiderses
Sure, I'll take a look.
These are all actually pretty good points. I've never been a huge fan of magic-wand endings that solve every problem in the story in one fell swoop it's a problem in MLP as well, but I'm more inclined to overlook stuff like that in a kids show, but strictly speaking not every ending like that is necessarily a deus ex machina. And yes, I'll grant that it is nice that the story at least has an objective that these characters can aspire to now.
>>304492
>Honestly I think you could handwave Pip knowing what the computer was with a simple line of "Oh a Crusader Maneframe, like that one we encountered in the stable(of course have her interact with it there), or my home stable that I sometimes passed by on my way to the workshops!"
It's not necessarily a problem that she has this knowledge, but it's not the sort of thing you could reasonably expect to be common knowledge. So yes, if the author at least provided some cursory explanation as to how she came across this knowledge it would pretty much be fine. A lot of this story relies on the reader remembering obscure things that were casually mentioned eons ago, so for all I know there was some explanation given a long time ago that's technically valid, but in that case the author would be better off providing a quick refresher. "Oh, the Crusader Supercomputer Whatever, I remember that from _______." Or something to that effect.
>>304501
>Glim would it be good writing if Littlepip went to a rock concert but it is literally a family of Tribals slamming rocks together while living inside a music stadium that was meant to be 3x bigger than anything on earth and double as a bomb shelter?
I don't see how this would add anything meaningful to the story.
>Also is it bad writing that LP started the story with no flaws and had to do drugs to get one?
Yes, though I'd argue that LP actually has many flaws; the problem is that the author doesn't seem to recognize them as such. Sanctimoniousness coupled with a complete lack of any identifiable moral code is not something I would consider a good quality.
One way to handle the kind of character development you're talking about is to give the character a "base" personality, and derive traits from that personality that are both positive and negative. Then, you create problems for the character based on that, that usually involve overcoming weaknesses and building upon strengths. The show does this with the mane 6 characters. For example, Fluttershy's base personality is that she's an introvert with a kind nature. This gives rise to the positive and negative aspects of her character: she's compassionate, empathetic, good with animals, etc, but on the other hand she's shy and tends to let ponies walk all over her. So, you start with that and build problems for her that allow her to develop her strengths while working on her weaknesses. Velvet for instance could have been a much more interesting character if the author had approached her this way.
>>304512
>It's bad writing that the author doesn't make the Enclave armour suit melt from the heat and stick to that chick as it kills her, right?
Not really; it's an irrelevant detail either way, and in terms of accuracy it's realistic enough. Whether or not the armor would melt depends on what it's made of. Does your skillet melt when you put it on the stove burner? Different substances have different melting points, and for most metals the melting point is pretty high. Unless dragon fire canonically burns at an intensely high heat, it's pretty unlikely that the armor would melt; however, the person inside would roast pretty easily.
The major issue here, from where I'm standing, is that Spike really had no reason to do this. If he just wanted to kill one of them to prove a point he could have just stomped on her and broken her neck; there was no reason to torture her to death like this. Also noteworthy is that the Enclave doesn't seem to care that he did this. They only came in there because they wanted to escort LP & Co. out of restricted airspace, and after that they just wanted to take Calamity into custody. I get the impression that Spike has a tenuous relationship with these guys, but they didn't really provoke him to the point that something this brutal would be justified. Realistically this ought to provoke retaliation against him, and if he's trying to protect his magic computer, that should be the last thing he wants.
>>304523
These are all excellent points. One way or the other this part of the story doesn't make much sense.
>>304527
I see. That sort of explains it, but at the same time this really just gives us a rough outline of what the Steel Rangers do and why they do it. The author still seems to be relying on the reader's presumed knowledge of Fallout lore to fill in the blanks here.
Also, if I'm following the details of this correctly, the Steel Rangers would be the knights of AJ's Ministry of Wartime Technology, while the computer was developed by Twilight and/or Twilight's ministry. So would they really be that interested in it? There's still quite a bit the author needs to clarify here in order for this to work.
>>304530
>I think this author has spent longer describing safes and LP's process of lockpicking them than he's spent explaining who the "Steel Rangers" are.
>When it comes to keeping a BOS Knockoff guy out of Spike's cave with the Semi-Deus Ex Machina machine, more dialogue should have been spent explaining this and reminding the audience what the BOS is.
This.
>why wouldn't Spike want them to get their hooves on this machine?
This is also a good point.
>>304532
>The Spiderses
Sure, I'll take a look.
>>304653
The thing to keep in mind is that any big writing project is going to be big. Meaning that one way or the other, you're going to be writing and re-writing it multiple times.
I actually tend to mostly write large, novel-length projects, even though I often advise people to focus on smaller ones. As a result I haven't produced that many works I would actually call finished; most of my projects are long novels in various stages of completion. Actually hammering out a story from start to finish doesn't really take all that long, in fact I am a big fan of NaNoWriMo for this reason, as it basically forces you to get 50,000 words out of yourself in the space of a single month. However, as I think I've effectively demonstrated in these review threads, just because you can manage to get the story out on paper doesn't necessarily mean that it's complete or that it's good. I'm a big believer in Hemingway's view that the first draft of anything is always shit.
I would say that if you've got an idea for something big, by all means go for it; just bear in mind that the amount of time you'll need to spend rereading and rewriting it is going to grow exponentially with the size of the document. The longer and more complex a story is, the more likely it is that you'll end up with continuity errors, irrelevant side-plots, poorly-constructed arcs, and many of the other problems I've pointed out with many of these long-form FimFiction stories we've looked at. So, the longer the work the more time you're likely to end up investing in it. If you're anything like me, you'll end up spending 30 days writing the initial story, and multiple years revising and rewriting it.
My advice to you personally would be to pick the project that you're most excited about and would be most interested in spending a massive chunk of time on, and do that.
The thing to keep in mind is that any big writing project is going to be big. Meaning that one way or the other, you're going to be writing and re-writing it multiple times.
I actually tend to mostly write large, novel-length projects, even though I often advise people to focus on smaller ones. As a result I haven't produced that many works I would actually call finished; most of my projects are long novels in various stages of completion. Actually hammering out a story from start to finish doesn't really take all that long, in fact I am a big fan of NaNoWriMo for this reason, as it basically forces you to get 50,000 words out of yourself in the space of a single month. However, as I think I've effectively demonstrated in these review threads, just because you can manage to get the story out on paper doesn't necessarily mean that it's complete or that it's good. I'm a big believer in Hemingway's view that the first draft of anything is always shit.
I would say that if you've got an idea for something big, by all means go for it; just bear in mind that the amount of time you'll need to spend rereading and rewriting it is going to grow exponentially with the size of the document. The longer and more complex a story is, the more likely it is that you'll end up with continuity errors, irrelevant side-plots, poorly-constructed arcs, and many of the other problems I've pointed out with many of these long-form FimFiction stories we've looked at. So, the longer the work the more time you're likely to end up investing in it. If you're anything like me, you'll end up spending 30 days writing the initial story, and multiple years revising and rewriting it.
My advice to you personally would be to pick the project that you're most excited about and would be most interested in spending a massive chunk of time on, and do that.
>>304708
I have a story I dearly wish to write. I think I mentioned it before, it's a big post-apoc adventure like this story you're criticizing.
I've been told by another writer friend that I should go ahead and write it for a variety of reasons instead of letting the idea sit.
However, I have a laundry list of reasons I don't think this is a good idea at this point:
-I have basically no idea how to write at all. Almost zero experience.
-I'm coming out of a 10 year depression which has left me with horrible work ethic and bad self-criticism issues which make me unable to enjoy doing things and get anything done
-Committing to a 300k word epic when I haven't written anything and at most i'm capable of writing small chunks of words over a week seems like a recipe for disaster
-I'd like this idea to be as successful as I could make it, and going into it with no skills, no following, and no clear idea how to make it the best it can be is not something I want to do
-I'd prefer to work on multiple smaller/ normal-length stories first, acquire both a following and writing experience, read more books, etc before diving into larger projects, and fix my bad behaviour issues before attempting this
Does this sound unreasonable? What do you figure?
I have a story I dearly wish to write. I think I mentioned it before, it's a big post-apoc adventure like this story you're criticizing.
I've been told by another writer friend that I should go ahead and write it for a variety of reasons instead of letting the idea sit.
However, I have a laundry list of reasons I don't think this is a good idea at this point:
-I have basically no idea how to write at all. Almost zero experience.
-I'm coming out of a 10 year depression which has left me with horrible work ethic and bad self-criticism issues which make me unable to enjoy doing things and get anything done
-Committing to a 300k word epic when I haven't written anything and at most i'm capable of writing small chunks of words over a week seems like a recipe for disaster
-I'd like this idea to be as successful as I could make it, and going into it with no skills, no following, and no clear idea how to make it the best it can be is not something I want to do
-I'd prefer to work on multiple smaller/ normal-length stories first, acquire both a following and writing experience, read more books, etc before diving into larger projects, and fix my bad behaviour issues before attempting this
Does this sound unreasonable? What do you figure?
>>304716
If you're aiming for 300,000 words, or at least expect it to be that long, that's a bit of an alarm bell right there. If there's one thing FoE has effectively demonstrated, it's that higher word counts do not equal higher quality; if anything, there's an inverse relationship, at least for amateur writers.
I agree with your friend that you should pursue the idea; however, I don't think it's a good idea to just sit down and start writing an epic, particularly if you don't have much experience. Instead of beginning the actual text of the story, you may want to spend some time formalizing whatever your idea is. Start a document that describes the world you're trying to create, who lives in it, what your story is about, etc. If you're dealing with some massive world-scale event like FoE does with this nuclear war, it would probably be helpful to lay out a timeline of what exactly happened and who was involved. Then, try narrowing down how you want to present this setting to readers.
One of the problems that FoE has, as I've noted before, is that kkat wants to tell too many stories at once. He's created this massive world, populated by all sorts of creatures, with all of this dense, complicated backstory, and yet he wants to show us the whole thing by having us follow this one annoying little unicorn around. The result is this meandering, bloated clusterfuck we've been reading. As I've also noted before, kkat's idea would have been much better served if he had tackled this story by writing multiple stories set in the same universe, told from different perspectives, instead of trying to cram everything into one giant book that centers around one protagonist.
My advice to you would be to spend some time fleshing out the world you want to create. Instead of trying to actually write a piece of fiction, just get ideas out of your head onto paper in some form, and organize it in some way that you can easily reference the information later when you need it. Projects like TV shows, movies or game franchises that have a lot of people working on them will often have a Writer's Guide or a Bible, which is basically a document that fleshes out all the details of the setting, descriptions of the backstories and personalities of the characters, and so forth and so on, so that all the writers working on the project will be on the same page about what they're trying to write. I do this myself with a lot of my projects.
Once you have this, maybe try writing a few short practice pieces set in your universe. You could do a short story, or a greentext, or anything really; just try to tell a complete story from start to finish and have it set in the universe you've created. Don't worry about showing the reader everything; in fact, for things like this, it's better if the setting just forms kind of a backdrop, with the story itself focusing on something relatively simple. That thing of Sven's that I just reviewed is actually a pretty good example of what I'm talking about; it's technically set in the FoE universe, but there's very little explanation given of the setting, or even the context in which the events take place. It's a fairly straightforward narrative about a human character (Anon) who infiltrates a guarded fortress in order to rescue a filly; however, you get a glimpse of the setting and a glimpse of the people ponies, whatever that live there. Once you can execute short ideas like this, you can start planning a larger and more complicated story.
Also, one approach I've found that works well for story planning is to start out by reducing your idea to its simplest form. Try summarizing whatever story you want to tell in a couple of sentences. For instance, here is the basic plot of The Lord of the Rings:
Ancient Lord of Darkness lost his power ring a long-ass time ago. Turns out some hobbit has it. Wizard tells the hobbit he needs to destroy it. Hobbit takes it to the place it was created, and destroys it. Meanwhile, the Dark Lord tries to stop him. Also, there's a war and stuff going on.
From here, you can take your basic skeletal idea and flesh it out into a longer and more detailed synopsis. Imagine you're writing the summary of your plot for the Wikipedia article on your book. Map out the basic plot, then go back over it and see if everything makes sense and it sounds like a good story. From there, you've probably got enough to start working on an actual draft.
If you're aiming for 300,000 words, or at least expect it to be that long, that's a bit of an alarm bell right there. If there's one thing FoE has effectively demonstrated, it's that higher word counts do not equal higher quality; if anything, there's an inverse relationship, at least for amateur writers.
I agree with your friend that you should pursue the idea; however, I don't think it's a good idea to just sit down and start writing an epic, particularly if you don't have much experience. Instead of beginning the actual text of the story, you may want to spend some time formalizing whatever your idea is. Start a document that describes the world you're trying to create, who lives in it, what your story is about, etc. If you're dealing with some massive world-scale event like FoE does with this nuclear war, it would probably be helpful to lay out a timeline of what exactly happened and who was involved. Then, try narrowing down how you want to present this setting to readers.
One of the problems that FoE has, as I've noted before, is that kkat wants to tell too many stories at once. He's created this massive world, populated by all sorts of creatures, with all of this dense, complicated backstory, and yet he wants to show us the whole thing by having us follow this one annoying little unicorn around. The result is this meandering, bloated clusterfuck we've been reading. As I've also noted before, kkat's idea would have been much better served if he had tackled this story by writing multiple stories set in the same universe, told from different perspectives, instead of trying to cram everything into one giant book that centers around one protagonist.
My advice to you would be to spend some time fleshing out the world you want to create. Instead of trying to actually write a piece of fiction, just get ideas out of your head onto paper in some form, and organize it in some way that you can easily reference the information later when you need it. Projects like TV shows, movies or game franchises that have a lot of people working on them will often have a Writer's Guide or a Bible, which is basically a document that fleshes out all the details of the setting, descriptions of the backstories and personalities of the characters, and so forth and so on, so that all the writers working on the project will be on the same page about what they're trying to write. I do this myself with a lot of my projects.
Once you have this, maybe try writing a few short practice pieces set in your universe. You could do a short story, or a greentext, or anything really; just try to tell a complete story from start to finish and have it set in the universe you've created. Don't worry about showing the reader everything; in fact, for things like this, it's better if the setting just forms kind of a backdrop, with the story itself focusing on something relatively simple. That thing of Sven's that I just reviewed is actually a pretty good example of what I'm talking about; it's technically set in the FoE universe, but there's very little explanation given of the setting, or even the context in which the events take place. It's a fairly straightforward narrative about a human character (Anon) who infiltrates a guarded fortress in order to rescue a filly; however, you get a glimpse of the setting and a glimpse of the people ponies, whatever that live there. Once you can execute short ideas like this, you can start planning a larger and more complicated story.
Also, one approach I've found that works well for story planning is to start out by reducing your idea to its simplest form. Try summarizing whatever story you want to tell in a couple of sentences. For instance, here is the basic plot of The Lord of the Rings:
Ancient Lord of Darkness lost his power ring a long-ass time ago. Turns out some hobbit has it. Wizard tells the hobbit he needs to destroy it. Hobbit takes it to the place it was created, and destroys it. Meanwhile, the Dark Lord tries to stop him. Also, there's a war and stuff going on.
From here, you can take your basic skeletal idea and flesh it out into a longer and more detailed synopsis. Imagine you're writing the summary of your plot for the Wikipedia article on your book. Map out the basic plot, then go back over it and see if everything makes sense and it sounds like a good story. From there, you've probably got enough to start working on an actual draft.
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