Winged Anomaly

At least you were more polite than the other guy. http://www.fimfiction.net/index.php?view=category&user=55852 If this was honestly so difficult to find, then you must not have looked very hard. There's a link to my FiMFic profile on my profile page here. I'm too tired from addressing Sky Warden's broken arguments to go through yours point by point as well, so I'll keep it brief. I don't understand why you're focusing on the past. Since everyone is using Harry Potter as an example, let me draw a comparison. Harmony's End to this story as the story of Lily and Severus is to the Harry Potter series. It is mentioned, and described lightly, but there isn't an entire entry about it. It's backstory. It's setting. That's all it is. This story isn't 'another one', it's a different story. Simply put, Harmony's End is entirely irrelevant to this new story. Pretend it's backstory. All it is is a lengthy, detailed write up of said backstory. As such, it's not the focus. So can we stop focusing on the stories that I've finished and actually address the topic at hand? Please? Forgive me for being blunt, but the first guy to comment has a fundamentally broken understanding of short story writing, and you can't seem to get past the fact that what came first is just backstory and is almost entirely irrelevant. I just want to talk about what I want to talk about. I'm not here to discuss Harmony's End, I'm not here to discuss how to write a short story, I'm here to discuss the new story. That's it. If giving you guys context was a mistake, then sue me.

Who pissed in your coffee this morning? You treat me like a child, I try to respond politely, and then you reply like you just did? I've been writing for twelve years. I don't need guidance on the basics. I know what I'm doing. I was looking for helpful input on the story I described, and instead of that, you fed me a list of instructions that would've been more useful to someone scrawling their first story on printer paper. I have one hundred and ten completed short stories online, fifty more on my hard drive, and six more that are pony related. I have one completed novel and three currently in the works. Don't talk to me like I'm a child. 'Learn to read before you can write.' I'd say the same of you. Let me quote my original post. Since it's clear I need to spoon-feed you everything instead of treating you like an adult, this means that the important plot points of the previous stories will be summarized within this one. That makes it standalone, since you're obviously so unfamiliar with the terminology. So you're trying to say that a story focusing on internal conflict is unsatisfying to the reader. Look, I'd be polite about this, but since we're obviosly beyond that, go back to school and take English again. Not all conflict is external, and if you don't understand that, then you can barely call yourself a writer. What we get from reading this short story is the story of Twilight transcending odds to become something greater, just like any story based on the 'Rags to Ritches' fundamnetal structure, only the odds presented are within Twilight's mind. They are her guilt, her hesitation, and her fear. Not only is that perfectly valid, but as a matter of fact, stories about characters rising to the challenge presented by their own weaknesses are among the most stirring, as they are relatable. Most humans know what it's like to fight through their own doubts and fears, while very few know the mortal peril that forms the conflict in most stories. Do I really need to be telling you this? For the love of christ, man, can you read!? I never said that! Stop throwing strawmen at me so you can feel superior! Just because a story lacks external conflict does not mean it doesn't have a moral or a message! But since we're on the subject, no, a story does not need a moral or a message. Stories with messages are called interpretive literature, where stories that just tell the story of an adventure are called escapist literature. Again, if you don't already understand this, you really, really need to retake English 11 or 12. Oh, so additional conflict is the key to interest, now? That is so wrong I don't even know where to begin. A story with a single or small group of related conflicts is streamlined. It is narrow, focused, and extremely easy and enjoyable to follow. A story with multiple conflicts that occasionally intertwine and compete is less focused, but is percieved as more complex and more deep. A story with too many conflicts is called unfocused and scattershot. Short stories should almost never leave the first category. Did you even read my post? Seriously? Do I need to quote it again? The setting is established within the new story. I won't address that again. You have no clue how to write anything smaller than a novella, do you? In a short story, the setting is presented in as simple and streamlined a fashion as possible. In this case, because the story is not about the war, we don't go into detail about the war. We just state that it happened and continue from there. And 'which isn't even released'? What the hell does that mean? Of course the damn stories are released! I'm not a toddler! I'm not even going to bother quoting anything else because it's painfully clear to me that you don't understand short story writing in the least. You know what? Send me a private message with a link to a short story you've written. Not a novel, not a novella with chapter breaks, a short story. Because that is what we are talking about here. I want to see if you're as talented as you seem to think you are, up on your sneering high horse.

What keeps me going? Well, I always swore to myself that I'd be published. If I gave in and killed myself like I've wanted to once or twice, then all my life's work would be for nothing. I'm mostly out of my suicide phase now, and in hindsight, I'd say that's what got me through. So yeah, thanks muse. You're a fickle hellcat, but you're also pretty cool.

Agent Merit from Syndicate is pretty awesome. I feel like a bit of a psychopath for liking him as much as I do, but come on, he's a massive badass. I guess he counts as minor because he's only an antagonist for part of the game and isn't actually the primary hostile force, even if he is a final boss.

Whoops, you kinda slid off the focus here. You raise a lot of valid points, but... well, all the stuff about the war and the rebellion? That's been covered already. I wrote three massive stories, totalling 45,000 words, dealing with all that stuff. Almost every question you asked is answered and point addressed, even the time skip thing. Time skips are almost exclusively reserved for inter-story, with one three-month exception in Part 2. It's done - packed in, dealt with, buried and forgotten XD I tied Part 3 off half a year ago. The only impact those stories have on this one is in setting up the situation. This new story is everything else. It's just Twilight post death. Your point about the 20 year time skip being ugly is valid, though, and I wouldn't do that if I didn't see any other way. She basically spends 20 years camping out and charging like a battery, and I don't know about you, but reading about that would suck, and waste valuable space to boot. Gotta keep the ball rolling in a short story - you don't have the budget for long low periods. Edit: Right, and character death. Dash's death is supposed to be a kick in the teeth. At the end of Harmony's End (the three-parter about the war and rebellion) we've been following a weary Dashie through everything. She miraculously survived her final mission in the war, she escaped capture and execution by the Unicorns when she joined the rebellion, she survived the rebellion itself, she survived the vicious, meatgrinder battle for New Canterlot... but she just couldn't struggle through one last fight. Then Twilight's sacrifice to pull her from the brink is supposed to be bittersweet. We like and sympathize with Twilight, but we don't want Dash to die, see? Anyway, rambling. Sorry.

Mass Effect 3's ending was AWESOME. See: Indoctrination Theroy. Syndicate (the remake) was a good game. So was Red Faction Armageddon. Alicorn Twilight is a good idea. Highly conditional, though - it'd have to be at the end of the series, and executed properly, which it probably wouldn't be. RAINBOW DASH IS NOT A CARDBOARD CHARACTER. WILL PEOPLE STOP TELLING ME THAT. I wrote 45,000 words of fanfiction with her as the narrator, I know her better than my own mother. And I'll shut up before I start ranting about that last one. Almost forgot: I *love* 009 Sound System and Oceanlab.

The Unicorns won the war because they had magic. We're talking, basically, beam weapons, plasma, and telekinetic artillery. The Earth Ponies used their strength and ingenuity to build tanks and walkers, while the poor Pegasus couldn't figure out what to do. Can't fly with armor, can't fly with guns, so they were stuck with dive-bombing enemy positions and dropping grenades on them. Cut the Pegasus population in half. As for Rainbow dying then not dying, what do you expect? She's my second favourite, so I can't *completely* murder her Anyway, moving on XD In terms of plot structure, mostly, you're dead on, but this is supposed to be a short story (christ, we know how much *that* means around me) and the rules are a little more flexible. Limited space requires a narrower focus and often a truncated main arc, which is why one shouldn't hesitate to end the story at a good spot, even if the main character's fate isn't sealed (such as Twilly setting off to take control of Equestria, like I was considering at the end there). At least, that's the conclustion I've come to after none of my 'short' stories landed below the 5k word mark. Short stories don't even need a villain. Many things can be substituted in as an opposing force, if you even have one, and in this case, it's Twilight's own confusion, self-doubt, and sense of duty. Having her take off on a glorious quest to rule Equestia, for good or ill, and following that quest, is novel material for a couple of reasons. Not only would the journey be *far* to complex for a short story without simplifying it more than I'm comfortable with, but it shifts focus. In what I've got above, the opposing force is Twilight herself, but in that quest, the opposing force becomes a scattershot supply of ponies who think otherwise, and Twilight's inner conflict is delegated to a support role. Also, I'm dealing with the political battle for Equestria's throne in another follow-up to Harmony's End that I've already got in the works, titled Steampony, which *is* a novel, meaning I've got space XD What I choose to have Twilight pursue in this story will affect Steampony - convergent plot trajectories and such, and to be honest, part of the reason I was considering ending the story with her apotheosis is it means that my decision here won't constrain future plot development of Steampony. Anyway, thanks for the tips, mate, and thanks for not booking as soon as you saw 'Alicorn'. As for suggestions, I'll take your comment as a vote for 'continue the story post-rebirth' XD

So I'm working on a new fanfiction project that focuses on Twilight's ascencion to Alicorn... status? I don't even know how to phrase that. ...oh come on, don't look at me like that. If it makes you feel better, I've been poking around with this idea somce before the whole 'Alicorn Twilight' rumor started circulating. Which is unfortunate, because now my basic premise sounds about as original as an overpowered OC. If you're still reading, good, I can now tell you exactly how I plan to do this properly. This fanfiction will be picking up after another (finished) project of mine, titled Harmony's End. This new project will be standalone, as any information the reader needs will be delivered within the story, but here's a little summary of prior events so you have some frame of reference. In a steampunk-esque alternate Equestria, the princesses are assassinated. The three races go to war against one another for dominance and control over the elements of harmony. As one might expect, the Unicorns win. Drunk with victory, they install a little dictatorship, and oppress the living heck out of the other two races. Uncontent with the state of affairs, Rainbow Dash (who narrates the whole thing, by the way) joins a revolution led by Spitfire, and kicks flank until a climactic final battle which leaves Rainbow dead. Twilight, at the culmination of a love triangle subplot that I won't go into here, uses an experimental Life Magic technique to swap Rainbow's fate with hers - Rainbow survives, but Twilight dies. This new story will pick up very shortly after Twilight's sacrifice. She is narrating. Yes, while dead. Twilight fills in the reader on the necessaries, then assumes that the unfamiliar forces of the Life Magic spell have trapped her soul in a sort of limbo between life and death - a mysterious, seeminly empty realm that is the source of all magic. She wanders for a while, thinking to herself, wondering, feeling foolish and guilty for feeling foolish, arguing with herself over whether or not she should've saved Rainbow, that sort of thing - until she encounters the wandering soul of Princess Celestia, who by this point, has been dead for something like seven years. After a somewhat teary reunion, Celestia gives Twilight the facts. She tells Twi that there's a reason she took her on as her student. Twilight has an immense amount of raw magical potential - enough that there's a name. Celestia calls her a Prime Caster. Prime Casters have so much magical potential tied to their soul that they're attracted to this 'magic realm' like a magnet when free from a body, and Twilight is particularly special, because all Prime Casters in the past have been Alicorns. This is why Celestia is in trapped in this non-death with her. Twilight argues that she's not that powerful, citing a number of events from the show, but Celestia insists this is simply because her training was nowhere near complete - she had the potential within her all along, but did not yet know how to tap into it, so to speak. She mentions the incredibly powerful spell she unintentionally unleashed on Spike during their first moments together, and how even until the moment of her 'death', Twilight had never managed to cast a spell on quite that level. It wasn't a fluke, it was dormant power. Celestia explains more, along with a little about the magic realm that they currently wander through aimlessly. As it contains all potential magic - all magic that has ever been called upon or ever will be called upon, it is positively *fizzling* with ambient energy. This energy, over time, soaks into the souls of ponies trapped there, even further increasing the already unbelievable raw power available to Prime Casters. Twilight asks the question many would: 'Will I ever be powerful enough to return to life?' Celestia answers yes. But it will take time. Skip forward twenty years. (note: during this time, Twilight was able to observe reality. This is why she didn't go completely bucking bonkers.) Celestia has long since finished teaching Twilight everything she can remember about magic, and now, at last, Twilight is powerful enough to attempt a return to reality. She tries once and fails, suffering an intense, painful, and very short half-life in a partially materialised body. She is massively discouraged, and during the time she spends recouperating, she starts to wonder if leaving Celestia all alone in this strange reality is the right thing to do. It takes a lot of convincing from Celestia to get her to try again (during which Celestia explains that she is not powerful enough to return like Twilight), and when she does, she succeeds, but finds an unexpected addition. She is now winged. Her theory is that the unbelievable magical power required to bring herself back to life was similar to the power used to create the first Alicorn, but she doesn't know for sure. Now, this is where I'm not sure what to do. I could leave the story there, on a high note, ending it with her incredible triumph, or I could push forward, which would undoubtedly push the story in a much darker direction. Here's a summary of the ideas I have for Twilight's (new) early life, but none of this is as well formulated as what came before. Twilight spends a long time coming to terms with the fact that she is now an Alicorn. Going from asking questions about who or what she even is from contemplating what responsibilities she now bears as the only Alicorn alive, she eventually decides that the first thing she needs to do is see Rainbow - see if her once-lover made something of her sacrifice. *subplot under construction* There's another idea I've been toying with where she goes somewhere quiet to figure out exactly how powerful she now is, and discovers after blowing her own arm off that her magical potential significantly outmatches the physical strength of her body. Somehow managing to make it back to civilization, she has someone see to the dire wound, and a friendly magical scientist takes the time to build her an awesome hextech arm that is better able to channel magic without exploding. Then there's what she does with herself. Does she seize the responsibility and try to lead a divided and battered Equestria? Does she ignore it and try to live in quiet peace? That kind of thing. If she tried to take control, then I wouldn't pursue it - that would make the story waaaay too long, I'd just end it with her setting off on her quest. Alright, that's all I got. *takes breath* Any suggestions, ideas, and opinions are super welcome. Anyone that comments based on the first line of the post is welcome to screw themselves and will be told off with extreme prejudice.