What Qualifies As A Bad OC?

[Buck Testa 5,505]

Its all subjective,there is now "law" to break or adhere to. So the question you ask is irrelevant,because the answer you seek will vary from person to person.

I sort of agree if the oc is just for your enjoyment... however if you want to entertain another person and not just you that is when it stops being subjective and you have to consider your audience.

[Pinkamena-Pills 6,839]

I sort of agree if the oc is just for your enjoyment...

 

That's usually what most of these what would be considered "bad OC's" are in most cases. However,perhaps not,im not the one to follow that part of the fandom. 

 

 

 

however if you want to entertain another person and not just you that is when it stops being subjective and you have to consider your audience.

While this is somewhat true,one must consider to not limit there creative mind and skewer their vision on the plight of pleasing another subjective mind or audience.

 However,if one wishes to follow unwritten guidelines to help make their OC/fanfic ect. in question possibly more appealing to the masses -- then by all means they have the right to do so. But the issue starts when another subjective creative mind starts to criticize and insert what they would consider "correct" to another subjective creative mind without receiving prior consent to critique and voice objective criticism to the owner of said OC/fanfic ect. in question. In layman's terms: No one asked them. 

 

However people are free to criticize freely,however,people are also free to not give a damn -- which in all honesty i wish they would do instead. But i digress. 

Edited August 14, 2014 by Pinkamena-Pills

[Phoenix Flair 332]

For me, it's not so much Mary Sue's as something that isn't, in some way, you.

 

When you write a story, you've got to get behind every character, you have to decide what they would do in a situation based on who they are and where they've come from.  That doesn't mean you are identical to the character, but that some part of you is empathetic to them.  Like villain characters spring from my jealous personality, or my pride, or even my religious zeal or anything, really.

 

Some people, though, they like the idea of making a villain or a hero, and they base them on somebody else's alter-ego, or this archetype they have no relation to.  Sometimes they base it on something they want to be, rather than something they are or could easily become.  They can't relate, so they have to work very hard to try and get the character to act in the way they think it might.  For example, I once edited a story for this girl who made her villain WAY too "evil".  So much so, that in one point of the story, he actually kicked a kitten.  I wouldn't do that if I were plotting to take over the world, or whatever stereotypical plans she had for him.  No point.

 

It's the same with OC's.  Start by sculpting a personality that is based on yourself, or someone else you understand thoroughly. You'll find you can get a much more complex character that way.  Once the believable backstory and personality is out of the way, as far as I'm concerned you have free reign with the rest.

[More_Fluttershy 127]

Pretty much anything that doesn't have a backstory, personality, or name. Oh, and alicorns. 

[Buck Testa 5,505]

That's usually what most of these what would be considered "bad OC's" are in most cases. However,perhaps not,im not the one to follow that part of the fandom.

 

 

 

While this is somewhat true,one must consider to not limit there creative mind and skewer their vision on the plight of pleasing another subjective mind or audience.

However,if one wishes to follow unwritten guidelines to help make their OC/fanfic ect. in question possibly more appealing to the masses -- then by all means they have the right to do so. But the issue starts when another subjective creative mind starts to criticize and insert what they would consider "correct" to another subjective creative mind without receiving prior consent to critique and voice objective criticism to the owner of said OC/fanfic ect. in question. In layman's terms: No one asked them.

 

However people are free to criticize freely,however,people are also free to not give a damn -- which in all honesty i wish they would do instead. But i digress.

I think we are on the same page here. If you just created the ultimate mary sue to have your private wish fulfilling fantasy and amuse yourself with then people do not have permission to critique it like an art piece on display. This is just you having a good time and indulging in your daydreams on the page.

 

If you want to be a good story teller and have your work critiqued THAT is when you need a more thought out and purposeful oc and story.

[Solecistic Miss 20]

Let's not forget that Mary Sues don't have to be 'perfect' to be a Sue.  I know that sounds like a paradox, but there are character types that fit the Sue trope by exaggerating negative traits as well (ex: clutzy, antisocial, and 'average looking' yet somehow still gets all the guys/girls and saves the day and loved by all *coughcough bella from twilight cough cough*) .  

 

Tv Tropes has a great page on all the different Mary Sue types if you'd like to have a look: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MarySue

 

That being said, there are situations where an oc might be deemed bad, but they might work fine in others or with one small tweak.  There really isn't a 'bad' oc per se, just an oc with not enough background and explanation for why they do what they do.

[Thrashy 2,800]

This might as well be renamed "The Alicorn Hate Thread". I'm seeing just about as many good arguments against alicorns posed here as I would in such a hate thread.

 

Which is to say, not many at all.

 

Frankly, it's silly to think there are any character traits that, on their own, make an OC bad/Mary-Sue'd by default. If being an alicorn automatically makes an OC a Mary-Sue, then it necessarily makes Celestia, Luna, Cadance and Twilight Mary-Sues as well. If having a dark past automatically makes an OC bad, then a huge chunk of well-loved heroes, anti-heroes, villains, and even side characters are now bad. If an OC is bad for having a broken horn or a malformed wing, so then are all physically disabled characters in fiction.

 

I get that many of you are tired of seeing certain character clichés, but that does not make any of those traits "automatic Sue" fodder. I personally revile heterochromia in OCs, which I see literally everywhere. But I'm not sure I'd go as far as to immediately write off such characters as "bad" just for that reason alone.

 

Simply put, if you're a strong writer, you can make an alicorn OC work. You can make a compelling OC with a tragic past.

 

It's my firm belief that a character's strength really boils down to one thing: Personal growth - or, in more commonly used literary terms, "character development". You can whine about a character being "OP" because he slices through hordes of foes without breaking a sweat - much like Achilles, who would probably fit most people's definition of an "OP Mary-Sue" - but like Achilles, they can still be a compelling character as long as they have weaknesses and face challenges that must be overcome through much toil and personal discovery. A character that only has one answer to every problem can get boring pretty damn quick, and it is the writer's duty to make sure that by the end of the story, that one-note character has learned how to sing an entire melody.

 

And with all that out of the way, I just want to say something about color. First off, a color scheme does not make a character in and of him/herself bad; had she been designed in red and black, Twilight would still be just as compelling a character. However, making sure your OC's color scheme doesn't cause eye strain is a very important thing to take into consideration. If you take a good look at the color palette used in the show, you'll come to find that characters (and even objects/BGs) are very rarely "pure" colors. In fact, most of them have been desaturated to some degree. Fully saturated colors - especially brighter ones like greens, yellows, cyan etc. - tend to be absolute murder on most people's eyes. I present to you Figure A:

 

 

Notice how one of them looks nice, while the other one looks like complete vomit that makes you want to tear your eyeballs out. This, friends, is the magic of color saturation.

[honk friend 1,978]

how to not make a bad OC:

1) don't make an OC

2) done

[Buck Testa 5,505]

This might as well be renamed "The Alicorn Hate Thread". I'm seeing just about as many good arguments against alicorns posed here as I would in such a hate thread.

 

Which is to say, not many at all.

 

Frankly, it's silly to think there are any character traits that, on their own, make an OC bad/Mary-Sue'd by default. If being an alicorn automatically makes an OC a Mary-Sue, then it necessarily makes Celestia, Luna, Cadance and Twilight Mary-Sues as well. If having a dark past automatically makes an OC bad, then a huge chunk of well-loved heroes, anti-heroes, villains, and even side characters are now bad. If an OC is bad for having a broken horn or a malformed wing, so then are all physically disabled characters in fiction.

 

I get that many of you are tired of seeing certain character clichés, but that does not make any of those traits "automatic Sue" fodder. I personally revile heterochromia in OCs, which I see literally everywhere. But I'm not sure I'd go as far as to immediately write off such characters as "bad" just for that reason alone.

 

Simply put, if you're a strong writer, you can make an alicorn OC work. You can make a compelling OC with a tragic past.

 

It's my firm belief that a character's strength really boils down to one thing: Personal growth - or, in more commonly used literary terms, "character development". You can whine about a character being "OP" because he slices through hordes of foes without breaking a sweat - much like Achilles, who would probably fit most people's definition of an "OP Mary-Sue" - but like Achilles, they can still be a compelling character as long as they have weaknesses and face challenges that must be overcome through much toil and personal discovery. A character that only has one answer to every problem can get boring pretty damn quick, and it is the writer's duty to make sure that by the end of the story, that one-note character has learned how to sing an entire melody.

 

And with all that out of the way, I just want to say something about color. First off, a color scheme does not make a character in and of him/herself bad; had she been designed in red and black, Twilight would still be just as compelling a character. However, making sure your OC's color scheme doesn't cause eye strain is a very important thing to take into consideration. If you take a good look at the color palette used in the show, you'll come to find that characters (and even objects/BGs) are very rarely "pure" colors. In fact, most of them have been desaturated to some degree. Fully saturated colors - especially brighter ones like greens, yellows, cyan etc. - tend to be absolute murder on most people's eyes. I present to you Figure A:

 

 

Notice how one of them looks nice, while the other one looks like complete vomit that makes you want to tear your eyeballs out. This, friends, is the magic of color saturation.

 

I agree with you on the point that a GOOD writer can make any character work. The problem with your stance is that GOOD writers know what they are doing. Its the new and inexperienced writers thst bite off more then they can chew and make a convoluted mess.

The reason Alicorn ocs tend to be bad is because the person making it does not see the value of limitations on a character and or cannot make up their minds on what race they want. The reason dark backstories tend not to work is because they are carbon copies of every other dark backstory out there. Its the lack of creativity and originality that gets people even if they dont see it. They do not call them OC for nothing.

[Thrashy 2,800]

I agree with you on the point that a GOOD writer can make any character work. The problem with your stance is that GOOD writers know what they are doing. Its the new and inexperienced writers thst bite off more then they can chew and make a convoluted mess.

The reason Alicorn ocs tend to be bad is because the person making it does not see the value of limitations on a character and or cannot make up their minds on what race they want. The reason dark backstories tend not to work is because they are carbon copies of every other dark backstory out there. Its the lack of creativity and originality that gets people even if they dont see it. They do not call them OC for nothing.

 

You seem to be defending the alicorn hate on the grounds that so many people write them poorly, as if the way a bad writer portrays something means it can somehow never be done well again. Stephanie Meyer wrote both vampires and humans like utter garbage...did that "ruin" those two creatures for everyone? No. Well, not for most of us, anyway. The fact that there will always be people who write alicorns poorly is not a defense of the assertion that they shouldn't be used at all, or that all alicorn OCs should just be assumed to be bad right off the bat.

 

As for carbon copies, those are an inevitability that we're all going to have to accept. One of people's biggest pastimes these days is claiming to want originality and innovation, while the success of actually original or innovative ideas is almost always weaker than that of the tried-and-true ideas that everyone's seen before. It may seem like an anomaly, but it's really no surprise (at least to me) that most people tend to prefer familiarity to alienness. While the human mind seems almost limitless in its potential, the fact remains that we're all really limited to what we know.

 

Because really, art is a reflection of reality - often a distorted one, but a reflection nonetheless. Characters are given dark pasts in fiction because there are many people in real life who've experienced dark pasts. (And that gives viewers/readers/players who've been through shit in their lives something to relate to.) Writers use the "big bad empire" scenario so much because, hey, look at that - all throughout human history, we've been trying to expand our territories at the expense of those territories' native inhabitants.

 

Suffice it to say, if we see a lot of something in real life, we're bound to see a lot of it in art as well.

 

If you're tired of seeing these things, that's fine. As I said before, I'm pretty sick of seeing heterochromia, at least as a cheap excuse to make an OC "unique" (and really, it's not all that unique when 1/8 of OCs have it). But its overuse or abuse at the hands of bad writers doesn't cheapen the thing itself.

[Buck Testa 5,505]

You seem to be defending the alicorn hate on the grounds that so many people write them poorly, as if the way a bad writer portrays something means it can somehow never be done well again. Stephanie Meyer wrote both vampires and humans like utter garbage...did that "ruin" those two creatures for everyone? No. Well, not for most of us, anyway. The fact that there will always be people who write alicorns poorly is not a defense of the assertion that they shouldn't be used at all, or that all alicorn OCs should just be assumed to be bad right off the bat.

 

As for carbon copies, those are an inevitability that we're all going to have to accept. One of people's biggest pastimes these days is claiming to want originality and innovation, while the success of actually original or innovative ideas is almost always weaker than that of the tried-and-true ideas that everyone's seen before. It may seem like an anomaly, but it's really no surprise (at least to me) that most people tend to prefer familiarity to alienness. While the human mind seems almost limitless in its potential, the fact remains that we're all really limited to what we know.

 

Because really, art is a reflection of reality - often a distorted one, but a reflection nonetheless. Characters are given dark pasts in fiction because there are many people in real life who've experienced dark pasts. (And that gives viewers/readers/players who've been through shit in their lives something to relate to.) Writers use the "big bad empire" scenario so much because, hey, look at that - all throughout human history, we've been trying to expand our territories at the expense of those territories' native inhabitants.

 

Suffice it to say, if we see a lot of something in real life, we're bound to see a lot of it in art as well.

 

If you're tired of seeing these things, that's fine. As I said before, I'm pretty sick of seeing heterochromia, at least as a cheap excuse to make an OC "unique" (and really, it's not all that unique when 1/8 of OCs have it). But its overuse or abuse at the hands of bad writers doesn't cheapen the thing itself.

I may seem like I am defending it but I am telling you WHY people hate these character types even if they do not realize the reason itself. Vampires get a lot of flack from people because of Twilight as you say, and the reason behind it is they are making blanket judgements based on bad experiences they had. Its not the Alicorn or vampires fault, but the writers behind it. People blame the character type instead.

 

There is always a way to make a story your own, a new angle you can take it, but just following the paint by numbers path is not going to engage anyone. I probably could make an Alicorn oc if I put the effort into it. In fact If you want I could make on the fly a good and bad oc just to prove my point.

[Fhaolan 4,483]

Here's my take on it. I tend to not 'hate' MLP OC's. I don't have one of my own at the moment, but that's because I haven't gotten around to it yet, not because I don't like it. I'm a RPG'er; having OCs is kinda necessary unless you're only wanting to play canon characters and that gets quickly boring. Then again, that also means I'm approaching this from the RP'er perspective where the character's appearance is only part of the puzzle. If all an OC is, is a picture, then it's not really an OC from my point of view yet. There has to be some kind of *character* behind that picture.

 

Any case: Bad OCs in my mind are ones where a lot of emphasis is put on character traits that are meaningless or unsupported. Heterochromia as mentioned by @, is usually a good sign of a bad OC trait because nearly all of the time it's meaningless. In those cases all it is, is a signal that the character is supposed to be unique or different from normal without any actual basis. It's the same as 'piercing blue eyes' on a character that is not observant or demonstrating other traits that qualify as having a piercing personality.

 

Why is the character an alicorn? What purpose does that serve? What are you, as the OC creator, trying to *say* with that character? Why have you chosen a red/black color scheme? What does it mean?

 

So on and so forth. When building a character, the parts really should hang together and make a whole. Even if the parts are contrasting, the contrast says something. If a character is just drawn because it's 'neat' (such as the avatar I've been using for awhile), it's not really a *character*. In my mind it doesn't really count as an OC.

[Thrashy 2,800]

There is always a way to make a story your own, a new angle you can take it, but just following the paint by numbers path is not going to engage anyone. I probably could make an Alicorn oc if I put the effort into it. In fact If you want I could make on the fly a good and bad oc just to prove my point.

 

Making a character "on the fly" would prove absolutely nothing. Anyone can type random gibberish into PonyCreator and call it a character, but no amount of alicorn OCs you churned out would cheapen what an alicorn actually IS and what it means to be one in the world of MLP.

 

It seems to me like you're just fighting to be right, not fighting to support an actual point.

[Buck Testa 5,505]

Making a character "on the fly" would prove absolutely nothing. Anyone can type random gibberish into PonyCreator and call it a character, but no amount of alicorn OCs you churned out would cheapen what an alicorn actually IS and what it means to be one in the world of MLP.

 

It seems to me like you're just fighting to be right, not fighting to support an actual point.

What Alicorns are is exactly WHY people do not like Alicorn ocs. There is a position of authority and power involved with Alicorns that you have to know what you are doing to do it justice. My point is that if you are going to take on an Alicorn oc you better have the competence to write it well. Too many people do not and they make the "gibberish" you normally see.

 

People take Alicorns too lighly and it bugs me.

Edited August 15, 2014 by Buck Testa

[Thrashy 2,800]

What Alicorns are is exactly WHY people do not like Alicorn ocs. There is a position of authority and power involved with Alicorns that you have to know what you are doing to do it justice. My point is that if you are going to take on an Alicorn oc you better have the competence to write it well. Too many people do not and they make the "gibberish" you normally see.

 

People take Alicorns too lighly and it bugs me.

 

And that's what I'm saying - if you come across someone who writes alicorns badly, you're more than justified in hating that specific alicorn character. Or even its author. But in the spirit of the phrase "don't judge a book by its cover", all I'm relly getting at is that it's unfair to look at any given alicorn OC and just assume they're written poorly. Why not read that character's story and then judge whether they're being used properly? What's really the point in filtering stuff out through preconceived notions?

[TenorSounds 832]

And that's what I'm saying - if you come across someone who writes alicorns badly, you're more than justified in hating that specific alicorn character. Or even its author. But in the spirit of the phrase "don't judge a book by its cover", all I'm relly getting at is that it's unfair to look at any given alicorn OC and just assume they're written poorly. Why not read that character's story and then judge whether they're being used properly? What's really the point in filtering stuff out through preconceived notions?

 

I don't condone "Alicorn hate", since I've seen Alicorn OCs that I like and think really work. I think we agree that not all Alicorn OCs aren't automatically bad OCs. I think the point Buck Testa is making isn't that Alicorns are bad OCs but that they are inherently difficult to make into GOOD OCs. For that reason there are quite a lot bad Alicorn OCs and it's worth pointing out that someone's first OC probably shouldn't be an Alicorn unless they are very confident in the writing abilities.

 

So, for me, an Alicorn OC would have to be very good in order to get over the "elite" stigma associated with them, and as-such I'm a little more critical of Alicorn OCs than I am of other types.

[AppleGearRising 526]

Thank you for this most magnificent hate thread, please, continue to go about your merry way of drawing in unsuspecting souls who are just about ready to argue 'till they're blue in the balls

 

Nah but seriously, I don't have any problems with any particular OCs or preferences myself. I'm really just here to see how ludicrous things are gonna get before someone ends up deeply offended by the words of another, this is a very opinionated topic and, as such, will inevitably draw in people with opposing ideas on the situation and are bound to turn unsavoury... If they haven't done already :/

[Thrashy 2,800]

I don't condone "Alicorn hate", since I've seen Alicorn OCs that I like and think really work. I think we agree that not all Alicorn OCs aren't automatically bad OCs. I think the point Buck Testa is making isn't that Alicorns are bad OCs but that they are inherently difficult to make into GOOD OCs. For that reason there are quite a lot bad Alicorn OCs and it's worth pointing out that someone's first OC probably shouldn't be an Alicorn unless they are very confident in the writing abilities.

 

So, for me, an Alicorn OC would have to be very good in order to get over the "elite" stigma associated with them, and as-such I'm a little more critical of Alicorn OCs than I am of other types.

 

Holding them to a higher standard is fine, but it seemed like what Buck was doing was justifying people's tendency to immediately assume "bad" when looking at an alicorn OC (or characters with dark pasts, etc.), not even giving their story a chance. You may suspect it to be bad, sure. But until you've read it, you're not justified in making a concrete distinction one way or the other. Reservation of judgment is a quality that far too many people lack these days; jumping to conclusions, well, THAT has always been hot.

 

Still, even if that wasn't entirely what he was getting at, what I said still applies to...oh, a grand majority of everyone who's posted in this thread, as a lot of them have jumped on the mindless hatewagon. This entire fandom seems to have a nasty mentality of "If it doesn't suit my tastes, it's objectively bad." And while people are free to have that mentality, I'm free to state that it's an unfair, arrogant and 2-dimensional way of looking at things that only does more harm than good.

[TenorSounds 832]

Holding them to a higher standard is fine, but it seemed like what Buck was doing was justifying people's tendency to immediately assume "bad" when looking at an alicorn OC (or characters with dark pasts, etc.), not even giving their story a chance. You may suspect it to be bad, sure. But until you've read it, you're not justified in making a concrete distinction one way or the other.

 

Still, even if that wasn't entirely what he was getting at, what I said still applies to...oh, a grand majority of everyone who's posted in this thread, as a lot of them have jumped on the mindless hatewagon. This entire fandom seems to have a nasty mentality of "If it doesn't suit my tastes, it's objectively bad." And while people are free to have that mentality, I'm free to state that it's an unfair, arrogant and 2-dimensional way of looking at things that only does more harm than good.

 

Well I do believe there are some things that can be objectively bad, such as certain color schemes and cliche/contrived back-stories/personalities, but otherwise I think we're in agreement.

[SparklingSquirrels 21,331]

I don't think it matters if an OC is "bad" as long as the creator likes it... although some people might get upset if the creator decides to join an RP with their OC.

 

Anyway, some of the things that I think don't work as well in OCs:

 

-Ridiculous color schemes

-Overpowered Abilities

-Relationships with actual MLP characters

-Super dark backstories

-No flaws

 

Alicorns don't bother me much, what with Twilght and Cadance being them.

[Buck Testa 5,505]

Holding them to a higher standard is fine, but it seemed like what Buck was doing was justifying people's tendency to immediately assume "bad" when looking at an alicorn OC (or characters with dark pasts, etc.), not even giving their story a chance. You may suspect it to be bad, sure. But until you've read it, you're not justified in making a concrete distinction one way or the other. Reservation of judgment is a quality that far too many people lack these days; jumping to conclusions, well, THAT has always been hot.

 

Still, even if that wasn't entirely what he was getting at, what I said still applies to...oh, a grand majority of everyone who's posted in this thread, as a lot of them have jumped on the mindless hatewagon. This entire fandom seems to have a nasty mentality of "If it doesn't suit my tastes, it's objectively bad." And while people are free to have that mentality, I'm free to state that it's an unfair, arrogant and 2-dimensional way of looking at things that only does more harm than good.

I was not justifying so much as pointing out the underlying reasons why people think like that even if they cannot quite articulate it. They understand many Alicorn ocs are bad, but they do not understand that its the writers fault not the fact that its an Alicorn.

 

If I were to make an Alicorn I would persue a theme.

What if an Alicorn was born in a time when they were hated and mistrusted instead of held up as royalty?

What if this Alicorn had to defend herself in a world where no tribe of pony would take her? When racial tensions between Pegasi, Unicorns, and Earth pony were high with no end in sight?

If everypony thinks she is evil and she has to do bad things to protect herself how would that affect her personality?

What could she have power over that would make her unique in Mlp? How would this power affect her appearance?

 

Before I even touch a character profile creator I would answer these questions and the questions that stem from it.

 

I have twenty minutes left on my lunch break.

 

So we know that this character grew up before the unifying of the races and the rise of the sisters rule. We know she has a power over a force of nature that is unique to her character. We know that she is hated, feared and hunted for being an Alicorn. What kind of character would fit this role?

 

What if she has power over nature, over plants and trees. She could be feared for the same reason Zecora was feared. Her power would give her a plant like appearance, and as she is hated and she is having to defend herself Fall colors of red orange yellow and brown would be her color scheme. She would be named something that would envoke fear in fillies and would sound like someone you would not want to get to know. At the same time she is alone and only her steeled reserve to live makes her march on against the falicy of what the races of ponies say about her

 

Her name would be MaleSeed. Her story would lead to the founding of Everfree forest, a place where the superstitious ponies would not dare tred and where her creation as like Timberwolves would drive away the ones dumb enough to tresspass. It is there where she went to sleep till a day she could walk among ponies without fighting for her right to live.

 

That is my idea of an Alicorn oc with potential to be really good.

[Falsey 44]

In my opinion, a bad OC would be either a perfect Mary Sue, or an overly emo, tragic, and whiny character.

[Abia 258]

Oh, I don't think any OC is inherently bad--er, well some of them are, but they're less common. I believe that is the mass amount of Alicorn OCs that makes them frowned so heavily upon.

 

In Equestria, there were only two Alicorns. Two of them are the rulers of all of Equestria and take care of all ponies in their realm as well as having the responsibility of raising the sun and the moon, forces that all living things rely on. And it is only Alicorns who are capable of doing this--of, essentially, sustaining life--Unicorns cannot do it without suffering from magic depletion or at the very least exhaustion, and Earth ponies and Pegasi simply don't have the physical ability to. But for Alicorns, instead of exhausting their energy or depleting it, are revitalized by the act of raising the sun and moon.

For a long time, only two beings were capable of doing this so easily. Two ponies. There were two Alicorns in all of Equestria... and after a while Cadance became one, yes, but I don't have enough information about her transformation to expand upon it.

Anyway, eventually Twilight Sparkle became an Alicorn. Her transformation was emphasized so much because it was special. Being an Alicorn is incredibly rare because it's just so damn special. In The Journal of the Two Sisters--that's where I'm getting most of this information, by the way--Celestia writes that "Alicorns stood for everything Equestria was founded upon: love, harmony, and friendship." Becoming an Alicorn is the greatest honor a pony could have.

At least, it is in modern Equestria. It's true that there was a time when Alicorns were common. They were most ponies. If your OC is an Alicorn and lived in this time period, yeh've got my full support.

Point being, Alicorns in current Equestria are extremely rare. A few OC Alicorns are okay, as long as they are similar in numerical proportion to Alicorns:citizens in Equestria--assuming you want your OC to exist in the Equestria we know. If your OC is the ruler of its own land or something in a land that is not Equestria--or is perhaps millions of miles away on the same planet--well, I'm fine with the numbers on that. But it's up to you to make it a quality character. Being an Alicorn does not make a character bad, but it makes it a lot easier for your character to become bad. There's a reason why Celestia was so unpopular earlier--and is still a rather disliked princess--and it's because she's so perfect and so special. Having a character created as an Alicorn or as the ruler of some land means that there are things expected of them and qualities that are really required for them to be successful. Fairness, good judgement, etc.... and then, of course, you want your own positive characteristics. You don't want to be generic, you want to be unique, so you add your own positive traits, like industriousness and chivalry or something.

Keep in mind this is not the rule for all Alicorn OCs, but I think it is similar to how the more unpopular Alicorn OCs are created. It's definitely not everyone.

Alicorns are so often Mary Sues because they already have that extra bonus. They are already special simply by being Alicorns. Adding on positive traits--or too many negative ones, making them an evil ruler with no good qualities whatsoever (no one likes an anti-Sue)--is icing on an already delicious cake. It's just too sweet.

I use Alicorns only because they are the easiest, and by far most common, example. Draconequus OCs are also pretty easily overpowered, Mary-Sue'd or anti-Sue'd. Having a rare species OC does not make it automatically bad, but it does make it a lot easier to let your OC become bad.

 

What I said above about some OCs being inherently bad--well, as an OC is simply a character, it is best to judge them as you would someone on a TV show. Some TV characters are badly developed as are some OCs--and the fact that a bad character happens to be a bad original character doesn't make it any worse.

[Countess Noodle 607]

Neon colored ponies. A vast majority of bronies the human race with good eyesight don't like neon colors.

Edited September 13, 2014 by NoobyBrony

[ARagY 1,152]

I don't really know.. poorly thought out development and bad drawing or obvious recolour? 

 

Let me give an example:

 

This is my OC Dainbow Rash, she's 19 and has a boyfriend named John (oh boy guess OC creator's name)

 

Likes: Flying with the wonderbolts, hot dogs, pizza, the Bible, Naruto

Dislikes: Rainbow Dash, vegetables, her mom, chores

 

So in essence if it's basically projecting the OC creator into their OC in a way that makes it a ponyfied version of themselves rather than an OC which is supposed to imply they're different. So not having correlations between the creator and the OC that require little thought to actually develop a solid character, notice that 'hot dogs' wouldn't be something a vegetarian horse would eat anyway.