The reasons why alicorn OCs are bad and hated

[Arkadios 91]

Yeah, even as an outsider, the Mary Sue archetype seems to me to perfectly fit alicorns.

[Nightfall Veilwing 1,138]

1 minute ago, Arkadios said:

Yeah, even as an outsider, the Mary Sue archetype seems to me to perfectly fit alicorns.

Why's that? 

Alicorns are merely guilty by association, here! 

[Arkadios 91]

Just now, Millennium Shadow said:

Why's that? 

Alicorns are merely guilty by association, here! 

Archetypes are stereotypes for fictional characters. They don’t always fit.

But to me, alicorns seem like “pony 2.0”. They seem to be just that bit better or more powerful or kinder and it looks like a daunting task writing any character of that description where elements of the story and, eventually, the character itself, don’t depend solely on those differences.

[TBD 17,254]

meh, it's just an OC based on a individual's interests. just let them have their fun. 

[Nightfall Veilwing 1,138]

28 minutes ago, strange quark 42 said:

Because the main character has quite a bit of depth, the mother and son relationship between Celestia and Strange Quark is really sweet and loving, the love story i set up between Strange Quark and Chrysalis is a cross between earned love and love at first sight, the first chapter of my story goes through Strange Quark's childhood and major events in that time, there is quite a lot going on at most times and a lot of pop culture references to keep things interesting...

And as millenium shadow said the power scale of an OC basically says a lot about the self confidence of its creator(i barely have any self confidence so i made Strange Quark very powerful) also i gave Strange Quark the sweetest possible relationship because i am quite alone

Who's Strange Quark?

What about the part where I said that the "being OP" thing could come from one's lack of confidence in themselves, both as a person and creator. The OP-ness of the OC gives one a sense of power and control?

•  

[strange quark 42 3]

3 hours ago, Millennium Shadow said:

Who's Strange Quark?

What about the part where I said that the "being OP" thing could come from one's lack of confidence in themselves, both as a person and creator. The OP-ness of the OC gives one a sense of power and control?

•  

Strange Quark is the name of my character... He was presumably born an alicorn(not even he knows who his real parents are) adopted by celestia after an alien spacecraft dropped him off from god knows where when he was no older than 1, absolute genious... Moved to ponyville to have a more normal life Fell in love with chrysalis and after a publicity nightmare she moved in with him in ponyville... They decide to adopt 2 changelings(1 is about 14 or 15 and the other is about 2) After a year they get married and have their own foals... And thats the "in a nutshell" version of his life story so far...... Any questions?

[EpicEnergy 23,177]

I don't think alicorn OCs are bad and I don't hate them!

[Splashee 28,563]

Because they have wings 

[Will Guide 21,360]

4 minutes ago, Splashee® said:

Because they have wings 

So do Pegasi, Changelings, dragons, Griffins and Hippogriffs, so now we got to hate all those races too? 

I don't think so. I don't think so

[Landi 600]

For the most part, alicorn OCs are terribly written. Because of this, they tend to be very overpowered and Mary Sue-ish.

Alicorns represent royalty and power. We see this in the show with the five we have. Along with that, alicornship requires a a lot of hard work and experiences. One has to ascend just to become that way. When people make their OC personas alicorns, they are indicating power and dominance. It comes off as a show of pride. Add that along with the bad writing, they can be pretty annoying.

They also come off as lazy. Choosing between the three pony types is a difficult decision that one faces when making an OC. When somebody chooses to make an alicorn, he/she is forgoing the whole choice. It's basically choosing not to choose.

Is someone truly wants to make one, I can't stop him/her. It's their OC. But I do recommend against it. If it's just a character in an AU, it may have the chance too be good. But in general, alicorn OCs tend to be pretty bad. 

 

[RDDash 19,166]

I feel like only girls can become alicorns and not boys. Like, think about it alicorns are princesses, and are targeted as a girl's toy from Hasbro. I roll my eyes whenever I read a fanfic where the author includes male alicorns in their story. Officially in cannon male alicorns  OCs never existed, and even if they were planed at some point they ended up retconned.

Alicorns are supposed to be extremly rare as well and the pony has to do something to earn it. When the alicorn exist just exists for the sake of it and they didn't do anything to earn it, it grinds my gears too. Celestia and Luna are exceptions to this because they are very old and the only true alicorns.

Edited June 18, 2022 by RDDash

[Nightfall Veilwing 1,138]

13 minutes ago, RDDash said:

I feel like only girls can become alicorns and not boys. Like, think about it alicorns are princesses, and are targeted as a girl's toy from Hasbro. I roll my eyes whenever I read a fanfic where the author includes male alicorns in their story. Officially in cannon male alicorns  OCs never existed, and even if they were planed at some point they ended up retconned.

Alicorns are supposed to be extremly rare as well and the pony has to do something to earn it. When the alicorn exist just exists for the sake of it and they didn't do anything to earn it, it grinds my gears too. Celestia and Luna are exceptions to this because they are very old and the only true alicorns.

As far as I'm aware, we have absolutely no canon information about alicorns. And the "rules" of alicorns, them being rare, are royalty, and are godlike are simply headcanons the fandom have came up with and stuck with since no canon information was ever provided.

So, there's literally nothing saying that there aren't any male alicorns or alicorns that aren't royalty.

[Courageous Thunder Dash 7,824]

Alicorn OCs...such a polarizing topic...I admit, I made a black/red alicorn OC, and I've used him, but he's not evil...he's really misunderstood and didn't have parents to teach him the way. He's a really cool guy when you get to know him. 

I have two alicorn OCs, one which I talked about one. The other is a female named Melody Breeze, who is like Fluttershy, but has some key differences.

[Nightfall Veilwing 1,138]

37 minutes ago, Courageous Thunder Dash said:

Alicorn OCs...such a polarizing topic...I admit, I made a black/red alicorn OC, and I've used him, but he's not evil...he's really misunderstood and didn't have parents to teach him the way. He's a really cool guy when you get to know him. 

I have two alicorn OCs, one which I talked about one. The other is a female named Melody Breeze, who is like Fluttershy, but has some key differences.

My main OC, despite being a red/black alicorn, isn't really red/black. His (literal) true colors are teal and white. His coat is teal, and his hair is white.

And if you knew of my OC's lore, you'd know he's not really an alicorn at all, or even a pony, for that matter.

[Nightmare Saturn 815]

Oh, geez.. I feel like I'm one of the only people who  has an alicorn OC who ISN'T royal. Her color palete seems okay, looks too much like Luna to be honest (Not the style mind you, but the color scheme, eeeyup) My character is Stellar Heights, simply put.. she's a very skilled astronomer, she's also a part time library assistant (reminds me of Twilight with the library thing.) I didn't make her royalty or any sterotype. She doesn't have very many powers, just teleportation and flying. She's actually kind of weak, she can't battle or fly in super hot or super cold weather. She is an extremely kind character and she rarely ever gets angry, except if you mess with her friends, then she will just haul off and buck you into next week. She is not that bad to me... But it's up for you guys to judge 

here's some pictures (the one where she's flying looks different because I used crayons) 

(also this takes place in a way different MLP world, where she's the only alicorn who exists and most of the pony OCS I have are earth ponies, I have three unicorns, a couple pegasi, a fairy pony, a butterfly pony, an earth pony/kirin hybrid, and a zebra. My main character is a rainbow haired butterfly pony named Rainbow Kaboom) 

 

 

Edited June 24, 2022 by Stellar Heights

[Nightfall Veilwing 1,138]

52 minutes ago, Stellar Heights said:

Oh, geez.. I feel like I'm one of the only people who  has an alicorn OC who ISN'T royal. Her color palete seems okay, looks too much like Luna to be honest (Not the style mind you, but the color scheme, eeeyup) My character is Stellar Heights, simply put.. she's a very skilled astronomer, she's also a part time library assistant (reminds me of Twilight with the library thing.) I didn't make her royalty or any sterotype. She doesn't have very many powers, just teleportation and flying. She's actually kind of weak, she can't battle or fly in super hot or super cold weather. She is an extremely kind character and she rarely ever gets angry, except if you mess with her friends, then she will just haul off and buck you into next week. She is not that bad to me... But it's up for you guys to judge 

here's some pictures (the one where she's flying looks different because I used crayons) 

(also this takes place in a way different MLP world, where she's the only alicorn who exists and most of the pony OCS I have are earth ponies, I have three unicorns, a couple pegasi, a fairy pony, a butterfly pony, an earth pony/kirin hybrid, and a zebra. My main character is a rainbow haired butterfly pony named Rainbow Kaboom) 

 

 

My OC's and an alicorn, and they're not of royalty. Hell, they're not even an alicorn.

Your OC looks nice, BTW.

[Ashen Pathfinder 16,161]

Doing an interesting and non-polarizing alicorn OC can be challenging. While you want your character to be accepted, you also just want to do your thing. I went with an elderly stallion ali corn whose main function is an archive-keeper. Not especially powerful, but enough to be an alicorn-level OC, if you will.

[Nightmare Saturn 815]

@Millennium Shadow Thank you for the compliment! Also, your character sounds interesting!

@Lady Kochos Pathfinder Yes, it can be challenging to make an alicorn, heck I struggled even deciding if Stellar Heights should even be an alicorn! Your OC looks nice too! 

[Nightfall Veilwing 1,138]

@Stellar Heights Thanks. What about him interests you?

[Nightmare Saturn 815]

The fact that he's not really an alicorn, I wonder if he was pretending or something.  

[Nightfall Veilwing 1,138]

10 hours ago, Stellar Heights said:

The fact that he's not really an alicorn, I wonder if he was pretending or something.  

He's not even a pony, so the alicorn thing is one of his pony forms.

[Nightmare Saturn 815]

Oh, so he's a changeling? I haven't come across too many people with changeling OCs (I had a zebra OC, named Razzle Dazzle Rock'em, her name was weird, her design was certaintly 80s based) 

[Goat-kun 2,527]

I'm pretty sure people who make bad alicorn OCs wouldn't fare much better with other creatures. You don't need an alicorn to zap to the extreme.

 

On the point of OCs used for RP, I'd say that cohesion and common lore matter, or you get this:

Spoiler

 

 

Edited June 24, 2022 by Goat-kun

[Nightmare Saturn 815]

Yeah, I try to make my character's more interesting and less "OH look at me, I'm Princess Sugar Doodle and I'm cool and a princess and unbeatable, wahoo!" 

But they run the risk of looking like a mary sue, Example: Rainbow Kaboom

Rainbow Kaboom is a butterfly pony with rainbow hair, she is the leader of my OCs and has been around since 4th grade. She looks like a mary sue though!

 

[ExplosionMare 18,062]

It all comes down to how they are written. Take a look at this example here:

https://www.deviantart.com/mileskiller70/art/January-s-Promise-Moonlight-Meme-848621215

(Backstory in spoilers in case someone here would rather discover the story for themselves):

Spoiler

January Fringe, the alicorn OC above, became an alicorn because her unicorn sister did something so crazy that her horn had to be transferred to January for her and everypony else's safety (besides, as shown in season 4, magic can't just disappear, much like matter).

January here isn't a princess or a goddess and while she's seen as the "good sister", she's not perfect as she is prone to things like emotional outbursts, for example. You can say she isn't the "typical" alicorn here.