Do you think the sister camping trips in s3E6 and S7E16 occur 1 year apart or several years apart.

[Senko 459]

As part of my ongoing attempts to work out a proper timeline I'm now looking at the two sister camping trips (S3E6 and S7E16) and I want to get a second opinion on how much time passes between them. So there's two way's to view these episodes either the S7 one takes place one year after the S3 one or that it takes place an uknown number of years later. I can see arguments either way so while I know which I prefer I figured I'd see what people think. Please limit any comments discussion to these two episodes and their relationship to each other as I've been working on my timeline for quite awhile now and I know first hand how murky, hazy and generally tangled this whole show is. I just want to see what others think do these episodes occur a year apart or several. On that topic however feel free to raise any points you like as the more information I have the happier I am.

[TheAnimationFanatic 3,596]

Given that's inferred that "Make New Friends But Keep Discord" (S05:E07) takes place 1 year after "The Best Night Ever" (S01:E26), I think that the same applies for "Campfire Tales".

[Senko 459]

There are several things to argue against that though. The dialogue they have at the start of the episode which sounds a bit odd if they've only had one previous camping trip or the fact there's been two seperate Hearthwarming episodes (Tanks for the memories pre-starlight and Hearthwarming tale post Starlight) which would argue there has been at least one whole year in between the first trip's year and this one i.e. first camping trip, tanks for the memories, hearthwarming tale, s7 camping trip.

[SharpWit 2,702]

1 hour ago, Senko said:

there's been two seperate Hearthwarming episodes

There's been up to five Hearthwarmings  in total though.

Hearth's Warming Eve, Season 2 Episode 11

Hearthbreakers, Season 5 Episode 20 

A Hearth's Warming Tale, Season 6 Episode 8

The Hearth's Warming Club, Season 8 Episode 15

And finally the Christmas special, "My Little Pony: Best Gift Ever"

As for other repeated events, we have two Nightmare Nights, two Hearts and Hooves Days, and two Sisterhooves Socials.

My understanding is that a majority of shows only produce one or two episodes based around a specific holiday because there's only so much to cover, and usually just one well rounded message. To make an episode every year can appear as though a show is beating a dead horse. This is why I think we've seen most annual events in mlp only take place once or twice, so it very well may be that we haven't seen every event that's taken place.

The biggest timeline screw up we've had is with Winter Wrap Up being a centuries old tradition in a town where a member of the immediate founding family of Ponyville is still alive. I'm pretty sure it's generally agreed upon that Granny Smith isn't really that old at this point.

The dialogue from some episodes has complicated matters, but strict continuity isn't the highest priority on the writers agenda. With all that's happened though, I would say that more than one year has definitely passed. And with the seasonal space between Hearth's Warming Episodes, I think we can get a much better idea of how much time has really passed, especially with how cemented the focus has been on it.

Now if only they'd start aging the Cake Twins.

[Zestanor 98]

One year apart doesn’t work for this reason:

The first has to be before “Hearthbreakers,” and the second is supposed to be pretty soon before the season 7 finale. But between those is “Hearth’s Warming Tale.” So it has to be more than one year. Probably about two years.

The chronology that makes sense to me, in brief: seasons 1, 2, and 3 take up one year. Seasons 4 and 5 take up a year, with the season 5 finale slightly more than two years past the first episode. Season six and season 7 take up a year, with S6 being in the fall, and S7 being in the spring, split by “A Hearth’s Warming Tale.” The movie goes about three years after the first episode, and season 8 takes up a year. Season 9 begins shortly after the end of season 8, with nearly 4 years having passed. The holiday special was released slightly out of order, since season 8 ended in spring and season 9 is starting in the summer. Otherwise you need a year long time skip, but that would be out of the ordinary for this show and nothing in-universe has implied a missing year. I predict that the season 9 finale will finish 4 years after the first episode.

[Senko 459]

14 hours ago, Zestanor said:

One year apart doesn’t work for this reason:

The first has to be before “Hearthbreakers,” and the second is supposed to be pretty soon before the season 7 finale. But between those is “Hearth’s Warming Tale.” So it has to be more than one year. Probably about two years.

The chronology that makes sense to me, in brief: seasons 1, 2, and 3 take up one year. Seasons 4 and 5 take up a year, with the season 5 finale slightly more than two years past the first episode. Season six and season 7 take up a year, with S6 being in the fall, and S7 being in the spring, split by “A Hearth’s Warming Tale.” The movie goes about three years after the first episode, and season 8 takes up a year. Season 9 begins shortly after the end of season 8, with nearly 4 years having passed. The holiday special was released slightly out of order, since season 8 ended in spring and season 9 is starting in the summer. Otherwise you need a year long time skip, but that would be out of the ordinary for this show and nothing in-universe has implied a missing year. I predict that the season 9 finale will finish 4 years after the first episode.

I think I'll put this post aside till I start working on my season 7/8 timeline currently I'm looking at 4 years from season 1 to season 5 and I'm working on season 6 currently but it doesn't have a lot in it to pin down times like the earlier ones do (types of fruit in season, fashion weeks, specific holiday's).

[Zestanor 98]

5 hours ago, Senko said:

I think I'll put this post aside till I start working on my season 7/8 timeline currently I'm looking at 4 years from season 1 to season 5 and I'm working on season 6 currently but it doesn't have a lot in it to pin down times like the earlier ones do (types of fruit in season, fashion weeks, specific holiday's).

Do share when you're done. The early seasons are little difficult. I like to keep it as compressed as possible to explain why the young characters aren't growing up. The absolute floor on distance between the first episode and the season 5 finale is two years, because in the alternate universe with Nightmare Moon, she says it has been 'years' since she banished Celestia to the moon.

[Senko 459]

4 hours ago, Zestanor said:

Do share when you're done. The early seasons are little difficult. I like to keep it as compressed as possible to explain why the young characters aren't growing up. The absolute floor on distance between the first episode and the season 5 finale is two years, because in the alternate universe with Nightmare Moon, she says it has been 'years' since she banished Celestia to the moon.

Will do, currently I'm looking at around 4 years from the begining of season 1 to the end of season 5.