Inhibitors to Magical Ability: A Discussion

[Trixie_Surrogate 4]

Hey, hi, fellow pony fans!  I'm back with yet another question for y'allz.

 

I've been thinking about Trixie as I yet continue my little backstory story of her, and something has been bugging the crap out of me for a while now.  Lauren Faust (again) has confirmed a while back that Trixie attended Celestia's Academy for GIfted Unicorns.  Yet Trixie, according to us and apparently a lot of Equestrians, has magical abilities that are sub-par, working an occupation that is...  well, redundant.

 

And yet she, with her mediocrety, managed to get into Celestia's Academy for Gifted Unicorns.  THe [as far as we know] most prestigious educational facility for freaking unicorns.

 

I've been stuck on stupid trying to rationalize this.  What in the world could possibly be going on with a Unicorn that would allow a unicorn who is supposed to be mediocre and average at best, or inferior at worst to most unicorns of average ability, yet she actually gets into the most - again - the most pristigious magic arts academy in the entire country?!

 

After trying to rationalize it, and after the feedback I received from my last topic regarding the admissions test to said academy, I pondered...  What if Trixie has the brains to be mage material, but something is keeping her from realizing the application of her studies?

 

Call me crazy, but I think that for all of her bull-headedness, egotisticism, and just general jerkiness, I think Trixie could be a smart mare.  I doubt idiots or even unicorns of average intelligence would have a shot at - don't make me say it again, I'm already sounding like a broken record.  So maybe something's serving as an impediment...

 

But what?

 

I had a similar discussion in a Fimfiction group where I levied some ideas as to why this would be the case.  Originally, I'd thought that maybe magic works like those manna/energy bars that you often see in fantasy games; when the meter depleats, a unicorn can no longer perform any spells; with Trixie, I thought that maybe her manna reserves meter, so to speak, was lower than the average unicorn's.  Then I thought, perhaps Trixie learns kinesthetically, and can't get a good feel for techniques other than the basics.  But that was an idea I quickly dropped, as I can't imagine that the illusionary class of magic is a cakewalk; sure, she's not firing microwave lasers from her horn, but the ability to manipulate one's surroundings and even mind seems very impressive to me.

 

The latest theory I have is that perhaps she has some sort of disease that causes her to suffer headaches when she uses magic.  For simple tasks, the headaches will be soft, benign, nearly undetactable.  But as the task requires more work, focus, and magical strength and stamina, the headache gets worse.  If the task is demanding enough, perhaps Trixie's headach can get to the point of being debilitating.

 

If that's the case, though, I need a reason for why ths can't be easily solved just by using a sort of perminant Advil spell.

 

I, just today, visited an uncle who has been suffering some nasty headaches and had to be taken to the hospital to be checked up.  Turns out he has a cyst on his brain, right in the middle at-top, near his memory region (and another region, but i can't recall what).  Perhaps Trixie suffers something similar, which would require surgery, in the end, to cut out.  But perhaps it turns out that brain cysts either aren't known about, can't be treated with Equestria's technological/magical abilities, or it can be treated, but Trixie can't afford the sugery.

 

(following up on the first-and-third points, in my headcanon, I imagine Trixie being kicked out of the house by her estranged mother after her father dies; for undetermined reasons as of now, Trixie's mom doesn't like her at all, her brother doesn't care about her, and her dad was the only one to protect-and I'm rambling, sorry.  Long-short, Trixie's out of house-and-home, she worked her tail off just to get into the school, she passed by the skin of her teeth, and she's looking desperately for a solution that will allow her to keep up with the remainder of her fellow students in the applications department and I'm still rambling...)

 

...Okay, I'm losing my train of thought.

 

Long-short-TL;DR: I need reasons for why a unicorn can be knowledgable of standard and advanced magical theory, but not be able to actually pull off using the spells.  She's not the equivilant of magically mute or anything, but her abilities are very limited except for her special talent, and even that isn't very impressive.

 

Thoughts?  I'd appreciate 'em.

[Princess Lona 382]

I'm not so sure you have to look for exterior reasons as to why her magic could be inhibited. She isn't as powerful as Twilight, but in Boast Busters she does show that she has at least slightly more prowess than the average unicorn. She was able to conjure lightning and her rope charming trick shows that she can manipulate objects with more precision than just moving them around as we've seen other unicorns do. Aside from Twilight, Sombra, Sunset Shimmer, and Shining Armour I don't think we have seen a unicorn more powerful than Trixie. So I don't see why she wouldn't make it through the admittance test. All you have to do is hatch an egg. She got laughed at all over Equestria after Twilight humiliated her, but it wasn't necessarily because she's weak, it was because she wasn't as strong as she claimed and people like to make fun of a liar who has been caught.

 

But if you still want an inhibitor how about simple lack of practice? We have seen Twilight get stronger and stronger through study and practice, but who is to say that once you gain a new magical ability you can't lose it? Using magic appears to be a physically strenuous task. Twilight strains and sweats when she is doing something particularly difficult with her magic, and we saw her straining to simply turn a page as a filly in the Cutie Mark Chronicles. As she got stronger, it got easier. So maybe magic is like a muscle and if you don't exercise it you get weaker. Both Shining Armour's and Cadence's magic got weaker when they were under stress.

 

So maybe Trixie was much stronger as a filly and that's why she got into the school. But then something happened that caused her to either get depressed or distracted from her studies, or maybe she suffered an injury (I don't want to go writing the backstory for you, so I'll just leave it vague) and she just fell out of practice. By the time Boast Busters happened she was much weaker than she was at school but she didn't want to admit it, hence all the bragging.

[Lateon 589]

Consider that Twilight's special talent is "magic." That's kind of unfair in it of itself, because that means she's good at ALL kinds of magic without really trying. In addition, she's stupidly powerful because she's the element of magic.

 

Our perceptions of power are ridiculously skewed because of her. Since Trixie and Twilight are the only two unicorns we've ever seen that have been confirmed to come from that school (don't quote me on that, it's early), it doesn't seem feasible or accurate to compare the two in that fashion.

 

Also, Trixie isn't especially weak with her illusion spells - I don't know where you got that idea. She's a stagemare; her spells are SUPPOSED to be overly flamboyant and yet not be that powerful.

 

That's my 7:50 A.M. argument for ya. Off to class!

[RWB2 17]

Hey, hi, fellow pony fans!  I'm back with yet another question for y'allz.

 

I've been thinking about Trixie as I yet continue my little backstory story of her, and something has been bugging the crap out of me for a while now.  Lauren Faust (again) has confirmed a while back that Trixie attended Celestia's Academy for GIfted Unicorns.  Yet Trixie, according to us and apparently a lot of Equestrians, has magical abilities that are sub-par, working an occupation that is...  well, redundant.

 

And yet she, with her mediocrety, managed to get into Celestia's Academy for Gifted Unicorns.  THe [as far as we know] most prestigious educational facility for freaking unicorns.

 

I've been stuck on stupid trying to rationalize this.  What in the world could possibly be going on with a Unicorn that would allow a unicorn who is supposed to be mediocre and average at best, or inferior at worst to most unicorns of average ability, yet she actually gets into the most - again - the most pristigious magic arts academy in the entire country?!

 

After trying to rationalize it, and after the feedback I received from my last topic regarding the admissions test to said academy, I pondered...  What if Trixie has the brains to be mage material, but something is keeping her from realizing the application of her studies?

 

Call me crazy, but I think that for all of her bull-headedness, egotisticism, and just general jerkiness, I think Trixie could be a smart mare.  I doubt idiots or even unicorns of average intelligence would have a shot at - don't make me say it again, I'm already sounding like a broken record.  So maybe something's serving as an impediment...

 

But what?

 

I had a similar discussion in a Fimfiction group where I levied some ideas as to why this would be the case.  Originally, I'd thought that maybe magic works like those manna/energy bars that you often see in fantasy games; when the meter depleats, a unicorn can no longer perform any spells; with Trixie, I thought that maybe her manna reserves meter, so to speak, was lower than the average unicorn's.  Then I thought, perhaps Trixie learns kinesthetically, and can't get a good feel for techniques other than the basics.  But that was an idea I quickly dropped, as I can't imagine that the illusionary class of magic is a cakewalk; sure, she's not firing microwave lasers from her horn, but the ability to manipulate one's surroundings and even mind seems very impressive to me.

 

The latest theory I have is that perhaps she has some sort of disease that causes her to suffer headaches when she uses magic.  For simple tasks, the headaches will be soft, benign, nearly undetactable.  But as the task requires more work, focus, and magical strength and stamina, the headache gets worse.  If the task is demanding enough, perhaps Trixie's headach can get to the point of being debilitating.

 

If that's the case, though, I need a reason for why ths can't be easily solved just by using a sort of perminant Advil spell.

 

I, just today, visited an uncle who has been suffering some nasty headaches and had to be taken to the hospital to be checked up.  Turns out he has a cyst on his brain, right in the middle at-top, near his memory region (and another region, but i can't recall what).  Perhaps Trixie suffers something similar, which would require surgery, in the end, to cut out.  But perhaps it turns out that brain cysts either aren't known about, can't be treated with Equestria's technological/magical abilities, or it can be treated, but Trixie can't afford the sugery.

 

(following up on the first-and-third points, in my headcanon, I imagine Trixie being kicked out of the house by her estranged mother after her father dies; for undetermined reasons as of now, Trixie's mom doesn't like her at all, her brother doesn't care about her, and her dad was the only one to protect-and I'm rambling, sorry.  Long-short, Trixie's out of house-and-home, she worked her tail off just to get into the school, she passed by the skin of her teeth, and she's looking desperately for a solution that will allow her to keep up with the remainder of her fellow students in the applications department and I'm still rambling...)

 

...Okay, I'm losing my train of thought.

 

Long-short-TL;DR: I need reasons for why a unicorn can be knowledgable of standard and advanced magical theory, but not be able to actually pull off using the spells.  She's not the equivilant of magically mute or anything, but her abilities are very limited except for her special talent, and even that isn't very impressive.

 

Thoughts?  I'd appreciate 'em.

 

 

Actually, as far as we've seen, Trixie is actually among the strongest magic users we've seen(outside the Alicorns and Sombra and the monstrous Cake Baby), and the most versatile behind Twi.

 

The only time her magic just outright failed to work was when she zapped RD with a spell that was meant for torture(that she most likely hadn't really mastered). Her regular lightning cloud spell shocked RD silly, and actually put the Ursa Minor in pain.

 

 

Trixie isn't incompetent or weak, it's just that Twilight is so far above her it's not even funny.

[Hive King 2,001]

I personally think Trixie has potential, but is too lazy to actually use it. She wants everything on a solver platter and the thought of training would be below her. Your theory is interesting, but Trixie showed some good potential with the Alicorn Amulet, which I doubt would get rid of a cyst. I think the Alicorn Amulet just brought out her hidden potential that she could have gotten if she trained

[RWB2 17]

I personally think Trixie has potential, but is too lazy to actually use it. She wants everything on a solver platter and the thought of training would be below her. Your theory is interesting, but Trixie showed some good potential with the Alicorn Amulet, which I doubt would get rid of a cyst. I think the Alicorn Amulet just brought out her hidden potential that she could have gotten if she trained

 

 

You do realize that AA Trixie is essentially Discord Lite, and as far as shown feats, above the the Princesses?

[Hive King 2,001]

You do realize that AA Trixie is essentially Discord Lite, and as far as shown feats, above the the Princesses?

Discord what? The Princesses move the Sun and Moon, Trixie's best feat is shielding Ponyville. Also, Twilight mentions than an age spell is only for "the highest level unicorns" implying it's been done before. Twilight during a magical burst is stronger than Trixie, aging a dragon is more impressive than aging some weak foals. Also, Twilight briefly replicated the aging spell. Trixie was stronger than Twilight, but she wasn't hugely stronger.

 

Twilight: 100

Trixie: 20

AA Trixie: 115-120

Twilight during a burst: 130

[RWB2 17]

Trixie's Giant Bowl spell begs to differ. Trixie effortlessly tossing Twilight out of Ponyville disagrees.

 

As for the sun and moon, we now know they are actually not that big, and frankly, we know just the unicorns could do that as a group... yet Trixie holds a whole city of them helplessly captive.

 

 

 

The whole point of the "trickery beats strength" message the episode had  was that Trixie was so overwhelmingly powerful she could not be faced head on.

[Scootalove 10,692]

Trixie was pretty powerful when it came to having the Alicorn amulet, basically in Magic Duel when she had the amulet on her neck it helped increase her magical strength to beat Twilight. But in Boast Busters, she was of course showing off for entertainment.

[Fhaolan 4,494]

We have no actual evidence that Trixie is weak in any way. We've only seen the a couple of unicorns actually *do* anything. Rarity can control a large number of small objects with Telekinesis, and has a gem-finding spell. Shining Armor has the one shield spell which seems to be his special talent. Pumpkin Cake only demonstrates telekinesis. Twilight is uber, as per her character design, and even she strains at controlling multiple objects simultaneously in Telekinesis as part of her demo for the Saddle Arabians.

 

Everyone else at best seems to be able lift a tea set and that's about it. 

 

Trixie has a wide variety of spells. They may not be at the individual power level of Twilight, but her repertoire is vast compared to any of the other unicorns we've seen. Thinking of her as weak is a holdover from people playing way to many modern RPGs and assuming that unicorns are all 'Wizard' level entities throwing army-busting fireballs around casually.

[Hive King 2,001]

Trixie's Giant Bowl spell begs to differ. Trixie effortlessly tossing Twilight out of Ponyville disagrees.

 

As for the sun and moon, we now know they are actually not that big, and frankly, we know just the unicorns could do that as a group... yet Trixie holds a whole city of them helplessly captive.

 

 

 

The whole point of the "trickery beats strength" message the episode had  was that Trixie was so overwhelmingly powerful she could not be faced head on.

Shining Armor making a shield that covers a city instead of a town begs to differ. Sombra without a body trapping Twilight begs to differ.

 

Where is this evidence for the Sun and Moon not being that big? As for Trixie holding a town of unicorns captive, none of them tried to fight back and I assume it meant high level unicorns when it said a group. 

 

Twilight can't call upon magic bursts on command, she showed vastly better feats than Trixie when she rapidly aged Spike. I'd also like to mention that Trixie did have trouble fighting Twilight, it wasn't the cake-walk people say it was. 

 

We have no actual evidence that Trixie is weak in any way. We've only seen the a couple of unicorns actually *do* anything. Rarity can control a large number of small objects with Telekinesis, and has a gem-finding spell. Shining Armor has the one shield spell which seems to be his special talent. Pumpkin Cake only demonstrates telekinesis. Twilight is uber, as per her character design, and even she strains at controlling multiple objects simultaneously in Telekinesis as part of her demo for the Saddle Arabians.

 

Everyone else at best seems to be able lift a tea set and that's about it. 

 

Trixie has a wide variety of spells. They may not be at the individual power level of Twilight, but her repertoire is vast compared to any of the other unicorns we've seen. Thinking of her as weak is a holdover from people playing way to many modern RPGs and assuming that unicorns are all 'Wizard' level entities throwing army-busting fireballs around casually.

We haven't seen Trixie do anything very impressive either. Her best lightning bolt only mildly inconvenienced Rainbow Dash and when she blasted her with intent to kill, the result was Rainbow literally laughing it off. Twilight has problems with control, not raw power, that was why her demo was moving around the animals, it's a show of great dexterity. This of course means that Rarity is super skilled, though not very powerful. 

 

Thinking Trixie weak is because compared to most ponies in the show, she would lose. She would lose to Discord, the Princesses, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, and many others. For all intents and purposes, she is weak compared to the main characters

[Fhaolan 4,494]

 

We haven't seen Trixie do anything very impressive either. Her best lightning bolt only mildly inconvenienced Rainbow Dash and when she blasted her with intent to kill, the result was Rainbow literally laughing it off. Twilight has problems with control, not raw power, that was why her demo was moving around the animals, it's a show of great dexterity. This of course means that Rarity is super skilled, though not very powerful. 

 

Thinking Trixie weak is because compared to most ponies in the show, she would lose. She would lose to Discord, the Princesses, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, and many others. For all intents and purposes, she is weak compared to the main characters

 

The Princesses are alicorns, and are therefore not valid for a discussion on the relative power of unicorns. Discord isn't even a pony, let alone a unicorn. Comparing Trixie with Discord is like comparing a Corvette with a Concorde, and honestly ruins your argument making it difficult to take you seriously. You're better off sticking with Sombra and Twilight for comparison purposes, but as those two are presented as being in the same league as Starswirl the Bearded, I'm not sure you're really that much better off. That leaves you with Shining Armor and Rarity, really. And I see nothing that says Trixie is more or less powerful than either of those, other that she demonstrates a wider breadth of knowledge, in that she can do fine control Telekinesis, enough strength of Telekinesis to pick up the entire body weight of an adult pony with no strain, weather control, illusion, and so on. Rarity acknowledges that she only knows just enough magic to do her two spells (Telekinesis and gem finding), and Shining Armor only shows the one shield spell. A powerful shield spell, yes, but still only the one spell. He probably knows a bit more, but we have no idea what.

 

As for the lighting bolt Trixie gives Rainbow Dash, it was when she thought she was being boosted by a fictional amulet. I doubt she put all her strength behind it, because she likely didn't believe she *needed* to, as the amulet was supposed to boost it to killing levels. Again, you're trying to use a situation when Trixie is not trying very hard as a indication of her top levels of ability. And you're assuming that an unboosted lighting bolt would be able to kill a Pegasus normally, when previous episodes has Rainbow Dash using lighting bolts on other ponies as a prank.

 

Trixie is an Alazon, specifically a Miles Gloriosus. A classic figure who puts forth the least amount of effort, and tries to glide through life based on boasts, threats, and being flashy. This does not mean that the Alazon is incompetent or weak, just not as good as they say they are.

[RWB2 17]

Shining Armor making a shield that covers a city instead of a town begs to differ. Sombra without a body trapping Twilight begs to differ.

 

Where is this evidence for the Sun and Moon not being that big? As for Trixie holding a town of unicorns captive, none of them tried to fight back and I assume it meant high level unicorns when it said a group. 

 

Twilight can't call upon magic bursts on command, she showed vastly better feats than Trixie when she rapidly aged Spike. I'd also like to mention that Trixie did have trouble fighting Twilight, it wasn't the cake-walk people say it was. 

 

We haven't seen Trixie do anything very impressive either. Her best lightning bolt only mildly inconvenienced Rainbow Dash and when she blasted her with intent to kill, the result was Rainbow literally laughing it off. Twilight has problems with control, not raw power, that was why her demo was moving around the animals, it's a show of great dexterity. This of course means that Rarity is super skilled, though not very powerful. 

 

Thinking Trixie weak is because compared to most ponies in the show, she would lose. She would lose to Discord, the Princesses, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, and many others. For all intents and purposes, she is weak compared to the main characters

 

Discord is so far above everyone else it's not even funny. 

The Princesses have a grand total of... almost no feats outside the raising of sun and moon. Heck, as far as sheer power goes, Shining Armor has shown himself his wife's equal. Sure, Non-AA Trixie has no chance.

 

AJ: Lolno. Trixie's magic is quite enough to handle AJ, who has nothing but strength to help her... and not even that is that amazing since all ponies in the show have comparable strength(See Twilight lugging around Tom the Rock). Heck, it's arguable if she's even superior to Rarity in physical combat.

RD: Rainbow Dash is a blackbelt with supersonic speed. And if it wasn't for that insane speed, Trixie would beat her too.

FS: Nope. Fluttershy's stare does not work on ponies, and outside that she has nothing on Trixie.

 

Rarity hasn't shown her magic to be on par with Trixie's.

 

The only Mane Six members that can solidly beat non-AA Trixie is Pinkie(but then again, with full cartoon silliness activated, she's second only to Discord) and Twilight(who is the element of magic).

[Hive King 2,001]

Discord is so far above everyone else it's not even funny. 

The Princesses have a grand total of... almost no feats outside the raising of sun and moon. Heck, as far as sheer power goes, Shining Armor has shown himself his wife's equal. Sure, Non-AA Trixie has no chance.

 

AJ: Lolno. Trixie's magic is quite enough to handle AJ, who has nothing but strength to help her... and not even that is that amazing since all ponies in the show have comparable strength(See Twilight lugging around Tom the Rock). Heck, it's arguable if she's even superior to Rarity in physical combat.

RD: Rainbow Dash is a blackbelt with supersonic speed. And if it wasn't for that insane speed, Trixie would beat her too.

FS: Nope. Fluttershy's stare does not work on ponies, and outside that she has nothing on Trixie.

 

Rarity hasn't shown her magic to be on par with Trixie's.

 

The only Mane Six members that can solidly beat non-AA Trixie is Pinkie(but then again, with full cartoon silliness activated, she's second only to Discord) and Twilight(who is the element of magic).

AJ: She was tied up but not much more, she was caught off guard as well. In a true fight, AJ wins.

RD: What's your point? Of course RD can beat her. You also forgot that Rainbow tanked Trixie's torture spell

FS: When enraged, she tosses ponies around like rag-dolls and can outspeed Rainbow.

Rarity: Has physical combat skills as shown against the Changelings and the Manticore

[Princess Lona 382]

It doesn't really matter if the non-magical ponies can beat Trixie and her magic in a fight. The question pertinent to the OP is "is Trixie's magic powerful enough to get her into Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns". I think the answer is yes it is. The school has a pretty vague name, they probably have many different areas of study. So even if Trixie's magic is no good for use in a fight, she can still do some pretty cool things. Her fireworks were dazzling, for all we know they may even be better than Twilight's fireworks. Perhaps she majored in Spectacle Magic whereas other students majored in Weather Magic, Levitation or Auditory Illusions.

[RWB2 17]

AJ: She was tied up but not much more, she was caught off guard as well. In a true fight, AJ wins.

RD: What's your point? Of course RD can beat her. You also forgot that Rainbow tanked Trixie's torture spell

FS: When enraged, she tosses ponies around like rag-dolls and can outspeed Rainbow.

Rarity: Has physical combat skills as shown against the Changelings and the Manticore

 

AJ: No, she doesn't, because magic+the fact that she's actually pretty lousy at fighting outside sheer physical strength(because that goes great against a pony specializing in tricks and magic).

RD: Already said she wins. 

FS: Can't actually get close to RD's best speeds even when angry, and magic is still stopping her.

Rarity: Not getting around the magic. But yes, she's a great physical combatant.

[Hive King 2,001]

AJ: No, she doesn't, because magic+the fact that she's actually pretty lousy at fighting outside sheer physical strength(because that goes great against a pony specializing in tricks and magic).

RD: Already said she wins. 

FS: Can't actually get close to RD's best speeds even when angry, and magic is still stopping her.

Rarity: Not getting around the magic. But yes, she's a great physical combatant.

AJ: Trixie's combat magic consists of levitation, not the best power compared to energy powered head butts which AJ has dealt with.

FS: In return of harmony, Fluttershy outsped Rainbow. You might argue that Rainbow was weighed down but Fluttershy had to deal with the drag of a balloon. Fluttershy can just dodge Trixie's magic

Rarity: Has the same level of combat magic as Trixie, the only reason Rarity" "lost" their fight was because of being a diva