Powers of Mane Six after giving up the Elements

[SasQ 1,376]

Warning:
This topic contains spoilers from Season 4.
If you didn't watch it yet, close the tab quickly and don't read any further

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OK, so as you know, Mane Six have relinquished the Elements of Harmony and gave them back to the Tree of Harmony. This move from the storytelling perspective could have made them look less powerful (physically at least; spiritually is a different pair of horseshoes ).

Now, after watching the next two episodes from Season 4 (especially the "Daring Don't") episode, and knowing what is scheduled next (the Equestria Games next saturday, and the "Power Ponies" episode later), I'm starting to wonder:

Have the writers planned all these episodes as a form of convincing us that the Mane Six still have some powers even when they don't use the Elements of Harmony anymore? You know, without all these powerful Elements bursting with "Rainbow Rays of Death" all around the place, they are now just a bunch of plain old ponies, without any "superpowers", which could make them look somewhat more "lame". And I have a feeling that the writers are trying to compensate it with all these episodes involving Mane Six struggling with different obstacles and monstrous villains (think Ahuizotl) to let us see that they still are sorta badasses (Edit: my first thought was "badplots" but it has had some wrong connotations ) even without the Elements of Harmony at hoof.

First, just after the season opener, we see them struggling in the Old Castle with some "shadow pony" and all the traps in the castle. The "shadow pony" being actually Pinkie Pie slightly weakens the effect (at least for me), but still  They show a lot of courage and attitude against all these difficulties, and lots of team work.

Then, we've got the "Daring Don't" episode where they need to face the dreadful Ahuizotl himself, a huge and monstrous creature. And we can see Twilight Sparkle saying "OK, but sounds to me like we're in way, way, way over our heads. We're going to need a carefully thought out plan...". I'm not a native English speaker so I had some trouble with understanding this sentence (please correct me if I'm wrong), but from what I understand, she says that this task sounds to be way too hard for them, so they need to prepare for it more carefully and come up with a good plan before taking action. If my understanding is correct, then this is quite a direct way to emphasize that they are now less powerful without the Elements, so they need to find other ways to compensate for it (which they pretty much do, and I like it).

I don't know much about the upcoming episodes' details before they've been aired, so I can only speculate from their titles and synopses. But I can pretty much see the pattern here, that the first several episodes do have a common theme, which is showing to the fans that the Mane Six can perform well without the Elements.

What are your thoughts about that?
Could I be right with it?

[LordDiscord 289]

Personally I am interested in finding out what is in the box the Tree of Harmony left behind. That box kind of gives me the feeling that the Elements are not gone but instead have just been put in storage and the box is meant as a way for the tree to test the ponies to see if they are worthy to possess the Elements of Harmony.  I could be wrong but I feel that they will still need some form of power to help them.  They might be able to overcome certain villains on their own but there are villains out their that are simply to powerful for them to defeat alone. Also there is that lingering possibility that Discord could take the elements sacrifice as a means to revert to his evil ways and if that happened then nothing could stop him.

[Nature's Spell 526]

You have pretty great English. :-) Yes that is what Twilight meant, but I also think that was done on purpose to provide conflict between the planner Twilight and the seat of her pants Rainbow Dash. In other words, it was a bit contrived, but reasonable I guess.

 

As to your excellent question I think the writers will try to slow that they can deal with major situations without the Elements. I don't think any of the upcoming episodes will showcase it, but at some point a villain will need to be dealt with. The Mane six are still the bearers of the Elements and they are all talented and smart ponies, but I can't think of any special powers. Twilight was always powerful and becoming an Alicorn may have boosted that, but we'll see.

[LordDiscord 289]

Wait...what if they can summon the essence of the Elements of Harmony like they could in Equestria Girls? Maybe they don't need the actual gemstones but instead can still summon their powers even if they are in the tree. I could see this ability as something that would be hidden in the box and the keys are meant to test them so that they learn that they don't need to rely on the Elements of Harmony 100% but they would be there if they are needed.

[Noodles 109]

 

 

Wait...what if they can summon the essence of the Elements of Harmony like they could in Equestria Girls? Maybe they don't need the actual gemstones but instead can still summon their powers even if they are in the tree. I could see this ability as something that would be hidden in the box and the keys are meant to test them so that they learn that they don't need to rely on the Elements of Harmony 100% but they would be there if they are needed.

 

Possible would fit my personal head cannon but it would seem to me like a cop out now!

[Scootalove 10,689]

They could still summon the powers of the Elements, if they are not in the tree. Just because they are the physical manifestation of the Elements of Harmony does not mean, that their powers can not still be summoned.

[Metemponychosis 1,261]

I get what you are saying, but I get the feeling that the show is changing. It IS too early to say this, but...

 

I think that if that episode with Flim and Flam happened during season 4, the Mane Six would probably have beaten the two unicorns after Twilight spouts something about working together.

 

If Dragonshy happened now, Twilight would have said something about the group of them being invincible and then proceeded to follow Rainbow's plans of beating the dragon into leaving.

 

At the Gala they might have beaten Blueblood (which I would actually like to see) and them beat Princess Celestia for tricking them into wasting their night. 

 

The Elements of Harmony were a visual reminder, and a "badge of office" showing that their power is their friendship. And I don't know where they are going with this. Meghan showed that the Elements are not that important; it's all about their friendship in Equestria Girls... Well, I hope to see this sometime soon... Because all I see now is how awesome Twilight is for reminding other ponies of things they should already know...

 

Maybe I'm being too harsh and partial, but I didn't start enjoying the show for it's action scenes...