Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes · 3:49am Jul 21st, 2012
Today I did something I don't usually consider and altered a couple of my fics due to reader feedback. I prefer to let a work stay finished, lest I go the George Lucas route, but in this particular case some readers were getting rather the wrong impression. I wrote Correspondence and Fluffershy shortly after Winter Wrap-Up aired, when we still knew relatively little about the world the show took place in, and at the time I had no idea when certain events in the ponies' lives took place. For various reasons I assumed, for instance, that Twilight became Celestia's student after she'd reached whatever age it is horses reach before they go to friendship college. This turned out not to be the case. So I've made a couple of edits to make it very clear, in Correspondence, that Celestia absolutely did not harbor sexy thoughts about Twilight while she was a foal. Likewise, readers of Fluffershy will no longer be lead to believe that Rarity made pornography while she was still a blank flank. It was never my intention to suggest that this sort of thing was going on, and rather than continually explain what happened in the comments section, I'm just going to edit the stories themselves. I've also fiddled a little bit with Fluffershy to try and make the dialogue flow better. I probably have not succeeded.
Also changed Luna Vs the Threesome to a teen rating. I may do the same with the Creature that Came to Ponyville. I'm trying to avoid children being traumatized by my fanfics, but I've gotten the impression the mature rating is mostly reserved for out and out porn on this site. As someone who's used to posting on FF.net it's a little disorienting.
More stories are on their way up. I've mushed "Clean" and "Moon Shy" into a collection of short fics along with a drabble I did on tumblr about Fluttershy and Rarity smoking weed. Should be interesting. Also formatting Estrus as I type this. Then it's on to the Correspondence sequel. All of those readers who said they wanted brutal, realistic Twilestia? You're getting it.
You monsters.
Good to see that the sequel to Correspondence is coming, but that 'You monsters.' comment scares me a bit. I'm getting visions of Celestia crying at Twilight's funeral (as well as a whole host of other very very sad things...), and they suck. Bigtime.
CORRESPONDENCE SEQUEL woohoo!
Changing stories is fine.
The canon is constantly at odds with fan fiction as more episodes come out. It's good to give authors the benefit of the doubt about this.
Dare I ask, what do you mean when you say brutal, realistic Twilestia?
Personally the only changes that should matter are the chages in ratings. It'd probably be easier to just put a disclaimer on your older works as to what season the story pertained to. I first started reading your stories two days and got the hint based on little clues like how abusive angel was. But you're the author and I'm the audience. Actually, your fics are entertaining enough to warrant multiple reads, so it might be fun to see these changes.
As for the rating issue, Mature usually = blatant clop and detailed grindmark.
While you're formatting, could you also do "Do You Really Want to Know?" Or is it already submitted, and just waiting for approval?
Also, the realistic aspect intrigues me, but the brutal... you meant brutally d'awww inducing, right?
Too many people overreacting over stuff like this. I mean, Friendly, if it personally bothers you, that's your thing and I can respect that as long as you don't flip over it like one notable author did and took his stories down. But the readers who complained, you need to back the hell up. So tired of everyone screaming "rape!" and "foal-fiddling!" like somehow this applies to cartoon ponies in a story, a work of fantasy, acting like it's some sort of crime against nature and frankly comparing it to the real thing is an insult to those such victims.
I mean if we want to get technical, Twilestia and Twiluna are pretty much always foal-fiddling due to the enormous age differences. Hell, even Granny Smith is a foal compared to either of those two. And please, no, I don't want to see Granny Smith shipping. ._. Just that this annoys the crap outta me that someone raises an alarm over nothing and yells at our esteemed authors for their own personal preferences being offended. If you don't like it, be mature, do your reading, then just shrug it off. Or hell, stop reading and walk away if you feel you can't get through it without turning into a whining brat that's trying to sound like some sort of crusader JUST because the whistle you blew is a serious one -in real life-, which really has no bearing here. If these are Friendly's personal feelings, I totally understand that, but any of you readers bitching at him really should just back off. Tired of seeing authors get mobbed by people who find a story not to their exact tastes, for either relevant or stupid reasons - it's rampant beyond belief on this site.
I always took Celestia's thoughts about Twilight to be simply an outgrowth of immortal perspective. She is never going to have a partner old enough that she wasn't a fully mature adult when they were a child. If she did find such an individual, there's hardly a guarantee she'd be interested in them. If she has any sex drive whatsoever, it is likely that she has at some point in her immortal life looked at a foal and thought about what they'll grow up to be. Note that I'm not presuming any attraction to foals in saying that.
So I don't agree with the change to Correspondence. Honestly, if you were going to change something, the 'God Empress' line is uncharacteristically harsh for Celestia, and has always served to jolt me out of the narrative. The sentiment is fine, but the phrase 'God Empress' specifically seems wrong.
EDIT: I wanted to add, whether agreed with or not, thank you for informing your fans of the changes. It's good to at least know. I also wanted to say that I like the change to Fluffershy. I regret I didn't start with the positive and have to include this in an edit.
241127
There are a large number of issues involved in shipping Celestia with anypony, and Correspondence pretty much glossed over all of them. That was kind of the point, really- I'd read a couple of stories where Celestia let Twilight down gently, and I kind of wanted to say "Hey, just because she's old she doesn't get to fall in love? Screw that!" But having given the matter some thought since, I've decided I want to write something that actually considers all of those issues and deals with them in a somewhat realistic manner. Unfortunately, dealing with the issue of Twilestia in a realistic manner is kind of depressing. I'll do my best, but the fic is going to be sad and there's not really anything I can do about that.
241147
Ah shoot, I forgot about Do You Really Want to Know. Yes that's coming up too.
And yes, I hope to induce some d'awwws. To make up for all of the crying.
241161
It's more about making sure people understand what I'm trying to say in a story than it is about any kind of moral outrage. I generally hold to the opinion that fiction is fiction, and that if you want to write about something and people want to read it, that's between you and them and as long as no real people are getting hurt then who cares? That being said... the suggestion that Celestia might have had romantic designs about Twilight when she was still a foal absolutely did not fit with the tone I was trying to set in the story. It's less of a problem in Fluffershy, but again, the issue of child pornography isn't one I felt had a place in the story and it wasn't a question I particularly wanted people considering while reading it. I want people to laugh when they read my comedy stories, or d'awww appropriately during the cute parts. I don't want them to hit a mental brick wall by implying that Rarity was an underage porn star. If someone doesn't like a fanfic because they just don't like the story or the characterization or my sense of humor doesn't mesh with theirs then that's fine, we can agree to disagree and I can take the criticism if they feel the need to give it. But if I've written something that confuses people and I can fix it by changing a couple of sentences here and there then I don't think it hurts anyone to do so. It just seemed like the friendly thing to do.
241231 Ok I can handle a bit of sad, as long as it ends happy. I was worried you were about to shoot them down, and stomp on them while insulting their mothers.
241231
Completely understandable, Friendly. Thank you for your stories and diligence in making sure you remain clear with your intentions through them. My personal moral outrage is largely directed at the whining masses who whine without reason. Carry on, good sir!
Well, if your trying to prevent Childrens minds being traumatized by fanfics, I don't think changing this to teen is the way to go. Most children still have "Show Mature Content" blocked because they know its bad, and I don't think a threesome is the way to go when it comes to keeping children's minds untraumatized. So now all the little children will learn about Threesomes because this is now easy for them to see since its teen.
Give me your opinion on this :P
Wait, you're formatting an already-written sequel to Correspondence, or going to be WRITING the sequel? Because if it already exists somewhere, I need to find it.
As far as the Mature rating is concerned, there are differing interpretations by many as to what should be rated Mature or what should not. The technical guidelines for the ratings are not always followed, and when they are I don't always agree with them.
For instance, Tumbleweed's "Friendship (With Benefits) is Magic" is rated mature for sex, even though no sexual activity occurs in the story at all. There are a few dildos used as props and some innuendo, that's it (similar to your "Do You Really Want to Know?"). I don't really agree with this rating, I feel it should be Teen..
On the other hand, a fic you know well, AJT's "Beating the Heat" is rated Teen, yet contains almost non-stop sexual activity, anatomical references, erotic allusions, fetish acts, etc. (similar, though a much greater degree, to your "Luna vs Threesomes"). I also disagree with this rating. A fic that is not only about sex but full to the brim with characters having sex should be rated Mature.
On a technical level, neither of these fics NEED to be rated Mature because neither contain explicit/graphic depictions/descriptions of the acts therein. Just illustrating the perspectives.
As far as "gore" is concerned, my personal opinion is that unless it is a "Gorefic" like Cupcakes (gore for the sake of gore), it should stay "Teen". If every story with any gore was labeled "gore" we'd never be able to tell the gorefics apart from the fics with some gore content.
Again, on a technical level, if the fic contains any explicit/graphic depictions/descriptions of gore it should be rated Mature.
On another note, hurry up and upload "Do You Really Want to Know?" so I can fave it already. It's one of my 5 favorite comedy fics.
241238
I think the problem with 'brutally realistic Twilestia' may be that it starts happy, stumbles a bit as it progresses, and then ends on a down-note (Twilight isn't immortal). The d'awwquation declines over time.
241250
Man I can't make everyone happy. Either I make it mature and the teenagers can't see it or I make it teen and everyone sees it. But if it's rated teen then small children aren't supposed to read it, right? And if they're not being properly supervised the kids can turn off the mature filter and read it anyway. So who's responsibility is it to keep the kids away from the fanfics about ponies talkin' about fuckin'?
Frankly, I wash my hands of the whole thing. If I ever publish actual porn I'll label it mature. For the moment I'll let my stories about ponies discussing the possibility of something that might be pornographic be read by the teenagers. If any teenagers are traumatized by pony threesomes then they probably shouldn't be on the internet anyway.
241289
I'm formatting another short story I've written called "Estrus," which contains a Twilestia joke but is not a sequel to Correspondence.
The sequel to Correspondence is in my head and has yet to be written down, and that is the portion of the process that I intend to begin imminently. As soon as it's ready to be seen by the masses you'll know.
Your diligence and commitment to your stories and readers are noted and appreciated but if you start down that road that you'll never see the end of it.
).
Changes to stay up with canon are futile because canon is moving so much slower than fanon. If you really wanted to do that the only way would be to withdraw all fics and re-release after the show has ended.
Don't you even consider that!
e.g. I have yet to see a story that actually suffers from ignoring Cadance as a third alicorn, even Shining Armor's influence on Twilight is minimal (which says something about that season finale, I'm not gonna spell it though
And for the whole nightmare that is "correct categorizing": I know I disregarded those when I was "at that age" (boy, were there some awkward moments in the gym's locker room) and while I'm optimistic for the future and all, I highly doubt that that aspect will change.
I've yet to read Correspondence. As for Fluffershy, I was laughing the whole way through. My friend listened to me read it online and now we can't stop saying "My secret shame and sin!" in high-pitched voices.
I never thought for a moment that Rarity did foal-porn. I figure the mane six are in their mid-20's. Also, "In my earlier years" is a phrase used by plenty of people regardless of age. Concerning Twilestia or Twiluna, the mortality matters to me rather than the age difference. How many lovers have they buried? Do they take consorts every few decades? Again, I have not read Correspondence so I don't know what you've explored.
Long story short, keep writing what you like; it's interesting as Tartarus.
brutal, realistic Twilestia
I am at once scared, intrigued and mildly, uh, excited.
241231
I worry about the implication I'm picking up from your posts that a 'brutal, realistic' Twielstia would mean they woudn't end up together. I like to think 'Composure' is pretty darn brutal and realistic, especially considering what I have in store for them, but that doesn't mean it's going to end for the worst between them.
It all depends on where they are in their minds - Twilight needs to stop putting Celestia on a pedestal (difficult) and the matter of Celestia being in a relationship with someone she taught must be presented carefully (usually by establishing that she sees Twilight as grown and independent from her time in Ponyville). Bad things can happen, sure, but it doesn't mean they'll be torn apart.
244039
I might be laying things on a little thick. It is possible that I am wanting people to be unsure about the ending of the fic in the interests of heightening the drama. Or maybe it will be a total sobfest where Twilight dumps Celestia to go have an angry threesome with Rainbow Dash and Applejack. We're going to find out together.
Muah ha ha ha.
244432
Very well. You may live... for now.