Like obviously we think the episodes under Faust were better.
But what does this mean specifically?

Like some of the more sane people in the fandom are discussing everything that's gone wrong with MLP.
But what is right about it? What makes a season 1 episode better?
What are the rules as such of faustian orthodoxy?

I have some ideas I just want to hear some peoples views on this.

4199741 Maybe because it was still new. Maybe because the writer were more focused to write nice stories with great morals instead of trying to be cool. Maybe it was before they made Twilight an alicorn. Maybe because it didn't tried to be epic but on count more to be smart writing. Maybe all the latter combined.

I do prefer that Twilight wasn't the sole special chosen one then the clique of tge Mane Six.

It felt like while heroes the world didnt revolve aroubd then.

Honestly, not a lot. I think apart from introducing the setting and characters the original sesason of the show was pretty much the same as what we're currently getting, perhaps a little more tightly plotted, perhaps with a bit more focus on the characters having a lot of flaws.
But curcially with how much more popular the series has gotten it hasn't really gotten any better even though with "Return of Harmony" it felt like we were promised that it could. The disapointment hasn't been so much that things are worse, Cadence and the Crystal empire aren't doing anything so obtrusive as to warrent abandoning the show over it but that there isn't anything to look forward to either.
Twilight discovering how to be a princess isn't going to lead to her having more interesting relationships or stories than her trying to learn about friendship, exploring the wider world isn't going to be the set up for some larger storyline and none of the other characters are going to have a season opening or final dedicated to them or really change as characters as much as Twilight has. I'd love to be proven wrong on any of these accounts but I doubt I will.

I don't really think the show should have become some sort of action-adventure-y drama but similar shows have had ongoing plotlines and at times I felt that this was what this series kept teasing us with but shying away from because any sort of sustained conflict- having something be *not okay* at the end of an episode- was too much.

I'd say the main difference was that the show had a direction that cared about the characters as characters, not as toy-selling devices. Faust wanted to have the characters grow, with the selling of toys a side effect of a high quality story. Hasbro's executives wanted the show to sell toys, with story quality a distant secondary consideration only to be made relevant when the marketing and toy departments weren't bothered.

The authors currently try to do their best with whatever restraints and silly requirements they receive. As a result, while there are always great beginnings of stories that seem like they'll make sense, in the middle of their construction of said story a new toy line appears that makes no sense whatsoever (Twilight alicornification, the Friendship Rainbow Castle etc.) and the story has to be changed to accommodate, or even scrapped altogether.

The blog post below takes Magical Mystery Cure as the focal point to explain how this works. It's long and well worth the read:

>> How Magical Mystery Cure ruined everything

In addition, I'd say that Equestria under Faust's direction was simply nicer overall. It's a place in which I'd like to live. Equestria under Meghan is slowly adding back all the non-nice things that make our modern world, from low paying construction jobs to stressed big city salaried workers dealing with rush hour. With every season it becomes more like Earth and less like a pleasant fantasy dream.

My Little Pony Friendship is Magic under Faust taught how to live by the positive reward of acting with patience, tolerance, and compassion.

In her forward to The Elements of Harmony, Lauren Faust says this:

To truly understand, we adults must go inside ourselves and remember the time before the grown-ups told us these things weren't worthwhile. That child is in there somewhere, and she believes unicorns are noble beasts that bring beauty to the world... We cannot belittle this... To her, magic is not frivolous and silly; it is huge, and it is glorious. It is real... She knows magic can give us everything we ever hoped for, if only we give it the reverence it deserves.