What are your thoughts regarding the general forms and natures of Diamond Dogs? I mean in terms of diversity, potential sexual dimorphism and culture.

Because of my strong hold on personal headcanon I am essentially "locked" to an idea that there are only four breeds of Diamond Dog (though I guess I could handwave up some more) and that sexual dimorphism is essentially nil; female Dogs are simply of a more feminine shape than their male breed counterparts. Their society is technologically muddled but they are civilized. They have become a willing vassal state of Equestria and allowed ponies to build cities over their underground cities, creating almost a "Dwemer" situation. I imagine they are natural miners, smiths, masons and gemologists, with some being extrmely knowledgable about magic as it interacts with gems, making them natural engineers for certain applications.

Anyone else have headcanon?

918807 All you have said is now my headcanon.

918809

Yep, I could not have worded my headcanon any better. Thank you for this.

918824
VEXY!!!!! How's your work on Spike's Crusade going?

918809
918824

Diamond Dogs are tragically underrepresented in the fandom. I am trying to give them some definition and identity.

918852
We need MOAR!!!!! of them

918835

Not really the place to discuss this, but it's going well. Just the final few thousand words to go. If I don't get further distracted by writing Chapter Three, that is...

918807

Branching back on topic, I'll deviate and say that I don't think that Diamond dogs allow ponies to build atop their cities, it's more that they don't really care about the surface as everything they want and need is underground.

It does make you wonder why evolution hasn't made them blind, however...

I also question the views ponies and Diamond dogs have of each other. Are they trustful? Perhaps that could make an interesting ship if the two parties distrust each other, but a single pair discover that they have more in common than they first think.

But that's just me speculating.

918861
First:

Second: That sounds like an amazing fic.

918861

In my headcanon they are at the trusting stage but it took a bit of time. There's no hard evidence about the first Dog/Pony romance. It was either someone I never showed, Emerald and Clear or Kipakuta's Centre and Jasper.

919285

So what about the Diamond Dogs that Rarity encountered? Where do they fit into your headcanon?

919349

They were the first ones encountered that close to Canterlot in numbers like that. The nearest prior encounter was Jasper, poaching from the LaRoulettes. He was caught and made to serve as Toola Roola's companion and valet where observations were made. And then he met Centre. Because of some things in her life she has been hesitant to actually have children. Thus one of the first Diamond Ponies was actually Emerald and Clear's pup. It's odd but a lot of the first pairs weren't the first to hybridize, like Braeburn and Little Strongheart. They were beaten by Howling and Clarion.

918861

Oh, and again on topic, I say "allow" in regards to city building because they help out and also have some autonomy in their land. They are active in their encouragement of ponies coming. More technology, more jobs, more stallions and mares to date. Good times.

My headcanon for the diamond dogs in my Cloudyverse is they used to be a much larger civilization in the times before Discord's arrival (in this setting I view him as an almost Elder God sort of entity, not of the normal world the way the rest of my pantheon is). But in the aftermath of that war, and Luna's fall into the Nightmare, their civilization fractured into infighting as the different Great Alphas sought to press their own methods for ensuring their survivial.

A thousand years later the packs are still strong, but far more localized, while below the mountains of the far north, the jungles of the south, and the plains of the west (beyond Appleloosa in that setting's map of Equestria, which I drew up before the official one came out) lie the remains of their great cities, picked clean by scavengers, archeologists and thieves. However, the greatest of their holdings remain undiscovered, and every so often a pack alpha dreams of being able to locate one and begin to cement his path towards becoming a new Great Alpha.

I briefly toyed around with the idea of that being the explanation for why Rover and his pack were inside Equestria in the first place, following the rumors of ruins hidden in the Great Forest. Still might write it at some point, if I can find some time between everything else I'm working on

As far as their interactions with ponies and the possibility of hybrids, I've not had it come up yet in-setting, but now that the idea's in my head, I'm sure it's only a matter of time...