In the event of the not-inconsiderable possibility that I should end up dead, turned to stone again, or transformed into some absolutely cliched and utterly humorless Evil Avatar of Pure Evilness, thereafter to suffer one of the aforementioned fates, I am writing my observations down, in hopes that someday, somepony might figure out what's actually going on here, and perhaps even be able to fight back. Although it seems quite unlikely, given the fall of two (possibly three, if Moonie counts separately) alicorns and the wielders of the Elements of Harmony and the inescapable fact that, if I should fall as well... put it this way, those two alicorns fought me with everything they had and until they found their pile of crystal fruit to stone me with, I laughed off everything they tried. So if I fall, I'm really not hopeful for the future of ponykind. Oh, you'll all live, except for those of you who don't, but your lives won't be your own anymore. You'll be puppets on a stage, dancing for the glory of an alien, and you won't even know it.
But it's not in my nature to go down quietly. I may not survive this, but at the very least, I'm going to do my best to ensure that somepony hears from me after I'm gone.
What a strange thought. Me, gone. I have quite the imagination, but I'm having a hard time picturing that one. Bad enough to be locked in stone, but to be gone? Forever? Dead, or twisted into something I'm not? It's... not a possibility I'm looking forward to, but sticking my head in the sand and pretending it can't possibly happen isn't going to work this time. And to think how well that strategy has served me so far! Ah well, I'm change, sooner or later I had to change tactics, right? Or they'll be changed for me.
As fond as I am of radical social transformation, the thought of someone altering the cultural mores of a society for no better reason than the gratification of their personal base lusts rather offends me. Also, the notion that the most dire threat to Equestria, the worst villain any pony has ever faced, far more insidious and powerful than myself, is prancing around (well, not literally, he's a biped) basking in the soppy glow of friendship and love and all that jazz, things no pony could ever be bothered to extend to me (not that I wanted such mushy pap in my life, but I'd have liked the opportunity to say no, at least)... well, I must confess, that rustles my jimmies something fierce. Plus, he's a moron. Seriously. The thought that Celestia, Luna and Twilight Sparkle, all mares who beat me on occasion, should have fallen to this uncreative numbskull who doesn't even know what his power actually is... now that depresses me. And I am entirely too cheerful a fellow to suffer depression! So I'm going to do something about it.
And if I fail, which I probably will, I hold some hope that perhaps somepony will read this account and see my nemesis for what he is.
It's not, you understand, that I had any intention of risking my life to save ungrateful ponies from mind control (and possibly involuntary retroactive sex change, or possibly banishment to nonexistence... I'm not sure which. Math is boring!) If I had a choice... well, if I had a choice, I'd be running for my life. There are other worlds out there, other dimensions beyond the veil of this reality, and I'm sure I could be very happy kicking back with a lemon milkshake and generating glorious chaos in one of them. But that's not an option. He's closed the dimensional gates to any but his homeworld, and I know perfectly well that if I go there I'll just be playing into his immature fantasies in a different way. And if I try to run and hide... well, that doesn't suit my nature. It will be child's play for him to warp me into wanting to carry out some ridiculously stupid revenge plot so he can be a Big Hero and destroy me. So I have no choice. As long as my mind is my own, I have to fight back, because if I don't fight at all, my mind won't be my own anymore.
(Oh, I can hear you ponies rolling your eyes and calling me a hypocrite. Pff, as if you can judge. Do you know I counted no less than 27 reforming spells in the spellbooks held in the library in Ponyville? Either your great and noble librarian heroine has a bit of a fetish there, or ponies think mind control is just good clean fun as long as the end result is harmonious. For that matter, why are there no pretty glass windows showing Celestia holding puppet strings with ponies dancing on them? Simple: history's written by the winners, and a thousand years and some change ago, I lost. But if you think she hasn't played puppetmaster far, far more often than moi, you simply haven't been paying attention, dear reader.)
To be honest, this isn't actually the first time I've played the role of hero for ungrateful ponies who never knew or acknowledged what I did. During my days as Lord Sovereign Designated Driver of Equestria, I dealt with quite a few threats to my ponies, since the operative word there was my ponies, and sharing my toys with other would-be conquerors... see now, sharing's always struck me as far too harmonious an activity for my tastes. Not really something I'm fond of doing. I can be a very generous Banana Sandwich if I choose, but I can't think of a single entity that tried to conquer Equestria, or part of Equestria, that asked me nicely if they could borrow some ponies for their slave mines or something. I'd probably have said no if they did ask nicely, but I might have let them go home without permanently damaging their sanity if they'd shown me just a little bit of etiquette. Most such threats were utterly pathetic, an enjoyable hour or day or week delivering a most humorous smackdown on whatever creature dared to challenge me. Dragons invading and taking ponies for food? Note the lack of a Dragon Empire any longer! Diamond Dogs looking for slaves? Ever notice how incredibly stupid Diamond Dogs are? Zompony apocalypse? Okay, that one was my fault in the first place.
But there were a few occasions when I was up against something in my own weight class. Like the time that my apprentice in the ways of Chaos tried to sacrifice me to the Outer Gods, and managed to open a portal to their realm that I ended up having to close. (Celestia and Luna might have helped just a bit with that.) Or the time that the Avatar of Order decided that it was too much work regulating magic, and things would be so much more orderly here if we lived in a standard heliocentric system and actually paid attention to the laws of physics and had no more magic, and yours truly bravely challenged a counterpart of equal power to preserve magic in our world. And that time with Grogar. Not that ponies know anything about any of this, and it's not as if I've gone around demanding that ponies give me medals and stained glass windows for my acts of heroism, or even acknowledged that they happened... because I'm well aware of who I am to them. I'm Chaos, and Chaos is always bad.
This time, though... this time what I'm fighting is well above my weight class. You wouldn't think so to look at him. He's so... pathetic looking. So... bland. How can you possibly be the only example of your species on an entire planet and yet be so unbelievably boring in appearance? And the visible powers he demonstrates really shouldn't do more than inconvenience me.
It's the powers you don't see that are the danger. The powers he doesn't even realize he has. The powers he has mind-raped eight mares with, and I use that term intentionally, because making a mare who envisions herself the very epitome of generosity fall in obsessive, jealous love with a giant boulder she thinks is a giant diamond is just pure hilarity, but making ponies love you because you have an itch you need scratching is foul. The powers he has altered the very face of Equestria with. And the powers he's going to kill me with, if I make the slightest mistake in dealing with him.
Ponies call me a god, but I'm not. At best I'm a demiurge. Some creator entity made the universe and left all these wonderful building blocks around; I just play with them. They call me a reality warper, but I'm not that either. Sure, I can make up become down while I'm thinking about it, but it is very, very hard for me to make permanent alterations to reality and they can't be on the order of "rewrite the fundamental laws of magic and the functioning of the Avatars" or "change pony culture completely, overnight". I'm a very, very powerful, very adept magic user, but there's no one effect I've caused that Twilight Sparkle couldn't pull off for herself if she tried; she just can't do all of them at once like I can. (Well, possibly she can't remove her head and turn it into a balloon. I've never seen a unicorn, or even an alicorn, pull that one off.)
The creature I'm up against is a god. But the worst kind. The kind that doesn't know what it is.
At least I know I'm a villain.
I've delayed too long, I fear; I feel a strange pressure on my mind, a red-hazed hatred for my opponent (deserved, but still! I don't do mindless hatred!), an increasing compulsion to plot some sort of horrific revenge. His powers are working on me and even I can't stand against them for long. I can only stand against them at all because I know they exist. Those poor, poor stupid little ponies, they had no chance at all.
I'm going to fight to save them and they'll most likely hate me and put me in stone for it if I even survive, and that's probably a best case scenario, and I...
I'm scared. I never thought I'd see the day when I'd admit that to anypony. I don't entirely know why I'm admitting it now.
Maybe because my opponent wants me to be nothing but a mustachio-twirling evildoer (haha for him! I have a goatee, not a mustache!) He wants to reduce me to nothing but my function in the story of his Grand And Glorious Adventure in Equestria, make me into nothing but a hateful antagonist, and, well, ponies will go along with that, because that's who I am to them already. And I never cared before that they are completely ignorant of the concept that I have thoughts and feelings of my own, because who needs sympathy? I'm here to spread disharmony! I don't need sopping wet compassion or empathy, I need some laughs and you've got a face I can laugh at!
But I'm more than that. I always have been. I'm... I'm not a pony, but I am a person. A living, sentient being, like you, like the baby dragon that my enemy is ignoring and maybe I can actually use this, like a zebra, like any creature you talk to. I have emotions. And if I'm going to lose all that, if I'm going to be turned into a cardboard cariacture of myself, and it may well happen... I want somepony to know, that isn't me. That's a story some asinine monkey told himself about me, and because he has the power to change reality with his thoughts and desires, that's what he's going to try to turn me into. I want somepony to know... I'm no hero, I'm quite happy being the villain most days of the week, because the only thing I like about any of you is how much fun you are to tease and play with, but I'm going up against something much more powerful than I am, to try to save all of you from him, and I'm scared. I don't want to die. I don't want to lose my identity and become a shadow of myself. I don't want to forget the true nature of Chaos and start acting like I consider every mistake in the Evil Overlord Manual to be a blueprint to follow. I don't want to be forcibly converted into a harmonious alicorn pony with a completely different name and mission in life. And I'd kind of like to avoid turning to stone for another millennium.
But I also don't want to live in a world where every single pony life has been warped to serve the egotistical needs of an idiot who thinks his life story is the only important one to tell and he should be the only hero in the universe. That doesn't sound fun at all. And, as I've mentioned, I don't think I have the option of running away anyway.
So here I go. If this journal ends here, then I lost, because if I win I'll probably destroy this journal. If I survive whatever this next encounter is, and I don't win, I'll be back to write some more.
Toodles!
I am thrilled that you are writing this! I actually expect that it might get quite dark, but then it might have to: such are the murky passages of the human mind, especially the mind of the puppetmaster/Gary Stu.
I am seriously glad to see you actually writing this! I hope there's more to come.
Oh, and from what you've written so far, it's already gotten quite dark. I'm guessing the eight Ponies Gary Stu's made his love slaves are Celestia, Luna and the Mane Six.
And yeah, even though the Season 2-3 Spike wasn't as powerful as he gets by Season 4, forgetting about Spike, who must have very good reason to hate Gary, the most obvious being Gary's treatment of Twilight and Rarity, was a major error on Gary's part. Spike is canonically a tough little Dragon. And smart, too.
Dis gun be good
Had to take some time off from judging the Writeoffs to read this. Definitely looking forward to the guerrilla psychological warfare.
5009428
Spike's feelings about "Gary" (probably not his actual name, though Discord may call him that mockingly) are complicated, because Spike is no better than anyone else at telling that Gary is warping the universe. From his perspective, Twilight and all of her close friends fell in love with Gary, who is naturally completely awesome and well deserves such affection, and the Princesses adore him as well, though if that relationship has a sexual aspect Spike wouldn't know about it. So he's jealous, and sad, and lonely, and his self-esteem is in the toilet, because Gary is the most awesome creature ever but Gary isn't paying any attention to him, and Rarity is in love with Gary, and everything Twilight talks about pertains to Gary. But he doesn't hate Gary.
Yet.
He does hate Discord, and he does know that Discord twists things and tries to turn friends against each other. So it will not be a simple matter for Discord to convince him of the truth about Gary. But Discord's story is going to be very, very attractive to him, because if Discord is telling the truth, then Gary is not an incredibly awesome and wonderful guy that Spike can never hope to be like who ignores Spike and has taken the attention of all the ponies he cares about; Gary's a villain, and Twilight, Rarity and the others haven't really lost interest in Spike, they're under mind control. Unlike the problem of hopelessly never being as awesome as Gary, the problem of Gary is a mind controlling villain is one Spike can at least imagine being able to solve.
5009611
Right. I figured that "Gary's" power includes an "everything's all right, nothing to disapprove of here" field effect, because that's a necessary ability to prevent everypony else in Equestria from going "Hold on, what's happening here?" when they see both Princesses and the Mane Six fawning disgustingly over this alien creature.
But if "Gary" didn't make Spike specifically enthralled by him as well, then that general effect might not stand up to a strongly opposed will. Obviously, that's not enough in of itself, because "Gary's" power must be pretty awesome to overcome Celestia, Luna, Twilight, and Fluttershy -- and risk overcoming Discord -- in the fashion that it obviously does.
Mmm, he might suspect, though, because normally Spike spends most of his time around Twilight, and most of the rest of his time around Rarity. Of course, if it does, that would make him feel even worse, and in some fairly complex ways given that he also has to believe that "Gary" is really super cool.
This idea greatly intrigues me and I'd love to see more. As a Spike fan I'd add my two cents, but I can't think of anything that hasn't been said just yet.
The trouble with a Gary Stu deconstruction is that it still has a Gary Stu in it. It's like a story about colon cancer: even if there is a cure at the finish, there's a lot of ass cancer to get through. I applaud the concept, but I'm not sure if I can continue reading.
Ooh, I'm liking the start of this. I'm a little iffy on the format (journal-type formats have always been a questionable standpoint in my personal opinion as they limit the perspectives that one can view events from), but as far as the setup of the actual narrative itself, spot on! I can't wait to read more!
5010133
But... he's not even the main character and is very plainly set up as the villain from the story's perspective. Not an "uber awesome hero who everybody will love."
Interesting! This is really good, but sadly for Discord, I don't see him winning. He may beat Gary, but if he does he'll get turned to stone, or if Gary's magic has a lasting effect, the Main Six could avenge their 'lover' by killing Discord.
I must ask, how dark will this get? EoO was about the darkest I'm willing to go... ( What happened to finishing some other stories first? I'm only messing with you at this point! )
I love this already! Those "Seventh Element" and HiE stories drive me nuts- I don't even read stories with an OC tag because they are, invariably, Mary/Gary-Stus. Discord had so better win!
5010597
This is a different kind of dark than Elements of Opposition, so I'm not entirely sure how to compare it. No one gets tied up and tortured, and ponies under the influence of a love spell don't perceive themselves as being sexually abused even if they are from an outsider's point of view, and Gary thinks he's a hero so he won't voluntarily do anything bad to anyone who isn't a "villain" in his mind. However, he's willing to do damn near anything to a villain except rape or captivity-torture-mindbreak. And our "hero" is willing to sink to much greater depths to win than, say, the Mane 6 would be.
I'll give you this spoiler for free: none of the Mane 6 will die, nor Spike. Can't make promises about Discord, the princesses, or Gary himself -- not saying any of them are likely to die, but I don't know how this ends yet. I know what Discord will need to do to win, but I don't know how he gets there or what happens after that. So I can't actually predict exactly what's going to happen yet. But I'm pretty much guaranteed to never kill the Mane 6 or Spike unless their deaths are part of the point of the story, and this is not a story about death, so all seven of them will be alive at the end.
So... Discord vs Gary Stu? This is gonna be awesome.
5010133
I like seeing how horrible it would be on the receiving end, so I think this is a good story idea.
I did something on a related concept in An Epistolary Legal Consultation Between Princesses, which is essentially about just how little the Ponies would like the Jerkass Everyman This Loser Is You type self-insertion character, especially when they took their whiny self-entitled amoral Homelander attitudes to a civilization based on Love and Friendship. Charlie Yu has no reality-warping powers, he's just a dumb jerk who can't control his own sex drive and is at first far too obnoxious to find anypony willing to have sex with him -- then behaves cruelly when ... but that's the story. And I should finish that story sometime.
What Alara's obviously doing here is parodying the kind of story where the Human in Equestria quickly masters everything in his environment, has everypony fall in love with him for no reason adequately explainable by character or plot, and soon finds the entire world centering around his existence for no very good reason. One feature of such stories, of course, is that anyone who opposes him for any reason turns out to be a jerk, canon jerks become minor villains, minor villains major villains, and a genuine major villain like Discord Infinite Cosmic Evil which must suffer the most horribly humiliating beat-down in the history of beat-downs.
A lot of those stories also miss subtleties (such as the fact that Discord actually isn't Pure Evil but is more like an amoral jerk with awesome power -- really, a lot like the Gary Stu except that the world doesn't actually revolve around him, so he has more of a sense of proportion. And they usually ignore any aspects of the canon heroes personalties that might get in the way of them all admiring and loving the Gary Stu. Not necessarily cause them to hate him -- just give them motives distracting them from total worship.
First, a few quips, because sad, frightened Discord is surprisingly upsetting and I need a few laughs to rinse out my mental palate:
A title he held for all of two hours before he got bored and changed it, I'm sure.
Pinkie Pie did manage the latter, which I think nicely explains why she is what she is in my stories.
Doesn't that mean that Discord is an evil twin? (cf. evil Riker removing facial hair.)
In any case, I'm am immensely intrigued. I haven't even met the Gary Stu yet, and I'm already glad he isn't in any of my instances of Equestria. Looking forward to Discord fighting like a Discworld character.
5011067
This is actually why I go to the epistolary/journaling format every time I have to deal with a sad, frightened Discord, at least to begin with. Discord In Hell and the prologue of No Escape From Yourself were things I felt I had to write in Discord's voice, because if I was in third person, there would not be nearly so many jokes being cracked. You can count on Discord to at least try to be funny no matter how awful his circumstances are.
(Also I got a lot of experience with the format writing Q first person in a prompt community. Q and Discord aren't identical -- even in my universe where they're the same guy, Discord's more giddy and silly when he's Discord than when he's openly being Q, because he matches the tone of his environment -- but they're damn close.)
I have a hard time doing straight first person for either Q or Discord; it's always a journal or letter because they feel like whenever they talk, they're explicitly performing for an audience, so I can't do the kind of basic first person narration where "I" tells the story with no consciousness of "you" reading it.
Good satire. Have you read this story? That's the first thing I thought of after reading the description.
Fun premise ! And a well written first chapter. Looking forward to where you go with this.
You know... this first chapter by itself makes for a fairly chilling one-shot, since if complete, it would imply that Discord didn't return to write more.
But I see it's not complete, so I'm very interested to see just how Discord fights back against a creature that even he can't take on directly...
5011710
It's true, and I actually thought twice about posting it with just one chapter because of that, but I figured the incomplete tag would take care of that.
I hate Gary Stus. I'd never write a story where the Gary Stu won. :-)
5010264
Yes, but everyone is brainwashed into acting as if he is, and reality is warped to make events go that way. It's not like I don't wish a fiery death for Gary Stus which are "really" heroic, so why should I not loathe this one? (Mind control and brainwashing are quite triggery things for me).
5012003
You should loathe this one. The difference between a story like this and a straight Gary Stu is that in this story you're supposed to loathe the Stu.
But if mind control is triggering for you, you're gonna want to get out. We've got a villain who unconsciously brainwashes everyone into doing what he thinks they ought to be doing, and a "hero" (protagonist, at least) who has mind alteration abilities as one of his signature talents and won't shy from using it if he thinks it'll help, so that sounds like a recipe for a lot of mind control stuff. Discord hasn't reformed yet so he has no motive not to use his own abilities in that regard. So this probably isn't a good story for you to read just for that reason.
5012027
Yeah, the notion of someone being mind-controlled into doing something they would normally find deeply wrong or repulsive, and controlled to the extent of being entirely cool with it, is definitely disturbing to me. You do very good Discord fiction, so I'm sorry to duck out, but I am probably going to do so.
Two Questions = Is this Last Draconequus backstory? And is the Gary Stu a Brony Gary Stu or from a world with no MLP?
Besides that, this is great! But please work on one of your older stories before completing this one
Yes, yes please. More of this. Thank-you kindly.
5012541
Hey, I've got 5600 words of King Who Would Be Man's next chapter ready; prob another 2-3K to finish the chapter and publish. :-)
Yes, this uses Last Draconequus backstory, because unless I actually need a different backstory to make my plot work, I'll pretty much always just default to that. And yes, the Gary is a brony. It wouldn't really be true to the worst excesses of the trope for him not to be.
Very interesting. I find it particularly intriguing that the Gary Stu doesn't know what he is, which seems to me to indicate that the real enemy isn't Gary, it's Gary's author, for whom Gary is the insert. I wonder if Discord would be able to reach Pinkie Pie, her 4th Wall Breaking powers might be relevant here. And Discord's right, Gary is way worse than him, even if it's unintentional, but I do hope if he wins this he gains some perspective on the way he treats ponies.
Nothing but Net alarajrogers!
I love your list of Discordian-era enemies and how the big guy dealt with them. You know why Tirek and Scorpan are brothers but look so completely different? You know what happened to the rest of their race? You know what happened to the rest of the cities in the Crystal Empire? You know what happened to all those witches? You know who has one lion thumb, one eagle claw and likes snapping them both? THIS GUY!
5014747
I don't intend to have any explicit breaking of the fourth wall; even though this is kind of a metastory about fictional characters being aware of some of the mechanics of the fiction they're in, I'm sticking quite strictly to conceptually framing it as a warping of the nature of reality. Gary's author is not accessible (strictly speaking, how could he be? He's fictional too; I'm the actual author. :-))
My personal favorite was the zompony apocalypse. "Okay, that one was my fault in the first place." What was Discord doing to trigger a zompony apocalypse and exactly what did he do about it? I'm pretty sure I have no idea. :-)
5014759 j'accuse! I knew you were the real villain all along, author!
Honestly Discord causing the zompony apocalypse doesn't surprise me in the least. He hates to see his toys die, and if some favorite pony who got really hilariously angry at having her mane turned into whipped cream died, he's not going to tolerate the Grim Reaper taking his ponies like a chump! In fact, why not give ol' whip cream mane the ability to share her gift with others!
The hard part would be fixing it without killing a bunch of ponies (and yes, if he created the zompony curse, then anypony who dies he has their blood on his claws).
I always love a good parody, so this definitely intrigues me. One question though:
So shouldn't Discord still be a statue? Or are you going to explain that at some point?
5014571 what seasons has he watched. Because if he saw discord in season 3, I don't think he would kill him (I know I wouldn't)
5015503
"But Discord is a VILLAIN! Discord is totally evil! They ruined him with that episode because chaos is evil and can't possibly reform! They should never have tried to reform him! But it's okay to try to reform Nightmare Moon because she's hot."
You obviously have not seen the number of negative brony opinions about Discord that I have.
5015455
Yes, that will be explained in the next chapter, but what it boils down to is, you can't be a Big Hero and save sexy girls from an Evul Villain if said evil villain doesn't get out of prison and start wreaking havoc.
Discord owes his freedom to Gary, but it's kind of like the freedom of a quail being released from its cage into a shooting range to be hunted.
This looks GOOD!
I dislike all stories that have a Gary Stu character, But this looks fun!
I think I like your discord as well. He is a villain, he has loose morals, and he is not gonna let someone change who he is. Another thing though! Discord is not just determined or angry, he is scared, that shows depth in emotion to him. but the way it's portrayed you don't lose that silly nature of him.
This story gets a thumbs up as I patiently await more!
Heh I wonder if Gary would say to Discord something to the effect of, "Freedom? You never had any freedom to begin with. You all are nothing more than fictional characters I can do whatever I want to. You never had any free will at all, you were always being controlled by someone."
While I'm not sure if I'd like a story like this told entirely in journal format (not to assume you will; I have no idea what your plans are for future chapters), I will say that your writing is strongest in the journal format. It lacks a lot of the elements I've previously critiqued you for in your third-person narratives.
I was kind of worried about how this story would turn out from your blogs, it being a reactionary fix-fic and my generally not liking those... but this seems pretty good so far. Hell, I'm interested. Let's see where it goes.
Didn't Discord fight the dragons as a favour for Celestia before he went mad and took over Equestria? You said this used the Last Draconequus backstory, but if so, you've got a continuity error there, because this is phrased like it's something Discord did while he was in charge.
5017387
He's Discord! He remembers things the way he wants to. It's more fun that way!
No, seriously, he technically did not destroy the Dragon Empire until he was in charge... did them a lot of damage, but the actual shattering them into total anarchy happened after he thought they'd killed Celestia and Luna. But, that being said, Discord will never admit that he used to serve Celestia any more than she will admit that he was her lover, so even if he had done it at her command, if he wants to talk about it because it makes a funny joke he's still going to say he did it.
I suspect the difference between the journal format and the other stories is that things like the constant little asides belong in a journal format, at least as spoken by someone like Discord. A journal kept by Twilight would be very different. And I can't delve as much into emotional states in something someone is supposed to be writing; it has a level of detachment that real-time narration doesn't.
Keeping it in journal format has some serious negatives -- nothing happens in real time, so if you see a climactic battle, it's because someone survived it to write about it -- but switching has negatives too. I did it with "No Escape From Yourself" because Discord is a completely unreliable narrator there, his worldview turned so dark from guilt and depression that he does things like completely forget all the overtures of friendship Pinkie Pie has extended him, and I wanted to be able to compare his journal to what's really happening. But here, Discord would make a more reliable narrator than anyone else in the story.
5016845
You're giving Gary way too much credit. Gary does not know that he is, in effect, the author of a story. (This isn't a pure metafiction. Gary isn't literally an avatar of an author, Gary is a guy who can rewrite reality as if he were the writer of a story. He's also not named Gary.) There are going to be some slightly metafictional elements, given that Gary is a brony (and some other parts to it we'll find out when we learn Gary's name), but for the most part, this is not a metafiction and Gary is clueless. He literally has no idea he's doing this.
5017575
Precisely. When done in this format, your usual style is perfectly in keeping with convention, and even serves to add to Discord's character in a way congruent with both what we've seen of him in canon and what we've seen of him in your other fics. It's only when you do the same thing in third person that I have a problem with it.
Oh god, I'm in love with this. I'm so happy someone actually decided to do this. Take all of my praise down that throat. TAKE IT ALL!
5015657
I can only face palm when reading such statements.
Since when is chaos evil by default? First and foremost, chaos is a state/condition/arrangement. Chaos is the opposite of order, it's comparable or essentially means randomness.
Chaos includes a wide variety of dangers, while being harmless at the same time.
If it's utilized as a force, magic for example, it depends on the wielders personality and intentions how dangerous or evil the effects are.
Discord was never very malicious in his intentions, he may twist and distort, often his actions would cause small conflicts as an after effect of such a twist. For the mane 6 though, he did those personality changes mostly out of revenge, and to ensure that he won't be captured by the elements again. He also did it for entertainment purpose to see Celestia's puzzle pieces crumble, also part of his revenge.
Yes, Discord has some negative emotions in him, surprise, a lot of humans do as well.
But with his powers, he could have easily killed the mane 6, didn't even have to be a gory death, just sent them into space in a rocket for example.
Did he do it? Nope! What does that tell us? Discord doesn't kill. He does not enjoy killing, hesitates enough to even consider such an option, so what does this tell us about his malice level? Not so high. He utilized his chaotic powers for entertainment purpose, because he didn't know how else to use them, or maybe he was of the opinion he wouldn't enjoy it as much if he solely used his powers to help others.
While that does sound egoistic, he wasn't evil, nor was it his chaos magic that made him evil.
His bad attitude is what caused all the problems, his powers were never evil to begin with, I mean how can chocolate rain and cotton candy clouds be evil? He could easily solve world hunger in our world if he did that kind of magic on earth for example.
Fixing his attitude can very well make him 'reformed'. Instead of Fluttershy showing him friendship, intensive therapy sessions may have done the same to him.
Anyway considering all this, I can see why he was given a chance, and also appreciate the possibility of him being reformed. The only thing that's nagging me a bit is the fact they did it so fast in the series. They should have done 1 more episode, with Fluttershy being in real danger after Discord became closer to her, so he could save her and show everyone that he can be good too, and the possibility that he may enjoy it more then he originally thought might have dawned on him in a more believable context.
Now, on another note, if one say's 'chaos is evil' I could easily reply 'order can be evil too'.
It's true, order is another form of arrangement, the outcome of those arrangements depends yet again on the person using it.
It already starts very early with the ideals, then proceeds into it's execution.
For Example:
A person want's to bring world peace, harmony and order, but to achieve it he uses weapons of mass destruction to wipe out other races. Eventually wars are ended and momentary peace is restored
Even with the picture of order in mind, isn't that just evil?
Same with a person who creates a totalitarian state, invoking strict laws, with espionage cameras all over the place and 'police' forces everywhere. They diminish the ideas of freedom and privacy strong enough to keep control and order, to ensure peace in that state.
Wouldn't that kind of order be considered not right or evil as well?
Turns out order can be just as evil as chaos, if misinterpreted or misused by the person in charge.
Discord is the person in charge of chaotic forces, he is the spirit of chaos, but having chaos at his disposal, doesn't mean he is evil by default.
And then again, I ask those people who claim to know Discord's character so well:
"Wouldn't his reformation be the most unexpected chaotic thing to happen? It sure fits his natural element, that he would so suddenly try the other side, or not?"
Hmmm... interesting story idea, though I can't help but think it'd be more interesting to see it from another perspective.
Spike's, for one, would be absolutely heart-wrenching to start with, but seeing him beat the odds and save everyone would be amazing.
The pony's perspective would probably be a mix between sad, and really, really creepy, maybe even with shades of 'fighting from the inside' as they began to notice something wrong.
The human's perspective would also be interesting, whichever way you want to play him. I mean, imagine if you went to Equestria only for everything to play out like self-insert fic, I don't know about you, but I'd find that freaking terrifying. Of course you could just have him be an oblivious entitled asshole, which works just fine. I think I may have actually seen a fic where the main character is a Gary Stu played straight and it freaks him the fuck out, if I remember correctly he eventually manages to fix things (for the most part at least), and goes on just trying to live his life. That said, I have to wonder, if you weren't a brony how quickly do you think you'd pick up on being the main character in what is essentially a poorly written self-insert fic? If you didn't know the characters or the setting, and everything is just real enough to fool your senses, would you just write off their personality quirks as a pony/Equestrian thing; at what point would you begin to suspect foul play?
Oh yes, and before I forget, I really liked Discord's brief crisis of mortality. It was interesting to see him come to the realization that not only was defeat (and subsequently death) possible for him, but even likely.
5021303 I agree with you totally especially about how order can be evil and often is worse then evil chaos
After all nothing is more orderly then a corpse
I always thought it was weird that they never had an element of love, then they brought in Cadance and any and all possible story plots went bye bye. Ive never seen any of the stories that you're clearly miffed abot and bored of but this is funny so I'm good :)
5034291
Taking everyone's free will to be works even better. No emotions, no freedom of choice, no conflict. Pure order, a fate worse then death.
Isn't it hypocritical for Discord to complain about somebody else brainwashing people for a selfish reason when he did the very same thing? Basically it just comes off like "this guy stole my gimmick and he's doing it better than I did". I'd feel more sympathy for his position if he wasn't such a blatant hypocrite who refuses to acknowledge his hypocrisy.
Oh and don't try to tell me that the Solar Regent did the same thing. Offering up advice to guide people into doing the right thing is not the same thing as actually literally mind raping somebody with a touch. Celestia is like Glinda from the Wizard of Oz. Discord is like Coyote the Trickster God. I think I'll take the one that can't possibly give me fleas. Or turn my mind into the mind of a dog for kicks.
i have never even seen a story set by the parameters of your author's notes
5256774
Oh, they exist. Believe me. It's actually quite terrifying how many of them there are. There are even groups on this site where people write about harems of ponies.
5335803
Example: The lost element