One night, on April 28th, 65 A.B. (After Banishment), an old, retired captain of the Royal Guard passed away peacefully in his chair by the fire. In his lap sat a journal. It was new, as if it were bought for a specific purpose, and contained many events of his life, written in the months preceding his death. Ponies today think of the journal as little more than a myth, seeing as nopony that has read it is still alive today. But when one pony finds the journal, she cannot help but open it. Read along with her, and see one of Equestria's most horrible events from the perspective of one who saw it firsthoof.
Edited by Scribblestick. Massive thanks to him.
Chapters (1)
Well, you asked for a review, so I've come in to at least offer one from a subjective point. Go go coverimage/title/description review!
Cover image!
There is none, moving on!
Title!
Interesting...this actually makes me think of a medical-based story. Doctor working in a hospital, trying to save lives, and this is a journal-based story of how they lost a pony, either their first death on record, or someone very close to them that they failed to save. All in all, a good title that inspires thought.
Description!
Despite some grammar mistakes, this is the kind of description I like to see. Thought provoking, gripping, yet it only acts as a TASTE of what the story can provide. It's definitely snagged my eyes, and hell, I always love a good description. You used 'his' a lot in the desc; try putting 'the' to use.
Overall, thank God I came by here. It's a story that has my interest. Dunno if I'll actually READ it, I've got a ton of shit to worry about, but I'll definitely try and read some.
Good luck bud, you've got a good concept here, at least from the surface!
~KillerSteel, TWE's Logic Machine
1484812 Thanks for the advice! I'll fix up the description. I do seem to have a fetish with the word 'his'.
Also, what you said about the title made me think a little. Perhaps a story about a doctor failing to save a patient is something I should try. I have no idea how good or bad I am at playing with emotions though, so I'd have to experiment a bit. Thanks for the inspiration!
I understand not having the time to read everything people ask you to. After all, we've all got these silly little things called social lives. Blasted waste of time, they are.
Have a good day, sir, and may copious amounts of money find their way into your pocket.
~Sabre Blade - TWE's Sarcastic Gentleman
1485287
Ohohoho, feels? Y' wanna play with feels?
Talk to Axel on the Skype chat. He is the master of feels currently.
As for depressing feels, what you wanna do is establish a 'cliff' of sorts; a happy start. Make the reader care about the characters involved. You wanna take it slow with the feels.
In a medical scenario, you've got a patient. Nice and stable, on recovery, antibiotics are working. Friends are coming by to check on the patient, chatting, not a care in the world.
Something goes wrong, but the doctors manage to save the patient in time. Research is put towards curing the disease, and preventing further cases. Friends are closed off from the patient as they're put in quarantine.
Things continue falling apart as the infection accelerates, slowly killing the patient. Perspective of the doctor and the patient here, play on the thoughts.
Everything finally reaches a climax as the doctors reach the end, and they're given one last option. This is your chance for either a happy, or a sad ending. Even then, your happy ending may be sad, and your sad ending may be bittersweet, or even liberating. It depends on how the story progressed thus far.
The bottom line is, instead of simply drawing an image for the reader to see, you're trying to invoke their thoughts a certain way. You want them to be moved, on the edge of their seat with anticipation. Predicting the plot is BAD, especially when they're right.
A surprise is good, be it recovery or death. If you manage to depress yourself by reading it, chances are others will be depressed as well.
As a check, have CSquared08 read it. He's a big Sadfic fan with a love for a lot of what the fics do. He's your go-to guy for quality checks in the genre.
Hope that helps, and don't be afraid to throw a PM in my face in case you need help or a writing buddy! Oh, and the description is far better now. Well done!
1486242 You've got a really good idea on how to write feels. I'll keep note of everything you've said, because it's enticed me to write a fic like that. I love the way you think.
I'll talk to CSquared08 if I ever get around to writing it (Although it will probably be quite a while before that. So many ideas in my head).
Good day to you sir. Thanks for the tips.
1491024
Always glad to help, bud. Hell, might make my own sadfic sometime, a REAL sadfic.
You ever need a writing partner, hit me up. If I've got the time, consider me on the team.
I've been waiting to see this pop up. Hope everyone likes it as much as I did.
1000 years ago in the land of equestria
Me likey
The disconnect between the introductory journal lines and the start of the main scene was a little jarring; it almost seemed like you could have started the story with the line about the moon shining brightly and dropped the journal aspect entirely. I suppose it does give us some nice insight into the way the character thinks right up front, but I definitely think it’s good that you got to the crux of the scene right away and didn’t spend too much leading up to it.
The chapter was quite entertaining overall.
I wonder what the hilt of an Equestrian sword would look like…
Howdy! WRITE's FoughtDragon01 at your service to offer a thought or two about this story. Let's not waste any time and dive right in.
Plot:
First, I want to talk about the story's actual premise, which I actually find interesting. I'm not sure how common stories about the Royal Guard recalling Nightmare Moon's first coming are, but I can honestly say that this is my first time seeing one like this. And I like it. It definitely sounds interesting enough to keep reading to see where it goes. As for the story itself? Well, since this is only the first chapter out of God knows how many, I'll contain my thoughts to the first chapter only.
The pacing, for the most part, is fine. It doesn't spend too much time dwelling on a single scene, but doesn't feel like it's going by too quickly, either. I do have some issues with the first few paragraphs that glance over Cyan's earlier life, but that will wait for later. Just know that the general plot, for all intents and purposes, is looking fine so far.
Characterization:
To put it bluntly, I feel like there's something lacking with Cyan's character. He's not the flattest I've met, make no mistake. I can at least imagine what he's like. Going off of this chapter, he's a nervous, recently promoted lieutenant whose lifelong dream was to be in the Royal Guard. I get that, but I just feel like there wasn't enough to him. And it was irritating because there were hints of depth to him through your opening descriptions of how he came to join the Royal Guard in the first place, but those were just glanced over. In fact, this bit in particular really caught my eye:
I can only pray–pray–that this will come up again somewhere in the story. I can only imagine that something like that would cause some tension between him and a few other guards who didn't have the luxury of being a unicorn. I understand that the main focus is around Luna's transformation into Nightmare Moon, but since we're seeing it from the perspective of Cyan, if he's boring, then the story will be boring. Again, this is only the first chapter, so I can only expect that you'll flesh him out more as the story goes on, delve deeper into his past, bring up some internal conflicts, that sort of thing.
The Fight:
Since the fight scene takes up this chapter's second half, I felt it deserved its own section. Now, this may be where some of my own experience rears its ugly head because I've never written my own fight scene before. I do, however, feel that I've read enough good ones to know when one falls flat in certain areas. This fight scene isn't bad, let me make that clear, but it's still missing something that keeps it from being great. I had little trouble picturing what was happening, but I did have trouble imagining what Cyan was feeling during the whole thing.
When it comes to fight scenes, I feel there needs to be a balance of external and internal description; that perfect blend of what the character is doing and what the character is feeling, thinking, etc. I don't want to feel like I'm watching a fight, I want to feel like I'm in a fight. That means I need to know what the character is thinking as they do the things they do, or at least feel the things that they feel. It's the difference between:
And:
It really felt like I was only watching a fight during Cyan's battle with the minotaur. At its core, it was just "I did this, and then I did that, but the minotaur did this, so I had to do that.", which, while not necessarily a bad thing, can become pretty tedious if I don't know what's going on in his head. In essence, things just happened, and I had virtually no input about what was going through his mind. Since he was fighting a creature I can only imagine he's never faced, I can't imagine that all of those moves he did were perfectly calculated. He had to have taken risks. He had to have made split-second decisions. He had to have been panicking a little. However, I don't know because it doesn't say.
And then when the fight ends, it's just over. Again, no time spent on the immense relief he must've been feeling for not having an axe embedded in his skull. Considering that this is a first-person perspective as well, this may be something you want to look into, as it may help with your characterization of Cyan as well. Is he a calm, collected combatant or is he the kind who'll give it his all if it means he'll survive.
The Wrap-Up:
I like this. Honestly, I do. I want to see where this goes. Again, this is only the first chapter, so I can't say much just yet. Maybe I'll say more as more of the story is revealed. Who knows? Anyway, as usual, these are only things that I feel should be looked at as you continue this. What you choose to do with it is up to you, but I can only hope that you'll at least consider them.
Best of luck to you, and keep up the good work.
~FoughtDragon01–WRITE's Pet Grammar Nazi
1860004 Here it is! And what a splendid thing it is, too.
Mhmm, I see. Mm, yes, quite. I concur. You've brought things to my attention that had never crossed my mind before. Thank you very much!
I'll get to work on fattening out Cyan's character. I had planned a scene involving a guard's "distaste" towards Cyan's rank, you clever devil. You just spoilered yourself! Hooray! On a more serious note, I do realise now that he is a little flat. I'll be giving him a heavy dose of characterisation in further chapters, so you can breathe easy. Cyan's breathing might get a little hectic, though. Those characterisation pills are very hard to swallow!
I find it a little hard to bring in feelings and details during some moments. Because this has been written in a journal, it's not very realistic for an old stallion to remember every detail, so finding that smooth spot is really giving me the shivers. And I seem to have flipped that on its head by including every detail of the fight and not his feelings on what's happening (The strongest thing we usually remember). I'll go through and rewrite it.
You bring up points of the reader wanting to know more about Cyan's character to make the story more interesting, so I'll try to find appropriate spots to slide in some childhood memories or bring to light his thoughts on a subject. I've got a few ideas right now as I'm writing this, so hopefully this shouldn't be too much of a problem.
I'll be reading and re-reading your advice many times. It is a major help. Good to know you like my story in its current state anyway. I'd love if you provided more input as I posted more chapters, but if you don't want to do it, then
I'll find you and hurt youthat's fine.May your days be filled with laughter!