Nopony believes in those old pony tales... except the true ones.
In some sense, tales are didactic, teaching lessons or instilling values, sometimes preserving, in metaphor and inference, the truth of a painful past. But tales must never be stagnant. When the situation changes, new stories must enlighten a new generation.
By Order of their United and Equal Majesties of the Principality of Equestria, Princess Celestia of the House of Day and Princess Luna of the House of Night, with the help of the Ministers of Equestria and with a mind to advancing and honoring those citizens long neglected or never praised, come new stories to be read to children, and absorbed by the grown.
Chapters (11)
Later
2354311
Hmm? What do you mean?
i assume he meant "Read Later" which is a shame, as these are a pair of beautifully worked fables. Quite short, but quite a bit of delightful imagery. I'm intrigued by the common thread of "wild talents" and can only suppose this might be a book of tales our Knight Errant might have come across? As ever, looking forward to more.
2370412
In a sense he inspired one. His gender-swapped counterpart is Duchess Alta. He was born with a wild talent. But his is to detect the number seven. If he had a horn he could train himself to read a book by touching it.
The Wild Talents are being noted as they are often ignored. I've written of a few or glossed some things as them, like Pinkie Sense and Fluttershy's affinity for animals (clearly an Earth pony trait.)
And they were written relatively recently, to take into account Changelings and Diamond Dogs.
There are more to come and I hope you enjoy them!
The fact he faked him out with only those two is MAGNIFICENT in itself. Devious!
Man I loved that old-school Dalek fear. I love that the Artificer totally won, too. Though, it's a bit scary to think there's essentially a Dalek-replicating machine sitting half-finished in a palace basement somewhere...
Fortunately these are all just stories, right? ... Rrrriiight? 
I suppose this breaks the wild talent chain, unless the Prince's talent was being a total jerkface. 
Either way, still a fun read!
2382116
To remove the fear, the machine was destroyed as it was no longer needed. As well, the 'mind' was lost as there was no new body for it to enter.
Yea, no wild talent. There was also no romance and no interspecies work. This was more about the dangers of arrogance and mismanagement.
plot form discovery. from
I went and read the song (had no idea she wrote songs) and love how well you fleshed it out and adapted it, plus, you know, I'm a sucker for happy endings.
2382645 Phew, that's a relief!
And hmm, very interesting. Still Relevant To Our Hero's Interests, though, considering it can also kind of stand in as an anti-Any Random moral: If you screw them, they will turn. 
(I 
take full creditapologize profusely for that awful pun.)Another nice fable, I'll have to read the inspiring material soon. It is nice to be going into the wild talents some more.
2386539
I wish I could say I was going into it but it is more a matter of making it clear they exist and are nothing to worry about. If an earth pony can walk on clouds or a pegasus can grow plants very well that's nothing to worry about. The explanation is really just a quirk of magic during fetal development. It is generally considered primarily magical because even populations with low racial diversity (Like Cannonites) can manifest them (See: Pinkie Pie.)
The song is almost assured to make me cry every time, like the squirrel scene in "Sword in the Stone." I wanted a happy ending because they both deserved it.
2385174
Hey, what do you know! Do you think maybe they intended for it to give that message as well? Heh. It was semi-intentional. It was mostly an "evil tyrant opposition" story. The Tyrantlestia/Molestia/Bluebloody/Nightmare Luna kind of character. The one that has all kinds of freakily specific perversions and detailed sexual or torturous proclivities but they hate managing their own nation and let it go to pot.
guilt weight heavily on the. weighed
metal amd magical. and
An evil leader gets fucked by paranoia fic, fun!
Yay for a Voltaire inspired fic... I mean another Voltaire inspired fic! I actually had not heard the song yet, so that was fun to experience. (Did you see he made his own pony plushies for sale? Looks like if Voltaire possessed Pinkie Pie.)
Also yay for daleks! ((Just started watching Dr. Who for real this season. I caught last season due to my sister watching it, and when I saw that Oswin was the new companion in the Christmas special I was hooked.) [Am I the only one who doesn't like Amy by the way? Rory was much cooler...and his dad.])
I liked where this series was going too bad it's over now.
2386539
Well I'm open to more talk about wild talents when they fit in.
I looked up the story, found out I already knew it: I like, surprise, the happier ending one better. Original one is creepy as hell.
2393068
This series? It's not over. There are more fairy tales to ponyfy.
Also, really? I haven't kept up with Voltaire as I should have. But I'm not surprised he made ponies. He's awesome like that.
2398411
Yay, more in the future!
As to Voltaire, it was up on EQD the other day, might have been in the Roundup. $25 gets you a nice looking pony and if he sells out within a month, we get a Discord song.
2401785
Dang do I wish I had the money. An original Voltaire? Do want!
D'awww.
Aaaaand dead of cute. That's rather adorkable, in a way.
A cute little diversion, though I have to say not as compelling as the others.
Yes.
This is adorkable AND awesome!
form those. from those.
Aww, it's fairytale Conny and Blueblood. So are they going to make a cameo in every story from now on?
Oh, and the story was really cute. Doe's smartass dialogue was thoroughly enjoyable.
2683952
Only where appropriate.
And yes. I had a lot of fun writing "smartass peasant heroine" Doe because I got to insert something new into the courtly expectations.
long,” She said. long,” she said.
always know. always known.
Gabe, stop rehashing, it's getting tiresome. That was what I was going to say before I got to your note. After, I get it, and like the concept, but I do hope that this has gotten them out of your system for the moment as elicting my initial reaction at all is a good reason to change focus for a bit.
2716030
In this series, the focus is moving on. I am also working on more "Accident" material, and am actually also going to pay off Sheriff Silverstar and Cactus Blossom. Plus longer chapters for "Fulcrum" that cannot be laid out that quickly.
Plus I can't be done with them yet. I have to write their wedding. Blueblood dealing with a caterer? Connie drowning in taffeta and silk? Blueblood's parents merely existing? Stuff will happen.
2716741
Not saying to never do more with them, just that two, albeit nicely done, stories essentially telling it over again in quick succession was a bit much. Glad to hear about what's coming soon.
I was going to comment that the last two stories seem awfully extra-familiar...
But I rather like the idea of Bluey and Connie being the ones writing them - it certainly does highlight the differences in how they think.
While it was dark as hell, way more than I normally like, I did enjoy it. I'm not sure why you call this a failure, I my eyes it works just fine. Hell, I'd read more.
I can understand the notion of wanting to call it a failure for not being perfect on your eyes, I have similar issues with my own specialties, but I will say it is not.
2749929
The turn portion felt off, too fast and too sudden. But I was blank on what else to do.
2750793
Well I still liked it, so it's only a failure in your eyes.
What games are you playing? GTA is not heroic, ever, at all and never attempts to be. For Fallout I only know the proper games, not this fancy new Bethesda stuff, but you could find a way out of anything. Elder Scrolls, see above, I don't do Bethesda.
I guess I'm in the minority apparently, I play the mostly good guy trying to help out. I'll manipulate things to suit me best sure, but I try to get the most positive result, not unlike your emporer here.
On a tangent, look up Planescape: Torment if you've never heard if it.
2785009
I used to be big on AD&D and especially loved Planescape. I had heard of it but my computers always sucked too much for most computer games, except for the slower and less technologically involved adventure and puzzle games. It's why I was always a console fellow.
My point was something that Robot Chicken also made fun of. They noted the freedom of the game and noted most folks use it to just slaughter and be completely stupid. I remember one night in the dorm hall common room one of the guys was playing Skyrim and taking great joy in completely depopulating Whiterun, complaining that the child characters are invincible. And the programmers added tasks for trophies/achievements that require crappy stuff, like the whole quest chain for the Dark Brotherhood and to a lesser degree the quest chain for the Thieves' Guild. I haven't played much Fallout but judging by every damn Fallout story ever there seems to be one real person in the world and then a collection of meat sacks filled with a gallon of blood and lootable resources.
Besides being a snarky little git, thist story was to nod and wink at the identity of the Emperor. I even left out a question and answer section akin to induction into a mystery religion. "Who would serve best as ruler over you? A general, a religious idealogue, a politician, a businesspony or a scoundrel? The scoundrel. He will have the tactical wisdom of the general, the high oratory of the idealogue, the craft of the politician and the cunning resource management of the businesspony. All with a hard, practical mind to move forward."
2785903
That's basically what I play, I hate not being a jack of all trades. Pick an RPG or hybrid RPG where you can be you (aka you have control over the personality) and I can tell you how I took the every-path with a nice guy attitude.
2785903
"judging by every damn Fallout story ever there seems to be one real person in the world and then a collection of meat sacks filled with a gallon of blood and lootable resources."
That pretty much sums up Fallout PERIOD.
2790289
I would totally play a game that allowed me to be a good guy all the way and fix the world as much as the programming allows.
2791315
Go for older Bioware games and the like. The new stuff is very bad at letting you do what you want.
2791315
I wanted to add, look for games with hard morality systems, they tend to punish you for being a dick.
2794524
Would Dragon Age be in that category? Or the original Fable?
2795940
No and no. Dragon Age has some choice, but being a 21st century Bioware game, it's still heavily on rails. I was still able to be as nice as I could, but it's very dark no matter what. Fable is marginally better, but when the best weapon in the game requires you to be both a huge bastard and a saint in turn, there isn't a lot of consequence to be found.
Older Bioware games like Baldur's Gate let you roam around a lot more and being evil SERIOUSLY hampers your ability to do anything in civilization. Arcanum is pretty good on that front as well. Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines similarly works like this as attacking civilians and cops gets you noticed, and when you are supposed to be a secret, your betters will make you a secret if they have to.
Edit: When I say on rails, it's not only the questing structure, but what you can do. You don't really have the opportunity to be hated.
2796797
I remember the original Vampire game. A bit railed and Diablo-esqe. I wondered about the sequel. Guess I need to look into it.
2797890
It's not a sequel per se, very different game. It's actually the first game released to have ever used the Source engine, coming out a month before Half-Life 2.
That was a fun one.
2855187
Thank you. I had fun with writing this one. I think I may have gotten a little too into the image of the two of them embracing.
She was a Booted eagle griffin, in this world as in the one know the lowest ranked, of the clans. as in the one we know, the lowest ranked of the clans.
names was traditional. names were traditional.
practical bid. practical bird.
stop me form. stop me from.
2861280
Personally, I really liked this one. Again, probably because I do Red Wolf shipping.
2863140
Oh, I liked it, just the only thing I was going to say was a poorly thought out Bald version that fell apart halfway through.
2863383
How do you mean? Bald and zebra or something with two griffins?
2865028
With Bald protagonists and a zebra antagonist. It falls apart when you can't use as many females, and you consider how Bald and Booted clans differ in their family dynamics. Maybe with a Bald hero and Booted LRRH, but then the Bald would be settling for adding a lesser hen to his brood.
2865724
They'll do it for the sake of numbers. A lesser noble who can't get hens of his own clan will lower their standards and settle, like this guy. More hens, more prestige.
I guess you were trying for the Griffin equivalent with a straight-bad zebra. It just needs lots of misogyny and traditionalism.
These are nice. Enjoyable.