I want you to give me feedback. · 10:23am Dec 14th, 2023
I wanted to ask my readers opinion of the Valley Dale arc. This is the first story that I've ever written and the first time that I've ever tried to create a dynamic and complex town, populated by interesting characters.
What did you think about Windy?
What do you think about Wind Chill?
What do you think about Valley Dale itself?
What did you think about the magic show, the build up to it and its aftermath?
What did you think about the conflict between Windy and her mother?
What did you think about the pacing, structure, flow, etc?
Do you guys have any other feedback or criticism?
I'm trying to improve my writing, storytelling and world building. I would love to hear any and all thoughts and opinions from my readers, so that I can incorporate that into my story later.
Happy to give any feedback.
I really enjoyed Valley Dale. I really wish if you could had Luna try and see more of it for herself and learn from the locals, rather than have her completely focus on Windy's situation, considering she hasn't really being 'in touch' with the peasantry of a small town in a while. and having her go into 'Culture' shock would had made it a bit better.
As for Windy, and her situation with her mother, did kinda came out of the blue. What should had happen for me is that Luna, through observation of Chill's and Windy's actions, words and behaviors, should had realised by herself that their was a 'conflict' between them. She would later confront Windy about it, forcing her to admit it and speak about her situation(and then try to persuade Luna to take her with her).
The same pretty much with Chill as well.
But it doesn't matter, I really enjoyed the arc, the writing was sublimal and the pace was excellent .
I fully agree with TheDoctorRet. It was a very enjoyable arc featuring high-quality writing.
Ok feedback, hmmm what to say, well first off for somebody who's just getting into writing a story for the first time you did a pretty good job so far.
How do I feel about valley Dale well I'ma gonna be honest with you my dude it's kinda well uneventful, nothing really happened except for a future plot being established and a side plot that we can come back to later nothing bad happens which was kinda boring, we don't know the names of anyone else in the town aside from Windy and Chill plus too if the town has been repeatedly attacked and a bunch of ponies have been killed shouldn't the town be more on edge and wary of strangers or maybe since it was the Pegasus race that attacked you could have had Wind Chill be concerned that her people might lose faith in her because of what she is.
Can I just say that Windy's character isn't very flushed out or interesting at the moment she's just basically a copy cut past of Luna I don't really know how else to describe her and I don't know how you could have given her a different character arc, as she is, she's fine for now and I look forward to seeing more of her but she doesn't really do anything as of yet.
Wind Chill on the other hand now her I have some theories not one of them good something is going on with her and I'd like to know what.
Luna's magic show felt like I was reading about Trixie, elusion magic come on Luna can't you do something better than that, her story about killing the sand monster has me hyped for more action but the entire arc was sorely lacking some action scenes.
The pacing in the story was really good, I never got lost or forgot anything, nothing felt rushed or shoehorned in except Luna's excuse for leaving felt more awkward than convincing.
All in all though really good job and I look forward to seeing where we go next.
First things first before I even start I'm going to admit I'm horrible at feedback cuz I have a hard time putting what I think into words. But I absolutely love this story so far the valley dale portion was really nice the magic show is hilarious as a nod to Trixie but it was well written and very descriptive so it was very easy to imagine it. The drama between windy and her mother is easily something I can see happen in that sort of era. But the thing I like most so far is the description of advanced Pegasus magic because frankly Earth ponies and pegaside just don't get a lot of love when it comes to the magic sides of it and there's a huge amount you can do with it and I love when people use Pegasus as spark shooters and blizzard generators (one of my favorites being in The Embassy) (https://www.fimfiction.net/story/447159/the-embassy). But all in all I absolutely love the story so far and I look forward to each update.
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I totally understand the criticism. I was simultaneously both too ambitious and too impatient with Valley Dale. Originally it was only supposed to be a brief stopover in her journey and introduce Windy as a character. Her mother wasn't even initially supposed to be a proper character. She was just a background character that was occasionally mentioned.
Although, longer we spent in Valley Dale, the more I wanted to flesh it out, and the more stuff I wanted to add. However, my mentally about Valley Dale's place in the story didn't change and was constantly frustrated with how long we were being bogged down in this small town. I tried to add conflict between Windy and her mother, but I was too impatient to properly set it up and tried to rush to the confrontation.
I tried to have my cake and eat it too, by having Valley Dale be both a fully fleshed out settlement, as well as a temporary step on Luna’s journey. And I accomplished neither particularly well.
As for the lack of action, that was intentional. This was a laid back and uneventful arc by design. Things are going to start moving very quickly now and I wanted to give Luna a few days of respite before shit hits the fan.
Thanks for the feedback.
It's good. I loved how you fixed a family problem that was slowly dividing them and they didn't even realize how bad it was. I can't wait until the next part where hopefully we can guess what Celestia is thinking about the letter and does she regret putting everything ahead of her sister. Politics will always be there but you only had one sister and threw her away because she wasn't important enough for you.
I really liked Windy's character, and how she parallels Luna. She has the same urge to do something different than Luna, but she hasn't had the opportunity (or a strong enough desire) to leave. She has a strained relationship with her family, but it hasn't broken like Luna's. Writing this out, I think I figured out how and why I like her: she is a lot like Luna, but at an earlier point in her emotional journey with one notable exception, her mother is paying attention now and willing/able to try to mend the relationship, unlike Celestia who wasn't. I hope we see her again before too long to see how things develop.
I think as a character, she's interesting, just not as much to me as Windy was (but that might be because I relate to Windy a lot, parental expectations etc). The "parent who is pushing their child in a direction the kid doesn't want, but out of a genuine desire to help set them up for a good life" is a relatively common trope, but it's not a bad one for me and it was executed decently well with Wind Chill.
I like the worldbuilding you gave it. Making it a textile town isn't something I've seen very often and it gave the opportunity for a really sweet moment at the end of the arc (the whole cart being covered in ribbons). I feel the mention of the roving pegasus tribe that attacked recently kind of laid down an expectation that wasn't resolved. I expected them to show up and cause problems, but they never did. At this point in time, it feels like a loose plot thread, but they might show up later or have been a worldbuilding red herring.
I'll be honest, I kinda skimmed through the magic show. I have a bad habit of skipping text if I can kinda feel where it's going. I blame having to read books I WAS NOT interested in in college for that. I'm trying to get better, but the relative pointlessness of the show made it really hard to stick to it. As mentioned earlier, I didn't quite see the point of the show being described in such detail and, probably due to me skimming, I remember basically nothing about it. I'll make a point of rereading it soon so I can comment better on it.
I do like that there isn't a person strictly in the wrong here. Wind Chill means well and is doing her best to equip her daughter for what is likely to be her best option for a comfortable future. And Windy isn't just a bratty teen in peak "you can't tell me what to do" mode, she has genuinely been isolated by her status and her ability to have a feel for other ponies intents.
I found the pacing slow, but as I've noticed in your other responses, it was deliberately so. So many stories these days start at 100 mph and only speed up from there (including the fanfic I'm writing myself), so I found it refreshing that this one didn't. You took the time to establish Luna's character before this arc and did worldbuilding by keeping the pace slow and having strong enough writing to support it, both in terms of the prose and in terms of making an interesting world.
I really liked the prose in general in your story. Except for the notable bit mentioned earlier, it kept me engaged enough that not skimming wasn't too much of a struggle. The slower pacing was also enjoyable in itself for me, I hope to one day be as skilled with descriptions as you are. A thought occurred to me as I was reaching the end of the chapter, it's a guess as to where this story would end: I wonder if this fanfic will wrap back around to being cannon compliant, with Luna turning into Nightmare Moon at the end, probably as some sort of heroic sacrifice.
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Thanks for the feedback.
The Las Pegasus raid is going to be relevant at a later date and that rouge cloud city will have a relatively significant impact on the story later. I'm laying the groundwork now by mentioning them early on.
No, this story will not end up being Canon-compliant. Many of the same Canon events will still take place, but some of them will happen a bit differently. My aim for this alt-universe is that everything will remain exactly the same as Canon with the single, sole point of divergence being Luna finding the diary.
All of the butterfly-effect changes to the Canon story will stem from that single variable. I won't say whether NMM will appear in any capacity whatsoever, but Luna’s actions and decisions will shape the future of Equestria.
The characters were nice and the pacing was alright. How the conflict between Chill and Windy was presented felt a tad too arbitrary. Also the references to Trixie felt a bit too strong. I'm no show person but I think some things could have been phrased more different compared to being a Trixie lines copy.