Squeee · 1:12pm May 29th, 2013
I am completely new to this whole 'blogging' thing, not to mention having people actually following me. I have to admit it is a little nerve wracking everyone waiting for me to deliver another piece of the story. I actually am terrified after I hit publish each time; I hope that feeling never goes though, it is a strange sense of excitement on whether it will be well recieved or eaten alive.
But today I am far more excited than I should be, some nice wolf like person has created a TV Tropes page for me. After getting lost on there more times than I can imagine, it is actually very surreal to see something I did being put on the site.
Truth be told this has made my day, I have no idea why. Here it is, it's tiny and I put it onto the story thingie because I'm proud of it, but bask in it's four entries! A Voice Among the Strangers
Now onto news people will actually care about outside my own little celebration! I have dropped a few hints but I will come outright and say it; A Voice Among the Strangers is ending soon. If my schedule keeps up, this will be three to four more weeks. In simpler terms, that is three to four more chapters.
Does this mean I will be abandoning Jessica, Ebony, Scar, Stoic and Dusk to create other things? Yes and no.
This is and will be my first ever completed story, it is a wonderful learning experience I have to admit but I want to explore other things. Now, I have promised one other story, that is the re-telling of A Voice Among the Strangers from the equestrian perspective, and I still plan to do that next!
However, there are other ideas I really wish to explore as well. Now, Tystarr you might say as your monocle needs adjusting, you appear to be rambling! Get to the point!
Well, in a nutshell the point is this; I have around four ideas I wish to dwelve into after this story. Regardless of whatever happens, the re-telling will go ahead, and run simultaneous to whichever of the below I do. Now that's where you people who follow me come in! I will write about 5k or so, so effectively a first chapter of each of the stories. I will then leave it to you guys and girls to choose which I continue on with first! I might get ambitious and slowly do them all, I don't know yet, but the one which wins will get precedence. Afterall it's due to all you people with your kind words encouraged me to continue from the dare I started this on (Which resulted in the first chapter,) and then actually finding interest in it and continuing to this point.
Now, food for thought, the story ideas are thus;
1) Sequel to 'A Voice Among the Strangers'. (I wont give any details on this one. If you are really curious you may PM me, but be aware it would slightly spoil the ending even if I was vague.)
2) A ponification story of someone who winds up in Equestria. After hunting around the forums I have seen alot of hate for this, why I want to write one I don't truely know. I want to do a girl into a pegasus, but then explore what happens after. Their learning to walk again, fly, speak, how different it would be for them, terrifying even to be a stranger to their own body. How their bodies biology would confuse them, not to mention the application of magic thrown into the mix. The process of learning to walk again let alone at a good pace would be intriguing to me, I wish to focus on this and their interactions with others.
Then there is how others would view them...
Perhaps even relate it to some of the characters I created in 'A Voice Among the Strangers' or make it a seperate universe altogether. Or have them in an entire new place entirely.
Learning to fly later in the story would be fun I imagine to write.
Edit: Also their using their mouths for things would also be amusing.
3) An equestrian finding themselves on Earth. Possibly a changeling or just a hapless equestrian or two. Nothing more to say on this one, possibly the least formed of the ideas.
4) A story exploring Celestia and Luna's battle. Starting with what caused it, leading into the war and then up to present day. I played around with this idea slightly in 'My Sister' but expanding it could be fun.
4) A story exploring more about Dusk, Scar and Stoic. How they came to become guards, how they know each other and exploring more of their past and what makes them tick. It may flow into AVAtS but probably only for a tiny bit, and possibly at the end as a bonus chapter. I want it to focus on them, and develop them further!
So there are the ideas! Once I am finished with the current 'A Voice Among the Strangers' I will go into production of the first chapters for each of these. Of course upon saying that, I wont kill the other three that don't win. Their updates will just be far, far more delayed. Perhaps a couple months between each as doing five at once would quite probably kill me. Edit: No, I would well and truely die doing that knowing my urge to get chapters out asap! x.x
More than I do with my accident prone self already.
So there you go, I hope this clears some things up. Again, squeee on the TV Tropes addition. Also thank you all once again for your support and feedback, you make it a fantastic thing for a first time writer like me. ^-^
I'm rooting for #2, I'd imagine that you'd actually do it really well.
So #1 would be in addition to the re-telling, correct? In that case, I would want to wait until the re-telling is finished before getting a sequel.
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#2 is interesting. If you need ideas, I would point you to First Pony View by Suomibrony. It is a good story also, though notably your story will be quite different, and perhaps more enjoyable, given you won't be spending the 1st 6000 words on your character waking up and walking to the bathroom
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The re-telling is seperate and will be done regardless of the other story.
Truth be told I would love to see how the mental aspects would affect them. I imagine a pony's instincts would work differently.
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What I'm interested in seeing is what most would consider the "mundane" aspects of such a transformation; where the focus is about exactly what you described and not about them going off on some journey or chasing destiny or something. It gets pretty boring after a while.
Learning about their body and new surroundings, how to interact if not flat out integrate with Equestrian society and fumbling through all the nuances of Equestrian social dynamics and cues sounds like a really fun and interesting experiment to think about.
I am totally supportive of your idea.
Quite honestly I'm very much against the #2 and #3 but I must say your writing style might just change my way of seeing that completely if A Voice Amongs the Strangers is anything to go by. So I must say I'd vote on #2 and second place vote for #4 because I've never really read any good story about the Celestia Vs. NMM / Luna. Now before anyone jumps on me, I have read quite some of these stories. Just never one that leaves me satisfied.
// Sphex
Guess I will go with #2 for reasons that have already been mentioned.
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Well I haven't even written the first chapters to help decide! ^-^;
But I am glad to see interest already. Especially the reasoning why.
I would recommend #3 since it would be more or less a reversal of number 2 or AVAtS.
#1 I want but don't want you to grow stale on overwriting the universe.
#2 I would read since most of the hate is for self insert mary sues who are shipped with the mane 6 (although, one like that, Through the Eyes of Another Pony managed to subvert it's tropes enough to become a phenomenon). But there are tons of fics like that and yours might be overlooked.
#4 I would not personally be interested in since I do not consider there to ever have been a war. It makes no sense. Luna went full evil out of jealousy. Nopony would ever side with her. No war. Just Luna flipping out and Celestia using the elements on her. I can't really consider it believable any other way.
The "Human in Equestria" genre gets a lot of undeserved hate (okay, maybe some of it is deserved, because there's a LOT of self-insert wish-fulfillment fluff in that category), but if you really put the effort into it, you can make a good story that a lot of people will appreciate. That's one of the reasons I ended up writing Written in Dust.
1112141 Maybe then Tystarr should write something and change your mind eh? :P
That said, whoever said you have to have supporters to fight a war when you have magic? If ponies won't follow you willingly then make them follow you. That's kinda the idea behind a lot of stories where the big bad is a necromancer at least. The necromancer don't really have a lot of followers that have free will, but they have plenty of slaves. Maybe NIghtmare Moon's rise was something like that?
Though, that said I do tend to agree with you (lore wise at least). I see it more as a 1v1 battle that took place rather then an actual war.
They all sound pretty exciting to me! I think all of them would be fun, so I'll let your readers decide.
I'll go wherever you point, Treilacl standing by!
Personally I think you should go on to do a sequel to A voice among the strangers first but that's probably just because I love it so much.
I'm less interested to see options 2 and 3 because I have seen them both be done before, badly.
However if we have learnt anything from A voice among the strangers its that you can take a gender that most people seem to hate on sight and turn it into something awesome, so I wouldn't mind seeing what you can do with them.
Option 4 doesn't really interest me to be honest because I don't really think there was a war, I think there was maybe a small conflict between the sisters and then Celestia was forced to use the elements. Remembering the reason why Luna when evil in the first place (Because no one seemed to love her or her night) there wouldn't be any reason for anyone to rally behind her in a war situation.
All that said Ill be reading all of them regardless because all the ideas sound good, its just that some have been overdone to death, although it would be nice to see you put a new spin on them similar to what you have done with A Voice among the strangers. What ever you end up doing, I look forward to it, and I'm really exited for the equestrian retelling, once the main story is finished.
One last thing before I finish this ramble I'm on: You said you started writing on here because of a dare, Mind telling us what that was? (You probably wont and I don't expect you to want to but it was worth a try)
Ok I hope this helps a bit. Have fun writing!
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See, my problem is that Luna embraced dark powers to achieve her misguided goals. If she had actually started a war and brought ruin, destruction, and death to ponies, I do not see her being forgiven and redeemed so easily.
If her only goal was to wrest control from Celestia and bring about eternal night, then it makes sense.
I believe she was banished for what she was going to do, not for what she had done. Otherwise it makes no sense in context.
So yes she was a villain. But I cannot believe there was actually a war.
1112366 It's my understanding that Luna was possessed by "Dark Forces." (That's there actual name, "Dark Forces" and if I'm not mistake "Dark Forces" also turned Rarity into Nightmare Moon for a bit.) Going off this Luna could then have waged a war and still have been forgiven for her crimes.
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The comic is non canon. While the dark powers that transformed her into NMM were outside forces, they do not have their own identity or personality. They just affect the wielder's.
1112473 I wasn't clear there. You're right they're not cannon. That said though, cannon or not they give good insight into things that could be. We really have next to nothing in regards to NMM's story. We don't have much that is cannon, which lets everypony come up with there own ideas. I've read many stories where it was all Luna and I've read just as many where she was just as much a victim as the rest of the world.
It really just comes down to what are you willing to accept and how far are you willing to stray from your head-cannon? ...well at least when dealing with stuff that's head-cannon.
I think your best bet would be to write number 2 in parallel with the pony perspective to give yourself some variety and then move on to number 1 when you finish the parallel story (this also makes it easier to keep from contradicting yourself later). 3 could also be interesting, but given how little detail you have I think it is best to let that mature while you work on other projects. I am not too picky on the actual order because all three sound interesting so I will be happy with whatever you choose to do, but I think this setup would be your best bet.
The only one I am really not interested in is 4 because it basically eliminates everything we know so there is less of a point to grab onto there and we know what is going to happen already which kills some of the suspense.
As for your concerns about HIE, that negative opinion is because most of them are just wish fulfillment that skips over all the meat you want to explore in order to jump into bed with a pony of the author's choice (this is really obvious given the number of second person ship fics out there).
1112473 Do you have a source for that? As far as I know the comics just expand the universe with material the show never had a chance to touch on so it should all be canon.
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Nothing is technically canon unless/until it is directly referenced or acknowledged in the show itself or specifically confirmed as so by the show staff. Even "word of god" statements are not technically canon until they enter the show continuity.
So the comic continuity is potentially canon, but can be either confirmed or contradicted by the show.
1112733 Yes, but I would think that there would be some statement one way or the other, and if not then the best assumption is probably to assume that it is a lower level of canon and thus holds true unless it is contradicted by the show.
O.o
Well from what I am seeing thus far, there is a clear want for a sequel but only after the retelling. Next is idea two with a lil bit of three.
I may change four, to be honest it was three am when I wrote that. I just want to do something with the sisters. Maybe a short story...
Hmmm...
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No. Canon does not have tiers. That is not how it works.
There is only confirmed (which is canon), unconfirmed, and contradicted which are both not canon.
Nothing that happened in the comic is canon until it is confirmed as so. Until it is (which it won't be) it is merely authorized fanfiction.
1112775 You have clearly never had a discussion about Star Wars canon then. They have a whole system of tiers and precedence to resolve conflicts, but fundamentally anything authorized by Lucas (and now Disney) is canon at some level unless otherwise stated. Most other IPs have some sort of mechanism for resolving conflicts or asserting dominance, but the recurring theme is that ever official publication is canon unless explicitly stated otherwise (although there are some cases where entire classes are non-canon like the Star Trek novels).
Other than probably the sequel to AVAtS, #2 seems to be the most thought out one plus I would love to see what you would do with the genre. It would also give not only you but the readers some variety of material to enjoy.
~Have a good one.
Ebony goes to Earth.
Just an idea.
Retelling would be really interesting, BUT I really want a sequel, cant choose.
All I know is this is the best HiE fanfic I've ever read. Please keep up the good work.
I don't think we should even HAVE #1 as a choice :). The sequel is simply NECESSARY :] (but after the retelling!).
So this leaves 3 choices.
I would say, #2 looks the most interesting. Be warned though - this one is one of the (if not THE) most difficult HiE stories to get right. A cartload of authors tried that and failed... Why did I chose this option, then? Because you are the most qualified Writer (with a capital W) to attempt such a feat. You already managed to master the 2nd most difficult kind of HiE (the language barrier story)!
In order of prefference, #1 and #2
Reading that "A Voice amongst strangers" is ending soon makes me sad on one hoof.
On the other hoof it means I can make a printed book version for myself much sooner, too! 
As for story ideas, I'll give my two cents on all of them.
This, of course, has my preference for the moment, but I suppose it depends on the ending of "AVATS". I'll say, however, that you really can't go wrong with more Jessica. You've created one of the best humans characters on the site, she deserves to have her entire life told, to be honest. Again, my opinion may change after AVATS ends, but for now, I say you can't go wrong with this idea.
Also an interesting idea, and given the quality of AVATS I think you're one of the few people on the site who could actually pull this off believably. If this ponified person will be anywhere as developed and likable as Jessica is, I can foresee you having another hit on your hooves with this. In any case, I love "stranger winds up in strange culture and has to adapt" stories, though I prefer when the stranger keeps his or her original shape. Still, since you already did such a story with AVATS, I'm not at all against you doing a ponification one.
I have a personal suggestion for this, if you allow me. With the latest chapter of AVATS, I think you've made a perfect opportunity for a fun compromise between AVATS and this idea. We know now that Starswirl wound up on earth, teaching Arthur and Merlin no less! It might be interesting to write about his adventures. It fits the concept of pony on earth, while at the same time serving as a kind of prequel to your masterpiece. It's merely a suggestion, of course, but one I'd love to see nevertheless.
Personally, this is my least favourite of your ideas. Not because I dislike Luna and Celestia or anything (Celestia is my favourite pony, after all) or because you can't write them well (quite the contrary, your "My sister" story is another slice of pure quality fanfiction), but purely because the subject matter doesn't interest me as much as cultural-clash stories. Maybe it's also because I've had bad experience with similar stories, in how they wound up shifting the blame for Nightmare moon on Celestia, which makes me quite upset. So, I personally would prefer seeing one of the other three instead of this, but if you want to write it, by all means go for it. I'll be certain to give it a read in case you do, and in fact I'm quite sure I'll like it too.
Those were my two cents. Hope it doesn't matter that they came a bit late.
I do love all the feedback I am getting for this, even before the chapters come out to choose which I put my energy into!
After some consideration, number 4 will be changed. It will instead be a story looking more into Dusk, Stoic and Scar. How they became royal guards and just what their positions exactly are. It will also give me a chance to play with more interactions with Luna and Celestia, since they will be very much involved with the story! Also it will only be about ponies which should please some people who don't like humans in their equestrian soup!
Ew, that sounds... horrible when put that way. X.x
Also their real names, but that will be revealed in the side story anyhow. ^-^
Hello!
A sequel would be great if you feel you have something compelling to share, so #1 would certainly be cool. Though I agree with ToaofTwilightZ that it would work better after a retelling is released.
I think you could pull off #2 or #3, as the thing you seem to do best (at least for me), is to make the scenes you're describing feel real and immersive. Seriously I completely lose track of time when I read Voice.
Overall I would love to see #4 the most, as I've come to enjoy the guard trio and their personalities, and more about them would be wonderful.
