And another thing · 6:08pm May 10th, 2014
I didn't spoiler the last one, but I'll spoiler this one. This one is somewhat less vague about things that aren't obvious.
I think we all need to take a moment to reflect on the fact that today, we saw a fight between two beings possessing between them the magic of essentially the entire population of Equestria. Just take a break to think about that.
This also implies that the combined magic of four alicorns (of various ages and powers) is roughly equivalent to the magic of every other pony in Equestria, plus Discord. Maybe it's time to go back to viewing them as deities? I certainly never stopped viewing Discord as a demigod, and apparently your average alicorn princess isn't much weaker. And then I guess all the rest of Equestria combined doesn't amount to much, since three alicorns aren't enough to defeat Discord, but four can match him plus Equestria.
Discord cheats though. Having raw power isn't the same as being able to use it creatively. Tirek stole Discord's magic, but he didn't get Discord's ability to snap his fingers and do things (or if he did, he didn't think to use it.) I think that changes the balance. In my head canon, if Celestia could have gotten Discord to hold still and stop changing things, she could have beaten him alone, but he won't fight directly or fairly. Wheras Tirek obviously has no sense of strategy, and just flung power around, while Twilight's inexperience led to her doing the same thing.
2096447 I dunno, there's the whole Celestia getting beaten by Chrysalis thing in a straight up duel. Also the fact that the regal sisters only went after Discord once they HAD the elements of harmony, which pretty much fire off a straight beam like Celestia did on her own, so presumably if Celestia and Luna could have done that themselves they would have skipped the elements of harmony and just duked it out with alicorn magic. Maybe the fact that Twilight is the Element of Magic, and magic is her special talent, means she can be more powerful/efficient with the amount of magic she has than even other alicorns?
2096657 Possibly. But also look at the damage Twilight cause in that battle. They blew up mountains! There were craters! Think about a fight like that in the middle of Canterlot. You'd have hundreds, even thousands of casualties. Maybe there's a reason Celestia didn't duke it out with Chrysalis. Maybe she was holding back, and trusting that the backup plan of "use the elements" would save her.
2096672 You have a very good point about collateral damage, and Celestia might have been able to break out at any time. Also, I always assumed the reason Chrysalis was so powerful at that moment was because she wasn't just eating the love of some random dude (which she could have done a thousand times over anywhere) but an alicorn love spell cast by the Alicorn princess of love, which gave her access to alicorn-levels of power.
That still doesn't explain the whole regal sisters needing the elements of harmony to beat discord, unless they were normal ponies who ascended in the process of GETTING the elements, and so they just figured as long as they had the elements, use them.
But back to Discord, the elements of harmony are a bit of a glass cannon. Nothing can stand up to them, but they are a one-trick pony, fire off a rainbow beam and whatever you hit gets harmonized (albeit that harmonization can take very different forms). Even unicorn/alicorn spells and battle magic seems to be about hitting each other with balls of light, shields, teleporting around, etc. Discord is far more versatile, he can create whatever effects he wants with his magic, so he doesn't need to stand around making shields and blasting people with power. He may be no more powerful than a couple of alicorns combined, but his magic seems able to create types of effects that no one else can.
2096766
Yeah, that was pretty much my point!
2096961 Yeah, you're right, I guess when you said cheats I interpreted it differently. Although I'd still rate him as more powerful than any one or two alicorns.