Contest project, day seven (part one): We all make mistakes... · 7:36pm Feb 7th, 2015
...the important thing is to recognize them in time.
For example, when I started to write, I made the mistake of making my first fic (The Doom Patrol) waaaay too dark, with the second chapter being outright creepy. I noticed that and promptly went to a more sci-fi setting with more lighter and softer chapters.
When working on my second project, Ponyville's Knight, I wrote a character that was, by all purposes, a mary sue. She was basically perfect, with every side-character rooting for her and every villain defeated in an humiliating way. Thanks to whoever is upstairs, I realized how generic and void of any originality was the project and it got shut down to be replaced by Mare-Do-Well Strikes!
Then, I started my first breakout fiction that was The Conversion Bureau: Judgement Day. At first it was just a fictionalization of my own perceptions of the genre, with each character representing a different reaction towards it. But when the faves began to accumulate, I decided to take things seriously. One year later and now the characters I've used so far have actual personalities instead of being just mouthpieces for me.
What I'm trying to say here is that I'm not above screwing up. In fact, is through the fine art of screwing up how we can actually learn from our mistakes.
Why I'm bringing this up? Because I realized how much of a mistake was trying to use Ponies and Robots Wars for the "It's impossible" contest.
If you take a look over the previous blogpsots and the incomplete draft posted on them, you will provably see what's the big problem about all of this; the prompt and the fic itself are constantly clashing.
I'll put an example, this paragraph:
"This is it!" Shining Armor shouted at the army. "We can’t let them do this to us, to our home." He was standing at the border of the Canterlot's barrier. "Today! We'll show them we're not defenseless." Behind him, every Equestrian who could carry a weapon, use magic or simply fight with his bare hoofs was standing together.
"Today, we fight for our freedom! We earned our place here and nobody will take it from us." Not only ponies, what was left of the changeling hive, the last remaining dragons and refuges from all corners. "Today we fight for future. Not only us, but everyone's." The whole army behind him roared in anticipation. It took months to assemble such an army, and they were ready to make that time count.
Shining Armor put his own helmet on and held a sword in his magic. Pointing his weapon forward, he shouted with all his strength .
"CHARGE!"
It doesn't sound like something out of a mecha fic, doesn't it? It sound like something you would find in a Peter Jackson movie, mostly because the absence of giant robots, but also because it's so cliché that I'm actually embarrassed of writing it.
This is not what I had in mind for that fic., and I know that if I follow this path, there will be more changes in this direction. In other words, I'd be giving up the actual intention of the fic for a contest's sake.
NOPE!
In other words, Ponies and Robots Wars is NOT going to be the fic for the contest. I deeply apologize to anyone disappointed with this as also with all of the wonderful people helping me here. I can only promise that I'm not giving up the contest or the fic, but from this point and forwards, they are two separate things.
Wave Blaster
it's okay, may be you just need something new to start with take a day off for now
and you know the idea with the praetorians Changelings guards wasn't that bad, they don't have to fight Mechas that's all
2777048
I never said I was scrapping ALL of it. In fact yeah, after this, Ponies and Robot Wars WILL have its scene with the praetorian guard vs a mecha. In a more upbeat tone I even added a twist to said scene to make it both, more EPIC! and relevant for the story.
The mecha in question is Moguera, since the Hive Castle is underground and the Moguera is basically a metallic giant mole. But instead of finishing with a changeling massacre, one of them managed to get inside of the Moguera's core and shut it down. After that, they use the Moguera as a base for reverse engineering, giving the ponies both, A.I. technology and the architecture to go around the square cube law, essentially enabling them to build their own giant robots.
2777105
glory to the survivors ! you know it could be a massacre without being too cliché, you don't need only one of them to be alive, but not too much survivors, to show they've been through hell and fuck yeah