The problem with Stripes

While my big "flagship" story fan fiction thingymadoo hasn't even begun to come close to the point at which I can hype it with blogs, I still feel like my first one should be relevant to it. Specifically, the reason why I don't make much progress on it.

Oh no, an author with basically zero fame and/or credibility has a problem! How tragic!

Snarky jabs at my own [lack of] relevance aside, I do have an issue with stuff that I would do good to have opinions on. The first being that the story in question has a pair of protagonists that easily poke the border between "dark character" and "Gary Stu abort mission close tab dislike and flag." Yep, tragic backstories, odd appearances, out-of-the-ordinary abilities, the whole thing. While one of them is more guilty (in context of the story) than the other of the last part, my goal is still to make them fit nicely into a story that is written in an acceptable manner.

The "Stripes" thing is the big one, as far as appearances are concerned. Okay, one of the two characters has a white* coat and black mane, with black stripes around his legs. Why? Because this is a design element that I liked and ended up keeping because this character's purpose is to be as outcast as can be. I refrained from having the infamous PonyCreator full zebra patterning, obviously, so it's not at its absolute worst, but it's still an immediate red flag. After all, "good characters should look like background ponies..."

...Or so the mantra goes. The idea is that his appearance aligns with both his backstory and abilities. Can't really spoil it, but he gets pushed around a lot due to the stripes on his legs. Like, beaten unconscious and stuff. While removing them would theoretically make him a "better character" it would also remove the primary reason for him having a difficult colthood, plus make it impossible to use the derogatory "Stripes" nickname, which I found was pretty accurate to childhood bully vocab.

"Then why not give him an average colthood like a good character should have?" One may ask. You see, if he were to grow up in a normal, nonhostile environment, he wouldn't be a social recluse like he is currently, 'cause he could just go to the inevitable friends he makes for comfort. The idea is that social interaction is so foreign to him that he's marginally insane throughout the story, which is a major device in how he acts and how the readers are supposed to think of him.

This isn't even including some of the things he can do. Pegasus weather manipulation aside (I like to think that, canonically, Rainbow Dash could shoot lightning from her wings if she wanted, but doesn't because it's a kid show and explaining how pegasi can gather and store electrical charges in their coats wouldn't really fit well with the theme) it includes some pretty funky stuff. I tried to balance it out with the whole "he's actually quite insane" thing, but I dunno if that's enough. It's still quite possible that he simply comes off as a terrible character that nobody wants to read about. I like criticism, but the notorious "your story is bad and you should feel bad" terrifies me.

*in similar fashion to Celestia, Rarity, and Vinyl Scratch, the coat color is called white, but isn't actually. There's a very light shade of green, to match his eye color.