So about those edits... · 5:28pm Jan 19th, 2016
I finished the intermediate chapter 11 that was going to add some character to the kelpies, but chapter 12 is being...
An utter slugfest.
Readers have told me that the battle in chapter 11 was a curbstomp, a laughable curbstomp, along with Celestia's fight scene.
While I can totally see how the fight Tethys had with Celestia was pathetic—heck even Tethys lampshaded it herself — after trying to rewrite the scene to add more nuance, I realize now that trying to make the ponies have any sort of good hits into the kelpies.... doesn't make any sense.
This is the first time the ponies have fought the kelpies, who had tentacles, who can attack from multiple sides b/c of them. Also, first time likely they've faced a serious enemy bent on actually killing them in a long time. Hence, normal weapons training in melee does NOT work at all. I know people are going to ask me about pegasi, well okay I need to clear up what happens to them in 11, but they're grounded thanks to seaponies in the water firing up at them. As for unicorns, the changelings in Canterlot Wedding preettty much beat them without a problem, and if changelings, who are to some extents, weaker land version of kelpies, can beat unicorns and earth ponies without even having to kill them, I think it makes complete sense that the kelpies would just roll over them, so to speak, at least in this engagement.
I know people are going to criticize or complain about me apparently reneging on my goal to rewrite and re nuance the story, but ask yourself this before you start commenting.
"How can one write ambush like this that doesn't arbitrarily hand people the idiot ball so the other side can win?"
Cause this is what happened to the Equestrian fleet, an ambush. While yeah, Celestia should fare better than she did in chapter 11, I can't see the ponies faring much better than they did in 11. Admittedly I appear to have left out a few relevant details and I've added some in to help flesh it out and make it clearer.
But i've tried, I've thought about this, I've discussed this with my editor, and every time I tried to write a scene where the ponies get a good hit,.... it feels VERY forced. At least understand that I took a good look at the story again.
As always, please feedback constructively or I will just ask you to reword within 24 hours on pain of deletion/block, because I don't want to read the blog and get repulsed by the feedback I get :P. Not that I can't take feedback, but if I don't get presented with it in a reasonable, clear fashion, I just can't take it seriously.
Yours sincerely,
vren55
I haven't gotten around to actually reading those chapters yet, but from what I pick up from this blog post, it might simply because the ambush is not ambush-y enough. The point of an ambush is to subdue the enemy with quick, overwhelming power, without ever actually giving them a chance to fight back. The ambusher gets to plan ahead and holds all the cards while the ambushed gets caught with their figurative pants down at the worst of times. Maybe that's an alternative option you could take into consideration? Simply not having any real fight at all except for some token struggling. It makes it more clear that this situation could never have had any other outcome.
Eh, like I said, the ponies are basically trying to fight the entire ocean, so them being able to do squat this time around seems only fitting.
A lot of folks just hope they can make a better showing later. At least, enough that, if Alternia grants the kelpies' territory back (because yeah, they were wronged first), it won't simply feel like bullies (fleshed out or not) getting their way (because they wronged back a lot more).
Funny thing is we never said we'd write it any other way, just that we'd try to balance things out and explain why things are happening the way they are. The ponies were always going to lose this battle and badly, so don't even bother mentioning that. These are enemies they are not prepared to face and many of these forces have NEVER SEEN ACTION.
3697977 To summarize, an entire army, complete with monsters of the deep capable of sinking ships, pounce upon the Equestrian fleet before they even know what's going on, with Celestia fighting the kelpie Empress in a one on one battle. Pony versus kelpie goes very badly and results in the ponies getting utterly trounced. Celestia gets pretty badly beaten as well, but as mentioned in the blog, that's getting fixed to where she puts up more of a fight.
3698059
I can see how that could be an issue. In all honesty, I think it sounds like entire situation would work better if she didn't put up a fight at all - with her forces ambushed, overwhelmed and effectively taken hostage, it seems like a much more natural decision for her to surrender rather than risk their lives by fighting back against an overwhelming force, but I'll have to catch up on the recent chapters to really be able to judge that with any accuracy.
Seems like you need to think of it from an Equestrian perspective as well.
These are ponies who don't know conflict. They're facing creatures that have wrecked the shit out of them repeatedly. What do you do in that sort of situation?
You turn tail and run. Hide in a broom closet until it's over.
You carry out an ambush to quickly incapacitate your opponent. If your opponent's gunners have abandoned their posts, you've already succeeded. If Celestia is the target of the ambush, perhaps the kelpies should be more focused on preventing any interference instead of complete wanton destruction. They cripple the ships and incapacitate the crew, but don't systematically slaughter the ponies and sink all the ships despite clearly having the means to. Shows that there's some sort of ulterior motive for this ambush beyond "attack ponies".
So, with the ships crippled, the crews hiding/captured/incapacitated, Tethys is free to face Celestia without any distractions.
This was never addressed in the show. All we ever saw of the wedding attack was from the perspective of the Mane 6 and Cadence. I'll remind you that the mane 6 (with two unicorns) collectively beat the crap out of a huge number of changelings, only losing to overwhelming numbers.
That's how the changelings won, through overwhelming numbers. Numbers are what give the changelings their strength. If you want to get into speculation, an average unicorn could probably beat a single changeling without too much difficulty. But one unicorn versus ten changelings? Unless that unicorn is a particularly powerful spellcaster, nope. That said, even the average unicorn could be assumed to take down a changeling or two in that group before being beaten.
Part of any training with a melee weapon would involve some practice in dealing with multiple opponents. Which is basically what one kelpie is. That said, the best strategy for multiple opponents is to have multiple people fight against them too. But like with the changelings, it's overwhelming numbers. You can't fend off that many attacks without more people, and you're on a ship with very limited space. That all said, it shouldn't be impossible for a kelpie to lose a melee engagement against several ponies fighting together. Trick is, this barely happens cause they've run off, panicked, or have already been separated and beaten.
All in all, the kelpies can have an incredible advantage and secure an easy victory, and still take losses. Likewise, ponies can suffer a crushing defeat without losing 100% of their forces and still taking out some kelpies.
As an additional aside, while I'm perfectly aware that this is fiction and doesn't need to work by notions of realism, I think this shouldn't be portrayed as a realistic reason for the kelpies' martial superiority, either. In the real world, there is a reason why land animals do not have tentacles: outside of the water, noodly strings of muscle with no bone to support them are simply not much good. The average squid or octopus is completely incapacitated upon leaving the water, which is not only because they're evolved for an aquatic lifestyle.
Even underwater, a giant squid does not always win against a single shark or whale. Having all those appendages is one thing, but being able to use them as if each was an entirely separate individual is quite another. Humans have two arms, but two-weapon fighting styles still never really became a popular thing for us, historically speaking. There's a limit to how much a single mind can coordinate.
3698081 Part of the issue is the kelpies don't seem the type to take prisoners so it's either win or be annihilated.
If you're going to use show canon as a structure for the abilities of the Equestrian military I need to just stop my argument right here, because from what we've seen in the show they have pretty much zero competence and it's pretty amazing that you let them be advanced enough to have battleships at all. It is after all a children's show so it's pretty unlikely they would ever show a military force in a kind of a good light. I was under the impression that you wanted this to be a little more "realistic" and giving Equestria as huge of a handicap as basing their prowess off of the show yet having the kelpies under no such cap it's no wonder these battles are so lopsided. This is seeming more and more like you want something akin to an alien invasion flic where humanity doesn't stand a chance until some deus ex machina appears and saves the day at the last second, if that is in fact what you are going for then by all means continue as-is.
Ok now assuming you don't want the military of Equestria portrayed as complete idiots the main problem is that they don't even try and do anything In the face of anillation. You are being extremely creative with the kelpies abilities wherein they have the perfect counter to anything the Equestrians can throw at them but refuse to extend that creativity with the other races opting to turn them into punching bags. Your argument that the Equestrians have never faced the kelpies works both ways, the kelpies have never faced the Equestrians either. At least not on this large a scale, I think sinking transports Vs fighting a military force with unknown weaponry would require a much different approach. Unless there is some way the kelpies know exactly the abilities and weaponry for a long enough time for them to have come up with exact stratagies against everything I don't thing brute force and numbers would result in such a curb-stomp. I should also say that I wouldn't expect the equestrians to get anywhere near victory just that they lose with some semblance of dignity.
I personally thought the original chapter 11 made tons of sense, lets look at this through the looking glass, if a group of ponyfied navy seals ambushed a gryphon ship and took 0 casualties, no one would bat an eyelash, good guys kicking ass and taking names is just part of the expectation, but now make those ponified navy seals a regiment of highly trained, biologically equipped for the terrain, and ruthless kelpies, and make the gryphons a peace-fed constantly shunted aside from major dangers equastrian millitary, and no one can understand why the kelpies would be able to roll them....even though the transformation from image one gives the kelpies even MORE advantages then their navy seal counterparts had
3698125
That's a fair point. It would, given that their own empress is present, be a valid alternative way for the situation to go down, though, I think.
We'll see how these edits are going to impact how the readers are perceiving both the Kelpies and the battle.
It should hopefully fix any criticism directed toward the Kelpies by making them less of an unknown to the readers.
Regarding the ponies side in the battle , if it doesn't work , it just doesn't work. You took the (respectfull) feedbacks from your readers to hearth and tried to do something to make everyone reading expérience more enjoyable. That's all anyone could ask for. (I liked the little bit in bold , makes me envision some interesting battles in the future)
Regarding Celestia , well , I can say anything at this point.
3698140
Incorrect! The kelpies have faced the Equestrians before, fighting the Royal Guard at time when the Royal Guard had more experience fighting, but this is something that you had to have read the original to figure out.
And we are making it to where the guard fight back more, it's just they keep finding themselves countered.
I'll give you my take on the core problem which this highlights. We want to know why the kelpies would consider negotiations when they are winning completely at every level as far as we can see. Some hint or clue what it is that makes simply destroying or eating anyone who approaches their waters not the choice they will go with. That is why the trouncing is being pointed out so heavily.
3698173
Does that mean that Equestrian technology and tactics has been stagnant or even regressive for hundreds or thousands of years? Thinking on it further it paints an even bleaker picture for the Equestrians if they are unable to write things down and not lose them while the kelpies can.
3698195 Think about it. Their tech may have advanced but they are still using spears and swords. Hell, how many times of the RG remaining to rigid/predictable screw over Alternia in the last story. New tools, same strategies.
3698206
It's pretty much impossible to be able to have not changed tactics with the addition of battleships, I would think that all tactics have gravitated towards ship vs ship seeing how any other tactics would be pretty much useless when facing another battleship on equal grounds. Even with spears and swords I would think close quarters multiple enemy's would be trained for as enemy's boarding the ship would be very possible. It was under that assumption that I was making suggestions on how anti-ship tactics could be somewhat used against the kelpies. But holy crap if it's as you say and the current tactics are sit there and let the battleship do all the work with troops sitting on it just for show then yeah I can't think of anything that would save those poor bastards from their own incompetence.
I have to admit, I don't understand how or why you're suggesting that there are only two possible modes for this engagement: total pony annihilation, or a clash of the titans. Even ambushes don't always go off without a hitch, because while the kelpies obviously have an enormous home field advantage, as well as the element of surprise, they don't exactly kill the ponies too quickly for them to react at all. Why is it a few kelpies here and there can't die for every ten ponies and changelings? Why can't Celestia land more than a single glancing blow against whatsferface? That being said, I accept that this was a total and utter defeat for the ponies. I admittedly think it's bizarre that they couldn't kill more than a couple of turtles, but whatever, the kelpies had a good breakfast that morning(that breakfast being sapient creatures).
What I am more curious about is how Alternia could possibly finagle herself and the survivors out of this situation, in a way that looks believable. Tethys literally holds all of the cards in this situation, and she has demonstrably proven that she is willing and able to kill world leaders, soldiers, and civilians alike. Now Alternia comes here with what is almost certainly a useless military force behind her. Why should Tethys not just kill them all? Even if she has no designs for the land, by doing that she effectively cripples their military and leadership for the next several decades. That is my main issue with this point of the story. Alternia needs to negotiate a surrender or a retreat with an incredibly powerful and ruthless creature, who literally has no reason to entertain either notion, aside from villain stupidity if she agrees. I know the answers are coming next chapter, but I'm afraid if they're not satisfying, this story will suffer for it.
So, I know that last time, I was one of the ones who came across as being rather aggressive, so I'm going to try and frame my words carefully here.
I'm going to skip past the section where you lay down the technical reasons why you feel that this would be such a curb stomp. While I completely disagree with them, I feel that they're almost a symptom of the deeper issue. Because what you say here....
Is exactly what I feel you've stuck Equestria's forces with in that battle. While it is quite true that they are woefully under-informed when it comes to the kelpies, but by Chapter 11 they've actually gotten some bits of intelligence. In Chapter 6, they picked up the journal detailing that one attack. In Chapter 7, they had the report from the survivor. In Chapter 9, Celestia saw at least parts of the attack on the Venecian ships. It has been pretty well spelled out what the kelpie mode of attack is with these assaults. Heck, the griffin sailor almost spells out that these ships' big guns are useless against what's coming at them.
Chapter 10, Celestia thinks she might have at least a way to escape. Sure, it's a gamble, but they don't really have any other options at the moment. Up until this point, everything is following, everything makes sense. Then we hit Chapter 11 and things kind of....fall apart. Equestria doesn't do anything to counter the kelpies based on the information they've already been provided. I mean, your big guns are functionally useless, so you might as well take some of the extra powder from your powder magazines and try to rig some crude depth charges. The smaller deck guns exist. Those might be able to wing the sea creatures when they emerge, so they could arrange their ships to have overlapping fields of fire. Even the Equestrian sailors fighting with their backs to the bridge and other parts of the ship would be something.
But here's the thing. All of that? It could still mean nothing. They still have monsters that can attack the ships from below. Even if the Equestrian sailors fought well enough to clear the decks of kelpies entirely, it still could not matter as their land was literally taken away from them. Showing them try and still get over-run both adds more menace to the kelpies and makes Equestria look less like chumps.
Like Misdirection said below. I don't understand why this is kind of an all or nothing proposition. Equestria going down to a bitter and vicious defeat, doesn't necessitate such a total curb stomp. The kelpies getting a black eye while they win doesn't make their victory any less complete. Hell, you could even use the battles on the ship to help add more weight to how Celestia was defeated. She's splitting her attention, trying to cast spells at the kelpies to help her sailors, even as Tethys keeps tearing into her, her focus un-diminished.
In the end, it remains your decision. But I think that you're really missing some obvious beats here.
My only beef was that the issue of visibility was not addressed, when it was within Celestia's power to fix it, especially after the line that practically taunted her to do so.
Celestia might have had good reasons not to raise the sun, but these were not addressed (this could have been good character exploration), nor were alternatives mentioned (starshells, flares, spells, etc, at least so far as I recall).
I may not have said so, but even if Celestia had raised the sun, I still wouldn't have expected them to win. I never had a problem with the idea that Equestria would be at a major disadvantage in the initial engagements.
But when you're in as deep trouble in a fight as they were, I would expect them to do whatever they could to try and improve their situation, and improving the battlefield visibility seems like common sense to me (incidentally raising morale, and giving Alterna a damn strong signal that Celestia was in deep doodoo)
When they don't, I would like to know the reason why (either why they can't, or why it wasn't necessary).
Sorry for harping on this again, but if you're doing revisions, that bit still bugged me, so I thought I'd try to explain my thoughts.
3698122
Actually, that gives me a pretty cool idea. What if it's a spell that allows the kelpies to do so? Maybe once the equestrians start getting their research on track, they might be able to develop some sort of countermeasure to that ability.
3698827 Because whipping the sun out because someone taunted her is both fucking dumb and petty. How have you not internalized this yet? That and by your logic she should have done the same when Luna refused to lower the moon and yet she didn't.
We're not changing the story line, just certain aspects of the battle. Besides suddenly bringing the sun up when your own troops have got their night vision and are in battle with hordes of shape-shifting monsters is going to kill everyone's nightvision and if the creatures recover first, her forces die while blinded. Good job Celestia, you helped the monsters win.
Also you're assuming Tethys would just sit there and let her.
3698122
One of the downsides of not reading the chapters. The kelpies tentacles are armored and are used for blocking so they clearly aren't the same set up as an octopus as both the armor and the ability to block means the tentacles have some sort of rigid support.
But hey if you want that level of realism, then changelings should not exist as they are horse/pony sized creatures with exoskeletons. The kelpies can get somewhat of a pass as they have a medium to support their weight, but changelings should not even be walking much less flying. Also pegasus should not fly with their wing size and Big Mac should have simply caused that house to collapse after he was tied to it as opposed to dragging it along while under the effects of the love poison, and Tethys should have learned of the joys of the square cube law the moment she tried going to her full size while outside of the water while standing on the battleship.
3698919
I'm pretty sure octopuses have neither internal nor external support, but the point was that since it's not a realistic notion to begin with, there's no point in using it as reasoning for anything. It would work as well as the story needs it to.
3699146 Ah ok. Thought you were going for the "this shouldn't happen because physics say so" angle. We've had a few do that lately.
3699191
Well, in the real world it wouldn't, but since this isn't the real world...
What I meant to say was that for the same reason that it can work in a story, the story could also decide that it isn't actually that much of an advantage after all. Fiction isn't entirely bound by the limits of what's possible in that sense.
3699196 Do you actually have a point to make in pointing out something that obvious though? I mean the reason you brought it up was to support what you thought as opposed to what the story is doing.
3699419
My point was that the author shouldn't feel bound to make the kelpies more successful in combat just because it "makes sense" from some realistic standpoint. It doesn't. If he wants to write them as great fighters because of this then that's his right, but by the same virtue he could also decide that it actually makes no difference. It's just something that particularly stood out to me. He's free to let their physical abilities work in whatever way suits the stories best. That's clearly something that's not equally obvious to everyone, given that there have been apparently arguments about it.
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Me response to some major trends in criticism, because a lot of people asked the same thing. I do thank you all for being quite tactful in what you are saying, even if I didn't totally agree with all of it.
So regarding kelpies being portrayed as too ruthless and having no reason to make peace, that is being corrected with some additional pure dialogue scenes that foreshadow the kelpies actions in the earlier chapters (I will announce when they are being opened) and hence give the reader some perspective as to the kelpies motives. They seriously flesh them out a lot without giving too much away. Also there's the new chapter 11 which needs to be sent off to pre-readers and that gives a LOT more character to the kelpies. That should in the most part at least alleviate the problem from which you have a curb stomp battle here.
Regarding why I was having difficulty, basically what happened was this, I tried to write in a scene where a kelpie died to pony hooves... it kinda worked, but the thing was that in the flow of the narrative, it looked forced, especially when you suddenly focus on a pony who gets one victory as opposed to the rest who are trying and failing. As for whipping out the sun... well aside from that being a rather gigantic hypocrisy on Celestia's part, visibility isn't so much of her problem as opposed to the nature of her enemy. Plus, i daresay half the world would take offense to losing their sunlight...
Regarding the multiple angles of attack thing. There's multiple angles of attack on a single opponent and then there's an opponent who can hit you at six different areas on the front of your body, at the same time. hence, ponies have a problem fighting kelpies.
Regarding why i based it off the show.. well, the story always was supposed to be based off the show. Its why I kept the archaic weaponry, but gave the ponies more guns.
That being said, I am still trying to give the ponies more scenes where they resist. Its just its not really possible to make them successfully resist as a whole, without making some random lucky guy get a lucky shot, which looks really forced.
and yes... there will be some interesting battles in the future.
So i'll keep plugging away at it, thanks for the feedback.
3698886
I'm not trying to be confrontational. I've had feedback on an aspect of one of my stories where the reader vehemently disagreed with some choices I made, so I know what it's like.
I've never said that Celestia raising the sun was the only option. I like it, but you've stated quite firmly that it's not an option, so I'll drop it.
I'm just trying to convey the mental picture I get when reading the battle as-is. Spotlights are mentioned twice, and Celestia lighting her horn twice. When I picture the battle, it is a pitch-black struggle, with a handful of beams of light, and occasional flashes from guns or spells. If I imagine myself as a sailor in that situation, it would be terrifying, and as a reader, I was not able to intuit from Celestia's thoughts or actions why it had to be that way.
3699497 OOOOhhhhh I see. Well lighting is something I should mention in that case...
3699471
I think that will be very much appreciated by everyone, thanks for that. I have only caught up to chapter nine-ish so far, but I have to admit that the lack of any real exposition on the kelpies' viewpoint may been hurting my impression of it a bit. It makes it very difficult so far to see them as anything but being cruel and aggressive for cruelty's sake, which, given how much of an effort was made to humanize (for lack of the better word) the changelings in the previous story, seemed like a bit of an incongruous situation. Actually showing some of the "why" of what they do will go a long way there.
3699500
I'm glad it helped some. As your author's not mentioned:
So I went into it with a pretty dark picture. A few mentions early on of 'starshells illuminated the sky like day' or 'the ships were lit up brighter than hearthswarming trees' etc, would suffice to set the tone for the rest of the battle.
As far as Celestia's choices go, if hypocrisy is so important to her that she's not willing to bend even for a battle like this, or if she's enough of a tactician that she realizes it wouldn't help, or if she consciously decides not to rise to Tethy's bait, I'd actually consider any of those useful and interesting bits of characterization.
But if they don't fit the flow of your text (and the illumination situation is a bit clearer) then that's fine too.
3699471
And suddenly things kind of click in my head. See, while I did argue against the curb-stomp nature of the battle...
I don't think you needed to switch perspectives at all, either. If I were writing this particular battle, I'd use it's chaotic nature and Celestia's POV as the framing device. She's flying, whipping about through the air as she clashes with Tethys. She looks down, sees a collection of ponies clumped up around a deck gun, desperately managing to cut down a few kelpies. A strike from Tethys rattles her bones and pulls her gaze away. In another moment, she looks back, just in time to see the position get over-run. Or maybe when she looks again, the ponies are just gone, the kelpies sweeping past the sheered remains of that deck gun. Things like that, mixed with Equestria taking some precautions before they set sail would really punch up the idea of it being more of a defeat with them being dragged down, opposed to a curb stomp.
That's how I see things at least.
3699471
Ok, after reading this along with Zervziel's rebuttal to the ponies battle strategy being archaic I've come to the realization that there is a somewhat simple way to make this so much more believable: remove the battleships.
Honestly right now what is really the point of them? All they seem to be doing is making the ponies seem like they just built those ships yesterday and have no clue how to use them. The picture you are painting is of an 16th century navy put into 19th/20th century battleships with zero training and going into battle the next day. Why not just give them the ships appropriate to that era if you really want to keep the military somewhat canon to the show?
The ponies in a warship over a battleship would make much more sense. Would also make the kelpies ability to easily manipulate the ships much more believable as sinking a battleship without explosives is extremely difficult.
Right now it almost seems like you are forcing the ships in without bothering to think of the consequences the great advancement in technology would do to the implementation of those advancements.
3699661 Contrary to what it seems like in your view, and contrary to what I've even said earlier again and again in this story where I've poitned out I'm pre-writing and pre-planning all the chapters, i've thought about the tech level a LOT, heck I made a blog post about it.. The ponies would literally, stand no chance at all in wooden ships. The blow that capsized one of the battleships? that would have turned a 16th century navy into tinder. SO for practical reasons lest the curbstomp got even MORE pathetic, I stuck with the battleships when I started with the story to at least give the ponies a fighting chance.
Also, the show does indicate that for some reason, Equestria does have modern ships and semi-modern tech eg. steam engines electricity, etc. also, see Rarity takes Manehattan. I know its an anachronism stew, but its what I got and i'm just going to work with it.
Put it this way, if I removed the battleships, and reverted everything to Man of War's and took out the cannon technology associated with those battleships ... Equestria should just bow down to their new kelpie overlords...
3699696
Then it seems you wish to follow what you perceive as canon to the point of lunacy. Selectively crippling what ponies could theoretically do just seems like a bad idea. I can think of nothing in the show that indicates that the military Stagnated in terms of tactics and the only thing you seem to be basing that idea on is that they still use spears and were defeated during the invasion in which six non-military trained ponies were able to decently fend off a hoard of changelings unarmed.
Plenty of other people besides me have made some reasonable points as to why the ponies should not be nearly as helpless as they seem to be and you and Zervziel's rebuttal has been that they advanced everywhere except in ways that could help them against kelpies because canon says they train like humans and have zero creativity.
The point I and many others have made is that you are specifically setting the ponies up for failure when realistically speaking that perfect of a match up should be all but impossible when the ponies have any kind of creativity in warfare. They were after all innovative enough to build battleships in the first place, it stands to reason that they could innovate in other areas.
I really feel like I am going in circles now and keep getting the same non-answers as to why the ponies can do nothing with their natural abilities yet innovate like humans with technology.
3699609 Huh, not a bad suggestion, I'll think on that. I'm not sure what precautions Equestria could take. But what we are doing is making it more.. well the ponies try to resist lets put it that way and they don't get annihilated...
Also... if you remember correctly, the battle ain't over yet XD
3699732 Sorry, I've completely lost you. You say they should have wooden ships and then you say they shouldn't have wooden ships and that i'm crippling them, when wooden ships would doom them. When i designed and chose the tech level, it wasn't to cripple the ponies. I made a I made a guess based on what seemed like the Equestrian tech level at the time (granted this is pre-season 5), and I wondered what I wanted with this story and I rolled with what seemed to make sense for a girls show about 4 legged horses.
Also, i've read the reviews quite carefully and they were really more on the execution of the battle scene rather than the actual technology. From what I'm getting This seems more like a headcanon difference more than anything frankly and well... I'm afraid if it doesn't work for you, it doesn't work :P
3699732
A: That's how headcanon works and B: That's why he's writing his own story as opposed to going with show canon.
And how is giving them wooden ships so they can get their ass handed to them even more thoroughly going to fix that?
The guards response to Nightmare Moon was to fly right at her and got hit by lightning for their efforts. The wonderbolts got taken out by an greed-bloated baby dragon because they flew right into the silo he held up. During the invasion of Canterlot, they were all disabled and bound in seconds of the shield going down. In Season 5, we see them slapfighting with Sombras slave warrior forces. We've seen more evidence of these morons being incompetent than anything else. Hell even in the previous story they fucked up royally on multiple occasions, their one major win coming from when Celestia/Alternia took control of them to attack the forces attacking Simulacris's hive and even then that's mostly because they outnumbered the EF forces.
Ok, what the hell are you even try to say here?
They have never needed to fight an underwater foe until now and in case you've forgotten, they've not even actually fought the kelpies until this chapter. They haven't had time to really innovate since they've had no idea what they're up against until now. Against surface targets, they'd do very well, but for now, they can't even fight until the kelpies surface and even then they have no warning when and where they're gonna board the ship from.
You really are. Because now you've gotten into headcanon territory and noone wins in that scenario.
3699765
fwiw, you could totally have magically reinforced wood, that for all intents and purposes is as good as steel. Make them have purple sparks when stuff hits them, or something, until the runes fail and shatter.
3699775 Perhaps, but its a bit late to consider that kind of inventiveness at this point when i'm writing the story :P
3699776
I follow the philosophy of "Ponies have magic, Magitek is awesome, magic-fueled explosions even more so."
It is annoyingly quite difficult to find anyone who writes that.
I don't really have a problem with even skilled humans/superhumans being curb stomped from an ambush(except, you know, I like ponies and I don't like kelpies X) ), my only problem was that Celestia was downright helpless and couldn't even LAND a hit. I am still interested in your story, and looking forward to reading it to the end. Here's hoping that the edits were good. =) Keep writing.
3699471
It had better be the best damn foreshadowing ever written on fimfiction, because otherwise it's just gonna fall flat when compared to the kelpies' actions.
No pressure though.
3699760
You keep talking about the tech itself not the implementation of the tech which is the entire basis of my argument.
You want the ponies to have battleships? Fine, but you should make them fight like they were not developed overnight.
The only reason I suggested going back to warships is because of your refusal to do just that. I cannot fathom a world where battleships were developed yet military doctrine stayed stagnate for hundreds of years to the point where an old foe knew exactly how you were going to conduct battle and thus had a perfect counter to anything you could do.
3699765
That is the point point I'm making, 6 untrained mares were more effective than the royal guard. The show itself makes zero indication that Equestria has anything more than a small royal guard that is mostly ceremonial. Their "Air Force" is a bunch of stunt fliers for crying out loud! Then the story goes and introduces this absolutely juggernaut of a navy. The idea that show canon has such a large semi-modernly equipped navy hidden away is almost laughable. Thus forgive me for thinking that you were not basing Equestria's military on what we see in the show which I am certainly not arguing their ineptitude. Like I said in a previous comment: it's a children's show, they won't show anything positive about a military good or evil and pitting a more realistic gritty military against one from the show It's no wonder the battles are a little jarring to some readers.
The way Vren did the navy and battleship descriptions made me think he was not going to write the Equestrian military as inept as in the show. Even in the previous story they didn't seem anywhere near as bad as in the show.
3699982 I think I get what you're getting at now and there is one thing to consider which is the navy''s newest acquisition's, the battleships, have been mentioned multiple times of being very recent so while they have battleships, they haven't had them very long and most likely this is their first bit of action with them. Now considering they're fighting a force that can literally pop up anywhere and I really don't see why the ponies shouldn't be losing this battle as badly as they have.
3699753
Well, just going off the top of my head, based on the information Celestia has available to her at the time....
I know that the attack, if it comes, it will come from below. The big guns of my ships are going to be functionally useless, unless I get really lucky. So, taking some of the extra powder or shells from the magazine to try and rig into improvised bombs to throw over the side of the ship.
I'd also probably try to have as many ponies with spears or other long hafted weapons that I possibly could near the edge. If there is any point in the battle where I'd picture the kelpies as being "vunerable" it would be while they're climbing up the side of the ship. Even with shape shifting powers, they still have to haul their own body weight over the gunwale unless they shapeshift wings. Which I suppose they could, I just don't remember them doing that in the story so far.
Now admittedly, these aren't much and defiantly wouldn't swing the battle since the giant sea creatures can still just tear away the ships from underneath. But, hey, it's still something!
3700166 perhaps, but it would be rather difficult to rig up explosives that could detonate underwater...
3700142
I do think that the fact that these navies are being portrayed by WWI era ships is kind of adding to the confusion. Just as an example, the wrecked ship in Chapter 7 is represented by the Russian cruiser Aurora. A quick check of wikipedia tells me that in 1903 she was armed with 8 152mm (6 inch) guns, which can fling a 100 pound shell 12,000 some meters. And while I'm not assuming that the load out of the griffin ship is exactly the same, the fic does mention it's guns as existing.
So, it does kind of logically flow that the rest of Equestria's military is more advanced than we've seen in the show. Roughly WWI era navy while having your army still using spears and plate armor would feel kind of off, wouldn't it? Unless Equestria is supposed to be like the Ottoman Empire right before WWI, "the sick man of Europe".
Which, admittedly, could be an interesting take. Just not a feeling that I got from this fic so far, or the last one.