Revisiting Old Stories; Deterrent · 9:51am Sep 13th, 2017
Many moons ago, back when I was a bad worse writer, I posted a preliminary idea for a story. It was about a freshly-alicorned Twilight, and her struggle with learning a new type of magic. Celestia asks her to learn war magic; whereas combat magic deals with combat between individuals, war magic deals with conflicts between armies. If combat magic is the bow and arrow or the sword, then war magic is the ballista or the siege engine: the same ideas taken to a larger scale. Naturally the whole thing takes a toll on Twilight’s psyche. After months of training, when it comes time to display her skills to a group of ambassadors, she goes some variety of crazy.
Today, in this blog post, I thought I would take this idea and revise it. Look at it and see how I would approach it differently as a writer now. This is a bit distinct from my previous “How Not To Write” posts, because I’m not really dissecting the story (after all, there’s not much to dissect, since it was never finished). Rather, I’m re-imagining it, reconsidering it. Thinking about where it went wrong, but with less specific examples, since it never got past the pre-writing stage.
Lets get to the main topic.
The first thing to consider about this story comes back to a very old fandom cliché. Namely, the “why doesn’t Celestia do it her damn self” school of thought. This is a well-trodden upon idea that doesn’t always produce very good criticism, but it actually has merit here. The story tries to answer this in the brief excerpt I wrote, but even that feels flimsy. Why does Celestia need Twilight to learn these things? Shouldn’t she know them herself? Doesn’t she have an army of guards and stuff who could learn it?
So first and foremost, I think this story would be better off being about Celestia than Twilight. It could be set far in the past, acting as a character piece for Celestia’s more formative years.
Rather than the climax of the story being a variety of mental breakdown, it could be more subtle mental realization. Another problem with the original was its melodramatic bent (leaning on the crazy Twilight meme), and this would neatly avoid that.
The issue this brings up is who is teaching her all this stuff. In the original story, Twilight’s teacher was going to be Shining Armor. Since this is set in the past, then using an original character is feasible. But I think personal character pieces like this are better served by canon characters when possible. The only other pony from that time from the show would be Luna. So in this new version, Luna and Celestia must learn war magic together.
Now, this still leaves the matter of a climax. In the original story, after having her breakdown in front of all the diplomats, Twilight goes off to the border between Equestria and another territory (like minotaurs or griffons). An army is standing there (the catalyst of this whole plot), and she slaughters them all. A similar plot point could take place in the new version, but of course, it would need to do away with the melodramatic elements. Perhaps Luna and Celestia only fire warning shots. Perhaps one or the other of them has a breakdown, but in a much more subtle way. (And there’s a tie-in to canon for either of them; Luna’s could be a call forward to her time as Nightmare Moon, and Celestia’s could be a reference to her future lack of efficacy and non-violent attitudes.)
So overall, we have the same general ideas. Ponies learning war magic, and the implications and mechanics that differentiate that from combat magic. Character development. Mental strain, shell shock, and the idea that war and combat leave mental scars as well as physical ones. The responsibility that comes with power. Sacrificing parts of yourself—like morality and innocence—for the greater good. And of course, the sad fact that sometimes such sacrifices don’t actually accomplish anything.
So as you can see, despite my brusque summary, the original concept had its issues. And the new, purely hypothetical version attempts to address those problems. It doesn’t discard the entirety of the story, but it does try and take the same concepts and themes and put them into a more streamlined and believable package.
Thanks for reading. This was a lot more rambling than my usual posts. While I tried to include as much context as possible without making it boring, obviously I had to leave out details to avoid the entire thing being a tedious summary.
Hopefully, this thought experiment helped out a little. If you take away any lessons from this for your own writing, then that is great. At the very least, perhaps this illustrates the importance of self-examination, iteration, and planning (and sometimes, discarding those plans).
As always, comments and criticism is welcome and encouraged!
The past was bloody, violent and filled with conflicts.
Maybe Celestia and Luna, in their youth, come across one such battle as one side routs and gets slaughtered? Preferably a glorious and bloody victory for their side to give then that warm fuzzy feeling of pride inside. (that or its all the warm blood on their coat)
As you memtion, could work to build the characters up to what they are today. Maybe in their youth they enjoy their time in the field of battle, but Luna being overcome by the bloodlust (history is written by the victor, plus i doubt celestia would tell her little ponies that her sister was a crazy psycho :P ) would be the reason for Celestia turning to "pacifism" or at least to influencing her ponies and probably most of the world into a more peaceful time, controling the sun and the moon might help.
I still kind of like the idea of it being Twilight moreso. Celestia - you can do a few things with her as to why it's Twilight. There's 'She wants as many options as possible'; there's 'Her own power is too unstable', there's 'She's actually a paper tiger', magical gaes, any number of reasons.
Young Celestia & Luna are more blank slates so there's more buildup there to make any wrenching...effective, as it were.
I think this would still work well using Twilight, if you start from the assumption that Celestia is already well-versed in war magic, and wants Twilight to learn it (or expand upon it in her own unique way) as part of her future role as a leader of their nation.
What might be interesting (in an amusing sense) would be Twilight subverting the entire process by being, well, the Princess of Friendship, and applying that view to the concept of "war magic".
Very intriguing and not too rambly at all.
4667081 I'll admit the idea of Luna and Celestia as Blood Knights, who join in battle for personal enjoyment is an intriguing contrast with their canon selves.
It makes me think of a minor idea in some of the Discworld novels; there, the act of casting magic can have a euphoric effect. The feel of magic building up inside you, releasing it, affecting the world (often in the form of a large explosion); it can be addicting.
If one were to apply that idea here, then it would make war magic almost the equivalent of a drug. To release all that magic at once would feel much more incredible than a tiny, regular spell. And of course, it wouldn't feel quite the same without some proper targets...
4667324 True, but their nature as blank (or at least blanker) slates also gives more freedom to tell a story around them. There is a slight trade-off in character familiarity and attachment, sure, but it's not like readers aren't attached to Celestia or Luna.
4667823 I think Cadance would be a more likely candidate to subvert war magic than Twilight. I can picture the disco lights and confetti and lovey dovey nicknames spreading across the continent now
4670051
Well i like to imagine they were very different before ruling and being bogged down by it. (or it shaping them).
You are less worried about things when you only have yourself to take care of, compared to a whole nation.