The chronicles of Project Horizons : chapter 10 · 1:08am Nov 1st, 2018
I finally reached the double digit ! And so I sail throught the sea of what people consider to be a fixed version of Fallout:Equestria who shares so many issues with the original while fixing some of them that I can't help but feel there is an irony regarding that expression that people didn't notice at first. However, enough padding this blogpost (there is a subtle joke), let's get on with the story.
Let's go.
So, first, and while I know that it'll be a repetition of what I said in the previous blogpost : we start with BlackJack realizing that Lancer was a bad meanie pants from the get go. The reasons she gives for believing such an obvious traitor/shady zebra are ridiculous. Extremely so. Let's expose them : BlackJack thought that if he was to be a danger, he would only be to her since she considered him a bounty hunter and she was arrogant enough to think she could deal with it. What does that statement imply ? Normal people would assume that she'll always be vigilant and keep an eye on him as much as she can in order to protect herself then.
Should I remind people that... BlackJack was shot in the back ? By Lancer, nonetheless ? So, how exactly was she keeping an eye on him if he was to be just a threat to her ? Also, let's not blame solely BlackJack but even P-21 and Morning Glory who didn't seem interested in sharing some doubts about a plan that the self-proclaimed "not smart pony" of the group had. Yes, P-21 apologize about the fact that he didn't catch on his suspicious activities DURING the attack but... for fuck sake : he shouldn't even have been with you, even less so with a device that can hide him from all detections. God, you deserve to die, all of you.
On another note, I have to give credit to this fiction because it actually makes BlackJack wounds have some consequence and need some time to be healed unlike in FO:E where two potions were enough to clean your palate and rince your wounds forever. However, while I appreciate this endeavour, I have to admit that I am not that impressed by the way some characters are developped.
Blackjack is obviously one with her continuous obsession with putting the blame on everything on her shoulders and moping about it even if I have to admit her character did change to try (emphasis on "try) to kill less people, actively trying to be as non-violent as possible. So that is a plus and her hypocrisy is less prevalent (emphasis on 'less', I'll speak about it). She still makes stupid sex jokes as the least savory moments and she still can convince people with one speech (Dusty Trail literally betrayed her group for her and successfully made 30 of her companion have a change of heart. How ? Fuck if I know, everything was done off screen) and she is still able to spout downright hypocritical lines when she wants to.
For example, jumping ahead a bit : she tries to say that in the memory orb she saw where the Macintosh's Marauders were destroying Zebra by dozens that she had seen war, hatred and carnage and that shouldn't be reproduced. Very fair message. However, I also remember her reaction during the memory orb : no horror when looking at the almost industrialized amount of death on the battlefield, no. She felt awe for the bravery of the heroes, she felt embarassment when she noticed a cock, she felt horny when she saw Blueblood and she felt great all around seeing the battle. So while the sentence was most likely the one to say, she was clearly lying unconsciously or not.
P-21 also did a complete 180, going from frail little male flower to a pony version of the Punisher. It is not that I find this evolution unrealistic... well perhaps a bit, but mainly that I didn't know P-21 enough for me to care about this change as much as I think I should have been. P-21 was so different from one chapter to the next that it was basically knowing a new character. First, he didn't want to have a gun or kill, now he uses explosives and kills with ease, he didn't think murder was a nice solution, now he thinks it's Justice incarnate. This character changed from 0 to 100 in the span of a week or so. That's insanely fast and not something I like, unlike Morning Glory who actually showed genuine interesting growth on top of offering some lore too.
However, for everything that I like in PH, there is like a universal force that shows me something completely absurd. Case in point : the telekinetic bullet learned on the fly by an almost comatose BJ who could barely move. Serendipity has its limits and... really ? A telekinetic bullet ? As powerful as a pistol bullet ? First, it just doesn't work that way. Telekinetic magic has been defined clearly by FO:E and generally all forms of media. Telekinesis is a field of zero gravity, not some kind of air control where you can slam an air bullet into a skull like it's some sponge. Second, why this context ? Why does she learn a new spell out of the blue like that while being attacked by a friend who became feral ? Sure, the mystery about the disease is nice and new but damn couldn't she have been saved by someone rather than that ?
As for the rest, it's standard PH. Sanguine is still as unknown as ever but he could only be a middle man. I hope not, it's already been 100K+ words were chasing after him, if he is only a lieutenant, I fear we'll never see the end of it. Also, let's try to keep the moral which says "Don't matter how much you hurt people because the good you do is more important than the good you intend". It's an extremely slippery slope that can easily be twisted as the end justifies the means. BJ kills people. A lot. She isn't losing any nail. However, I get that the zebra was trying to raise her mood.
Closing thoughts : I'd like if the story could, in its structure, follow his own advice : Ante up. Stop dilly-dallying and make this story move forward to Sanguine !
I think it's not as big a leap as you do; after all, his "don't give me a gun" was based on the stated principle that he couldn't be trusted not to shoot someone that he, on reflection, would do better not to shoot. His whole thing on that issue was worrying that if given the easy opportunity, he wouldn't exercise self-control.
I don't really think there's a contradiction between expressing that the carnage shouldn't be reproduced and not reacting with particular horror in the moment, certainly not in a "lying" sense. Ambivalence is part of life, and I don't think it's hard to imagine someone being swept up in excitement or heroism in the moment yet also believing that the destruction war brings is a bad thing.
I think you're getting a little too hung up on the word Blackjack uses to describe her magic bullet, especially since it's not like she's a student of magic or anything. Also I don't think it's really meant to represent something like hitting someone with air, more like a packet of the magic itself that then on impact has a concussive or explosive effect, perhaps grabbing a bunch of tiny pieces of what's hit telekinetically (or if you prefer, with some distinct but similar motive effect) and propelling them more or less in the direction the packet was heading. As for why then, yeah, there were other options for how she could have got out of the situation. There pretty much always are. But coming up with new magic under pressure has plenty of precedent in FiM, running from the obvious cases of various ponies' cutie marks to Fluttershy's stare (at least as first established) and RD's second rainboom just in S1, and then there's Ditzy's rainboom in FoE (which in fairness happened after this chapter).
I really don't understand how you can get to "the ends justify the means" from a story where the whole point is that things that happen that you don't intend--things that aren't your ends--still matter a lot. Unless you're going on some interpretation that because we can't know everything and maybe something good will come of it, you can do whatever you want. But that seems like a major distortion of something where the message seems like a pretty transparent "when things don't go as planned, look at both the good and the bad--the cloud may have a silver lining."
Also this:
Simply put, on a chapter to chapter basis this story is almost never as driven by the highest level plot as (for example) FoE is. It's written more like a long-running serial than a novel, and is dominated by 1) character/slice of life/exploration, 2) incremental short-run plot lines (usually 2-4 chapters) that generally advance the main plot, but don't necessarily do so by leaps and bounds. And it is one overarching plot, not several quasi-independent but closely stories that really should have been published as one, then a sequel, then a sequel, and so forth, though strictly speaking I suppose it could have been done that way if Somber were fine with it (mostly) not really feeling like any were really a complete story on its own. With that in mind, it pretty much follows that either 1) it will take a very long time to deal with Sanguine or 2) he's not the end of the story.
Bearing that in mind, if you want something really plot driven, where most or every chapter is in large part and directly about advancing the main, high-level storyine--which seems to be the case--you just aren't that likely to find it here.
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Wow, you've been on a roll tonight, Icy. Let me reply to your points in as much details as I can. Regardin P-21, you are right to say that he mentions lacking self-control however, you have to remember that P-21 actually mentions that he despises BJ way of always wanting to solve her issue through fighting and killing, showing that he is not a cold-blooded killer and would prefer diplomacy over sheer killings, something he loses quite quickly as you can see with his rather... extreme characterization.
As for my comment on BJ's lying about her feeling, it was more to say that she didn't feel both awe and dread. In the memory orb, we only see a BJ completely swooped up by heroism and bravery while she threw some sex jokes here and there. If it isn't mentionned in any way, shape or form or even hinted at, I'm not going to write the character for the author. BJ is facing the first true grand scale battle she ever saw and there was no mention of the impressive number of death on an industrialized level. However, you are correct that the statement in itself wasn't a "lie" per say. However, it feels very phoned in to me.
Also, Icy, it's factually wrong that you say that "Telekinetic Bullet" is the word BJ uses to describe this new spell. That's literally how the Pipbuck she has called it, I can fetch you the part where it's mentionned, it's clearly not her own words. While you can try to make sense of it, it is simply not something I can admit because telekinesis is precise, it's not just concentrated magic to do whatever and we never saw BJ use her magic to do anything else but telekinesis, as such it feels like a very disgenuine moment. A contrived way to give her a go-to spell to one-shot enemy that would try to grapple her. As for your example of serendipitous moments, they are all valid but they all work against this moment : a cutie mark related spell is extremely contextual, it has a reason to exists. The Stare and the Sonic Rainboom weren't new, Fluttershy already knew how to did it in the episode that introduced it and it was shown to be a latent power, not something she actually came up with. Likewise, the Sonic Rainboom wasn't something that she came up with.
Here, there was a conscious effort to make something new and... really ? You find it fine that a BJ that is barely able to stay conscious, let alone walk is able to fend off a rabid raider with a notepad and new-found super useful spell ? It doesn't feel like BJ was resourceful, it felt like she just was given a plot-gun. I advance that this spell wasn't needed and I fear its future usage. As for Ditzy's radboom... taking FO:E as an example with me won't get you far, especially since I can really say that this radboom was one of the most contrived manner to destroy the Enclave.
As for my interpretation of the zebra tale, I might have gone too far but see it this way : telling BJ that there are good in her actions really made it feel like they were actually saying that she wasn't doing anything wrong and that she should take pride in what she did right through her actions. Yes, it is important for BJ to learn that as it would avoid whining chapters. However, I advance that she NEEDS to rethink her methods rather than being told that even if she goes on a rampage, hey, she'll better the lives of someponies because (like Pip) she has a good heart. So yes, a bit of an exagerration on my part but highly contextual. My apologies.
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I would counter that with something simple : if you're doing Slice of Life stuff, you're betting all your chips on the fact that your characters are strong enough to carry the story. And while BJ is not an horror of a character, as I said in the blogpost of chapter 11, BJ doing the same thing over and over gets dull after a while and it is essentially always the same, especially with P-21 and Morning Glory (for the moment) being relegated to side characters.
I am not saying that Sanguine should be the end of the story or that the story should always get us closer to the goal (though it would be appreciated) but we need a sense of purpose to guide the protagonist's actions. Because just doing small stories arc and exploration can only get you so far when your character has, herself, no core set of values and no goal to tend to. "Doing better" is a lofty goal but we need a form of progression, of evolution which this story is purposefully not doing in favor of padding and some chapters suffer heavily of the "Nothing happening" syndrome. I don't doubt some fan just love to see BJ being BJ but I expect a bit more of any story trying to sell me some mystery, because the Stable 99's attack is a mystery in need of a resolution, be it long or be it short but it's definitely a thread that needs to reach its end.