Notes for Chapters 2, 3A & 3B of "Giving Yourself Advice"

Here are the notes for Chapter 2 of "On the Fine Art of Giving Yourself Advice", Breaking the Universe:

98 ponylengths-per-second

Just think of it as 98% of the speed of sound/magic.

The Sonic Magi-Boom

If the Sonic Rainboom is supposed to be legendary, and a pegasus’ contrail is the same color as their mane, then that would mean that only rainbow-maned pegasi are capable of breaking the barrier, which doesn’t sound very fair to me. So I decided that the feat is generically known as a “magi-boom”—Rainbow re-branded hers as a “rainboom”, and got everypony to buy into the term instead of the generic one.

As for the warnings? Something similar was a popular belief before Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier in 1947.

Pseudo-magic

Yeah, that’s depressing—the idea that with all of the wondrous magic in Equestria, there are still paranoid ponies that believe in types of magic that are in fact impossible...or impossibly dangerous.

The “weird blue creature” chasing the “brick on wheels”

This is your hint for how to put this and the following chapters set on Earth in chronological order.

Posey Shy and Cloud Cover

Fluttershy’s parents aren’t named in canon. I took the names from a pair of comments on their MLP FIM wiki page. Posey is the name of the G1 pony that Lauren Faust used as the inspiration for Fluttershy.

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Here are the notes for Chapter 3A of "On the Fine Art of Giving Yourself Advice", Main Character, Part 1:

“That orange kid”

Hate to disappoint you, but this is the only appearance of H. Scootaloo in this fic. The human counterparts of the CMC are not yet in high school at this point, and so there’s no way that Scootaloo would be able to talk to her hero. At least, none that I would think of that wouldn’t derail the plot.

Human Fluttershy’s cynicism

I’m using the excuse of her harassment at Crystal Prep, with this being her coping mechanism. Don’t worry, she’ll drop it once she transfers to Canterlot High.

Human Spitfire

In the “Equestria Girls” comic origin story, Spitfire is the captain of the Canterlot High soccer team. I’m not using that because my idea is better.

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Here are the notes for Chapter 3B of "On the Fine Art of Giving Yourself Advice", Main Character, Part 2:

“Dear Rainbow Dash...”

This is the entire reason I wrote this story. Specifically the idea for a scenario where the Equestria Girls counterpart to a pony is the more mature one for once.

“Griffon magic is wind magic, and pegasi magic is anti-gravity based.”

I have a bad habit of putting forward ideas I think are original, when in fact I read them somewhere a while ago and then forgot about them. So if anybody knows of a story or blog entry that advanced this particular theory first, please let me know so I can properly credit the author in the Acknowledgements chapter.

I think this theory is pretty sound, especially the pegasus side of it. I’m just going to assume that cloud walking is an ability completely separate from flight, to explain how griffons can stand on them without blowing them to pieces. After all, a pegasus sleeping in a cloud home doesn’t fall through when she falls asleep, while a flying pegasus who was knocked out would not just float in place. That implies that cloud walking is involuntary while flight is instinctual/conscious. And therefore pegasi and griffons can both cloud-walk in the same way, while flying in two different ways.