Well you know why you're here. But you still want to improve so why don't we all go around and say what E:D said was wrong with our stories and offer each other advice on how we might improve.
I'll go first, have some copypasta
1.) The original character Star Gazer, later Cloudy Skies, does not come across as a very sympathetic figure. We do not learn much about him before he becomes a her. As a result we are left without any real connection to him as he goes through his travails. If the story were to develop him more as a character before dropping him into the situation we perhaps could better understand his plight.

2.) In the three chapters of the story you've presented to us the plot has only developed marginally. Apart from the gender bending spell itself, which happens in the first chapter, we see nothing of the situation resolving or progressing until the very last few paragraphs of the third where Twilight undergoes the same process. Star/Cloudy's meeting with Applejack, Fluttershy, and Rarity do not hold the reader's attention. The scenes in the spa with Lotus and Aloe seem very out of character with what we've seen from them in the series. Could not this time be better spent letting us know more about the original character?

3.) There are some errors in grammar and syntax. There's some extra spaces present. The word "complement" is used when the word "compliment" was intended. There's an unusual situation for us pre-readers in that times there's a lack of commas within a quote, which is the opposite of our usual problem of having too many. At other times you use it correctly, such as after "Umm", but sometimes you do not. Please do a check for these errors.

Ooh, is this like one of those "review the person above you" things? Nifty! I'd jump right on this if it wasn't too late at night already for me to start on something (20,000 words takes a bit more than an hour to read properly), but sooner or later I'll get back to you.

My first rejection was of the first draft of Harmony's Wrath, which looking back on the first drafts I have saved is totally valid: "this needs a lot of work. The sentence structure is bland and stilted, I feel like I'm being jerked from one sentence to the next with no flow at all. Awkward phrasing is abound. There is obviously a good story here and a lot of work has already gone into it, but the narrative reads like a truck with busted shocks driving slowly down a pot-hole filled road. The dialogue is dry and uninteresting. All of this could be solved by rewording things and changing around some of the lines so that they suit the characters better."
I might post the first draft of the first chapter somewhere to show off some of the more G-man tier dialogue I had going on there. A lot of that was largely fixed though.

My second came in two parts, with no direct prereader feedback (these comments were from Sethisto himself):
"There is a lot of confusion as to why you anthroized the ponies on this one. It sort of steals the charm of it. I'll wait for a few more reviews though"
"I'm just not sure how people will take it, I have posted an anthro in drawfriend before and received massive amounts of rage in comments, so I usually avoid them there, "
Kinda not much I can do about this one, but I'd love to hear some other opinions on it.

My first draft of The Calamity of Doctor Whirligig Velocity was rejected because "it needs a little more polish". They didn't give me anything specific, so I've been working with pre-readers ever since to try and narrow down and remedy whatever areas seem to be lacking.

Well I've redone chapter 1 and parts of chapter 3 and I'm looking for some feed back so here's the link to redone chapter 1 chapters 1 and chapter 3 https://docs.google.com/document/d/1BJb_N_P4CUmZKxBIKaZK_zODHxo8TMB0yYA7Iv5NuPE/edit

233087 Well first, those two links lead to the same place. Not incredibly helpful.

Now, critique: There's a few things that jumped out at me as I read this. First, you're prone to some clunky phrases and broken semantics. For example, "why does the princess have to be so meticulous?" doesn't make a whole heap of sense. "Diligent" or "punctual" are more appropriate words, but to be honest I'd scrap that sentence entirely and find a better way to say what you mean altogether. Or, "In sheer terror, Star sarcastically flailed his hooves and wings around, hoping the reflection wouldn't respond". Is Star terrified or sarcastic here? We're not sure what you mean. To remedy this: 1. Try not to use a word unless you know exactly what it means. 2. Sanity check your sentences. After writing a sentence, read through it to spot things like simple conflicts of meaning. Things that make you go "wait a minute..." 3. When editing, try reading some passages aloud. It helps you spot awkward phrases much more easily. If your reading sounds like a robot, Google Translate, a 10th grader's homework or the G-man, then you need to go back and fix something. Prose should read like largely like regular speech. 4. Less is more. Avoid complicated ways of saying simple things. Trim out words that don't add anything.

Second, show, don't tell. What does "a pose that emphasized her high-class lifestyle" look like? What are we looking at? The reader feels a lot smarter when you give them the pieces of an image and let them put it together themselves. On the other hand, they feel lost when you summarise something that isn't readily obvious.

Third, your punctuation needs a bit of work, particularly your comma placement. There are plenty of resources out there regarding this, but as a rule of thumb, read your sentence aloud. If you run out of breath before you get to the end (no cheating by taking a big gulp of air first!) then you need to break it up with a comma, dashes, colon or semi-colon. Commas are used to separate clauses of sentences, like this, dashes are used when you want to do an aside - y'know, just whisper something to the reader mid-sentence - and semi-colons are used to separate things that could be in different sentences, but are still related; you don't have to use them all the time. Colons are for explanation: you explain what you just said. Commas are also used in lists, with certain prepositions, and anywhere that indicates a brief pause. Ellipses do this job for slightly... longer pauses. And yes, that self-demonstrating paragraph was a pain to write.

Fourth, I can see what the pre-readers meant in their point 2. We don't get to know Star well enough before he gets turned, and the trip to the spa doesn't really add anything. You're not trying to sell toys, you don't need to show everything that they're making into playsets. I understand that you're essentially doing a romantic-comedy thing where he meets each of the mane six in turn, but his meeting Fluttershy and Applejack feel a bit inconsequential. Basically, you need to go back, sit down and thoroughly rethink your plot. Hammer out the key points so you know exactly how the whole thing goes, make sure it's consistent and that every point makes a contribution (either advancing the plot or deepening the character), and then you can get to writing.

256150
1. Yeah that was a typo thanks for pointing it out
3. I swear by everything almighty that commas will be the death of me.
4. Really, not even with the re-done opening? I thought that emphasized he was a scholarly pony. He's studious but he's very nervous around mares. Did that point not get across?
Regarding Fluttershy and Applejack's meetings. They are meant to show Star that mares are not the terrifying entities he's made them out to be. Fluttershy shows him that they are kind and forgiving when he makes mistakes in front of them. Applejack shows that they aren't foreign entities (as Star feels very out of place at the spa) and can be just as out of place at a spa as Star. Has that point not come across fully?

I just posted my fic, Endless Darkness, into the group and it's been rejected twice so far. Supposidly I've still got a lot of noticeable errors and paragraph problems and could certainly use all the reviews I can get before I even think abotu submitting it for the last time.

218604 So I finally got around to giving your story a read, and I actually quite liked it! Just so happens The premise is interesting, your characters are pretty in character, and the plot trundles along nicely in the first chapter (that's all I can see that's up at the minute). Dr. Whirligig Velocity and Seven are interesting characters, and the short passage we see of them begs the question of what happens next. I can see why the pre-readers were having trouble putting their finger on what exactly needs improving, since most of everything is pretty solid already.

The first thing I would do with this is put in some horizontal bars for scene changes. It's a little confusing when we're reading about Whirligig and then suddenly Twilight's waking up in her bedroom. Next, go through the dialogue of the mane six again. Some of it felt a little wooden, and just... not what they would naturally say. Try and read it in their voices in your head, and if you're having trouble imagining it, or it just sounds like they're reading from a formal paper, then you need to reword it. After that, I can't really say anything about how the plot is going to pan out because of the fact that only one chapter is posted, but I will give a generic word of caution on that note, to make sure that your plot makes sense! Nobody likes plot holes.

Here's mine, Twilight the Terrible.

Here's the rejection letter.

Response:

Pre-reader X here for Equestria Daily. I cannot recommend this for posting.

Look for errors in the following areas:

Italics abuse
List formatting
Capitalization
Compound word use
Hyphen use
Missing spaces
Dialogue punctuation

There's also a lot of repetitive sentence structure and awkward phrasing, making this difficult to read.

Twilight also seems very out of character here. Even as a filly, she adored Princess Celestia, and so her taking Celestia's place seems implausible at best.

This is your first strike out of a possible three.

... List formatting?

Any help is appreciated.

299631
Ah, you got pre-reader X too, huh? Well, I'll copy my rejection letter, and I understand MOST of these points with the exception of the first.

Pre-reader X here for Equestria Daily, and I cannot recommend this for posting.

Look for errors in the following areas, based on perusal of your first two chapters:
List formatting
Ellipsis use
Run-on sentences
Tense confusion
Comma use
Superfluous articles
Capitalization

First and foremost, your framing device of the interviewer getting Diamond Tiara's life story is distracting at best. It reveals next to nothing about the present and serves as more or less a speed bump before we get into the meat of the story. The script-style scene changes when you move to the past are extremely awkward, and they break immersion like a sudden advertisement for Mountain Dew. In all honesty, this story would be stronger with it removed entirely and just diving into your headcanon.

I ALSO NOTICED YOU LIKE TO USE CAPS LOCK QUITE A BIT. I DISAGREE WITH THIS STYLISTIC CHOICE, AS IT LOSES ALMOST ALL MEANING AFTER YOU READ IT FOR A WHILE. Use italics instead for emphasis, but try to use it sparingly.

Diamond Tiara's "baby voice" is also very difficult to read, not to mention confusing. She says "Dwad" at one point. From my limited experience with small children, they're far more likely to simply drop the final consonant and say "Da" if anything. If you find this objectionable and you don't want your foals sounding Russian, then perhaps not writing out her impediment might be for the best.

Canon issue: Sweetie Belle is not pale. She just has a white coat color.

Finally, your author's notes are intrusive and too present in the story. These should be saved for the end of each chapter and should be kept to a minimum. FiMFic gives you a great outlet for these with comments, blog posts, and the story description itself, so I suggest making further use of those things. Putting author's notes in chapters as short as yours can come off to some as though you're trying to pad your word count.

This is your first strike out of a possible three.

Anything anypony wants to add? Feedback would be appreciated.

299631
Well, while I'm here, I might as well do my best to give you some help. I read your story, and I do have a few problems with it.

First off, the transition between Chapters 1 and 2...isn't really good in my opinion, because it skips from Twilight falling on top of Spike in Canterlot, to Twilight eating with all of her friends. Again, I understand you were telling the story from two different perspectives, but please be sure those two perspectives go in chronological order, or it becomes really confusing.

Next, the accents of certain words are absurdly inconsistent. Please stick to either using italics or bold to accent words, and keep that throughout your story.

Also, most of the characters in the story appear to have little to no purpose. A few minor characters is fine, but when your ratio of main characters to minor characters is 1:5, it begins to become somewhat of a problem.

Why does Luna appear in this story? Aren't Luna and Nightmare Moon the same character? Please explain this.

Finally, while I do admire the fact that you are detailing the pony's actions very clearly, there are some scenes where the dialog and the statements switch constantly, and after dealing with a few of said paragraphs, I got a little dizzy.

Aside from those points, this is a great story with a unique concept! I know that if you will fix some of those points, you'll get into EQD for sure!

Here's my story We will catch you if we can, and the response I got from EqD was this:

"Thank you for the submission, but due to countless grammar and punctuation errors, we are not interested in posting this story. Please edit your submissions before sending them in.

All the best,
The EqD Team"

I think that whoever read my story read it, but found too much errors, or he didn't read it because of those errors, so can somebody help me, please?

Well it seems that I have problems with grammar and I also have a problem with showing instead of telling. This is a problem in all of my fics apparently, and if someone could give me some advice that'd be great.

Thanks in advance

When Rites got rejected, the main complaint was the "glacial pacing". They even demanded a plot outline if I ever resubmitted.

What gets me is that nearly everyone else I've talked to since said the pacing was on the fast side.

But, I don't even know if I'll ever resubmit. The story is growing in fav's at a nice pace even without EqD. I will be re-writing chapter one eventually, and re-editing the other chapters (NOT re-writing), but I honestly don't feel the need to scramble to completely redo all of what I have. Maybe I'll resubmit after it's all done.

*puts on hipster glasses, then adjusts them* Also, the better and more popular Rites gets without EqD, the more I can be all underground and indie. *gets pelted with fruit*

>>Perfect Prime I read over your story, There, and I could only spot a couple of things that might, maybe, possibly—if a pre-reader was a complete jack-ass—fault you for, and I was looking very hard, mind you.

I suck at sentence structure, and grammar, and it's a life-long process, I don't know anyone that just woke up one morning and was brilliant at it. As for myself, my tombstone will most likely read...

Here Lies D
Killed by ,

I think it's pretty obvious that the pre-readers at EqD are given more personal allowance for cherry picking stories for the site, than we would imagine. Personal preference, has tainted their minds to the point that, I don't take them seriously anymore.

After my first and only rejection for The Guardian of Equestria which was a rejection letter about two paragraphs in length, which told me to radically change my story, accused me of too much telling, and wanted to know things early on, that were intended as major plot reveals later, I decided to abandon the idea of ever submitting to them again.

So taking everything they didn't like about the story, and everything that one is not supposed to do, I revised, and took my work elsewhere, and at one site it had well over ten thousand views, and another about six thousand. I only recently decided to add my work here, because I was asked to.

I think your story is fine the way that it is. And if the pre-readers don't like it, then that's just too damn bad. It's not their story, it's yours. Write it as you wish, and let the editors polish it up later... it's their job after all to make you shine, not have you write the book they themselves never could.

Well... This is what I got for this story: Remembering the Fallen

Dear Author,
Thank you for submitting your work to Equestria Daily. I regret to inform you that we are not able to approve it for publication at this time. Please see below for a list of issues in your story;
- Run-on sentences
- Improper capitalization
- Repeated instances of telling information in lieu of showing (describing how the reader should feel or how an event is rather than describing the event or emotion itself
- Capslock used for emphasis
- Clumsy insertion of onomatopoeia
- Tense confusion
This is not a comprehensive list of errors. It being the case that all of them were spotted on a very brief initial reading, we recommend you consult the services of a proof-reader or editor before resubmitting; your story isn't likely to receive the care and attention in regards to plot that it may deserve if it is hampered by grammatical problems.
This is your first strike of three. Please revise carefully before resubmitting.
Regards,
Prereader [derp]

Darn they didn't even mention plot, and my proof did check my grammar... must have missed the tenses... and I'm worried about second strike. Help please?

744620

My advice? Don't fret. From the looks of it, you've got a decent amount of readers anyway. You have to ask yourself; do you want to spend hours and hours meticulously scrawling through each chapter or hiring pre-readers (who might not even be very good, by the way. I've read fics that supposedly had 3 pre-readers and I spotted at least 5 mistakes in the first chapter alone) so that you can re-submit to EQD and probably get rejected again because of plot details?

I got rejected yesterday, and to be honest, I don't actually care that much. From what they said on the email, I'm convinced that they only read the first two chapters. To make the changes that they wanted, I would've had to give them both a complete re-write. And as for the other chapters... I expect I'd have to change them significantly as well. There was also some advice that they gave which actually goes against MS Word spell-check, so I don't know who to trust. And am I the only one who has seen EQD featured fics that contain the so-called 'mistakes' mentioned by people?

Personally, I'm not going to bother again. I don't want to spend weeks agonizing over my fics - cutting into the time I wish to spend actually progressing the story - just to meet their standards. I have a few fans on here and fanfiction, and that's fine with me.

Good luck with this one guys.

'touches on too much of questionable material not allowed under our content guidelines'

756649

Yeah, I'm going to have to agree with Ficta on this as well. It's probably not worth it.

The main reason for that would be that if these issues are a plot point in your fic, then changing it and removing it would do more harm than good! And from what I can see, you're doing just fine without EQD.

In my case, I've got 2 strikes on me, but again I feel that it's not worth the bother. I've tried to find prereaders from groups, but after 11 responses saying they're too busy, I'm just going to leave it as it is. I've done some heavy editing since I got the last rejection, because the prereader's claims were entirely valid, but I've yet to find somebody to look at it and give it a grade.

In the vain hope that somebody will go through the prologue and first two chapters (both prereaders never read more than 1K words before stopping), I'll put a link to Everdale right here.

TLDR; if you get rejected for something other than grammar, it's probably not worth changing the basic structure of your fic just to get it in.

Lemme make it clear that I'm not a reject... YET. I have two strikes, and I admit they have good points. That said, HELP ME. I still have hope that I'll get myself on EQD!

That said, time to get real. Here's the full response as of my second strike.

Dear Hoof of Approval,

Thank you for submitting your story, "The Race of Dreams", to Equestria Daily. Unfortunately, I still can't recommend this for posting. The writing is generally good, so no particular worries there, but I found the characterization of Rainbow Dash wholly unbelievable. Beyond that, I feel that there are some weaknesses in where you're choosing to place your descriptions and how you're structuring things, especially in the prologue. While I don't consider those strong reasons for rejection on their own, I'd like to see them cleaned up. I've provided some notes I made while reading below, to help explain some of these issues, and I'll discuss the Rainbow Dash characterization a bit more in a minute. This is your second strike for this story, but I'd advise you not to worry too much about the three-strike process right now. This story already looks pretty good, and I suspect that with some more work, you can get it up to the standard I'd want to recommend it for posting.

As for the Rainbow Dash characterization, your Rainbow really doesn't seem to be capturing any of the self-monitoring of canon Rainbow Dash. In the prologue, Rainbow seems exceedingly self-aware and open with Rarity in a way that she doesn't appear open with anypony on the show, and in the first part of Chapter 1, she shows a nurturing spirit toward Lightning Dust which is barely visible in Rainbow's interactions with Scootaloo and really nowhere else. I think authors should be allowed some artistic license in how they choose to portray their characters and so I'm willing to give a little leeway on characterizations of Rainbow, but in a few places you just seem to be flying in the face of canon without any justifying character development, and it's more than I can readily excuse.

If you're having a hard time writing Rainbow's personality, I'd suggest going back and reviewing "May the Best Pet Win", "Read it and Weep", and "Wonderbolts Academy" for good Rainbow character arcs. Her baseline personality should be close to how she starts those three episodes, and if you want her to act more like she does at the ends of those episodes, you need to provide some in-character justification for her actions. But generally, I'd suggest trying to stick to the baseline characterization as much as possible, so you have room to show her growth as a character (as those episodes do). You can even assume she's learned some lessons from her experiences (like you allude to in the academy flashback at the start of Chapter 1), but she feels like she's already learned all her lessons perfectly here, and like she really doesn't have any growing left to do as a character. It's kind of like reading about Twilight Sparkle in a flight suit.

For reference, I read only the prologue and the first thousand words of Chapter 1 before coming to this decision, so I can't comment on issues past that point. But it seems likely that issues with Rainbow's characterization are going to need looking at throughout everything you've written so far.

Good luck with your story,
Pre-reader Bradel

Reading notes:

Prologue

>The cool of the early morning ran a brush through her mane and coat, sending a hint of the sea into her nose and onto her tongue.
Not a big fan of metaphor opening. Also, why isn't the perspective character being named? It's not like the fact that it's RD comes as a surprise to the reader, nor like you're introducing an unknown character.

>[Weather report opening]
I really, really don't get the choice to start this out with a weather report. Establishing the scene, sure. There's some legitimate, interesting establishing to be done here, since Mareaco is a non-canon location. But the first paragraph of the story, instead of going for something relevant and/or interesting, dwells on the weather in fairly purple terms.

>[First 600 words get boring fast]
There's a lot of unnecessary repetition in the story up to the point where the radio buzzes in. You basically go through and do your scene establishing in two distinct passes. Rainbow imagines her way through the track twice. She dwells on how it's different from other races twice. She shuts out thoughts of the outside world twice. I'm confident there's more in parallel than that, too. As a reader, you're losing me quickly. The writing is pretty good here, but it feels directionless.

>"Out at the track again?"
Not explicitly a problem, but this leaves us hanging about who owns the voice on the other end of the line. It gets cleared up in the second bit of earpiece dialogue, but like the failure to name Rainbow early, I don't see any good reason for failing to clear up any reader confusion. Just tossing "darling" on the end of the sentence fixes this in one word—though I'd probably play with the next line a bit to make it less repetitious.

>Rainbow shook her head. "I've already forgiven you for that." She sighed. "Take those nerves and ramp 'em up by eleven. I'm... scared of this course.
Your voicing for Rarity and Rainbow is a little off-canon, and up to this point I was happy to give artistic license on it. But the forgiveness bit feels a little off, even with your slightly different voicing—it makes Rainbow sound notably more deliberative than she is in the show. And volunteering information to somepony else that she's scared? That's a very significant break from established characterization. Rainbow is rarely willing to admit to herself that she's scared. You're upping that three levels: Rainbow admits to herself, admits to another, and volunteers the information unprompted. Sure, Rainbow may be scared, but I just can't buy—out of the gate, with no new characterization—that she's going to suddenly start acting this way with Rarity. Very OOC.

>The red and white silk dress on her figure, enchanted to ward off the cold, glistened in the first rays of the sun, and the wide-brimmed hat on her head did well to shade her eyes from the morning light.
You're going back to weather reports instead of giving us any insightful new description. I'm sure some readers will eat this up, and I'm not counting it as a significant negative to the story yet, but I feel like you're really wasting words with this stuff when you could be using description to help flesh out your setting instead of just providing imagery.

>Rainbow nearly shrieked, her hooves a foot off the ground from her shock. After a few wing beats to steady herself, she groaned as heat rushed to her cheeks. "I hate her for teaching you how to do that."
Again, Rainbow isn't showing any of her usual self-monitoring tendencies.

>The other pony turned to face Dash. "You mean... a dress?" Her eyes sparkled. "You actually want a dress from me?"
I don't remember there being any canon characterization indicating that Rainbow doesn't like fancy dress, like there is (to some extent) with Applejack. Both of them were perfectly happy to let Rarity make them dresses for the Gala. Kudos for trying to give Rainbow some of her tomboyishness, but you're picking an area that doesn't seem to be a big deal to her canonically. It winds up feeling apiece with the other weird Rainbow characterization here.

>Rainbow took the first corner, ninety degrees right, gritting her teeth as the g-forces tore at her. She burned her way uphill toward a wide left turn, curved around, and pushed ahead toward a sharp right. Rainbow grimaced as the hotel approached. She'd have to slow down for this one. The pegasus twisted sideways as she took the hairpin before continuing with a right turn. Dash sliced yet another right—and dove into the tunnel.
For all the weather description earlier, and the repetition of just this in Rainbow's mind (and the reader's eyes), this is remarkably bland. Here's a great spot for some description. This race is the centerpeice of the chapter (or likely the first few chapters), and yet a good chunk of it is getting passed over in two sentences with almost no description. Here's where you want to be drawing the reader in, making them see what Rainbow sees and understand how she runs the race—air currents; landmarks spotted for turns, accelerations, or decelerations; physical stresses; how the sunlight might make things more difficult; etc. These are just some ideas. If I were writing this, I'd probably rely heavily on visual detail (what is she speeding past as she goes), somatic detail (the feel of speeding through the air), and probably aural detail (the sounds of the wind and morning in the city around her), though you could use different sensory palettes if you wanted. But the misplacement of description—giving it to the reader where it's not terribly useful, and not giving any when it's important to the narrative—is a problem.

Ch.1

>It was why she'd asked for the unruly pegasus to be her wingpony.
Again, this feels a little too discerning for Rainbow. She goes from having her own crisis of confidence over her status, to her big exit from the academy, to suddenly trying to look after her rival? It's a nice thought, but it's not terribly in line with Rainbow's character, considering how long it took for Rainbow to actively take Scootaloo under her wing. Rainbow is not very naturally nurturing, and while I definitely think it's a side of her that can be explored, you need to provide some development before taking her character there. It's not at all immediate that she'd go in that direction after the events of "Wonderbolts Academy".

>[Timing]
I get the feeling that the prologue must be happening near the climax of the story, and now we're in extended flashback before we get to that point? Maybe you explained things somewhere past where I stopped reading Ch. 1, but this is of a piece with the Rainbow and Rarity establishment issues. There's no particular connection between the prologue and the beginning of the first chapter, and because of that, the reader really doesn't know whether the prologue comes before or after the story until you'll eventually bother taking the time to situate it.

And here comes the story itself.

http://www.fimfiction.net/story/103054/the-race-of-dreams

Just got my second rejection email today. Only posting the important bit, since the opening paragraph is the standard "Thanks for submitting your story, but we can't post it because reasons" spiel.

Two big issues stand out to me, just in the first few scenes. The conversations are very "talking heads," which means that there's barely any narration besides the speaking verbs. There's nothing to communicate their emotions outside of the dialogue, and it does noting to set the scene and anchor that this is a real event happening with real characters. When it's just speech, they might as well all be disembodied floating heads.

Second is that this is pretty inaccessible as a crossover. By virtue of it being on FiMFiction, you can assume the reader will know about Equestria and ponies, but you can't assume he will know anything about all these other properties. Then it becomes a balancing act in giving the reader just enough to understand what's going on without giving massive amounts of exposition to explain all the extra material. So, shortly after Sonic is introduced, I get a ton of characters added in rapid succession I have little to know idea who they are and why they're important, and it's also difficult to keep them all straight. It just leaves me confused and feeling like I have to come into the story already well-versed in the crossed material to understand what happens.

Sincerely,
Pre-reader 63.546

The story, for reference: Revenge of Lavan

2103649

>It was why she'd asked for the unruly pegasus to be her wingpony.

Again, this feels a little too discerning for Rainbow. She goes from having her own crisis of confidence over her status, to her big exit from the academy, to suddenly trying to look after her rival? It's a nice thought, but it's not terribly in line with Rainbow's character, considering how long it took for Rainbow to actively take Scootaloo under her wing. Rainbow is not very naturally nurturing, and while I definitely think it's a side of her that can be explored, you need to provide some development before taking her character there. It's not at all immediate that she'd go in that direction after the events of "Wonderbolts Academy".

I agree with the pre-reader here: Rainbow lost whatever remaining respect she had for Lightning Dust after the tornado incident. I also agree with the Scootaloo thing; I know writing for any of the Mane Six is hard, but put yourself in their horseshoes; get into their head, so to speak.

4979346
Without looking at your story, I can only speculate a few possible reasons:

1) The violence is gratuitous. Either it was perpetrated by characters who would not normally go that far; or it is unnecessarily violent for the context in the story; or that it is unnecessarily violent to make the point the scene is trying to make.

On the third one in particular: if you wanted to show Mr Bad Guy was evil, you don't need to describe in detail that he gouged a mare's eyes out with a corkscrew, skinned the legs, scraped the flesh off the bones, and left a chain of fresh sausages a few metres away from the body. That would be inappropriate, and arguably the greater sin is that it is unnecessary. You could show it through the horrified reactions of the investigators, the smell, or the feeling of revulsion, and it's more subtle that way too. Hyperbole, and again, it's not based on looking at your story (as it's not up) but it's an example.

All in all, you have to ask yourself honestly if the violence serves a purpose. 1984 achieves prime horror without detailing torture or violence too much (if I recall correctly). Harry Potter portrays violence in a sufficient manner - Rowling could have gone into visceral details about how Crucio works, but she didn't. She just went enough into it. Restraint in description leads to subtlety. Letting loose is for conceptual design.

2) Perhaps it is flat out too much. Tolerable violence levels are very much subjective, but the prereaders are generally good at deciding what's the general average as they keep tabs on their audience's reactions to approved fics. Many of us on Fimfic probably wouldn't consider Grand Theft Auto as excessively violent, but it might trigger gag reflexes in older people, who knows?

You can do a follow-up inquiry if you really can't find the reason. They're very approachable, and are probably willing to explain more.