After mulling some ideas over in my head for future chapters in my story, I seemed to hit a mental roadblock. While I did watch the episode on the changelings several times and read a few things, I never formulated a solid method on how they feed. Do they simply just take over a loved one and feed off of the love that pony receives or is there something else?

1593473 It's like a sponge. they absorb ambient positive emotions, but can turn that on and off at will.

1593502 Thank you for the timely response. That concept would make it much easier to write about. I find it rather fitting that my answer came from a person who is named "The Changeling Prince".

Does anyone else have any further input?

It seemed like Chrysalis could forcefully absorb at as well. This method might get love energy faster, but it seemed like it was hurting Shining Armor too. So maybe they have the ambient method that they use while they are trying to blend in and the forced method for when they need it immediately?

1593539>>1593556 it's true. a Changeling can take the emotion by force, but that's usually not used unless they're desperate.

Not sure about this, but IIRC some of the oldest legends of vampires and variants involving supernatural creatures that "feed" on blood (I.E. Telachauchi, shapeshifting witches said to feed on infants less than 9 months old during the winter months) have them simply harvesting their meal from the victim by standing next to them.

1593606 1593556 I like both of the concepts that you two brought up. It should allow for more freedom in my writing. Thank you very much for the assistance.

1593647 Hmm yes, that seems to fall in line with the sponge concept The Changeling Prince brought up, interesting...

Personally, I figure it depends on what sort of tone you are looking for.

1. Passive absorption - Useful for Friendly Neighborhood Changelings since they don't have to hurt anyone. My take is that this gives them enough love to survive and maybe live like a pony but not enough to become exceptionally powerful.

2. Devouring the Victim - They forcibly grab the pony and suck out their life force or love (imagine a vampire sucking out all the blood from their victim). This gives the changeling a great deal of energy at once but severely damages or kills the victim. Its basically like being a predator. This is basically what the changelings did to the Luvcats in the comics.

3. Drain their Energy - Basically what Chrysalis did to Shining Armor in the show, she took on the form of someone he trusted and gradually drained his life energy through his love for the person she imitated. Considering how much power she got from that, I imagine this provides the greated gain over time... it requires finding someone with a great deal of love for someone (or maybe being loved for themselves a whole lot) and taking their place and meticulously draining them of energy without their knowledge.

4. Emotion Eater - They haven't displayed this power, but imagine something like what Discord did when he used his powers to grey out the mane 6. Basiclaly, they actually drain the love from a pony, leaving them a loveless greyed out husk of their former self. They are skill alive but it robs them of the love and kindness that they had before.

All in all, it depends on what sort of story you want to have them in. There could be a variety of tactics:

1. Be a nice Changeling - Is just generally friendly or loved and absorbs love from a large number of ponies he knows. Power wise is likely just as strong as a normal citizen of Ponyville but with shape-shifting powers along with whatever pony power their form has (flight, magic, strength, etc).

2. Clingy Ponyfriend - Like the above, but seems really attracted to a specific pony who loves them back. Said love interest may or may not feel the effects of being drained but if they do its nothing more than getting dizzy, headaches, or being a bit clumsy. The changeling meanwhile gets a greater amount of energy so they would be generally more powerful than an average pony, maybe on par with the Mane 6 or so.

3. Cheating heart - A changeling who basically has several girlfriend/boyfriends and insists that they love every one of them. Expect lies, deception, and abusing their disguising ability to have multiple personas to work with. Basically the personification of a cheating bastard. May or may not physically harm their victims but expect emotional pain and manipulation. Gains the most power a non-murdering changeling can get, probably on the same power level as a powered up Queen Chrysalis (assuming Shining Armor was 'worth' the love of about five or more normal ponies).

4. Carnivores - Likely what the standard shock troops of the changeling army are like, they don't have the patience to go through long periods of disguises or the like, they just grab a pony and forcibly drain them of love. Could seriously injure of kill their victim but they don't care. They are built as soldiers and their diet gives them the power to enter combat effectivly. May have trouble feeding themselves during a "time of peace" or in instances where they have to stay undercover. If a soldier changeling tries to survive on just passive absorbtion, expect them to lose some of their magical 'muscle mass' like someone who regularly eats steak and high protein meat going on a vegetarian diet. Its quite likely that certain changeling better at infiltrating stealthily absorb love from their victims and then feed this to the soldiers to keep them healthy in case combat is necessary.

Less violent Carnivores could instead just drain their victims of love to leave the greyed out loveless pony. This still nets them a lot of quick energy but leaves the pony alive... though said pony could need a hospital visit or love-transfusion before they pop back to their regular happy self.

So yeah, there are alot of ways to handle it. Personally, I prefer it where they energy payoff is better for long term infiltration or predetation that hurts the victim. If changelings could get all the love they need through osmosis then there would have been no need for the invasion. Its quite possible that Chrysaliss shock troops are just too dumb, violent, or carnivorous to go through long term infiltration plans. There could be plenty of 'nice' changelings, but they aren't powerful enough to really fight back against the more aggressive ones on their own.

does this solves your question?

1594037

Canon speaks. Changelings are nasty critters, eh? I've always thought of them as FiM's version of Dracula-esque vampires. They abhor the light but are not destroyed by it and feed upon the living, or in this case the loving.

Of course, fanon has a million different depictions of the Changelings. Also, everypony is secretly one. No exceptions.

1594037 Hahaha that is awful and glorious at the same time.

1593978 Thank you for further insight. It will be quite useful.