We have all read a HiE story where the human eventually fight or distract or run away from a monster of the Everfree forest. With this, three monster nearly always get used by writers that it's become a running joke with Gary Stu's of HiE fics.

Say them with me now.
Chimera (Speciffically Lion, Scorpion and Bat)
Timber Wolf
Hydra

I am so sick of these monsters. They have been used so much in fics that the actually feeling we "should" feel when we come by them is diminished now. Hell whenever a Chimera is introduced into a story I have to stop reading and stomach the rest because it will most likely have the Chimera dead and human in hospital. So here is my question to you all.

How do you feel towards these monsters? And what other monsters could be used?
Personally I want to see a "Nue" in a story. These things sound terrifying and way more interesting than a bloody timber wolf.

And manticore. Don't forget manticore.

1251759 What other monster have you seen in the show? Parasprites? Bears? Dragons? Madponies? There aren't many monsters to choose from so the known ones get reused. What you are really missing is the event doesn't change. The human does see the monster and run away. The human doesn't do anything clever like climb a tree when facing timberwolves.
The manticore wasn't even that hostile before or after it had the thorn stuck in its paw. I'd use those monsters if it came to it, but the other thing that the people you're complaining about forgot, humans are the wrong shape to be prey animals. Real predators get real nervous about encountering the new and different, especially when it's as big as they are. They don't have health care, so a serious injury is a death sentence. I'd like to see one where the human stands up out of a crouch, and the predator leaves.

1251759

I wouldn't mind seeing a Kitsune sometime.

I mean come on, get a Renamon in there!

But as for other monsters and such. What about memory Ghosts?

Ghosts who hold on to the last emotion and memory they had before they died.

And yes I did just make that up XD

Or we're going down a route that has the "Monster" becoming more involved in the plot. Why not make the "Monster" something only the main protagonist can understand. Perhaps it's from another world, or maybe it's from Equestria but as the ponies become the dominant species it became extinct.

You could even get a romance in there. Female Monster X Human male. The female is territorial and thus attributes to her more primal side, yet is capable of speech and emotion, this attributes to her sapient side.

All of this is just food for thought, but it's interesting that I've never read a story with anything like this in it.

It's why I added the Alicorn Instinct into my stories, because ponies were at some point quite primal and protective of their mate/young.

...speaking of which, I should get back to writing it

1251759
I feel nothing. My soul is an abyss.

1251774
What you stated is true in some cases, if the monster in question was rather young and hungry however well I doubt they would care if the human is weird looking, meat is meat. What I'm trying to put forward here is how unoriginal writers are being with the amount of room they have in the mlp-verse. It's just magic and mythology, the show hasn't restricted writers from using any monster in any mythology, so why are writers restricting themselves? Also an event can easily evolve and become more dynamic if the monster the writer uses is more adaptable. Rarely in a fic have I read the manticore flying or timber wolves changing shapes. With so much room it is disappointing to see so little creativity so maybe writers should just look towards more interesting monsters instead.

1251776

But as for other monsters and such. What about memory Ghosts?
Ghosts who hold on to the last emotion and memory they had before they died.

That totally made me think of this:

Well I'm sorry to say that my fic does indeed fall prey to the "manticore punching bag" trope. But at least I do it in a way that's a little bit novel, specifically, the protagonist hits it with a truck going highway speeds and then has to get out and shoot it in order to finish it off. Everfree wildlife is far more durable in my universe than in most fics

1251777

At least you can feel a sugar rush

Still wondering about when someone will mention the cockatrice

Then there's still the 'peaceful tribes' out there... Minotaurs, griffons, diamond dogs, changelings.Luna Eclipsed featured spiders, which in a swarm might be conceived as a threat. Cerberus still roams the gates of Tartarus, but has been seen in Ponyville, so there's that.

Then I've seen stories with zombie ponies, werewolves or vampires tossed in. Not to mention one that chucked in graboids, and a Tarentatek into the story.

I'm guessing the monster in the Everfree bit is limited by ones imagination, or a need to give the reader an image in his/her mind when reading the story. I mean, you could toss a satyr, sirens, centaurs, an ophiotaurus or even a taraxippus (look that one up... should make for an interesting monster for the ponies) into the story, and still make it entertaining. Problem is that most people have a fixed (or even no) concept of how such a creature should look. The fixed monsters from the show give a reference frame for people that read the story to connect to.

Human mythology is full of monsters that could be used, but only a select few of them garner an immidiate spike of recognition with an accompanying mental image.

1251759
I knew that manticores were overused, but chimeras too? I don't think I've ever seen any fics with chimeras in it. That's too bad, I was gonna use a chimera in my story because manticores were overused, but now I don't think that'd be a good idea. Oh well, I guess I'll just use one of the many monsters mentioned here.

1252429

Harpies !

Yeah....

Man Eaters from garys mod, Ponies shall wonder why human ran into corner crying! THEN MAN EATER EATS BLUEBLOOD YEYYYYYY

1252429
That was actually just an error on my behalf. I got manticore and chimera confused

People need to add things like:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tengu
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peryton
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stymphalian_birds
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarasque

Less know and underrated mythical beasts are the shit! You can also educate people on other mythologies!

1251759
I would rather just dispense with the idea of fighting/killing/running away from generic Everfree monster #29 altogether. While we're at it, we could also get rid of the whole, "waking up in the middle of the Everfree Forest," trope.

I wonder, out of all the fics that have humans waking up in the Everfree how many wake up in the castle?

There still is a 'monster' out in the Everfree that the ponies created tho... Parasprites.

And not the ones that just eat every kind of organic food stuffs. I mean there's also the batch that Twilight changed to alter what they eat.

So... if the human doesn't get his shorts eaten off his ass, he might be on the menu himself (nobody ever said the parasprites wouldn't eat meat, even if the episode never goes to that length).

NINE TAILS BABY!

How about centaurs and gorgons?