Does anybody have an idea for a daybreaker story, or at least know of some stories with daybreaker in them (the first two stories here don't count)?

5969225 I will be writing such a story in a few weeks once I get my Anon-a-Miss story done. If that helps. I don't know much about the character or how she came to be seeing as how I didn't get to see the episode where she shows up. I hope my story will be up to snuff about the character.

5969236 alright, that's a start.

5969237 It will take at least three weeks before I can start the next story as I want to finish my second one first.

I don't have any great Daybreaker ideas yet, but one will happen along eventually, I'm sure.

If nothing else, she'd make for the subject of some interesting clopfics!

I don't have time at the moment to write one. But here's a idea. A story where instead of Luna turning into Nightmare Moon, Celestia turned in to Daybreaker.

5969361 an idea so simple it works. The main problem is though is that it's already been done, just not with her. Still, as they say, no time like the present.

5969282 why did you have to put that in my head?

5970415 was that a bad thing?

5970756 I suppose not, but again they already did one where Celestia turned evil instead of Luna, only she was called solar flare before nightmare star or daybreaker.

5969238
5969282
5970756

Ok, here's an idea, basically Celestia fights nightmare moon as she did in the beginning of MLP. However instead of using the elements of harmony to defeat her, she gives into her darker half daybreaker (or nightmare star if you prefer) and now the two are on equal grounds. The fight goes on for awhile and they start to tire out eventually, and realise this needs to end soon. This can go in many directions, one way is that one of them manages to defeat the other and either their evil self gets their way, or they somehow become good again and now have to live alone for the rest of their life. Another way is that they stop fighting and come to terms with each other, realize they were both wrong for what they did and apologize, and then they either return to normal to live the rest of their years normally and maybe more closer then ever, or they keep their darker half forms for the sin they committed or they're still evil and will just rule Equestria with an iron good (what they will call each other from now on namewise will be their new or old names). One last say this could end is.... the clop route. Basically after they vent all of their anger in the fight, they squabble a little bit (from the readers perspective maybe. Realistically this would go on for awhile) before that hate turns into love/lust and they make out, which leads to them doing it essentially. After which they finally stop hating one another, and also stop their selfish plan, and they either keep their current form or revert back to their normal, and possibly younger & weaker, state. However they can't exactly look at themselves as sisters now in the same light, in fact they don't quite know what they should call themselves now for what they just did so it might take some time for them to straighten things out. Anyway, what do you guys think?

5972093 That sounds interesting.

5972100 which of it sounds interesting?

5972104 Well.....all of it. Your ideas could lead to differences story.

5972109 Oh, well thank you . I just got another idea, you remember the timelines that starlight helped create? Well, I'm not sure if anyone else has come up with this story or idea yet, but what if twilight and spike came across a timeline with daybreaker, which would lead to some heartbreak for twilight, and maybe cause her to lose a bit of faith in her mentor?

5972132 Haven't thought of that one. That would be a good story.

5972144 I know right?

5969282 what did you think of the story ideas I gave?

5974493 They're pretty straightforward, I suspect somebody somewhere is already writing something like them.

I'm more interested in finding something other than "reverse Nightmare Moon". Even before the show showed us Daybreaker, we'd had tons of "Daymare Sun" stories. And lots of "Twilight loses faith in Celestia" stories too, I've already written one of those myself! If I was going to write about Daybreaker, I'd want to find something to say that hasn't already been said.

5974562 that's fair, but then what would be a good idea?

5974564 Dunno, that's why I don't have one yet!

5974570 I see, so I guess my ideas weren't that good huh?

5974573 My, isn't that question a Catch-22. Either I say they're good, and then you ask me why I don't want to use them, or I say they're bad and I'm being mean and insulting. There's really no way to answer that. (You may as well have asked me if your butt looks fat in this. )

Ideas don't matter nearly as much as execution, in any case. Any of those could be an amazing story, written the right way. But I'm not interested in writing those particular stories.

5974584 I wasn't going to ask you to write them, I was just asking what you thought about them. Also, I didn't think you were being mean, you were giving your opinion, I was just wanting to know from someone who has experience in writing on what about the idea wasn't appealing to them?

5974607 Well, I think I already said, they're not appealing to me because they've been done. And done. And done some more. "What if it was Celestia who turned evil instead of Luna!" is the second thing that came into a ton of writer's minds the instant they saw the first two episodes of the show. (The first thing was "What if Nightmare Moon won?" and I've done one of those already too.) This is a story idea that the fandom has been telling since the fandom existed. "What if Celestia turned evil *and* Luna turned evil" is a slight variation, but it's still treating Daybreaker as exactly the same as Nightmare Moon. (And hey, I've also already written part of a fic where Celestia and Luna fight to a standstill instead of the Elements letting Celestia win, so that still doesn't feel like something I want to tackle.)

One can do good things with old stories, and I think Daybreaker has a lot of potential, but it just seems very boring to me to simply go back and have Celestia be evil in essentially in the same way as Nightmare Moon. Especially when so many people have already told that story.

I'd be more interested in finding ways for Daybreaker to be completely different from Nightmare Moon. For one thing, she was in Starlight Glimmer's dream, not Celestia's. She not what Celestia created, she's what Starlight created. What if she escaped the dream realm, like the Tantabus was trying to do? What if she somehow crossed into Celestia's dreams now? What if she crossed into Luna's? What would she be if she was created from Starlight's mind to bean equal to Celestia? (There's a Star Trek episode like that.)

Those are places I'd start looking if I were looking for something more original.

5974649 to be fair I've only been here for two years, so of course I haven't read them all. Anyway like I said, you made fair points, so I might have to reevaluate these ideas and think of something else. Anyway, I'm sorry if I came off as ungrateful; you have your input so that's what matters (after all this forum is for discussing ideas). So thanks, really.

5974657 Well, as I said, execution is what actually matters. Idea is 10% of a good story, how you write it is 90%. And frankly some things I find very boring are pretty popular on here. People have strange tastes sometimes! Those are reasons why *I* personally wouldn't be interested in stories like those, not reasons why they'd be bad stories.

5974669 true, you could have the best idea and the story is just okay, or have something done a million times over and it's golden. Also, those small tidbits could eventually spawn something interesting, so all isn't lost for originality. Thanks again for your input.

5974669 I just read how to break the day, and I have got to say it was sufficiently interesting.

5985536
Yeah, that was a decent take on it. Not wildly original, but not just a rehash either.

5985550 ah, so it still hasn't reached that sweet spot you're looking for? Still, you can't deny that it's well liked.

5985557
I quite enjoyed it! But it's a "two ponies talking" fic. Nothing happens. Little bits of conversation like that can be a pleasure to read, but they don't actually tell a story as such.

5972132
I had an idea for a while inspired by the DC game series Injustice.

It takes place in one of the many alternate timelines created by Starlight.

During the eve of the Summer Sun Celebration, a desperate Celestia finds ponies whom she hastily deems worthy to wield the Elements of Harmony in order to confront Nightmare Moon.

However, the plan ultimately fails as the ponies are captured. With nopony to master the Elements, Celestia is forced to confront Nightmare Moon herself.
During their battle, Celestia starts to lose ground. One pony escapes her bonds and tries to help, but is mortally wounded by an attack from Nightmare Moon. Seeing a life fade before her eyes, Celestia has no choice but to go all out for the first time in her life. Overwhelmed by anger due to the loss of one of her subjects, she ends Nightmare Moon.

With Luna gone and the Elements rendered useless, a grieving Celestia stands over the lifeless form of one of the chosen Element bearers. Having tasted the full potential of her power, she comes to the realization that if she hadn't held back, her faithful subject would still be alive. If she had acted instead of putting faith and hope in others, a pony's life might've been spared.

Celestia ruled alone for a thousand years without Luna, and convinces herself that she never needed her sister to rule a thousand more. And this time, she would not be weak princess doing so.

Celestia becomes Day Breaker.

As Day Breaker, she ensures that Equestria remains forever safe. Villains like Discord, Chrysalis and Sombra are taken out quickly and her subjects live peacefully under the watchful protection of their sovereign. Less they be burned by her if they ever step out of line or challenge her.

I have an idea, or at least an id. The thrust of the idea is to imagine a scenario in which Daybreaker and Nightmare Moon, are co-rulers of a version of Equestria that isn't a completely terrible place to live.

Suppose Nightmare Moon wasn't a one-off. Suppose nightmare syndrome is just part of the way alicorn brains work. A young alicorn thinks much like any other pony with a great degree of personal magical power. A hundred year-old alicorn is ambitious and idealistic. A five hundred year-old alicorn is cynical. A millenial alicorn is vicious and decadent. Left to her own devices, she goes off the deep end, like with Nightmare Moon's plan for eternal night.

However, Celestia and Luna, who develop nightmare syndrome and become Daybreaker and Nightmare Moon after some time on the order of millenia, have each other. I envision young Celestia and Luna agreeing, when they were young enough to be idealistic but just cynical enough to consider the possibility of their values changing much later, that they would never fight each other. That whatever came later, they could always be safe for each other to talk to.

The promise gives them some stability. Not enough to stop them diving off the deep end, terrorizing the populace and collapsing civilization, but enough for them to thereafter stop and consider whether the hellhole they've made of their local area of Equus is really something they want to have forever after. In particular, among Nightmare Moon's desires is adulation; in canon she went Nightmare partly out of jealousy over love of the ponies for Celestia.

I don't think Daybreaker has well established wants and feelings, so I borrowed some from How to Break the Day and made up more. Daybreaker wants to break things, transgress against norms hurt ponies and forsake restraint. But when everyone's dead, there are no norms to transgress against, no ponies to hurt, nothing to break and restraint is loses meaning.

So Daybreaker and Nightmare Moon don't exactly grow out of it, but they learn to compromise some of their desires in order to fulfill the rest, and they build an empire from the ashes. Rather than mirroring the canonical duality of the alicorn sisters, they take distinct roles. Nightmare Moon plays the face, the beautiful and terrible empress, cloaked in titles and resplendent ceremony, and Daybreaker is a sort of chief troubleshooter.

The driving force for this empire to not be a complete dystopia is that Nightmare Moon is prideful. Her variety of nightmare-syndrome, absent long-held jealousy of Celestia, is intrinsically more compatible with a well-ordered government than Daybreaker's violent, transgressive sadism. However, Daybreaker has hit rock-bottom of realizing that if she doesn't change, she'll run out of things she enjoys doing, so she changes a bit. She becomes a healing scalpel for the nascent empire. When Nightmare constructs a bureaucracy, Daybreaker prunes it of corruptible ponies, or reshuffles it to prevent complacency. When Nightmare creates a military, Daybreaker challenges it.

And so the empire grows, to the aggrandizement of Nightmare Moon, who does not spare the personal propaganda. Daybreaker has things to break that really ought to be broken and ponies to hurt that no one will miss. It's not a perfect place to live, but it works better than might be expected, because of the following dynamic. In the real world, a tyrant can die of old age before the consequences of his mess fully catch up with him. Like Stalin. The nightmare alicorn sisters, however, must live with any messes they make, indefinitely, so they eventually learn to clean up after themselves a bit.

So that's the premise. I want to write a story in which this is all background, which conveys the plausibility of immortal rulers with some very evil predilections finding an equlibrium of quasi-responsible governance. My current tactic is to echo canon a bit and have Daybreaker take on students who she trains to take on roles much like her own as roving troubleshooters. But not just Twilight Sparkle, more than just one student every few decades, because they're actually supposed to help keep the government running smoothly because Daybreaker doing it all herself isn't realistic. Nightmare Moon also takes students, but she recruits from universities and makes them into ace administrators. I'm currently using a Daybreaker student as the viewpoint character.

I have two ideas.
1- When Nightmare Night event approaches, Nightmare Moon becomes more powerful in dream realm and gets ability to enter and possess other ponies dreams. This becomes possible because everypony mentaly think about Nightmare Moon on that event and it gives her more strenght.
Daybreaker decides to convince Nightmare Moon to help both of them escape into the real world using someponys astral projection, capture it and force somepony to wake up. That is because Daybreaker can't leave dream realm herself and Nightmare Moon lost her ability because was separated from Luna. (Use the same way Freddy Kruger was brought to the real world). The day before Nightmare Night Daybreaker decides to use princess Luna's strongets admirer - Pipsqueak. When Daybreaker and Nightmare Moon secretly follow him in dream realm, they found him before Nightmare Moon's statue in Everfree Forest. He sits and wishes it to be his most perfect Nightmare Night. Nightmare Moon says Daybreaker that he is capable to bring them both into the real world, they just need to touch him both at the same time and force to wake up. At that moment Daybreaker offers Nightmare Moon to unite themselfs and shapeshift into Luna in order to approach Pipsqueak. He sees Luna, hugs her and when he looks into her eyes they become black and yellow. He becomes frightened and wakes up in cold sweat. At that moment in everfree forest, the statue of NMM explodes with terrible force and portal appears through which Daybreaker and NMM enter this world in shape of Luna, than Daybreaker separates and deceives NMM, punches her very hard with hoof in face and magically throws her back into portal. NMM Regains consciousness back in dream realm, curses DB and tries to contact Luna in order to warn her about DB. Then Luna brings NMM back into the real world to help her and main six to defeat DB. In final battle, when everypony is harmed, NMM decides to sacrifice herself in order to kill DB. NMM strikes DB, they both explode in a blast of magic. NMM becomes hero posthumously when she saves Equestria on Nightmare Night Event.

2- Daybreaker traces and captures Luna's astral body when she is asleep after her nightshift. Celestia can't figure it out why Luna does not wake up when her next shift starts. In panic she askes Twilight to help. They found an ancient spell to enter dream realm. Twilight meets NMM, she says that Luna is being held captive and Daybreaker will kill her if Celestia will not give her body to host Daybreaker. Celestia agrees, Luna immediately wakes up and gallops into the throne room where she finds her sister's body unconscious and being consumed by fire. At that moment Celestia opens her yellow eyes and strikes Luna with bright red beem but misses her and destroyes enter doors. She sets Canterlot Palace on fire and blasts herself though the roof maniacally laughing. Luna searches dreamland to find NMM and asks her to unite with her to defeat DB. After grand battle NMM manages to blast Celestia's body out of DB. Daybreaker continues to exist only as evil ethereal being with fiery mane and bright yellow eyes. NMM has dialog with Luna and mane six, asks to forgive her for all her bad deeds, than releases Luna's body and in her ethereal form charges herself into Daybreaker. They both die in huge fire and magic explosion.

My idea of how the sky would look like if Celestia covered the moon using the sun in the same manner that Night Mare Moon did in the flash back in the 2nd episode of season 4.
My reasoning (Head cannon) being that the two planetary bodies are the same size and as they both emit light make the sisters the same strength. which is why Luna was able to out match her elder sister along with stopping her drawing strength from her object.

5969225 It was funny I was writing a fic (this was long before Daybreaker was shown), where one of the characters was from an alternate reality where the roles had switched with Celestia becoming the equivalent of Nightmare Moon and Luna having to seal her sister away on the sun. However, when Celestia returned there were no elements and ultimately both Celestia and Luna kill each other resulting in a dying world. However, I never got that far in the story, as I later decided that the story needed some reworking.