No, not Omelette. Amulet.

Hey all. Before I dot another "I" in my current story, I have to ask this question: do the ponies of Equestria use amulets? Yes, I know about the Alicorn Amulet, but what about every day use for more mundane amulet technology, if magic is so ubiquitous in this world? What about an amulet that works like a proximity alarm? What about an amulet that protects one from electrical discharge? Has anyone seen amulet usage in the cannon of the show - as I am trying to stay as close as I can to cannon - before I break said cannon.

And no, the Elements of Harmony don't count! They are a special exception. So my question is two-fold:
1) do you recall the use of amulets anywhere (crystal imbued to empower the user with something)
2) if there are no amulets, why? Theories?

5950438

Not explicitly shown in canon, but there are probably other amulets, yes.

No, amulets definitely exist in the show, as seen by their depiction thus far. Enchanting objects like jewelry is within the realm of My Little Pony considering how magic is a major world-building theme. So no, it wouldn't break cannon, the fact that you don't see it more is simply because they haven't thought of anything that would warrant the use of an amulet.

5950441
I hope you are correct. If so, than I have explicit reasons for why amulets are NOT common knowledge to anyone except Luna and Celestia... they were covered up and buried for a reason, until something happens... Of course, I hope that is credible: like - why didn't anyone think of this before?! Maude holds some key information...

5950446
I am hoping I can make it believable that imbuing a crystal with magic to suit a purpose requires a particular knowledge that was lost to time, and nobody had figured it out. (then here comes Twilight, with Maude as a rock expert advisor - putting their heads together, they totally figure it out)

5950451
Maud said it herself that she had knowledge of gemstones that could theoretically control the world right? So what you're proposing isn't far-fetched really.

5950438

No, not Omelet. Amulet.

Clever little Spongebob reference there; even if the special was garbage...

5950468
Yes. When she said that, i got a goofy grin on my face. I wuz like: "Oh yeah! I'm using that. Maude? Welcome to my story!"
5950471
Heh. I never watched Spongebob... didn't know that was a reference.

5950480 It's from Atlantis Squarepantis when Squidward is stunned to see Spongebob and Patrick with the other half of the amulet.

5950471

Amulet du Fromage?

5950438
1) In Canon? Maybe.
2) For fic purposes? Do what you want, a fanfic author you be.

My Theory on the alicron amulet: and evidence for it.

What does it do? So this amulet gives the user (particularly unicrorns or alicrons) a surge of magical power and corrupts the user the longer the user wears it to use it for their own selfish inner desiers. This means it must be somthing evil or dark.

What is it? To me its somthing similar to the one ring in lord of the rings. A powerful artifact that could have a will of its own as deminstrated by trixie when she used it and she had no intention to use it to the extent she did.

Its design: the alicorn amulet has a male alicron fane with a red jewel in the middle. This design to me indicates it couldve been made by a male alicorn.

My theory: so my theory is soley on the scraps of evidemce from watching the show: so first off I think the amulet was made by a male alicorn because of the design and seeing that only alicorns are females and their all good in nature. Males might be the oppisite and represent evil. If so why? My theory on that is was to combat the powers of the elements of harmony due to the fact no males as we know could weild the elements of harmony. In summary I think it was desinged by a very powerful male alicorn to either take over Equestria and failed. And who was this dark alicron? I have no idea sonce male alicorns aren't canon. But I would day their father as im sure celestia and luna probably have no idea who their parnets are and my bet is that their mom may hav had to stop tjier father from taking over. But like I said this isnt based on much.

The way I see it, a magical item needs both a "spell" that makes it do the particular thing that it does and a source of power. The spell is a shape in the magical field of the item and wears down over time until it returns to the state of an un-magical item. The power source would need either to be some kind of magic battery or else the life force of a living being. The latter is tiring and generally an unpleasant experience. Normal spell casting is shaped and stabilized by the will of the caster. A magical item's spell is more mechanical and needs to be more complicated and conditional to make up for the lack of an active will controlling it.

In short, they are hard to make, high maintenance, clumsy, and nauseating. They are rarely competitive with a nearby unicorn and have been written off as a curiosity with only a few niche uses. In other words, their time is coming, but not yet here.

“Behold your doom, Princess Twilight,” cackled Trixie, waving one hoof for emphasis while thunder rumbled in the background.

“Cut that out, Rainbow Dash!” shouted Twilight up into the clouds. “You’re just encouraging her.” Lowering her voice, Twilight Sparkle turned back to the flamboyant performer, who was wearing her traditional magician’s cape and hat, only festooned with half of Pinkie Pie’s glitter supply. “What is it this time, Trixie?”

“Princess Trixie,” cackled Trixie. “Once I have revealed my greatest creation, you will shake in fear, tremble with anticipation, and be stricken dumb with terror. Behold!” With one sweep of her hoof, Trixie removed the silk cloth cover from the platter she was carrying, and Twilight Sparkle cringed back in fear.

“No!” she cried. “It’s not possible! Nopony could possibly—”

“Not just any pony!” declared Trixie. “For only an alicorn could vanquish… The Alicorn Omelette!”

“So much cheese,” murmured Twilight. “And… are those mushrooms?”

5950491

5950503
Hee hee. I am loving your theories, and they aren't tooooo far off what I am doing in my story. Very nice. However, I go way deeper than a simple Alicorn, and the Alicorn Amulet is nothing compared to what is in store...
5950561
This is the kind of info and thinking I am on here for. You have great nuggets of magical wisdom, oh wise and sage mage... Do you mind if I adapt some of your ideas for my story? There is all kinds of potential there!

5950579
Yes yes yes yes! See the youtube link above for a Spanish food potato amulet

5950438
My personal take on it is that enchantment power is a harmonic progression regarding the power going into creation of amulet, thus making creation of powerful amulets profligately expensive in terms of effort and cost. Different materials have different magical density, going over which goes by the rule of diminishing returns. So in order to create a powerful amulet one has to both furnish material with high magical density AND ridiculous levels of power to cram it in.
So basically, it`s not impossible to create, for example, a fire alarm amulet, but the cost of such a creation would be on par with the cost of house it would protect, which makes much more cost-effective technological alternatives the preferred choice.
Stuff like alicorn amulet would likely cost billions and billions of bits to recreate, so all memorable amulets are created from rare and opportunity-granted materials like fulgurite or something even more exotic. The examples that do exist in free trade are priced as objet d`art, not based on how much their industrial creation would cost.

In that regard, the situation is reminiscent of gold value in real world. Theoretically, it`s possible to extract gold out of seawater. In practice, the cost of doing so would be far exceeding the cost of gold obtained from natural deposits, finite as they are. So absolute majority of gold on the market is mined and not electrolyzed out of seawater.

5950655
Heh. I saw your name and symbol and immediately thought "microbiologist..." Why? Because that was my college major at one point before I saw the light and went screaming the other way. Nope! Then read your bio and figured, no you aren't a microbiologist, so never mind. I like your thinking here, but I am thinking i will go more along the lines of geology, with the nature of the crystal needing to have the correct geometric pattern for the magic to resonate.

In other words, molecular bond distances and angles within the crystal lattice framework have to match up with the exact wavelength and other properties of the electromagic spectrum involved. Such as Amethyst crystals can only be imbued with magic that is psychological/emotion based, such as warding the wearer from having nightmares and are typically used in mental hospitals as such. Agate could be empowered slightly magnify an Earth pony's strength. Etcetera. Google crystals and their uses, and let the imagination run wild.

5950676
That might create undesirable implications.
If your universe has specific parts of electromagnetic spectrum directly related to concepts? This can cause a highly fucked up world. For example, if violet color is intrinsically tied to mind magic, then simple black lamp in Equestria might turn into terrifying dark artifact.

5950750
no no no! Not electromagnetic! Electromagic... Or I will think of a different name for it. Essentialy all regions of magic have their own "wavelength," which is then modulated by that magic wielders unique signature.

5950772
Still makes no sense why arbitrary types of magic would correspond to different wavelengths.
That implies that the frequency of magic is directly dependable on the intent of spell.

Think about it for a moment. There are several equally viable ways of fudging with one`s mind, depending on different methods.
You can do it mechanically, using precision cuts to excise parts of brain to produce necessary effect.
You can do it chemically, introducing chemicals to erode or alter the structure of brain.
You can do it pharmaceutically, introducing chemicals that fudge the chemical reactions of the brain.
You can do it psychologically, exciting ear and eye nerves to influence the target in question via gallucinations.
You can do it electrically, by directly applying electrical stimulation to parts of brain.
Etc ,etc, etc.

5950630
Sure, knock yourself out.

5950794
Well, taking this discussion over to your lengthy treatise on the seven circles of magic on your profile page, lets assume that each circle of magic can correspond to a certain general wavelength. Taking a school of magic and making it correspond to a wavelength isn't a bad way to look at it in my humble opinion. Just like radio waves can go through modulations and amplifications in ways that will carry a complex auditory signal, and convert it to music - or in a more current example, amazing amounts of information embedded in the carrier wave so that our smart phones can interact with data and receive video, audio, and etc. Could not magic do the same thing? A region in the spectrum then would not correspond to a particular object or concept, other than a particular school of magic and all that it entails.

I am only suggesting that crystalline structures can be selected that can resonate with types of magic and further worked in order to produce a powerful reservoir that works in only one simple way. (but maybe can be developed as the technology is developed... I will need to research some sciencey stuff to go deeper on this... hm. Anyway, hope that makes sense!

5951190
The problem I have with this is the assumption that measurable quality like wavelength is tied to abstract notion like schools of magic.
I wouldn`t object if you tied measurable quality to another measurable quality - for example, connect the frequency of magicwave to the penetrative capacities of magicwave - longwave magic being much better at propagation, while shortwave being able to pack much more power.

As I pointed out before, tying measurable to abstract is really unwise, because majority of abstract ideas have a lot of options one can take to achieve them.

There`s also a very unfortunate implication for different crystals for different magics. Ponies often have coat hues close to that of many crystals, don`t they? Wouldn`t it be natural for ponies to start assuming that coat color DOES mean the predilection for the same kind of magics as the corresponding color crystal is?

5950438

"ITEM: the Magical Medallion of Macguffin will cause ponies to go off on quests, chase pirates, become pirates, fight off gangsters, ninjas and shadowy government agents, and generally behave as if they were following a melodramatic narrative."

SUSCEPTIBLE: Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie

IMMUNE: Applejack, Twilight Sparkle, Fluttershy.