Well, I don't know if this is the most appropiate place for this, but this is the premiere Luna fan base, soooo...

So, recently I've noticed a trend amongst stories about Luna, and her thestrals (and why don't you have thestrals here conflabit) labeling them as assassin's, or more accurately ninjas. Now, I realize people are fans of Naruto, but really, I don't think the tropes fit her or her thestrals.

First off, while I'm certain that the Sister's would have their spymasters, I sincerely doubt they'd employ straight up assassin's in either their normal selves, or their alter egos. Now, they might have countermeasures in place to stop such things against their ponies in their castle (though doubtfully any for themselves. Good luck assassinating an alicorn friends and neighbors, lets hope they put in a spot in the garden that has a good view.) So, if Luna doesn't fill the shinobi or ninja assassin niche, a noble knight right?

Well... not neccessarily. We have to remember that while manners have always been a staple of every culture, knight chivalry isn't, and while they themselves might use the European model of granting knighthoods and fiefdoms (something I doubt one could buy their way into. This verses Luna, as an example, doesn't seem to be the type to take bribes towards such things.) I don't think they themselves fit the mold very well.

So what sort of warrior would they be? Well, given the Machiavellean theme of this group...

No school like old school folks, and no school older then Iron age

You know, thinking about it, I'm not 100% sure that bat ponies even exist. The only time that they're ever seen is in Luna Eclipsed. The more that I think about it, the more that I'm convinced that they were just a Nightmare Night costume.

7058254
Nope. they are surprisingly canon

7058833 7058254
Debatable...

The show itself has never once expanded on the origins of the two bat-winged guards who were seen pulling Luna's chariot. To my knowledge the only official source to have provided any additional information regarding them is one of the novelettes, (Princess Luna and the Festival of the Winter Moon), but The "canonicity" of those books is far from universally agreed on and even if taken entirely as canon, details seem scarce.

I haven't actually read the book myself, but from the few summaries I've found, what little information is presented about Luna's two guards remains vague. Apparently in the book their names are Echo and Nocturn, and it is also briefly mentioned they come from a reclusive group of mountain dwelling ponies, but that's about it. The two guards don't seem to be main characters in the book, just cameos, and no one ever actually visits the mountains they come from or meets any other ponies from there. As such, anything else regarding the exact nature or culture of that group might still be anyone's guess. Although if anyone else on these forums has actually read the books and could quote any relevant text, I'd certainly be curious to learn more.

Still, even if every other member of this reclusive group of mountain dwelling ponies is supposed to be bat-winged, I might be reluctant to consider them an entirely unique race unto themselves. In the show we have also seen that magical mishaps can infuse an otherwise ordinary pegasus with bat-like qualities, specifically Fluttershy, and so it could be that the group of mountain dwelling ponies Luna's guards come from might just be descendants of a similar accident. Although, if anybody wanted to, I suppose it could be feasible to head-canon it the other way around, that maybe one of Fluttershy's ancestors was a "bat-pony", and Twilight's spell rather than actually transforming her merely awoke dormant traits.

7058947
Well, its not that far a stretch. I mean, they have breezies, flutterponies, hippocampus's, kirin (though technically those are longma) This also leads one to the conclusion that ponies will put out to just about anything No wonder Trixie is such a cold fish

Really though, thestrals are pretty much a fan canon thing at this point, and why the hell aren't they here RDD gosh hecking darn to heck!

7058959
Ah... well, if you're asking about the Lunaverse specifically, then I can comment on that canon with some authority.

Our "official" stance is that there are no thestrals, as you call them. Luna simply enchants the armor of her personal guard to give them all a similarly fearsome appearance. All guards regardless of tribe get the same illusionary gray fur, slitted yellow eyes, and fangs while additionally pegasus wings are made to appear bat-like and unicorn horns appear curved with a bladed edge.

7058977
No, I wasn't "asking" specifically, just a bit of fun on my part. I knew that from the word go.

7058980
To expand a bit on this, my personal stance is that there's only three tribes of ponies: Earth ponies, pegasus ponies, and unicorn ponies. All other apparent tribes are just "offshoots" or "subraces" of these three. I think I originally outlined...

Earth Ponies: Crystal ponies, and possibly also zebras, donkeys, and horses
Pegasus Ponies: Longma (Shouma dragon-pegasi), hippogriffs, and actually also the ancestor of all seapony tribes
Unicorn Ponies: Kirin (Shouma dragon-unicorns)

The idea came from Vampire: the Masquerade, wherein there are 13 main clans of vampire but each clan has a number of bloodline offshoots that can often develop very differently from the main "parent" clan.

7059360
I figured as much. Any thoughts on the original topic?

7059532
I can see Celestia or Luna having once had basically a wandering corps of adventurers-slash-troubleshooters, sure.

7059539
I meant what sort of warriors they are personally, but yeah, I can see them having some less then reputable sorts.

As for what I meant I sort of see them as having an iron age mind set in regards to such things. Less King Arthur and more Vlad Tepis to some extent. They easily have to be over a thousand years olds, and the untamed world of back then hardly allowed for much aside from, at best, a legionnaires mindset.

Again, I agree with the notion they'd want to avoid contempt, but again, the world probably didn't allow for much in the ways of mercy way back when. Of course they changed with the times, but at their core, they're both still more or less warlords, at least in my view

7059548
I think for both alicorns war was always a means to an end, rather than a way of life in and of itself. Plus Luna likes to come at things sideways rather than head-on, is a big fan of "soft" power, so even if she ever lead a group of marauders they'd probably be pretty ninja-like in how they acted and acquired what they wanted. Actually probably have a lot in common with changelings, come to think of it...

The pedant in me feels compelled to point out that even if there was a historical King Arthur he most likely would have lived at some point between the 400s-500s AD and so predate Vlad Tepes by nearly a thousand years, with Vlad Tepes' reign technically occurring during the beginning of the Renaissance, well after the iron age ended in even the most isolated parts of Europe. But that's not relevant to the discussion

7059552
Good point on the Tepis, I'm just using it as an example of mindset since a lot of people seem to be held to that standard. My apologies, I mistook your grasp of the matter

7059555
It's fine, like I said, I was just being pedantic and I knew what you were driving at. History is just my personal best subject, the one class I was very good at when I was in school. I devoured my history textbooks and usually had them read cover-to-cover within just a few weeks at most of the term starting. And I'm a bit of an egomaniac and can't resist showing off sometimes.

7059558
I failed at school entirely, but yeah, I'm a history freak as well. And you don't have to worry about pedantic-ism or showing off with me, I love this sort of stuff. That said, even though I do incorporate much of history into my works, I do try to respect the notion that ponies are ponies and while they may have parallels to humans, they aren't us. That's not good or bad, but they would be different.

Its one of the things I like about your works. A lot of people either play them off as being inherently better with things just working out, or make them into humans in pony suits