Appendix A
While the story is over, there was one part of its creation that I wanted to share. Between my two stories I had twelve separate players I needed to balance, and to help myself not go crazy I gave each pony a different play-style to use in the game. Here is the list of styles used in this story:
Twilight Sparkle was playing as The Psychiatrist. The Psychiatrist knows how the other players think and gets into their heads in order to get them to do what they want. Maybe that involves playing with their trust or spreading rumors about people they don't trust. Sometimes it means lending a helping hand to a player who's struggling and getting them to lean on your advice more than they should. Either way, the psychiatrist plays the players more than the play the game. Everything this player knows about the others is a weapon in their arsenal.
Applejack was playing as The Turtle. The Turtle is defensive minded, grabbing some territories at the beginning of the game but retreating once contact is made with the enemy. Focusing solely on keeping the others from taking what they've managed to collect, this player tries to wait out the competition. Towards the end game, the Turtle's units will be fresh and poised to leap on the lost territories of any foe that falls victim to another player's action. Has the added benefit of appearing small and nonthreatening, no matter how many units they actually have.
Rarity was playing as The Mafia Don. The Mafia Don doesn't like to come out and face their opponents, rather preferring to offer "advise" and "assistance" to the others in the game. Best played from a position of strength, they try and become the person the other players come to if they need a hand dealing with someone else. Meanwhile, all these little deals means they have a ton of "favors" to call in if someone dares to attack the Mafia Don instead!
Rainbow Dash was playing as The Rhino. The Rhino does one thing and one thing only: attack, attack, attack! As soon as the game begins this player launches all their pieces at the nearest opponent, hoping to surprise them into not having a proper defense ready in time. This player often doesn't last long, but if they can come in from an unexpected angle they might just catch a more stealthy or manipulative player off guard, without the sheer bulk to fend off the stampede.
Fluttershy was playing as The Unseen Threat. Basically the Unseen Threat bides their time, not doing much of anything to attract anyone's attention at the beginning. Sometimes this player even makes purposely bad moves to appear incompetent. After a while even the best players let down their guard around this player, thinking that they aren't any real danger and that their focus would be better used elsewhere. And that's when they strike! Usually only good for one blow, but if that blow is costly enough, it's all the Unseen Threat needs to pull a win.
Pinkie Pie was playing as The Mercenary. The Mercenary is a player to whom the actual winner of the game is inconsequential to making a profit from the chaos. This player will offer to do whatever any other player wants, usually in exchange for something outside of the game. Whether its straight up money, favors, or literally any kind of collectable, the Mercenary always walks out of the game a winner. And being mobile like that often puts their pieces in places where they can do a surprising amount of damage, if this player wants to try winning the game as well.
And these aren't all the different possible players there could be. Check out my other story to see a list of six more!
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Considering the amount of fanart there is of Pinkie with/as Deadpool, this is hilarious for me. That or the week's exhaustion has finally caught up to me and I'm delirious.
Wow, this was neat. It almost makes me want to pick this game up, risk to friendships notwithstanding.
This has been an enjoyable story. Good job.
5903005
Thank you! Stay tuned for the maybe-sorta-sequel I've got planned, sometime this summer!
Oh how I love this story. Seriously, watching the poor ponies flip out over a simple game was hilarious.
Wow, I just marathoned this entire story! Instant favorite! I could barely interpret how the game itself was going, but just reading all the interactions, the strategy, and the ever-growing chaos, that all just made this one helluva compelling read! Great job!
it was really hard to follow the actual moves of the game as well as the whole storytelling, even though it took my full attention, checking the map as well as remembering names of the places, it really, really was a really interesting story, it took more mental horse power, but in later chapters you just couldn't follow the moves and instead switched your attention to the plot related, important moves, which was a different focus, but was a more lighter read.
still, a really amazing story, I marathon it, characters rendered perfectly, just amazing.
I want to play Diplomacy with my friends so bad right now.
What!? I read this whole thing to see how they'd patch things up afterward and you skip right over it!? Highly disappointed. That was the part I was looking forward to the most.
Wow. I knew this was going to turn ugly, and I was right. Only one real complaint here and that is that you used different colors for the nations starting territories and the player colors. It made it difficult to figure who was moving where. A simple fix would be to make the color printed onto the board match the player, such as having Applejack's nation orange, Rarity's white, etc. Green could be Spike, and the nation that wasn't played.
But really, that's minor. This was a masterful rendition of the Mane Six playing an extremely dangerous game. If I ever write a mental exercise that involves permanently splitting the cast, your story reminded me that this could be the breaking point. Well done. I recommend you submit this to the Good-fic Bin. I'd put it in myself, but I'm locked out of submission for some reason. Just go to the forums and find the Self Submission thread.
Pinkie Pie was playing as The Mercenary:
I feel like if I played this game this would be my play-style (free tf2 hats give them up now and il help you in your invasion)
I read this story and I bought a copy of Diplomacy off Amazon. Now I want to play it.
Damn. I was expecting Spike to set the rule book on fire, toss it onto the board, and tell everyone to stop being idiots. Even so, it was a good slam-bang way to break that fever pitch.
And I still hate that fucking title.
It was a good story but it could be best if you put the reaction of Celestia and the battle between her and Twilight for a simple game.
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Well, at least it sounds like you are enjoying the story!
Some of them are a little out of character, but that's kinda the point of the fic. This game really does do this to anyone who plays it. It has the magical ability to turn every person who plays it into a devious, scheming backstabber. I played it enough times and seen enough good friends turn on each other to be confident on this game's diabolical power!
6396390
I suppose I was getting a little carried away at this point, but each of them are basically turning to the way they acted when Discord played with their emotions in Season 2. They are each getting a little most distrustful, a little more cynical, and a LOT more suspicious. Some of them, like Pinkie or Fluttershy, needed a bigger shove to get to that point. I apologize for being so mean.
My goal with this story was to see if I could get them to turn against their elements as naturally as I could. I probably failed on that respect, but if anything could accomplish that, it's this evil game!
6774838 Not really, it was just a moment of strong visceral anger.
Like a fair amount of other people, reading about this game that nearly split the mane six has me wanting to play with my friends.
This fic was on my RiL for EVAR, and just got around to reading it.
I must say, this was just how I expected it to come out, being knowledgeable about this game's power. Not that I minded, though. It was difficult to follow their moves with the colours not matching characters and crappy internet, but my personal board made it easy to figure out if I really wanted to.
Allinol, it was a funny, relatively small fic, but a blast to read. 9001/10 Would meme again.
You can has review!