I knew what I needed to do, but it was hard to make that first step. Everypony knew us princesses were Goddesses, but very few knew what that meant. True we were immortal, but that doesn’t mean we’re invulnerable both to emotional wounds, nor physically. Albeit we are much more durable than mere mortals, take Twilight learning to fly for instance. The craters and ditches she left took weeks to fix up, yet no damage to her was sustained.
We had ways of seeing things far beyond mortal comprehension. For instance I use the Aetheric Plane to scry upon the lives and actions of others. It has allowed me to make judgement calls as fair as possible while ensuring the innocent didn’t suffer. My sister has her ability to see the memories and past of all dreamers should she deem it necessary to do so. Cadance and Twilight are too young at the moment to utilize those gifts, although Twilight’s table has the Elements send her on missions to fulfil their end goals. For whatever goals those may be … again, I need Twilight to find away to summon them … they’ve been just as helpful in their manipulations as they’ve been hurtful.
Anyways, while we see much. We aren’t omniscient without our tools, or without knowing what we are looking for. As such we can be taken unawares.
Most taxing though, is while we have power that is greatly superior to normal ponies. The weakest of us, darling little Caddy, has the power of 9 Clovers. Twilight had 1.3 Swirls when she was a unicorn, and my sister and I hold the power of 2.5 Swirls. At least I did in my last physical a few hundred years ago, and my sister was evenly matched with me in terms of magical strength. So she should be about that much … if it wasn’t for the fact that I don’t want to deal with diets, I would take my sister and I to get a much needed physical.
Nonetheless, while powerful. We aren’t perfect. Perfection simply doesn’t exist, if it did, there would be no room to grow. As corporeal, magical beings. We had feelings, needs, and desires. The major weakness to that is we made mistakes, and admitting we made them is incredibly hard to do.
So it was that I spent an hour staring at a strip of parchment that I needed to use to write my first of two letters. The first was the worst, since it would mean that I had to overturn a thousand years of tradition, and make amends to the futures I stole … if any were still alive. The second was something of a tickle of fancy to do something that would do much good for a few ponies.
I needed to get my Autobiography written. It would do much good to shatter my pedestal I was perched on, and hopefully, if I was lucky. Would let the two ponies I needed to let know how I felt about them know without a doubt how much they meant. Also I could do something for Twilight’s family, for all that they have given to Equestria.
*Sigh*, I think that’s going to become a problem later. Sighing so much, that is. After all my Cutie Mark was for the service and happiness of Equestria. Yet it seems that I’ve only been truly helping one third of the species as much as I should have. *Sigh*.
Dear Dean of CSFGU,
I hope you didn’t try to destroy records of non unicorn applicants after this most recent news article. I would be greatly interested myself in seeing how many non unicorns attempted to enter my school.
- HRH Princess Celestia
Philomena was an amazingly useful Pheonix, constantly regenerating feathers, faster than dragon mail, and cheaper too. I really hope the school didn’t try destroying those records. It would send all the wrong messages. I started on the second letter to Twilight Velvet, when the response arrived That was quicker than I expected. But why didn’t they send the records, I’m sure I gave them enough feathers of Philomena to send me a decent amount. Unless I’m lucky and … no. No trying to wiggle out of this.
Your Majesty,
While we didn’t destroy the records when the article came out. We do have a tradition of dumping them in the trash when we get them. After all it was yourself who said that this was a school for unicorns. So we never really saw the point in saving files for ponies that weren’t our race, after all it’s not like we could save them to see if they could retry later. Since they would have no reason to try again.
Although you’ll be glad to know that we tell them in no uncertain words that, as I’m sure you remember telling our founding members. ‘While a Cutie Mark is magical, and has a deep meaning to an individual. It doesn’t make the pony magical.’ and we let them know that, ‘only unicorns can cast spells. A non-unicorn just wouldn’t make it in our school.’ Although we no longer send a spell to carry our laughs at them. We make sure that we are civil enough to do it behind their backs.
So you won’t need to worry about those journalist finding anything. For there’s nothing to find.
Sincerely,
Dean Wizen Berry III
I headdesked for real this time. Not just shattering tile, but obliterating a desk. I really like that desk too. I let loose a scream backed by the primal force of the Royal Canterlot Voice, while tossing the broken desk out the window.
I could hear the guards trying to break the door down to get inside. Casting a quick illusion spell to look my best, I undid the locks so the poor guards wouldn’t break themselves trying to ‘save me’.
“Princess! We heard screaming, are you … “ Random Guard number one said, until he saw the shattered window.
The first rule in misdirection is to take advantage of somepony when they are off guard, “Oh I’m fine my little pony. I just saw a rat.”
“A rat?”
I fluffed my wings, “Yes, it was a big one. But it’s gone now.”
“I - A- Are you positive?”
I let loose a restoration spell returning the window to its former glory, “yes.”
“Well alight princess. I-we will just be outside. Just incase more rats show up,” he replied uncertainly. At least I think it was a he. Those concealment charms made to make them all look the same made it hard to tell sometimes.
“Thank you, I’m very proud to have such brave guards watch over me.” I reply in the most sincere tone I can give. After all it would be horrible for those doing their patriotic duty to feel as if I didn’t have use for them, or if I was insincere towards their sentiments.
I teleported the desk after resealing the locks. With a flick of my horn the desk was fixed, and another it was magically reinforced … hopefully well enough to avoid shattering. Making sure everything was in order, I tried headdesking with less destructive force this time. *Sigh*, it was Bright Pen who said that “Only two things are infinite. The universe and mortals stupidity, and I’m not so sure of the former.”
I don’t know what was worse. That my school had an old tradition to send the a scroll big enough to store a spell just to laugh at some unfortunate pony. Or that my own words, spoken many centuries ago were taken out of context and used to hurt my little ponies. Quite possibly the worst was that they tossed the applications out and laughed behind their backs and called that being civil … I think all my employees there need to take a few new ethics classes after I fix this mess.
After all I have, I looked at the grandfather clock Luna invented for one of our Hearth’s Warming Gifts in our old castle, two hours scheduled to be at parliament. More than enough time to try and fix this mess.
I let loose another sigh at the mountain of additional work that I would need to do. I point at a random stone at the wall, loosen it, and without looking in there I cast a dimensional pocket spell. The point of it was to ensure that I would be uncontaminated by what I was about to do to ensure a stable time loop. While the Star Swirl wing did have a one use time spell. There were a few others, but like me and Luna learned the hard way. Changing time isn’t easy, and it’s much simpler to simply alter events that have no impact on your past, but could be used to help your future. Although it would still need to be done carefully.
Even then, there were some events that one simply couldn’t change. Such as when Luna and I cast Star Swirl’s unfinished spell a few days before Luna fell. I still don’t know what it did, and honestly I’ve been scared to hear what Twilight would say. All that mattered is the finished product allowed a pony to affect their destiny, and Twilight’s destiny I had shaped for over a decade came to be. I just hope the Elements found away to give the other bearer’s the immortality they deserved as well. Since I couldn’t simply ascend them myself, although I hope they don’t look to deeply into the explanation I gave Twilight of creating new magic.
Going to the Aetheric plane is something that is disorientating, no matter how much practice I got, but I knew that since Luna was waiting for me to give me a shoulder to lean on. She’d be here in 3, 2, 1.
“Sister!” Luna’s voice echoed around me, before her body formed. Seeing her flail about before falling flat on her muzzle was chuckle worthy. She always had problems forming here, and it was adorable seeing her entry.
“Hello Lulu,” I said giving her a loving nuzzle while giving her a wing up.
“So are you done brooding?” Luna asked returning the nuzzle.
“I wasn’t brooding, I was looking at my past. Seeing myself through an unbiased lens.” I replied, “and I saw things which I was rather displeased by.”
“So you came to stalk somepony?”
“No sister. You remember how we used this place to manipulate small events?”
“Oh yes! Like how you stole cake that one time?”
*Sigh* “It wasn’t theft. That unicorn queen told the ponies that they should eat cake, so I thought it would be funny.”
“Then we learned that she meant a different kind of cake,” Luna giggled.
“Yes. Still I didn’t like her, she said I was fat and that you looked like you like bathing with … that one word.” Even if ponies thought I was a tribalist, and I was an accidental one didn’t mean I said certain words. I’m not as uncivilized as a mule … which now that I think about it the world had a million sayings about mules. From “Too mule for school”, to “stubborn as a mule”.
Is that speciesist? I don’t think so, it’s not like mules are ponies. “Lulu? Is thinking derogatory things about Mules speciesist?”
“I don’t think so, even when we were foals those sayings were popular. But at least ponies now apologize for saying them.”
“Yes. Apologize.” How long did it take before ponies apologized for all the sayings about them? I haven't the slightest.
“Sister, are you worried about the article?”
“It’s true. Not quite as malicious as they made it appear, although from what my school has told me it does seem that a bit of maliciousness does exist for those that represent myself.”
“How so?”
“Well we’re about to find out. After this we’ll need to get ready for our little get together.”
Luna looked at me questioningly.
Especially since you were thinking "I know that everypony feels a magical bond with their Cutie Marks but that doesn’t make it magic." just two chapters ago, and what the teachers at the school were doing were just following through with that sentiment.
And, of course this:
Preeeety sure that is exactly what it is.
Wait Twilight had 2.3 Swirls as a Unicorn, what's her rating now?
And yea it is a bit mean of the unicorn professors to laugh a non-unicorn applicants. But I can see why, they only teach Unicorn spell work, if Earth and Pegasus ponies spell cast it's not going to be the unicorn way. But on the other hand , having not explored the non unicorn spell casting methods is a terrible oversight, but I'm sure Twilight being the element of magic can figure it out and would be excessively happy to research it.
I believe the proper term is "malice". However, with this being dialogue, it's somewhat more excusable.
Putting a period between the "and I was an accidental one" and "didn't mean I said certain words" is unnecessary.
The behavior of a school supposedly headed by Celestia is somewhat worrying. Perhaps this issue is deeper than she thought initially.
7008647
Fixed second error fix. As for the first one. Idk, malice and maliciousness are both nouns. But the second one means "having the nature of, or resulting from malice." Which there attitudes do possess / arise from. So I guess it could go either way?
7008617
Well Twilight was more powerful than Starswirl as a unicorn [and had 1.3 Swirls] . Alicorns are usually many times stronger than a regular unicorn. So her levels would probably between God-hax, and WTF?
As for Twilight learning other races magic. Let's just say that she's been on top of that and the sequel has her experimental Earth Pony student.
7008586
It so is specieist . But at least she's thinking about it rather than glossing over it .
So how does she expect to correct this issue? I get the feeling that this action will only make things worse.
7009139
Next chapter we'll see the first step, and in the sequel via hooves on learning. Eventually, I hope at least. That I can get her learning all the different types of non-unicorn spell crafting. But mostly I'm letting the sequel build itself organically.
7009153 Will Twilight meet any masters of non unicorn spell casting? I can just imagine her going all twicthy due to her being told all her life that only unicorns can cast.
7009570
Zecora knows how to, and taught Twilight how to walk on water , and knew how to levitate multiple orbs of water for meditation purposes [Magic Duel]. Showing she's best Zebra-Yoda [although an utter nightmare to write].
7008617
7008745
I believe the correct equation would be
Twilight ≈ 1/4 Fully Charged Tirek, where a Fully Charged Tirek ≈ (every Earth pony) + (every Pegasus) + (every Unicorn) + Discord.
However, given the nature of the magic, it's quite possible that their powers combined are actually multiplied, so the above equations would really be for the exponential powers of the involved factors.
7011655
Well everytime Tirek fed he did get exponentially bigger physically. So there is a probably exponential factor.
And when he ate the Princesses Magic + Twilight he grew to the size of a mountain. So with Every non Alicorn + Discord he was huge.
But with all 4 Princesses he became many, many, many times bigger.
[4:05 - 4:20; 5:10 - 5:13 [final form full sized.]].
7011896 Indeed. Which also means, The BOX » 2 Fully Charged Tireks since it easily defeated him after he had absorbed the powers of the 4 princesses.
So, boys & girls, if you're having trouble with exponential problem solving, just remember the "Twilight's Kingdom" episode and you'll come to realize: FriendshipMath = Magic!
7012678
Math kills XD. And that's the truth. Well math and physics do love to join together with the occasional soiree with biology to kill the living.
But I think the box was a bit more powerful that that. I mean the entire Mane 6, were turned into nothingness, then reconstituted by pure energy into Magical Harmony Mass. Which then was 2X>> Tirek. Then immediately after pwning him, grew an entire functional castle out of pure crystal, that had the ability to sense every living creature in all of the world.
Nice chapter!
I'm curious what Celestia is intended to change.
Maybe what she told to the founders of the school?
One last thing:
You should look for an proofreader. There are no big errors, but many small ones which gets annoying in the long run.
7013989
Sorry. I do have two technically.
One's caught up to the sequel and caught some stuff. The other one only got up to chapter 2 of this fic so far, and he's super busy IRL. But I do promise that when the new pre-reader fixes a chapter it gets switched out, and when he gets through all of the chapters here. I'll be sending a Tagged Story Blog letting everyone know that the story is error free ... or to the extent of my knowledge error free.
Huh, I don't know about Twilight having more raw power than ol' Swirley as a unicorn, but we almost never see her go all out with her power as a unicorn either, so it's probably up to artists interpretation.
At this point, I'm starting to wonder about the other two tribes. Did they just not bother even trying to learn magic on their own over the last 1,000 years, since they got those spell scrolls with the laugh in them? Ponies do seem to lack individual initiative, it has to be admitted. It's probably their biggest weakness.
7014108
Well it's cannon that she's more powerful than Starswirl. It says show in the show ... well they say, "Most powerful unicorn since Starswirl the Bearded," and she did pull off things that he was unable to do. Including hacking the gateway to his "Supervillain Garbage disposal Universe", and finished a spell he was unable to do. [although yes, both of those technically don't count as unicorn.]
And she was able to go toe to toe with Tirek ... which makes the whole Starlight Glimmer being more powerful than Twilight thing totally ridiculous. As well as another point of proof of the whole "made new magic" bunk a lie.
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Well technically they do have magic ... it's just that it gets under-appreciated, looked down upon, or outright called "not magic". Even though you have Zebra Voodoo / Shaman Spells, and all of Pinkie Pie's family. But yeah the few who did either want to further it, or got a Cutie Mark in it. Got constantly down trodden, and was an uphill losing battle to the status quo. So the few who do, do it in Equestria are forced to work on trial and error. While facing ridicule by others.
That and the whole ' herd minds suck at initiative most of the time' thing.
7014180 Being able to write new spells or hack Starswirl's spells doesn't mean Twilight has more raw magic, it means she's smarter than Starswirl, or she has the benefits of another thousand years of advancement of magic theory and study to draw on. (Was Einstein a better scientist than Pythagoras because his mathematics were much more advanced?) Or, Starswirl never saw a need to hack the mirror because he never had a friend on the other side with a magic book, and he never finished his last spell for the same reason: He was a misanthrope with no understanding of friendship.
Tirek was obviously not getting a 1 for 1 conversion on the magic he absorbed. If Luna and Celestia each have roughly 2.5 Swirls, and clearly Discord has more than 5 Swirls since he is stronger than the two sisters on their own, and Tirek has absorbed the energy of hundreds of thousands of unicorns, so he has absorbed what, 10,000 Swirls? Twilight has 2.5 Swirls plus 2.5 Swirls plus 9 Clovers plus herself. You could say then fine, Twilight is just so powerful she has 10,000 Swirls on her own, but then absorbing the power of the other alicorns shouldn't have been so difficult for her to adjust to. If Tirek actually was wielding 10,000 Swirls of power, he would have crushed Twilight like a nat......... unless he is incredibly inefficient at using the magical power he absorbs, with most of the magic just growing and rejuvenating his body. If he only is able to use say 1,000th of the power he absorbs, then it makes sense he would tie with Twilight, even with all the magic he absorbed.
Honestly, the Starlight fight was no more ridiculous or nonsensical than the Tirek fight, just going to show that a weaker fighter (I'm going to guess Starlight at like 1.5 Swirls) can beat a much stronger fighter if they have superior training and tactical thinking instead of raw power and theoretical knowledge.
Yeah, I think your logic on the magic of the other tribes makes sense, but if you're writing a story about Celestia trying to rebalance society in favor of other tribes including earth ponies having easier access to learning magic, you're going to have to fit in Maud Pie's Rockterate at some point.
7014251
Here's the thing. Clover is an Average Unicorn measurement. So a (with approx. 900 to a thousand ponies in all of Equestria), there is a massive range of power differences. We see that he does grow each time he feeds. That's just a fact. And each time he feeds, he becomes more powerful. That also is a fact.
Not all ponies have the same level of magic, or even the same efficiency using it. Some unicorns range in levels less than a Clover (or .X(XX....) Clover.). And add that in to the fact that even with low power levels. High levels of manipulation / control can give just as much an illusion of power as more powerful ponies [such as Rares. She doesn't have that much raw power, but she has ridiculously high levels of control, and manipulation.]. So even with feeding on a one to one scale. That one to one scale is hardly equal one to one across all ponies. I mean Ditzy doesn't have the power of Spitfire, who doesn't have the power of Rainbow Dash, who's Twilight Levels of power in Pegasi Magic [at least in some fics. Others just have her as the "fastest pegasi in all of Equestria" (Pinkie Pie's a faster pony technically.)].
So as you can see. Just because all ponies have magic. Doesn't mean that that magic is equal to all ponies. Or that all ponies can be comparable to the Mane 6 in terms of power.
And yes those things don't make her [Twilight] more powerful. What makes her more powerful is the show said she was. Thus she is.
She didn't have 2.5 Swirls but 1.3 as a unicorn. So yes she's more powerful. As for why it was more harder for her to adapt. Here are a few reasons.
1) Power gained is Expotential. Tirek at all the power of Equestria minus the Princesses. Was as big as a house. After eating them grew as big as a mountain. So it's not a straight on 1:1.
2) Sure Twilight was Powerful. but then you take Twilight's Base ^ Celestia ^ Luna ^ Cadance (or even a Twilight ^ CelestiaXCadanceXLuna) and you have power that is many times more higher than what was her base. So of course she would have problems, since her body wasn't given that power over time, and her biology isn't hardwired to eat and consume magical energy.
3) She was dealing with the entirety of Tia, Luna, and Cadance. Not just what they are able to channel normally (and safely). As I'm sure you know, the body has tons of limiters, and blockers to keep a person under normal cirmumstances from going at full power. To prevent their body from destroying itself. Sure a skinny person can lift a semi truck, but doing so would utterly wreck their body. So is true for magic use. The body simply doesn't want the pony going at 100% power, because much like opening the higher levels of the Celestial Gates would kill / horribly injure a normal person.
Thus Taking all that power in. Including the parts that normally never get utilized. Is far more than a normal body can handle. It's like taking a full cup [Twilight's base energy levels], and trying to pour in a lake into it. And hoping the cup would hold it in.
4) It's not that Discord is more powerful than the Princesses. Rather his magic, and powers work on their own rules and conditions. That are so opposite to reality, that reality becomes his mistress. It's not so much a power thing, as much as a dirty, dirty, cheater thing. Especially since the rules of reality in any given point (including himself) are whatever he says they are. And his only two weaknesses are the Elements of Harmony, and Tirek after he ate all the normal ponies in Equestria - the mane 6.
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And yes the Starlight thing was super ridiculous. Show states Twilight's the most powerful since Starswirl.
Starlight:
1) Invents magic to steal Cutie Marks [she herself states she invented the spell]. Which is uniquely her own spell.
2) Breaks into a secure vault in Canterlot, and steals a Time Travel Spell.
3) Invents a spell to make the time travel spell, an Infinite Loop Time Travel Spell.
4) Barely breaks a sweat, while Twilight gets more and more out of shape magically and physically. Showing she's more powerful than an Alicorn. Which should not be possible.
5) What's more this unicorn is more powerful than an Alicorn who when a unicorn was stated to be the most powerful. Then got an Alicorn level power boost.
....
6) Thing that makes me want to end Starlight Glimmer in the most horrible way possible. Trixie gets blamed for the poor parenting skills of Ponyville; Using her gimmick to the fullest after Rares, AJ, and RD Vandalize her home / stage [Rares] and Heckle her non-stop [all 3 of them]; and all in a donation basis show.
Spread rumors, and "What happened" so that Trixie's home get's constantly destroyed, or she gets run out of town by angry mobs. To her desperation makes her do something stupid. Even after that. Her "redemption" is open ended, and gives 0 closure.
Starlight rapes the timeline, putting the entire multiverse in danger, brainwashes / mind rapes a town into communism, and does multiple atrocious Crimes Against The Crown / Equinity.
Get's instantly forgiven by all of Twilight friends, and ends on a touchy feely BS. That Trixie gets dicked out of. Frell even now there's tons of Trixie hate fics / Fics that snipe at Trixie. Yet Starlight Glimmer even as a villain in stories gets tons of more respect than Trixie ever did or will ever get.
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As for Maud. That's not Earth Pony Magic. That's geology. At least from what we learn in the Hearth Breakers episode. I think it's stupid what they did. But apparently Geologist get Rocktorates since they work with Rocks / Minerals / Gems.
7014382 I get that there's an average there, but if Clover is an average and Starswirl is 10x Clover, that's why I said only 10,000 Swirls when Tirek had absorbed hundreds of thousands of unicorns (and all the other ponies as well). I don't get how you think Tirek gets exponential power growth, exponential means extra power has to come from somewhere else. How does one being absorbing the magic of another being have more magic than those original 2 beings combined? I can see the absorber having less than 2, especially if most of the magic goes into increasing your body size to become as big as a mountain, rather than giving you mana reserves.
When did the show say Twilight was the most powerful unicorn since Starswirl the Bearded? Was it actually an omniscient narrator, or a particular character, who probably didn't know Starlight existed at the time?
1) Yeah, clearly it's not enough to just "invent magic" to ascend to being an alicorn, otherwise like every professor at the CSfGU who ever did any magic research would become an alicorn. Twilight cast that spell in conjunction with the EoH, while Cadance performed some vague magic while interacting with a magical crystal locket that resembled the Crystal Heart, and was probably from the Crystal Empire. I suspect the Harmony Tree or something similar has to induct you into the "horns and wings" club.
2) We saw just how tough the security is on Starswirl's Wing, i.e. not very.
3) Just like Sunset Shimmer, Starlight Glimmer hijacks the power of a magic crystal artifact to perform her spell (also the scroll itself seemed magical, but don't hold me to that).
4) You just said Starswirl and unicorn Twilight are stronger than Cadance! Also, Twilight is sweating harder because she is fighting dumber, because she never bothered to train. Starlight is doing the magical aikido here, turning her foe's strength against her.
5) See my above point doubting that assertion from the show.
6) I totally agree with you about Trixie, she lost her wagon successfully saving the lives of Snips and Snails by delaying the Ursa long enough for them to get away. But maybe the point is, the Mane 6 learned their lesson from Trixie and Discord, so they realized they should have gone all in on friendship and reformation from the start. I would hope that Trixie is welcome at any time to show up at the Crystal Castle and become another friendship student if she wants to. I certainly wouldn't complain about an episode where Twilight and the gang track down Trixie and apologize for not treating her better from the start.
But really, how many fics get written today that are Trixie-hate fics? I mean, a lot of them kind of tease her, in the same way they tease Rainbow Dash, because they have a similar personality. I think the vast majority of the fandom love Beatrice Lulamoon.
7014474
Celestia said it herself. So if Celestia said it in the show in a throw away line. Then if she said that, then it must be so.
As for exponential. You're thinking of energy as solid objects. Rather than their own energy fields. As he collects energy, their waves and raw energy components build off of, and enhance one another. Think of it like a resonant transformer / Tesla Coil. A battery [raw energy] goes in to a conduit [the coil] and it gets a whole lot more powerful than it was on it's own.
That and it wasn't hundreds of thousands. More like hundreds of ponies all together.
In the shows foreground and background in the first three seasons there were ~794 ponies all together. Add in Manehatten, Vanhoover, Fillydelphia, and the unseen. There's probably barely hitting the high thousands. Possibly even the low tens of thousands.
Still alot. But it was enough to turn him from slightly bigger than pony size [we see his depowered "Empty Form" as the same as when he first appeared in the show before his first meal.] To as high as a Twilight's Library, and his horse leg bigger than Twilight was wide. He was practically a walking building. And not only that, his physical growth was mirrored in magical power.
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Yeah. Just like regular ponies have a varied level of powers. And with how weak her power is as a whole. I thought that not all alicorns would be higher levels. But yeah, Cadance really doesn't do much powerwise, and her big magic acts 1 involves Shining Armor pumping his power into hers.
The second the Crystal Heart powered by every pony in the Crystal Empire.
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Still. Starlight Glimmer was a freaking Marry Sue.
As for Cadance's ascension. She broke a love manipulating crystal of doom. By not being mind raped by a spell ... a weak sauce reason for ascending. But didn't involve magic on her part. As much as not being affected by magic.
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And yeah they need to have a Trixie episode where she's not dumped on. But apparently that's about as likely to happen as Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash getting an episode dedicated to them, rather then those two being in the background of their own sister episode.
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And yes. There are lots of Trixie love episodes. But the ones (and there's more than a few) that exist snipe the hell out of her. Frak. Even the fic's that have her as a romantic interest such as http://www.fimfiction.net/story/178685/opening-twilights-heart [barely, for a short while. But does this hard.], http://www.fimfiction.net/story/168902/trixies-forest-retreat[eventually subverted by Trixie way into the fic.]; http://www.fimfiction.net/story/37836/of-maids-and-mistresses [Boy does it do it hard big time]; and even http://www.fimfiction.net/story/58101/lodestar [Does this hard for a redemption fic. Especially the hate in the comments.] goes with "Everything in Ponyville was Trixie's fault" bit.
Heck almost noone really seems to care that the only thing she ever did wrong was the Alicorn Amulet, and even that was caused by stress /temporary insanity from not only not being able to do one's Special Talent, but her very dreams and livelihood utterly destroyed.
Yet none of the girls go out of their way to ever help her, or make things right. They put all the blame on Trixie, and make her have to be "the humble one". Because it is all "her fault".
And that's not even touching the fics with actual Trixie hate. [A writer's group thread]. But yeah, There's actually quite a bit of Trixie hate. Or just writing her as a villain in the most ugliest of ways.
7014626 Even Celestia gets things wrong sometimes (as this fic makes pretty clear). I doubt she said it after Starlight mutilated space and time, Starlight was clearly slipping under the radar of the Princesses, metaphorically speaking.
Transformers change the voltage of electricity, they don't actually create new energy out of no where. Tirek's size doesn't seem to correlate that closely with the amount of power he is drawing in, (probably due to poor writing). It's also possible that he had absorbed all the magical mana reserves he could before he got to Twilight, so everything else had to go into increasing his size. Or he didn't want to get too big because it wasn't practical for catching and absorbing individual ponies, but once he had gotten everyone's magic, he could grow as big as he want and carry on his true war against trees!
Do you really think Tirek took in less than 1,000 ponies? Celestia had said he had absorbed the energy of almost everyone in Equestria. I assume the population of Equestria is like 30 million, and in the few weeks of Tirek/Discord team up, Discord was like an evil santa claus that helped Tirek aborb everyone's power at an incredibly rate. Are you saying only the ponies we actually saw get absorbed actually got absorbed? Or that Equestria has a smaller population than Wyoming?
Yeah, Starlight is an annoying Mary Sue, even if you agree with everything I said, it still means she was this friggin' genius who self-taught herself the most advanced magic in existence and secretly built a cult town without getting on the authority's radar for decades, while Sunburst gets one magic cutie mark from levitating 50 pounds of books and gets shipped straight to the CSfGU. I'm glad she was redeemed, but I don't actually like her, I want her to move back to Our Town or go off and marry Sunburst, and never be seen again. If they need a second unicorn, Sunset, Trixie or Moondancer would all be much better choices (maybe Moondancer most of all because she isn't another super-unicorn, it would be nice to have another average unicorn around).
I was kind of bummed they never brought up Trixie in the Hearth's Warming, or when Maud visited. Even though you know at one point, Trixie touched Holder's Boulder. (How great would it have been, in that scene where the Apple Family is sleeping in the guest bunks, if there was a little carving in the wood that said 'Trixie was here!'). A lot of those fics you linked to started in 2012, I think there was actually more hate for Trixie in the early years than there was after the Alicorn Amulet incident. It's like with Blueblood: The people who hated him wrote a lot of hate-fics early on, but got kind of tired of it, the people who want to write him as a sympathetic 3-dimensional character are still finding new ways to explore him. You've read the Lunaverse, right? Where Trixie replaced Twilight as the Element of Magic? Those guys do a fantastic job at writing Trixie.
7014726
Tesla Coils, which are called Resonant Transformers. Generate volts of electricity far more greater than the elecricity put into it.
Yes in the thousands. I say this because in Season 3 I did a count of every pony and every gender in the show foreground and background from Season 1 to Season 3. Not counting repeats, and the Royal Guard [I got to 45 before I lost count since there's no distinguishing marks, or anything on any of them.].
http://www.fimfiction.net/blog/201457/canon-gender-split
We have 488 females to 264 males: 752 ponies. That's all of Ponyville, Appleoosa, a majority of Cloudsdale, and a Fraction of Dodge Juction, and Canterlot, and all of the Crystal Empire.
So we aren't really dealing with the 30 millions. Heck pony population for all that they have land and culture wise. Isn't really that big of one.
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Of Maids and Mistresses yes. That was 2012. The rest either were in 2014 and up. Or like Lodestar, was late after Magic Duel. And those were the good ones, where Trixie was given some respect. Not the ones that were pure Trixie hate.
7014863 So you're telling me that a pony population that includes Manehatten still totals in less than ten thousand? I picked 30 million because Equestria is about the size of the US, but even though the US has large uninhabitable areas, I assumed Equestria had many more of those, so the population is only a tenth that of the US. Realistically, you can't have an industrial economy with a population fewer than ten million. That list you generated you admit is not a full list, but a controlled sample.
Heck if there are only a few thousand ponies in Equestria, how did no one notice all the grifters disappearing to Our Town? That's like 100 ponies, that would be like if 3 million people disappeared over a decade, we would notice.
7015248
You're thinking modern world levels of technology. And you're thinking of only humans (earth ponies).
Equestria while it is big, is not as populated as America. Which has 52 states. Each state packed to the brim with people. The lands and cities they have are widely spread apart, connected by train. And more than a few of those aren't mentioned. Then you have to think of city size.
Yes, Fillydelphia and Manehatten are huge. But most cities don't get bigger than Ponyville, or Appleoosa [which does have a population of the low hundreds]. Even their capital city is small. Yes it just out from a mountain. But only the top part, and even then only takes up a part of one side of it.
But ponies aren't human. Nor bound to a single races short comings. They have magic that replaces the need for most tech; Have magic that can build / repair things almost instantly; Have access to weather and nature altering tech, and the power of a single well trained pony of any tribe far outstrips what a person can do. Heck even agriculturally they can plow the fields with only one worker, rather than needing humans to do it for them.
So they can get by with less. As for missing grifters ...
We're talking about a society that lets children run away in cannon and doesn't think twice nor care all that much. Both as we see with Filly Pinks not long after her Cutie Mark; Fannon Dashie after leaving flight school and doing her own thing [and possibly filly Flutters leaving the skies]; Heck even Cheese Sandwhich's backstory is that he was a colt, ran away from home, and got his Cutie Mark at a Pinkie Party. Noone cared that he ran away, noone cared that he had no adults with him, noone cared that he had no money or means to support himself.
So it's not that hard to imagine that those grifters that left, noone cared. Or they didn't care enough to look for them. It's a common thread in Equestrian Culture.
So we have a society of beings who're stronger, faster, smarter (they learn College Level Astrophysics in Elementary School in cannon for crying out loud), and all around better than humans for most intents and purposes. Living in a society of anachronistic tech development, and if need to can do it / build it with magic. Or use tech (Earth Pony, Unicorn, or Pegsai) to assist them in building it faster than a human could.
Then of course we have Reality Warpers. Ponies who can build tech simply by willing it to exist and reality obliges them, This is of course ignoring spells that warp / alter reality. To one level or another.
So using earth population size really doesn't work. Especially for the whole cities we do see. Few of them leave the low hundreds, so as I stated.
Either it's in the low tens of thousands, or the high thousands. But I doubt with how small their cities are [remember. Not states, those places on the maps are individual ciites], that they'd hit the millions. There's just to few cities that exist, and too small to even be considered a state.
7015391 You could design a techless society for ponies, but that's not what we've seen. Someone has to build refrigerators and sewing machines and trains, and I doubt there is one pony each with a train cutie mark that somehow magically builds one in a day. We've seen smokestacks in Manehatten, which means factories. They have hydro-dams, which means mass electrical power, which means lots of technology that isn't just "magic" powered. There's also the question of just how that technology gets invented. The weakness of cutie marks is they bind ponies to a specific thing, so I doubt a pony with the cart cutie mark invented trains. You need that huge population density to support enough geniuses to invent lots of new inventions in relative succession to have an industrial age. There certainly aren't enough unicorns in Canterlot to maintain that kind of pace, you're right that it is a fairly small city.
(Also, when did they teach advanced astrophysics in elementary school? I don't remember seeing anything in Cheerilee's class that comes off as challenging to the average human ten year old).
Also, remember the Grand Equestrian Pony Summit, with delegates from the 50 largest cities. You don't see 50 cities on any Equestrian map, which means there are a lot more cities in Equestria than are shown on the map. And since Ponyville and Appleloosa apparently don't have their own delegates, all 50 of those cities must be larger than Ponyville.
7015702
I didn't say techless. Heck I said in numerous times in that post the word tech. And even mentioned types of tech. I even mentioned how magic could enhance the speed and production of tech, or in some cases completely eliminate the need for factories to build stuff.
I just told you that they have access to magic as well. And aren't limited to human disadvantages. Especially where creating things is involved. They are faster, stronger, and smarter than humans. The only advantage we have is hands. And if a pony wants hands, Griffons or Dragons would probably be willing to help if The Price is Right. So that only advantage isn't all that big.
As for needing alot: We see Cloudsdale. A City of a few hundred, yet only a fraction are needed to use Pegasi Tech to engineer and master the weather production. And Equestria if you've noticed, doesn't really advance technologically all that much. Outside of bits and bursts [their technology is filled with anachronisms. With some modern tech. Tons of 1900's tech. Or things invented in the early industrial era as modern tech.].
So they don't have huge jumps, and innovations. They move slowly, where technology is concerned. Heck they still use normal post offices or Twilight's dragon fire spell to deliver messages, rather than invent phones. And instead of TVs have those cheesy 1950's movie reels.
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As for Astrophysics:
mlpforums.com/uploads/post_images/img-1081894-1-Cheerilee_s_Equation.png
And yes that equation is correct. [on link page Ctrl+F: astrophysics].
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7015756
That's circular logic, there are only a few hundred pegasi in Cloudsdale because only a few hundred are needed to create weather, and we know only a few hundred are needed to create weather because there are only a few hundred in Cloudsdale.
I know you said magic could eliminate the need for factories, there's just no evidence of that, and considering the limitations of magic we've seen it seems pretty unlikely there is a magic train factory conjuring trains in Manehatten. If raw materials could easily be conjured for that, Rarity wouldn't have to dig for gems, so a magical extraction industry is right out. Heck, we've seen the cutting edge of magical technology, they're the Flim Flam Brothers, two ordinary unicorns brilliant enough to take over Equestria. They build a fancy piece of technology like the Cider Squeezy machine and use their magic as a power source and apple quality judger, taking the work of 8 and bringing it down to two, which sounds pretty much in line with 1950s technology in the first place. Magic lets a population of ponies keep up with humanity in their technological advance, in spite of being only 1 tenth as populous as us, but that's as much ground as it can cover.
Thanks for linking it! Did you read the full quote?
I agree on faster for Pegasi and stronger for earth ponies, but I don't see any evidence for smarter. Heck, Equestria has had a thousand years of stable governance and their technology has advanced much more slowly. You know what else you need for technological advancement? Widespread advanced education, which you seem to argue doesn't exist outside of a single school for unicorns in one of the smaller cities in Equestria.
Heck, there's a good chance with Equestria's technology being so schizophrenic and hands-based (like scissors and door knobs) that they don't build anything with magic or technology, they just buy everything from the minotaurs in exchange for their agricultural surplus.
7016238
It may be circular logic. But in the Cloudeseum, there were a few hundred. In the factories, it didn't even hit the hundreds. As I said a fraction of what lives in Cloudsdale. I didn't say the entirety of Cloudsdale.
As for magic. We see:
1) It has the ability to repair/alter broken things / (Restoration / Transformation Spells). [As seen in Rarity Takes Manehatten [wheel], and Rarity vandalizing Trixie's home [magically transmogrifying Trixie's curtain into pretty dresses]. Among other things.
True it can't conjure materials. But it can shape, alter, transform, repair, put together, meld, mend, and alchemically effect materials to become other materials.
2) Magic can do the heavy lifting, and all the things robots do nowadays in assembly lines easier and faster. Especially if they have a Cutie Mark in that field.
and
3) Magic might have a few limitations. But it's proven time and time again that it makes science / physics it's b17<h. Not only laughing in the face of what biology, physics, and science says are laws. But breaking those laws, tossing it into science's face, then taunting it with things that are otherwise undo able.
And we see time and time again that "laws of magic" can be undone or even entirely proven false when someone learns how to do it. J
As for Conjuration. We see that it is possible. Both when Trixie, and later Rarity were using artifacts that gave massive power boost [especially in Rarity's case when her imagination manifested]. So Conjuration of materials is possible. It's just not a school studied / shown that much. And as I said earlier. Rarity isn't a powerful magic user. Her magic level is actually pretty weak, but she has ridiculous levels of control.
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You're the one who didn't read the full quote:
That was Cheerilee's Class. For Cheerilee's Class. So her students were learning that.
There are more ponies than those for her class room. More doors are implied, and the school is big enough to hold multiple class rooms and age groups of ponies.
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Faster; Horses as a whole have a base average of 55 MPH running speed, with a slow walk speed of 4 mph [2.95 mph is the human average walking speed, while humans on average have running speeds of 8 mph, or 15 mph sprinting average.].
So Twilight a unicorn in a mostly Earth Pony and Pegasi race finished in 5th. So base wise can go for either one. Although Earth Ponies do get a buff to strength and [land] speed with their Earth Magic Buff, and constantly using their muscles to move stuff.
Pegasi have greater air speeds and aerodynamics.
Unicorns can Teleport. Well those who can Teleport automatically beat all the others in speed, if and when they use that ability.
Stronger: A normal horse [not strong ones, or ones who work out] can easily carry 15 - 20% of their weight without stress. Of course this isn't a fair average there. I mean you have a few that can lift buildings single hoovedly, or those who can lift incacluble weights with their tails.
So even taking into the 15 -20% for on earth ponies. Equestria Ponies subvert that all the day long.
as for Smarter:
As you'll see in that quote [if you read the correction to that ball of stupid the "one classroom" guy made] that's Cheerilee's class. You add in the fact that they [pegasi] need the equivalent of a pilots licence from the time their small children and get their wings, unicorns have physics breaking death rays on their heads (that are capable of killing anyone accidentally with even the barest use of magic [tossing something sharp or blunt, or loosing control of something sharp or blunt in the wrong way].
As well as the fact that they are expected to hold down jobs at CMC age (minimum), or go to a higher education (that'll take them if any). The fact that they can be socially independent without adult super vision at CMC age. Even to the point of living away from home / adults that know them (unless they are lucky). And are expected to know enough at that age not to go homeless forever.
It makes sense that they are smarter.
Yes they don't have all of our tech or to greater amounts. But that's because they don't need it. As well as the fact that their ruler is an immortal. Immortal rulers aren't known for how fast they make / allow change a majority of the time. At least not in fantasy environments a majority of the time.
As for things being hands based. You're forgetting that they do the same thing in Cloudsdale, Same thing Pre-Equestria [when it was only ponies, and tribal supremacy. All other races were seen as inferior, and lesser beings.] All of they tech even then was hands based.
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And you're forgetting the actual thing needed for technological advancement. Well 2 seperate things:
1) Necessity [Our greatest inventions came from war. The need to build better and greater things than our enemies, and be more advanced made many of the civilian technologies we enjoy today; As well as other times in history when humans were forced to create for our survival or protection. Necessity is the Mother of Invention.]
Ponies aren't just stable, they have no real needs. There's no constant wars, no great threats [that the EoH / Celestia hasn't dealt with]; no real need for most tech / tech advances. They are socially and emotionally stable for the most part. And with that stability means there's nothing necessitating the creation of new things a majority of the time. For a majority of needs.
Air Travel: They have pegasi chariots. Or for many ponies Zeppelins. And recently as of Pinkie Pie's invetion. Rotarcopters [pedal based Helicopters].
Communciation: Scrolls and magically assisted scroll transmission has worked for Celestia and Equestria since forever. So they have hadn't a need to create telephones, or Email. Sure it'd be useful, but they don't have them because they never had the need for them.
Entertainment: They don't have TV's, because they never felt the need to move past Reels / Projectors. Sure it'd be useful, but they don't know that yet. And heck, it's possible they could make them so it can fit in a AU, but cannon. They never felt the need for Radio / Transmission towers. So broadcasting networks never came to be. All because it simply never occured to them since they don't need it.
etc: is Etc.
and
2) A frantic need to leave a legacy regardless of effects on the world:
A lot of massive boost of advancement has come with horrible costs to the populace, environment, and planet as a whole. Because most people see that as the next generations problem. And mortal rulers have such a short time alive to do only so much. That bribes, promises for X, and what have you. Push them to doing whatever it takes to further their end goals.
Equestria is ruled by an immortal. She doesn't think a single lifetime a head, or even a generation ahead. She's been around to see countless lifetimes and generations (in a mortals perspective) go by. And thinks not of a few measly years. But generations in the future the repercussions of her actions or the effects of doing X.
And would move to ensure any construction / industry / creation is done in a way that's safe for the world. In harmony with nature / the world. And wouldn't have many long term consequences. And being the ruler, would ensure that unlike a mortal ruler. Things move at the speed needed to be safe [so you know. No toxic waste dumps; no barrels of nuklear waste thrown in / resting in oceans. Not having it so that nearly all fish in the world contains trace elements of mercury. Etc.].
So yes. Higher education means more inventions normally. Except when there's not a drive or a need for advancement [or you have an immortal ruler keeping all the horrors excessive advancement [and yes our world's technology is growing to fast for our species. And have now, and in the past made tech we haven't understood and kept advancing it because we could and for the riches.], and ensuring that advancement happens in a way that doesn't screw the world like a 2 bit whorse.].
7017271 The population of a sports stadium is not the population of an entire city. It's a tiny fraction.
If you read the full quote on Cheerilee's equation, you would also see they are saying the reason that particular equation was shown was because the rulers have a connection to the sun and moon, so there is a special focus on celestial objects, rather than astrophysics being indicative of the general education level. And yeah, there are other doors, but that doesn't mean there are other classrooms, that's the door to the Newspaper room and/or the supply room. That building is tiny.
Magic does break the laws of physics, but it also has to obey its own laws that physics can ignore (after Equestria Games, when a single teenager built a hand-held device in a few weeks that curb-stomped all the magic in the world, it's looks like technology can make magic it's beyootch.) For example, I can absolutely see from a technology/scientific point of view that spells to repair an object are pretty similar to assembling an object from base materials. But from a magical point of view restoring something to its orginal state is very different indeed from forming something new, laws of thaumaturgy and enchantment that are like the laws of physics. (For a great example of this in more detail, I recommend the Master of the Five Magics for a more detailed look at this. Remember how Rarity hatefully sewed all those Princess Dresses, even though she didn't want to, even though she wasn't putting in any TLC? If she'd had spells to just transform the raw materiel, she would have used them. She did use magic to speed things up, with her levitation, and she probably got about as fast as someone with a fancy electric sewing machine would have gone.
There are an exceptional few magical artifacts that can boost a pony's magic, but they all seem incredibly dark and dangerous, and stored in hidden vaults of curio ships, I think its a safe assumption that they are not being used to make widgets.
For the stronger faster, I would generally agree, except you're using numbers from full grown horses, we are talking about ponies the size of a St. Bernard. And only a rounding error of unicorns can teleport.
By the logic of Pegasi, do you think birds are smarter? They need the equivalent of a pilot's license by the time they are like 2. The number of unicorns who can fire off death rays, let alone foals, is a rounding error, and accidents do happen all the time (Twilight, the smartest unicorn ever, has had how many spell mistakes?) So no, they are not smarter.
Foals who can eat grass when they wander off and start their lives as grifters and hobos, and a society that ignores them, is not in my view a sign of great intelligence in that society. Did we use to be smarter in the 19th Century, when we had widespread child labor? We had 14 year old officers controlling adult men in the military. As we grew smarter as a society, we realized that a full childhood letting people develop more and get an advanced education was a better investment than wasting it having kids try and work when they were 12. And I wouldn't call ponies emotionally stable, at least not more than humans. They are herd-based, panicky creatures who have a great deal of problems with deviations in routine.
In terms of lack of war to drive technological progress, there you have a point I admit. There's also the fact that cutie marks delay technological progress, since a large part of the workforce can be locked into a particular invention from the time they are ten to the time they die, that's a big impediment to innovation.
I disagree with the idea that technological innovation requires huge environmental destruction though. Technology and Industrialization are not the same thing. And part of technological progress is finding ways to minimize ecological harm, or even reverse it. If Celestia had a more widespread advanced education system, she'd could be getting more environmentally friendly technology, rather than coal-chugging trains or hydraulic dams, both of which are not exactly great for the environment.
7017494
Re-read the quote. It says that special importance would be placed there yes. But it also was the reason that astrophysics was taught, since things in outerspace / the celestial bodies [which the rulers control everything in outerspace] have more importance than they do on earth.
And your wrong on there only being one classroom.
We see her class, and there are way more ponies in the school than in her class room. Also if you read the quote all the way you'd notice it [the guy countering the "one class room" guy] says that interiors are always bigger on the inside than there's room on the outside.
Not only is that a trope of Equestria in General (look up "my little pony" under the "western animation folder"). But we see time and time again in the show. Places that look ridiculously small on the outside, have ungodly roomy rooms on the inside. Case and point:
vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/mlp/images/c/cb/Rarity_Carousel_Boutique.png/revision/latest?cb=20110805212648
outside
s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/e5/85/c0/e585c0f38fc06759576851bc948237c7.jpg
inside one ...
vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/mlp/images/7/72/Hoity_Toity_carousel_boutique_S01E14.png/revision/latest?cb=20110922224551
two .. and that's not even her entire house. You can fit numerous regular houses in her boutique.
Let's not forget:
img08.deviantart.net/3fab/i/2013/237/f/0/twilight_s_library__golden_oaks_library_by_gatesmccloud-d6jni16.jpg
outside
and
i3.photobucket.com/albums/y84/tsukinofaerii/My%20Little%20Pony/Episode1/40.png
Held all of Ponyville for the Pinkie Pie Party.
Those are only two examples. The show has tons more.
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You can't judge a building by what it looks like on the outside. Because that means absolutely nothing to the size inside it.
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There was never a teenager who built a device that defeated all magic in the show. Ever. Nor was there ever anyone in the show who made tech that shut down magic in the show.
If you're talking about Starlight Glimmer. She out right states that the staff wasn't a magical artifact and that the spell cast was one she invented. So that's magic.
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And that's actually only barely true. We see numerous instances where something that "can't be done" with magic. Is done with magic.
So yes there are laws, and rules. Most of those laws and rules are meant to be broken, or have instances when they don't work ... and Discord isn't involved.
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And forming something entirely new isn't all that difficult. Heck it's done all the time in the show, and Twilight's practiced numerous spells.
On a technological stand point. 1) If the materials exist [Or can be conjured / created. Since we see this is also possible with magic in the show] ,2) a mental / physical blue print exists [again. We see things being created with the power of the mind / a mental shape given form), and 3) either a sufficiently powerful unicorn, or enough unicorns to power the spell / series of spells.
It's easy peasy. Then of course you have pure magical constructs. Which again. The show has shown is doable on multiple occasions. As for transforming things into entirely new things. Twilight was able to make a horse (mouse) drawn carriage from mice and a pumpkin. The mice-horses ran off. But still only one of the many, many transformations possible.
So it's not as difficult as you make it sound. If anything it's super simple.
Then of course you have Pegasi Magical Tech. Tech made mostly from clouds, weather, and some physical metals / machines [held up with pegasi magic]. Which is super simple in it's construction with enough cloud material. Since it's made from clouds can easily be shaped and molded.
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I don't know? Do birds need to use flight, weather manipulation, and control to ensure that all of the world's water and weather needs happen? Because if they fail to use those powers properly everypony would die? Do birds need to know the advanced maths, and sciences needed to properly form the proper clouds, in the proper possitions, or need to know how to use their flying ability not to crash into other things? Do birds need to carry people across the sky to many different destinations? Do birds act as sky cargo movers?
Tell me how easy is it to throw a rock, or shoot sharp objects with Telekinesis?
Since spells have particular methodologies to do X. And yes Twilight makes mistakes, but think of how dangerous and catastrophic they are. Now think of what'd happen if they didn't get appropriate training to use those horns? They are litterally dangerous weapons that have the ability to do massive harm. Even weaklings like Cadance and Rarity can do massive damage with them.
Frell, there was a spell that ripped off Cutie Marks. A ponies Special Talent / Destiny.
A Pony needs to be smart enough, and intelligent enough to use those abilities without doing great harm. And yes mistakes can happen. But without proper training, those mistakes could be much worse.
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Then you have the fact that they are expected to be able to hold down an adult job / at CMC age. For them getting a job that young is common place. Which means that those ponies need to have the education able to actually get and hold down a job [as Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and Cheese Sandwhich did. Possibly even Rarity and Applejack.]].
All of which means that yes. They are indeed smarter than humans. That and then you take the complexity of non-basic spells, and and precise weather control. And things only spiral out from there.
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So Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Cheese Sandwhich, Applejack, and Rarity are grifters and hobos?
The point is. They have enough education to hold down jobs, earn a living, and make something of themselves from the time their fillies or colts. And are expected to by the time they hit CMC age be able to start the process of making a massive living. Heck even Colortora [sp?] started her massive following and music career when she was a filly.
So yes. It's cold, and in human eyes wrong. But a large part of the populace earned their living / cutie mark doing similar if not the same thing. So it becomes an ingrained tradition. One that spans countless generations. Because it's something that'd lead to a Cutie Mark, or possibly even many successful ponies who've done the same thing.
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I didn't say that. I said excessive growth, and making fast growth that you equate with intelligence and higher learning. Is destructive. Massive boost, and innovative growths. Usually and have historically been met with massive ecological destruction. Since growth happens faster than it can be learned to be dealt with safely, and negate those impacts.
Rather a lot of waste and harm happens in the rush to build the next greatest thing that we mortals are consumed by. That it takes ages before those problems can be fixed. And that's not counting "Experts" who screw over the world for there own personal wealth [leaded gas, had it's inventor dip his hands in it to show it was safe. Even though it was far from being anywhere near safe; Edison screwed over everyone for a quick buck. Even slowing the use of AC energy so his development of DC would be more successful. There are plenty more examples. But too many to list].
But yes. As I mentioned earlier, her being immortal would mean that growth is slow. So as to ensure that it's safe, and work out problems before it becomes to big of one. Which is why the trains use Steam Engines, And industrial growth is slow [since industry makes lots of waste.].
7017616 I re-read the quote, clearly different parts written by two people who disagree with each other. And yeah, the point of the quote is that they make a special exception for this particular area for patriotic reasons, not that its indicative of education in general. A lot of the houses they draw the dimensions don't match up, but that's not the same as proving that equation was ever taught to those kids, it doesn't mean class rooms can't be used by multiple teachers. It's also true that that equation is left up on the board like its a previous lesson, while Cheerilee introduces herself like its the first day of class. A lot of elementary school classes end in early afternoon, and adult classes are often taught in those buildings during the evenings.
I was referring to human Twilight Sparkle during the Friendship Games.
The rules of magic are meant to be broken in the same way the rules of physics are meant to be broken. There are rules about what the voltage of an electrical current is, but those rules are "broken" with a transformer. Similarly, there are rules about how much you can time travel, but those rules are "broken" by tapping into the power of the Equestrian Harmony Map. The difference is, you can easily build another transformer, magical items that let you break the "rules" are either mysterious gifts from magic crystal entities, or ancient curse ridden artifacts.
Of course, Twilight Sparkle, the mare you called more powerful than Starswirl the Bearded, has the raw power and intelligence to create a new carriage, just like her human counterpart creates a device that can swallow all magic. Using Twilight as a guide for what the average unicorn can do is like using Pinkie Pie as a guide for what the average earth pony can do. Unless Twilight Sparkle is sneaking off at night to the secret magic factory to build those trains, I doubt there is a unicorn powerful enough to generate them.
Pegasi can fly by instinct, just like animals can. The stuff with clouds and weather is done only by adults, we never see foals working in the weather factory or helping Ponyville raise the water to Cloudsdale. Unicorns for the most part don't seem capable of causing massive damage with one random spell, unless they are powerful enough to be immediately taken in as Celestia's personal student. Instinct is not a guide for intelligence, whether for unicorn accidental magic or pegasi flight.
Kids running away from home as hobos (and if they did run away from home I would count Flutters and RD as hobos until they got a new home) is something we saw all the time 100 years ago. It meant you had a simpler society where anyone could take a manual labor job, it's not an indication of greater intelligence, just greater negligence. We have child stars who started their music career at Coloratura's age, I don't think of them as geniuses. So no, not smarter.
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That's not accurate.
After all we see that Cheerilee's class doesn't have all the ponies who go to school. During recess there's a whole lot more ponies than those that belong to Cheers. So she's not the only classroom nor the only age group being taught. And it we see time and time again in the show that each opening has different lessons.
So it's not that far off, to see that what was on the black board was on was either a previous lesson, or like most class rooms a lesson to be continued. I mean no classroom only teaches one subject, and one subject alone each day.
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Well human Twilight can't be equated to Equestria. After all it didn't shut down magic. It sucked in magic that was brought over from Equestria, and transmitted it into Twilight. So it didn't shut down, as much as transfer. And even then it had a habit of making random magic [which we see if not taught properly can be world ending].
So that wasn't anything in Ponyville Equestria, and they already showed magic that can do the same thing as that tech. That and nopony has the need to build tech to transfer and store magic of others. Especially now that Tirek happened and fresh in ponies memories.
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Any pony with the power level to pull the spell can do it. Just like the Wing Spell that she casts was in a spell book. Just as the 52 spells she mastered by Boast Busters.
Yeah, she has a joy of making spells. So did Starswirl, and its not like all of his spells are so high level almost nopony can do them. He was just very, very prolific.
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You're forgetting Cutie Mark Buffs. Pony magic becomes powerful, and gives massive boosts to their special talent. Not that they don't have the ability to be general [thus greater range], or able to be used in other ways [Rarity]. but lots are specialized in that one field. [Heck we see just how horrible ponies get when their CM's are stolen / Special Talents stolen].
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They have Flight School for a reason. And several different levels of Schooling dedicated to flight, and flying. If it was all about instinct than there'd be no reason for school, or a reason to be taught how to fly.
Wrong.
Rumble was supposed to be collecting water. But he and most of the ponies were sick that day. Rainbow Dash said she needed every pegasus [that could fly] there. And there were two young ponies.
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So yeah. Young ponies do work in water collecting.
As for working. We don't see the inside that much. But ponies work in things they get Cutie Marks in. If they get Cutie Marks in Weather Work, or a weather related field then they'd be working there. After all they'd have the talents needed for it.
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We see a baby filly open portals, and animate objects. Hurling objects with magic or accidentally sending something flying because you don't have control of what your lifting. And that's not necessarily true. We only see three ponies with magical potential. Twilight, Trixie, and Starlight.
Going by that as a sample for spell casting is just as bad as stating as only they are that good.
Spell books exist for a reason. And transformative spells exist. So ...
Spell Books exist.
Unicorns can cast spells. And can cast spells from a Spell Book.
Ponies have Buffs in the Special Talent.
Buffs in creating / making X give buffs in making / creating X.
Transformation Spells exist in cannon.
Thus if all are true. Which they are. Jobs can exist for a groups of unicorns Working Together to get stuff done.
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Again. until proven otherwise. That equation was in Cheerilee's classroom. Thus they were learning College level Astrophysics.
Twilight as a small filly was learning college level Chemistry [of course in a school that had higher learning. But still that seems to be common].
Ponies learn more, and to higher degrees than humans in cannon. And unless absolutely proven otherwise. It is as it was shown to be.
Thus are smarter.
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7018181 We see more kids, that doesn't prove there aren't other lessons at other times of the day.
Human Twilight has built the equivalent of a ghostbusters device, but for magic instead of ghosts. It stores up the magic, and if she wants to it can be released. Or it could have just been left shut and she could have built more to absorb more magic. I admit we haven't seen anything like that in Equestria, their technology is less advanced.
You're forgetting, Twilight Sparkle has the power level and the cutie mark buff, she just has the OP buff in general magic, which is what makes her so special. It doesn't seem like most ponies can learn out of spellbooks, we only see Twilight and the other super-unicorns ever looking at them. Advanced spells and spellbooks appear to be primarily for the elite casters like Twilight and Sunset, unless they are actually malevolent artifacts that can feed on someone.
If there were 30 million ponies in Equestria, then yeah, I could see a large number of ponies with a "carriage building" cutie mark cooperative casting, I could see like 5 ponies with the exact mark building a carriage in a day. But if there are less than 10,000, the odds that a sufficient number of ponies will have the exact right cutie mark for the thousands of different manufactured goods needed is incredibly low. Also, where are these ponies? Didn't you say there are only a few hundred in Canterlot, and most are nobles, politicians, buearacrats, and student/faculty at the school? Manehatten is mostly earth ponies, and is run by earth ponies, so if it was unicorns generating all the wealth they would be running the city. I thought you didn't believe in postulating things behind the scenes?
Rumble showed up just to let Rainbow Dash know his brother was sick and to cheer him on, we never see any kids actually doing weather work. Birds teach their young to fly, that's a form of school too, doesn't mean its the same as getting a pilots license. Baby fillies with accidental magic just prove that most magic isn't a measure of raw intelligence, it's just random instinct.
Twilight was a gifted student, that was not college level chemistry in that scene with her and Moondancer, that was Mr. Wizard stuff that 8 year olds do at school all the time. So no, until proven, not smarter.
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Ah! Ah! Ah! The spell book she used was in a library. A public library, in an Earth Pony Village.
If a Spell Book can be mass produced, and stored in a public venue with ease of access. Where anyone can get to it. It means that anypony has the potential for it. Especially if they have any sort of magic based Cutie Mark that shares bits with the spell in that Spell Book. Ergo. It's not just Twilight or super spell casters.
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And again your wrong with your numbers.
10 unicorns can control the very cosmos.
1 Carriage is much, much smaller and less convoluted. And we see how easy it is to make them with magic. As well as how many carriage based vehicles there are.
5 Earth Ponies is all it takes to build a 5 story building. At minimum. With out magic. Something that takes many more humans to do.
And you're forgetting something else important. Mixed Tribe work force. Sure most workers only use one race as we see so far. But I'm just getting to get it into your head. One simple fact.
Spell books exist in public libraries where anyone can get to them. Which shows that anyone can cast them. Not just the few rare Super Wizards. Else those public spells would be meaningless with noone to use them.
as well as
If 10 unicorns together can control the cosmos. What limits are there to industry?
Answer. None.
As for the filly. You're missing the simplest of points.
If a pony can do something that dangerous without thinking, how easy would it be to make a mistake to kill somepony? All it'd take is an accidental portal like spell connected to the inside of a ponies head. Or inside a pony period.
Or an animation spell on clothing causing accidental strangulation. Yes. It's instinct.
Which is why they get taught at a young age. Concepts and skills that humans don't need to learn. Because we don't have dangerous weapons growing out of our heads. Nor a chance to crash and die horribly in the air [like Twilight, if not for Rainbow Dash watching out for Twilight ... well not die. She's an alicorn. But still wouldn't have been pretty.].
And yes. Rumble was on Water Collection Try outs. As was the filly in the preps. 2 Foals.
But they contacted, like a vast majority of Pegasi. Feather Flu.
The point is. If you have a Cutie Mark in something. You are "Made" for that job. So it's possible as Pinks, Rares, Applejack, Flutters, and Dashie did Get jobs [some more full time than others] in that Cutie Mark field.
7018949 Just because a spell book was in a public library, doesn't mean anyone can use it, their are foreign language texts and advanced engineering texts in the average public library, it doesn't mean anyone can use it. And you know Twilight got a bunch of books in from Canterlot to stock the Ponyville Library, which she treats as her own private book collection, right?
Based on the fact that Celestia can control the cosmos, and she loses in fights to just about everyone, at this point I have to assume controlling the cosmos in MLP is much, much easier than you would assume. There's the moon, the tiny little sun, and those little globs of aether known as stars. Whether as some have theorized it's orders of magnitude easier to move things in space than to move them in Equestria, or if the old gods bound the celestial objects inside the crystal sphere Equestria is residing in with control spells to make them easy to move around, we can't be sure. But adjusting the stars in Equestria seems to take about as much effort as hanging up the Christmas Lights on earth.
You saw how it took Rarity like a month to make those 100 Princess Dresses, and that was when she was doing it in the most efficient manner possible. Do you really think that scales up to carriages in an hour?
When did you see 5 earth ponies build a 5 story building? I remember like 40 Apple family members built that barn super fast, but 40 Amish guys build a barn at roughly that speed all the time.
The Cake Foals hadn't been taught anything, and they were still using advanced magic. It was instinct. Maybe some foals do die of accidental magic use, and we don't hear about it. Yes, we do see foals get trained to use their racial magic, that's what "Twilight Time" is. But training someone to harness their instinctive abilities doesn't prove their innately more intelligent. Do you think witches and wizards in Harry Potter are more intelligent than muggles?
And Rumble said his big brother was sick, not that he was sick. But we still didn't see him fly. I agree that a lot of cutie marks give you a big boost in a specific job, if you get a job-related cutie mark. But of the Mane 6, I think only 2 of them actually have a cutie mark that directly helps with their job, Applejack and Fluttershy. Twilight's cutie mark makes it easier for her to perform magic, which kind of helps her job, but doesn't make her better at say, hosting a diplomatic function as princess. Rarity has a mining cutie mark and is in denial. Rainbow Dash has a super speed cutie mark, but its not like that cutie mark helps her work with clouds better, though it does help her work faster. Pinkie Pie's cutie mark helps her plan parties more effectively, it doesn't help her baking though.
A big problem with cutie marks is, they are basically chosen by ten year olds. If we let ten year olds choose what type of jobs they wanted, we would have a ton of cowboys, astronauts and ballerinas, but no actuaries or garbagemen. I doubt there are lots of ponies who have those kind of cutie marks, so the ponies doing the ugly but necessary jobs are doing it without the boost of a cutie mark. Hayseed Turniptruck is an example. He's a window washer with a turnip cutie mark.
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[Send reply through PMs. This debate is eating up too much room in the comment sections.]
Your argument for libraries I saw coming, and is flawed in the extreme.
Everyone can use them. Not everyone has the inclination to do so. Whether it's due to lack of interest, learning problems in certain fields [such as math, science, linguistics, etc.], or simply they don't have the skill set for it. Libraries have text that can build up skill sets for something, help one learn how to do X, but it can't help those who have no interest in X.
So yes. A Spell Book in a library is something any unicorn can study and use. Whether they have the nescessary power to do so is up in the air. But as in any society. There are those who are slightly strong and better than others. Just because we only see Twilight cast powerful spells. It's ignorant to say that only Twilight can do them.
A book becomes public, and becomes massively available because it can be used. Otherwise they'd be only in places of higher learning / schools. Rather than found in any random library.
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As for Celestia's loosing streak. That's a gross exaggeration.
We've seen in the past with the EoH Celestia and Luna defeating Discord, and we see them use their raw power to beat Sombra.
The only fights she's actually lost. Is only one.
To Chrysalis. An Emotion Eating, Shapeshifter. Who for weeks to even months had been feeding off of love. To gluttonous levels.
Other than that we've seen her fight exactly 0 times.
So she has a win loss ratio of: 3 [including Tirek when she and Luna had the EoH], and 1 [Chrysalis].
And it was cannon that it took 10 unicorns on average to raise the sun and 10 on average to raise the moon. And if the books that you mentioned are cannon. Then it lessened the lifespan greatly of those who did it. Yet Celestia has been doing both at the same time more or less of 1,000 years. She and her sister. Both raise their own Celestial Bodies now, and have magic to spare.
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As for the Muggle / Wizard thing. Way to yet again shoot your argument in the foot.
They have accidental burst of magic [instinct] but it's chaotic and potentially dangerous.
So they go to a school, that teaches them things muggles would never dream of learning.
memorizing and perfecting advanced maths, mental feats, and other skills [spells [wand, hand, and verbal [mostly] components]. That are far more advanced and demanding than Muggles schools.
They train, study (for) , and preform acts that require a greater deal of mental fortitude, intellect, willpower, and concentration than humans. And we see in the books what exactly happens when such things [such as instincts] go horribly wrong. Hell they have a hospital for all the F-ups that happen.
As for the cake Twins. It's stated that all infants do that. But guess what, they can't when they get older. Foals stop being able to fly, unicorns become spell less. All that instinct means nothing.
Until they get trained for it. Which is a far more demanding task than what humans deal with. Hell we see that for Pegasi alone they have Flight School, Flight Camp, Junior Speedsters Flight Camp, and Wonderbolt Flight Academy.
There would be no need to have so many schools, and activities to train / teach flight / pegasi magic. If it wasn't for the fact that instinct means didly squat. Or there wasn't a very good reason for that.
There's more to flying than flapping wings, and there's more to magic than pointing a horn at something. And as a pure-human I know that's hard to grasp. But instinct without training / education on how to do it properly. Is meaningless. As is the Hogwarts topic you broached. Think of how many Wizards short of Voldemort and Dumbledoore had both great power and control over their powers before schooling? The answer is none. They were haphazard, dangerous, and over all random bouts of magic. Much like the Cake Twins, and much like those having such great power with no education to learn how to use it.
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So yes. There education system would be much more advanced than earths. Thus they'd be more smarter than us. Simply due to an accelerated and more fast paced education than humans have. Especially if they are expected to hold down a job permanently [Senior in High School level of education or higher], and do so competently at a young age.
As well as learn how to use their horns and wings around the same time as well.
For a large swath of the population at least. That means that thinking of schooling in human terms flies out the window. And gives credence to the fact that those equations were part of that grades curriculum.
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The Mane 6's Cutie Marks.
Twilight: Hers was in magic, even before being an alicorn was dumped on her lap devoted her life to magic. And even as an alicorn a magic is an important, near constant part of her life.
Flutters and AJ:Yeah Flutters deals with animals. And AJ's Cutie Mark is for her family, and she steadfastly does what ever is needed to help her family. So that's right.
Pinkie: Her's isn't planning parties. No, her cutie mark is spreading happiness. In her own words:
http://mlp.wikia.com/wiki/Transcripts/The_Cutie_Mark_Chronicles
And her Cutie Mark appeared when she got her family to smile. That's what she's all about. It's just baking, doing odd jobs, cracking jokes, doing gags, and throwing parties are the easiest way to bring a smile to a ponies face.
Rares: What she states as her Cutie Mark in Canterlot Boutique, and what happens in The Cutie Mark Chronicles is retarded. But it's still what resonates with her [especially since she got it after the play].
But yeah Dash's Cutie Mark is about Speed. Which does help in her job, and helping her prepare for her dream of being a Wonderbolt, and she does use it in sports competitions. So in a way she does use her CM to it's fullest. Although Magic Mystery Cure was stupid to have Rares do weather work; And it without knowing Rarity's Special Talent prior to S6, Applejack was equally stupid. Still is.
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And you're right. There are some ponies who aren't able to do their Special Talents. Although you're wrong about being chosen. Since as we see with the CMC it doesn't work that way. When they find something that honestly clicks with them, and they have a special connection towards. The cutie mark appears, and does so without ponies choice or thought onto what it'd look like.
So it's not so clear cut as picking something and saying that'll be your Special Talent / Cutie Mark. Especially if you have not talent / real connection to it in the first place.
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And http://www.watchcartoononline.com/my-little-pony-friendship-is-magic-season-2-episode-22-hurricane-fluttershy
7:14 - 7:18: [He's there training with his brother. Since every pony standing around is training for water collection.].
7:56 - 8:00: Still there.
8:19: Flapping his wings hovering.
8:39: Rumble is among those who fly off to train to get their wings up to 10.0 Wing Power.
I could go on. But as you can see. He was training for, and part of Water Gathering.
But let's check that "Only Thunderlane" bit ...
14:58 - 15:13: There were tons, and tons of ponies sick.
And Rumble didn't arrive to say his brother couldn't make it. Look at:
15:00 - 15:11: He was there already in the line. Part of the team. And only mentioned Thunderlane when Dash asked Rumble where he was.
So ... Case and point. Pegasi can do weather collection. Double case and point. Rumble was doing training to do so. And was part of it.