- Member Since 4th Nov, 2018
- offline last seen Nov 4th, 2023
Phantomdust
Always enjoy writing or your stories will suffer as you do.
Phantomdust
Joined 4th Nov, 2018 ·
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interesting story, like to see where this goes.
Well damn. I really like this, and it's going to be a lot more struggle, conflict, and most importantly violence. I even might so boldly say this is a better start than the original.
This is a world with flying creatures who from their vantage point should be able to see miles and since the world is locked into eternal night smoke wouldn't be that noticeable but light should be visible for miles and he's trying to hide yet he lights a large bonfire next to his lab.
She would know the area because the scouting party didn't return but the large bonfire would pinpoint the exact spot.
I know it ended up being irrelevant as she's getting his location from Silvanus but it still feels highly careless.
10672316
Like you said, silvanus already told her where it was plus he was going to be discovered anyways and he knew it. So at that point, even not knowing Silvanus was helping her, he wasn't really concerned with whether or not he would be discovered since he already had been. Thus just tossing the corpses all into a big pile and burning them was simply the quickest and easiest solution for disposing of them otherwise he would have disposed of them in a much more stealthy manner like he had done to the skeletons of the diamond dogs.
The reason Nightmare Moon attacked way ahead of time is because she spoke with the soldiers Gerhardt had captured in their dreams and knew that Gerhardt was expecting her to attack in two weeks. So she decided to utilize the element of surprise and attack him the very next day instead.
Though I definitely see your point and I'll try my best to avoid similar issues in the future. Thank you for the feedback!
I wonder if equestria's gods will start getting more directly involved
10740832
Hmmm... Perhaps so, but perhaps not... It will take quite a bit to get them to intervene directly, but its entirely possible that things will indeed get that bad. We will just have to see as the situation continues to deteriorate even further from this point onwards.
i love this so much
10740832
if they do i hope they take Gerhardt's side as while he isnt the best at least he isnt making deals with foren gods and making equipment that can and will be disassembled and learned about despite nightmare moons objections.
10672411
Ooh, dang! He almost got her.
AWESOME!!! Also, he could, keep using brute force and fighting a straightforward battle. Or, you know, he could just conceal himself in a cloak, walk up to the two guards at Canterlot Castle, have one of them go fetch NM, knock the remaining guard out, take his spear, conceal said spear inside his cloak, play dead on one end of the doors with the unconscious guard slumped over on the opposite end of the doors when they return, and...stab NM through the eye with a surprise attack...? That sounds like the most effective option rather than just using brute force, and considering how rare it is for a pony-even a villain-to be killed, along with a deceptive tactic-conceal, play dead, and lure-that's never been used before, it would most likely work. She most likely wouldn't have her guard up and thus would be wide open for the attack. Heck, all he has to do it grab NM's horn and apply enough presure that it hurts too much to move, and it's pretty much over. Also, please tell me that the next chapter will be up soon.
10754393
Perhaps but that wouldn't be very interesting and it would make for a very short story. Plus, Silvanus would warn Nightmare Moon of what Gerhardt was planning so she couldn’t really be caught off guard by that.
10754414
Huh, oh yeah, I forgot about Silvanus.
Somethings not right here… a being who is incredibly smart and efficient uses the inefficient imperial system instead of metric?
10767600
I'm American so I'm more familiar with the Imperial system. Also no system of measurement is inherently better or worse than the other. Some are more difficult to use than others but that's it. The Imperial system is more difficult to use than the metric system, but it's just as good and can be just as accurate.
Also he uses both depending on the circumstances. Let's say he's making bullets, he will label a nine mm bullet a nine mm bullet rather than converting that number to the Imperial system. Of course if something is a perfect number in the Imperial system then he will use the Imperial system instead. So if he's making heavy bullets that are 1 inch in diameter then he will just call them 1 inch rather than converting that number to the metric system. For large distances like the range of his sensors in this particular instance he would use miles.
Also, he would use Fahrenheit and Kelvin to measure heat. Fahrenheit to measure general temperature in regards to weather and Kelvin when he's making more scientific measurements. Celsius isn't used whatsoever since Fahrenheit and Kelvin are already sufficient for his purposes.
This story summed up: Gerhardt wins; everypony dies -- in agony.
Are you going to do a story like this, but it takes place in one of the other timelines Starlight Glimmer created?
10770067
Not quite. The story is only just getting started and he lost two separate battles this chapter alone. The first being when the ponies bombed the hell out of his lab and the second being the major military base he sent the majority of his army to capture. He's actually on the losing end right now. His production ability was crippled quite a bit by Nightmare Moon’s army destroying his lab/factory and a lot of his army is being destroyed. His army might be scarier than Nightmare Moon’s but he's still definitely losing.
And there's no guarantee he'll actually win by the end of the story. After all, he may be the protagonist but he's definitely not the hero. He's blatantly a villain.
Though, admittedly, some of his enemies have and will die in agony. Mainly because of his "Nightmares".
10770081
I would but realistically I can't really do one for every timeline she created. I would be here writing for years. I'll probably just mention what happens in those timelines once I get to that point in the main story.
10770092
NMM is blatantly also a villain so I don't know that it matters since there are no heroes in this story.
I'd argue Gerhardt is still managing to be the least in the wrong as he tried to leave without conflict and everything that has followed has been the result of NMM repeatedly trying to kill him for the original perceived slight.
Otherwise
supposed to be range
Feels like the sentence should end at primary roles rather than reiterating.
10770884
True enough, I suppose. I guess it sort of depends on perspective as with good and evil in real life. So, you're right. I suppose there are no heros in this story. At least not for the moment. Anyways my main point was that just because Gerhardt’s the protagonist doesn't necessarily mean he's going to win.
To be completely honest I haven't decided whether he's going to win, or if Nightmare Moon is going to kill him, or if the Equestrian gods are going to intervene, or if someone else is going to defeat and imprison him, or even if it will end with no one winning and everyone dying as both sides unleash WMDs on eachother. So there's a very strong possibility that he will actually lose by the end of the story. I don’t know yet.
Also, fixed. Thank you for pointing out those issues! I really appreciate it! 😊
Finally.
This is the first thing intelligent this guy did.
I find it worrying that the Author considers common sense. Insanity and unhinged.
What I want to know is why the Author felt he had to push the character to the point of insanity to get him to use what most people would consider sound judgement.
Anyone with the smallest amount of common sense would have done the above on the second encounter. As for kill the civilians and necro their asses. Second encounter as well. The longer you drag on conflict the more civilian casualties you have. Stomp the conflict out at all costs, and you save lives in the end. Kill Nightmare in a month and you lost 100 civilians, drag it on for 2 years and you intentionally killed thousands of troops, and multiple hundreds of civilians.
Half measures costs lives and helps no one.
The monk
“Not telling you too much about humanity's special power, but I can give you a big hint! It is pure, concentrated spite.” -Knight Breeze
The monk
Now He is getting serious.
Greatly approve.
He is letting her get too comfortable in my opinion. She feels too safe while she keeps him off balance by hitting him close to home.
The Monk
10796011
I don't think common sense is insanity. He has been trying to fight back ever since like the third time his base had been found. He just hadn't had enough time to build anything of any significance because Nightmare Moon kept on finding him and he kept having to run away before he had a chance. Otherwise I guarantee that he would have done something like this a lot sooner.
What he needed to be driven to insanity to do is make such extensive use of necromancy. Up until that point he had been trying to avoid it as he found it morally reprehensible and he didn’t want to lower himself to the level of Caedes, his former apprentice who invented Necromancy and used it to start the First Necromantic War. Using necromancy like this is the only reason he has been able to make any sort of progress whatsoever. Using necromancy like that was against everything he stood for. So he needed to completely lose his morals to do this.
Personally I would of preferred the third one because I think it would be entertaining to see them try to convince the other races to work with them.
He intentionally created something that was beyond his control and about a level of power above what he's trying to kill so while his children have prepared countermeasures of some sort it seems very unlikely that they would have anyway to effectively counter it since they haven't been able to kill nightmare moon and she isn't as powerful.
He only requested safety for his family so allies look unlikely.
He's gotten into a bit of a catch 22
The being he created doesn't intend to kill luna so there is a chance that it will turn into if they are successful in killing malice to free Gerhardt it could free nightmare moon to set everything back to square one.
No timeline but at the rate they are going that'll probably take a few months at most but this is supposed to end the war, are they going to continue killing the ponies after their leader is dead?
That's only 100,000 and he's got a 100 years to do it so it doesn't seem like that big of a deal except he's intending for malice to end this problem and I think it takes souls to make them so he's either going on a genocide run on the ponies or he's going to have to find new enemies.
Does he automatically get the souls of any he kills or what?
I get that it's magic and all but it seems odd that he just sits there and goes woe is me rather than bothering to mention any of this to his family.
Only path from here that seems to make sense is assuming malice is able to keep his part of the deal and captures NMM is Gerhardt returning to his universe with his new family to continue that war otherwise it looks like they will have to kill innocent parties to fulfill the deal.
Also is malice powerful enough to notice that Silvanus is still interfering? would he tell Gerhardt if he did? Gerhardt is assuming they are being spied on but he hasn't noticed this seems like a possibility that could occur on this path but not on the others.
Seems plausible as sombra doesn't seem like one to care about gerhart's methods but it seems limited in character interaction as sombra mind controlled the crystal ponies so it'd be one new character and his army.
This one provides the most flexibility as you can show different species perspectives on events but I think they would be hard pressed to convince others to join their fight as from an outside perspective both parties are monsters.
I think option 3 would be the most interesting, option 2 is the most straightforward as practically nothing changes except Gerhardt will likely upgrade sombras drone army, option 1 we're already seeing seems to be prohibitive of any sort of a good ending for anyone.
10943925
True, but his children have to at least try to take countermeasures knowing what Gerhardt was going to unleash upon the world. Even if those countermeasures are useless. Also spirits are impossible to kill as they are literally concepts. There is no distinction between them and the concept they represent. So to "kill" Malice they would have to destroy the concept of Evil in its entirety which they obviously can't do. They could potentially imprison it, however.
Well, look at what they did in Tall Tale and Vanhoover. Especially in Tall Tale. If killing a million ponies after Nightmare Moon is gone is the price for being free of Nightmare Moon, they will pay it.
They're just machines designed to perfectly replicate the behavior of demons. It doesn't take souls to make them. Though maybe it should? Hm... Maybe the ones in the future could be designed using necromantic rituals in their creation process to make them more powerful and realistic as per Malice's specifications. Though I've received two comments preferring the third option so far, so I'm probably going to rewrite it so as to not include Malice in the first place.
Eh, not quite. It's more that he can use necromancy to enslave souls after he kills them. He can then decide to give the souls he enslaved to Malice. It's not an automatic process, it's something he has to actively do with necromancy. So if he didn't know necromancy then Malice would be demanding live slaves instead of souls.
He would have mentioned it to his family but he was a bit preoccupied dealing with Malice. Also, since he wasn't allowed to commit suicide he was concerned that he wouldn't be able to say anything to his family either. In future bouts of sanity he would most likely try to mention that he had been cursed by Malice as that's something the curse would allow him to remember. The fact that it exists.
Yes. I've stated in replies to previous comments that Gerhardt is not a hero or a good guy in this story. He's just as much a villain as Nightmare Moon. So killing innocents is not out of the question.
If Malice did notice Silvanus spying it would likely hijack the "thread" Silvanus tied to Gerhardt and use it as an opportunity to taunt and torment Silvanus. So no. It wouldn't tell Gerhardt. Also, Gerhardt noticing they are being spied on is something that would happen in all three paths. They would diverge at the point where Arthur says they need allies.
Fair point. You're right, character interaction would likely be fairly limited for that reason.
True. But I suppose that difficulty is what makes the idea interesting since it would provide further conflict.
Fair though I will say a few things. For option 2, Gerhardt would upgrade Sombra's drone army but he would also take a few of Sombra's cursed crystals for study so they could potentially use those crystals to counter Equestrian magic due to the properties the crystals display in the show. Thus it would be more fair of a fight between Gerhardt and Nightmare Moon. Also, this story is meant to be dark. A happy ending is definitely not guaranteed in any of the paths. Though you're right, option 1 is the most unlikely to have a happy or even neutral ending.
10943991
If you could convince any of them to join as allies in option 3 you could probably get away with combining options 2 & 3 since sombra even with the mind controlled army would be considered less of a monster than Gerhardt so it wouldn't be a much of a stretch that anyone agreeing to work with Gerhardt would also be ok with sombra.
Sure it's supposed to be dark but option one seems like it's going to end with constant war rather than there ever being a clear victor and everything else on the planet is going to get drawn in as fodder rather than participants.
10945384
Fair enough. And true Sombra is less of a monster than Gerhardt and his family. So combining options 2 and 3 is a rather interesting option I hadn't considered. Since people seem to be preferring those over option 1, I'll definitely look into that as I rewrite the most recent chapter.
hey question about malice so he is the concept of evil right. What type of evil as evil or good for that matter are subjective.
10961566
Evil as the general concept. And as it is a spirit it is objectively evil. Anyone who meets it would agree it is evil beyond a shadow of a doubt and it itself realizes and enjoys the fact that it is evil. There is no real perspective in which it's good or even just neutral.
I mean what it was doing to those ponies it would do to ANYTHING regardless of species, religion, political alignment, or whatever else. It's not truly on anyone's side but it's own. And it's only goals are to spread as much death, pain, suffering, conflict, war, and general misery as possible. It's not insane, nothing is wrong with its mind, it's fully aware and in control of its actions. It's just evil.
Also, I'm going to finish rewriting this chapter after I finish the current arc in the main story. So Malice isn't going to be present in the final version.
Well, unless something happens later on in the story to make Gerhardt decide to conduct the same ritual for whatever reason, or if it just spawns naturally through the conflict between both sides.