Re: [GRIMDARK] Fallout Equestria: Project Horizons Discussion

[Train Dodger]

ch 1:
but I certainly did as I felt the bite of one that traveled through my temporary shield.

"travelled"

Just thought I should mention that the double-l spellings "travelled" and "travelling" are British English, and the single-l spellings "traveled" and "traveling" are American English. Project Horizons is supposed to be entirely in the American English dialect, but since it has had both American and British editors working on it at various times, it has a mixture of spellings from both dialects.

[Icy Shake]

I'm happy to hear that's still the case. It's nice that others can get something out of them in addition to them being something fun to do and a way to try to remember things better.

And they're good for pointing out errors that need correcting, of course.

Yes, there is that too.

ch 1:
but I certainly did as I felt the bite of one that traveled through my temporary shield.

"travelled"

Just thought I should mention that the double-l spellings "travelled" and "travelling" are British English, and the single-l spellings "traveled" and "traveling" are American English. Project Horizons is supposed to be entirely in the American English dialect, but since it has had both American and British editors working on it at various times, it has a mixture of spellings from both dialects.

"Travelled" and "travelling" are an unusual case, because while by my understanding they are fairly unambiguously the standard spelling in British English, they are considered acceptable variant spellings within American English. Given that, I took the minimalist approach of suggesting the majority be standardized to.

[Train Dodger]

It's true that it's an accepted variant, and yes, it would be a bit more of a pain to standardize them the other way around. Including those last few edits, there are 28 instances of "travelling" throughout the story and 15 instances of "travelled" that I know of. Just in case, here they are:

Various Edits - Travelling/Travelled to Traveling/Traveled:

[O. Hinds]

It's true that it's an accepted variant, and yes, it would be a bit more of a pain to standardize them the other way around. Including those last few edits, there are 28 instances of "travelling" throughout the story and 15 instances of "travelled" that I know of. Just in case, here they are:

Various Edits - Travelling/Travelled to Traveling/Traveled:

...Yes, um, a wee little bit of a pain. I'm so glad that Icy Shake found a way for me to not have to do that. :D

[Silver136]

@Memory orbs/Mind killing the user

I think it was implied that if you died in your mind while hooked up to a machine it would kill you. I doubt it's like the Matrix, where wounds just spontaneously appear as your mind "makes it real." Its probably something like brain death, your brain just shuts down because your mind thinks you're dead. So I feel like if the machine made Goldie experience death as a canterlot ghoul, he would probably just go feral.

[FeatherDust]

If you're not familiar with Preston and Child, they write excellent contemporary thrillers with just enough science thrown in to keep things interesting.  They started out with Relic, and had a slew of mostly mundane characters trying to tackle a monster in their museum.  Along came a mysterious FBI agent with the guns and knowledge to give a little nudge here and there.  Aloysius Xingu Leng Pendergast.  It wasn't that notable.  In the movie, he doesn't appear at all.  And in the sequel, he makes another appearance at the middle, but it's largely left up to the less competant Officer Degusta.

Then Pendgergast took over the series.  The man can do anything.  Knows everything.  Let me acknowledge that Preston and Child have a knowledge of high culture that, if true, is staggering, and if made up, feels legitimate.  The problem is that it's everywhere.  He speaks a dozen languages, has the ability to manipulate anyone and everyone, and is always right in the end.

I read Relic based largely on a friend's recommendation for the Pendergast series.  It's a fine book, but I didn't go on to others after I looked over some information about Pendergast on Wikipedia and my internal reaction was "Ugggggh."  I'd buy it if he were simply charismatic and manipulative, and other than that had the skills of any FBI investigator.  But then he speaks every language and is an expert at everything, and it's just annoying.  As soon as they start laundry-listing the skills the guy has, I get grumpy.

That's the same reason I turned off the Son of Batman movie; Bruce's raised-by-assassins son isn't just skilled at martial arts (which makes sense), he's also a brilliant hacker and engineer, can imitate voices well enough to fool computer security systems, can track financial data better than people whose job it is to do so, can stunt-drive like an expert, and did I mention he's like 12? Ugh.

So maybe if isn't the right thing to say.  Maybe what I take as Ultra Competance is plot armor.  After all, Blackjack screws up immensely, but I doubt that she's going to step on a landmine and die right before the last chapter.  She has to live or the story stops.

We always expect a hero to win ultimately.  They're the protagonist.  But that doesn't mean a protagonist has to have "plot armor".  This is what bothers me about hypercompetence.  It's not that a less competent hero might lose, but rather they have to struggle to achieve victory, and often make serious sacrifice.  The hypercompetent character doesn't.  It's lazy writing that removes obstacles by just saying "Oh, the hero can handle that no sweat" instead of actually having them work hard at it.

Blackjack has never EVER succeeded at a goal without struggle.  That's why she's still interesting despite all her upgrades (both physically and in terms of skills).  Pendergast never struggles.  Once he knows what he needs to accomplish, he just goes and does it, and if there's a need for some arcane skill to accomplish it, he just magically HAS that skill.  Harry Dresden is the same as Blackjack -- he has new, better skills and abilities, but he's still ending every book beat to hell and barely pulling out a victory.

I don't think it's even the "final price" you mentioned -- Harry Potter doesn't have to die to take down Voldemort to make it a good story; it just has to be a struggle that pushes him to the limit to succeed.  That said, I didn't like Hallows much because the ending depended so much on three magical artifacts and their hidden properties, rather than on Harry's goodness triumphing.  The theme of the whole series, from Book 1, was that love is more powerful than evil, and the ending didn't use that theme.

Also... I realized I screwed up.  I should have had BJ's friends find her in the Core.  This is one happens when characters are ultra competant, but secondary characters aren't.  Since Maripony, the story's been largely keeping BJ away from her friends.  It seemed like the only thing I could do because I don't want them to die.  They didn't have BJ's victory talent protecting them. 

Sigh... I dunno.

I don't think it was a screwup.  The hero always faces their worst moment alone.  That's what makes it their worst moment.  Luke has to face Vader at Cloud City all by himself, and it ends with him losing a hand.  Blackjack takes on the Core without friends, and loses her body.  Their friends are there to back them up and help them afterward, but that loss has to be theirs alone.

As for Goldie, y'know, on one hand maybe he is hypercompetent, but I never found him unbelievable.  He's the head of an entire organization that specializes in data acquisition.  It's not Goldie himself that's really hypercompetent, but the group he works with.  I see Goldie more like Nick Fury, in that he has personal skills, but his personal abilities only turn into a virtual superpower within the context of SHIELD.

And also, hypercompetence is more (not totally, but more) acceptable for a villain than a hero.  Goldie isn't the center of the story, and is in fact acting in the past, so his hypercompetence or lack thereof isn't as obvious.  We see him through glimpses and implications, so it doesn't slap you across the face that he's good at everything.

But honestly, it never really feels to me that he's an expert at everything.  In fact I don't think he has any greater competence than any other major character in the story.  All he has is a pretty good insight into people's motivations (he's not blinded by hatred) and he's willing to do anything, but he leans on the people around him for his expertise.  In building Horizons, he used Horse's repairsprites, Trottenheimer's weapon designs, a pre-existing space program, and so on.  The only things he personally brought to the table were the realization that he had to put a check on Luna's power and the willingness to threaten the world to do that.

[Vinylshadow]

Depends on the character and the author's whim more than anything

What if your character is designed to be useless on their own?

How would they get through their loss?

[FeatherDust]

My interpretation regarding how the computer would kill Goldenblood was that there would be a simulation of whatever the executioner wanted him to experience, but the killing itself would be done physically via some robotics or the life support system itself.

No, that isn't what the Interrogator said.  It said it could turn up its neural interface so that the shock of the simulated execution would kill him (or words to that effect).  That was why it didn't want to just release him to Blackjack for execution (which she was going to use as an excuse to just get him out). I doubt neural shock would be a viable method of killing a canterghoul.

I remember that the memory orbs lacked one of three, mental, physical or emotional. Physical is out because the Deus orb would be entirely pointless if BJ couldn't feel what he felt 1:1 and mental is too because Pinkie always communicates vocally to BJ and again the Deus orb, he spoke into a mirror instead of just thinking.

But I don't have any evidence against the inferance proposal for the emotions. That sounds fine to me actually.

Yeah, it was stated way back in FoE that memory orbs are a full-sensory experience but don't record the "inner life".  An orb can show what somebody did, but not why they did it.  A few times Pip had to infer the subject's mental state from increased breathing rate and shaking legs and so on.  I seem to vaguely recall a discussion of how weird it was to be feeling all the physical sensations of terror while not actually being frightened.

[Derpmind]

So this is interesting: a phone case! (From this reddit post)

Grand Pegasus Enclave Volunteer Corps:

In addition, there's an.. interesting new Epic Rap Battles of Pony featuring Sanguine vs. Red Eye. I don't think it's that great, but it's PH related so...

youtube video:

[SilentCarto]

I kind of loved that sense, in the early days, that the team was hanging together by a thread. It made me cheer every time one of them chose to stay in spite of all the reasons they should leave.

That's all true—and I feel the same way—but though it feels great when they pull through even that feeling is built on the fact that there wasn't that much holding them together, and both Glory and P-21 did have good reasons to leave, and that's a point I don't think I can deny when I hear it as a criticism of the early chapters.

I guess I don't understand why that's even a criticism. I mean, yeah, if someone was expecting Harry Potter-style instant friendships, I suppose it could be disappointing...

Well, hospitals are already kind of unsettling by default...
And then you populate it with actual monsters that are silently stalking you as we speak.

That was a really awesome analysis.

Thanks!

@Elected Queens
It's easy! You have only one candidate, and you can either vote for them or not vote for them! :P

I vote for Queen Whiskey! All my votes for Queen Whiskey!

Depends on the character and the author's whim more than anything
What if your character is designed to be useless on their own?
How would they get through their loss?

I don't know, I haven't read that far in Murky Number Seven yet.   

I kid, I kid. Murk has his stealth skills, and his drawing skills... and his... numchuck skills...

In all seriousness, such a character makes a poor protagonist. It's all very well and good for the main character to start out useless, but he should improve his skills and find his place in the world in the course of the story. If he started out useless and continued to be useless until the climax of the story, then your instinct is exactly right -- the narrative "arc" is a flat line, and his "darkest hour" is necessarily going to be weak sauce since, being useless, any of his more-competent friends should have been able to overcome the same problem effortlessly. In fact, the fact that he's "useless" implies that even the reader would feel they could do a better job.

What you're suggesting is a protagonist who is carried through his own story on the shoulders of his friends, which implies that A) they would probably do better to find somewhere safe to ditch the deadweight so they can get some work done, and B) the story really should have been about them instead. This sort of thing is frustrating to read because it implies that the protagonist has no real influence on his own destiny and the author doesn't know who he's writing the story about.

At best, the character takes on the role of a portable video camera reporting the actions of his more interesting cohorts, who are the true protagonists of the story. (Not that there's anything wrong with the role of Peripheral Narrator -- Doctor Watson and "Call Me" Ishmael are two famous examples.)

Edit: Oh, god, now I have the mental image of Ishmael singing "Call Me Maybe" as he dances around the Peaquod.

[Guest]

Yeah, it was stated way back in FoE that memory orbs are a full-sensory experience but don't record the "inner life".  An orb can show what somebody did, but not why they did it.  A few times Pip had to infer the subject's mental state from increased breathing rate and shaking legs and so on.  I seem to vaguely recall a discussion of how weird it was to be feeling all the physical sensations of terror while not actually being frightened.

Ah, thank you FeatherDust. Alright I think I'll retract that theory about the pod then. I think without the thoughts and emotions of the subject the memories were taken from it must be enough for the brain to seperate the experience from reality.

Where simulations like Happyhorn and presumably these executions the brain can't.

As far as killing a Canterlot ghoul what's happening in the pod is that the brain is dying in response to it percieving the body as dead? That's what we're going with? It could work for him. It's not like ghouls have more resilient brains. But at the same time maybe they do? I'd think if a ghoul could be killed that way there would be no ghouls. Their body already died and their brains haven't shut down in response, maybe the ghouls who have brains that can't handle that just go straight to feral as someone else suggested might happen to GB.

But GB hasn't gone feral yet of course so I don't think that there's reason to believe this would kill him if that is how it works. So maybe they play the simulation to get him out? I mean what vitals is this machine reading to know that GB is alive? Brainwaves? Or is it just assuming he's alive until one of the options is selected. Because ghouls in FO:E aren't like the ones in fallout. They are not mutated they are dead.

Clearly GB believes this will kill him so I don't see BJ giving it a try, unless it's one of those select one of the options or wait in the cell for all of eternity deals.

[Silver136]

So this is interesting: a phone case! (From this reddit post)

Grand Pegasus Enclave Volunteer Corps:

Man, why do all the cool cases have to be for stupid iphones...where are all the awesome Android cases?

[Vinylshadow]

How amusing Blackjack manages to cobble together a chronicle of GB's life as she renders her verdict

Even though killing someone for acts committed 200 years ago seems rather...pointless in light of the possibility of yet another apocalypse


As for memory orbs and what you experience from them:

Logically, I knew what to expect: a reliving of some other pony’s experience. I’d been told such memories were visual, auditory, tactile… even taste and smell were preserved. But would it be crisp and vivid, or blurred by age? Would I see things as they had really been, or would it be filtered by the perceptions and biases of the rememberer? Would I sense the pony’s thoughts? And would I be able to tell them from my own?

Everything was slightly muted and out of focus, but I could still make out the faces of each individual pony – a level of detail that defined this as a raw recording of the events by the brain of the pony I was, for lack of a better word, “riding” rather than what the pony could have naturally recalled on her own

But, of course, I could only watch what this pony had watched

The pony I was riding was achy from sitting in the same position for too long. Her mane itched, as did…

Yikes! Okay, his mane itched. As well as other places. And I suddenly very, very much wanted to be back in the Manehattan Ruins feeling rebar being yanked through my leg instead

And they also experience physical sensations, as Littlepip saw when she viewed an orb from a stallion, and Blackjack when she viewed Deus's orb

[O. Hinds]

Unfortunately, it almost certainly will not be out this weekend. Sorry, everyone, but I thought it would probably be better to tell you now than to let you all get your hopes up.

[Somber]

Sorry... things fell apart.  I'll be at Everfree next weekend, so we won't be able to brush then, so it'll be the weekend after next.  So very very sorry.

[RoboRed]

Welp, there's always next weekend.

[Guest]

Have fun at Efrafa! :P

[WavemasterRyx]

Sorry... things fell apart.  I'll be at Everfree next weekend, so we won't be able to brush then, so it'll be the weekend after next.  So very very sorry.

*nuzzles very lightly*  You should only be sorry for it if you don't have fun while you're at Everfree, so please have as much fun as you can, sir.

[Silver136]

Its all right Somber, I'm sure all of us understand. Enjoy yourself, have fun. By the sound of things, you need it! 

[Somber]

Well, I tend to have crushing bouts of depression at most of the cons I go to, but I'm usually glad I go regardless.

[Vinylshadow]

Part of me feels like Horizons should have been split into completely separate stories instead of one long continuous one

Or maybe I should've read it in volumes instead of one giant PDF...

[Derpmind]

Somber, you're going to Everfree? That's pretty cool! Huh, I wonder if anyone else here is going too. I can't go, wrong coast, but I hope it's fun.

Part of me feels like Horizons should have been split into completely separate stories instead of one long continuous one

Or maybe I should've read it in volumes instead of one giant PDF...

Because of how big it is and the serial nature of it's creation, the story is definitely more enjoyable if you take breaks between chunks of chapters. I certainly suggest you try re-reading at a slower pace.

[Somber]

Horizons is three stories all smooshed together.  If I'd actually been a writer worth crap, I would have focused on clustering the story.  Book 1 would have been BJ getting EC-1101, dealing with the zodiacs, and culimating with Deus and getting the Info on Horizons.  Book 2 would have focused on the war between the reapers and the Steel Rangers, culminating in the sea pony.  Book three would have focused on the east side of the river, culminating in High Tower (and dealing with Sanguine THEN).  Book 4 would have been Thunderhead.  Book 5 is Horizons.

[Vinylshadow]

Call it an affliction 

Once I get into a good book, it's hard for me to put it down

There were times I almost missed getting off my bus stop because I was busy reading the Twilight Saga

The books were fine, it's the movies and fans that ruin it


Wait...can't the same be said about a lot of fandoms?

MLP was popular and when the EQG movie came out...


*pets Somber with a rake* Shhh, it's okay, it's still a good story

[Silver136]

Well, I tend to have crushing bouts of depression at most of the cons I go to, but I'm usually glad I go regardless.

I understand that feeling. Maybe try to find something that makes you happy, a hobby, something to distract yourself. Its helped me quite a bit, and I hope you'll feel better too.

[Vinylshadow]

I blame my depression for my own lack of writing skills

I still try though

Got about five different unfinished FoE fics that revolve around my own character hunting for Luna and Celestia, who somehow survived Canterlot (We know Celestia did...in a way...)

but, I can't really think of a good reason as to HOW

[Silver136]

In the words of our entertainment legend, Geoff Ramsey of Rooster Teeth (been watching a lot of their old stuff for some reason), "Freaking bail!!!"

But really, seems to me she said screw it and ran, left Luna to die. I believe she even said that to Pip.

[Vinylshadow]

We'll see what happens

meanwhile, he's off to Filly for some fun in the rad-pits, because he's immune to radiation and taint...

He's an ageless pegasus, of all things


So it's a mary-sue or whatever, bite me

[Guest]

So it's a mary-sue or whatever, bite me

[Icy Shake]

Oh, and as part 3928423 in my unnecessary and unending quest of justifying Blackjack as a potential Element of Generosity, I'd like to note that right here it looks to me like she's so desperately insistent on giving Snips what he most desired that she's losing sight of the fact that some things aren't hers to give—in this case, risking the lives of Psychoshy and Stygius by spending more time there. I think this is an interesting potential failure mode of Generosity, and would actually like to see a Rarity episode or comic based on it someday.

As I recall, that was basically the reasoning for making Red Eye Corrupted Generosity in FoE.

Yeah, but I feel like the situations are very different, with Red Eye largely being an evil character using "corrupted generosity" to mess with Littlepip's head, taking advantage of her weird obsession with Virtues. Part of the issue is that he's very consciously doing it, in a way that may well increase the chances of things falling apart compared to a more consensual change from the status quo (among other things, he's putting some pretty clearly terrible people in positions of power—and I'm not talking stuff from MN7 but for example the mercenary forces), not to mention setting himself up to be in essence the god of the new world, whatever his protests to the contrary. In contrast, where Blackjack made the same mistake, it was because of something closer to an unthinking carelessness which she rapidly came to regret and listed among her greatest mistakes—and didn't repeat.

I kind of loved that sense, in the early days, that the team was hanging together by a thread. It made me cheer every time one of them chose to stay in spite of all the reasons they should leave.

That's all true—and I feel the same way—but though it feels great when they pull through even that feeling is built on the fact that there wasn't that much holding them together, and both Glory and P-21 did have good reasons to leave, and that's a point I don't think I can deny when I hear it as a criticism of the early chapters.

I guess I don't understand why that's even a criticism. I mean, yeah, if someone was expecting Harry Potter-style instant friendships, I suppose it could be disappointing...

I think the point was more the opposite: that especially for P-21, it would make more sense for him never to become her friend, and leave her at the first opportunity. Bearing in mind that not long after his first realistic chance to leave her (Megamart), he not only leaves her but enacts a plan to capture her and turn her in to Deus with U-21 until she surprises him with her reaction to seeing him again (Flank)—seemingly brought on by the fact she refused to execute the manager of the mine at Brimstone's Fall—well, I can see a reading where them becoming friends isn't exactly a probable path.

Sorry... things fell apart.  I'll be at Everfree next weekend, so we won't be able to brush then, so it'll be the weekend after next.  So very very sorry.

Don't worry about it. My actuarial tables indicate most or all of us will still be here. Wish I could be there, but unlike Derpmind, I'm not even on a coast. Also, my travel budget for a while is being taken up by a trip to Vegas for a friend's bachelor party, which would be a considerably higher priority anyway.

Chapter Forty Nine Running Thoughts:

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