Ashton Posted March 4, 2012 Report Share Posted March 4, 2012 This is an idea that popped into my head I'm curious of the community's thoughts on...Somewhere there was an idea that Celestia was a body-snatcher and was grooming Twilight in order to steal her body when the purple pony reached her prime... but I thought "what is this is *partly* right..."How do we know a king? Because he wears a crown. What if Celestia isnt really an alicorn, or rather, isnt even really celestia? What if 'Celestia' is merely a crown?Background:Many melinia ago, there were the three leaders of the ponies, and during shifts in power, there were often riots and uprisings because people didnt know or trust their new leader. So, to remedy this, a unified monarchy was established under the rule of the immortal alicorn sisters Celestia and Luna... At least, this is what everyone was told... In truth the greatest of pony mages got together and created the royal crowns, these took any pony and magically transformed them into the alicorn princesses. This way the succession was handled in secret and there would be no uprising or questioning of the new ruler because, as far as the ponies knew, there was no new ruler!So, the story opens with a very sick Celestia summoning Twilight to Canterlot, once there, Celestia explains that she is not truely sick - she is dieing. It is time to pass her crown to Twilight, who has reached the required level of power and knowledge of friendship. When celestia passes the crown to her heir, the two switch places. Twilight becomes celestia and the old celestia is now in the visage of the purple unicorn.The story would continue, showing Twilight's trials as she learned to be the princess and rule the land --- and also as she dealt with the loss of her friends since "twilight" returned to ponyville and soon perished. Luna, who, of course, is not the same luna as in eons past, helps Twilight come to terms with her new role (and form) and the two become as close as true sisters, since they can only confide in each other.As a possible extension to the story, Luna's time has come, and a new pony must be chosen to take her place - one with an attitude, who is brash and often talks before she thinks, but who has a heart of gold hidden away inside... gee I wonder who that could be....Thoughts? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stainless Steel Fox Posted March 7, 2012 Report Share Posted March 7, 2012 Now that is interesting. Celestia as an ideal, not a specific pony. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lux Posted March 7, 2012 Report Share Posted March 7, 2012 Wow! really interesting idea. I'd love to see how this turns out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ashton Posted March 8, 2012 Author Report Share Posted March 8, 2012 The main thing holding me back from this right now is the fact I'm not entirely sure exactly what celestia *does* all day... so I'm not sure what trials and toils that Twilight would go through, obviously some 'peace conferance' with another race (Griffens? Zebra?) would be one of them, perhaps judging some prisoners and/or disputes between nobles would be another... I might make her be the judge of the next Best Young Flier competition so she has to face Rainbow and her friends again, not sure... Possibly overseeing the Summer sun Celebration (not at ponyville this year, obviously)... I can surely make some jokes based on a large amount of the royal duties include just paperwork reviewing and signing and looking over numbers and such... but that will get old fast...still that's only a few chapters if I went into all of those in detail... Any ideas? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lux Posted March 8, 2012 Report Share Posted March 8, 2012 Well royalty would have to hear from committees, pass laws, attend social gatherings, attend peace treaties, maintain a royal image in all things, see to the affairs of all of Equestria, raise and lower the sun, deal with disputes between the three pony types, etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ashton Posted March 8, 2012 Author Report Share Posted March 8, 2012 heh Twilight's first attempt at raising the sun will be... interesting... I have a few ideas there... needless to say in the end it's going to end up secretly being a combined effort of twilight and Luna to get it done right...The committee idea is beautiful, I might combine that with the laws idea and make it a committee to determine some minor but important law and Twilight stresses out during it... makes me wonder how many of the royal court are aware of the transition, wheather it will be a "we know this is your first week as Celestia, so we'll try to make this as fast and painless as possible" or "what in ewuestria is wrong with you, your highness, last week you didnt so much as blink and now you look like your about to crack!" (Given the semi-official canon (as per faust) that the guards armor has similar properties to these crowns, I'd think that some ponies might be aware of it or atleast suspect it...) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stainless Steel Fox Posted March 8, 2012 Report Share Posted March 8, 2012 The question is, do you want it to be more than a few chapters? Tell the story you think needs to be told, and hang the length.Also, I've always thought there was some sort of clone-appearance spell on the guards armour. Your idea extends it, though I'd assume the effect is less complete since they presumably have home lives. I'd say the guards armour is more like an separate AI helper rather than becoming a part of their core consiousness. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ashton Posted March 8, 2012 Author Report Share Posted March 8, 2012 I always try to shoot for 10-20 chapters, minimum of 8 pages per chapter, max of 30 (though obviously this all changes) so anywhere from 80-600 pages... *derp* (laugh all you want, I have one story that wasnt even half finished and weighed in at ~230 pages)My interpretation is the guard's armor makes them look identical, and when they take it off they revert to their natural appearance, basically an extention of the armor, no different to having armor that compeltely covers their bodies. On the other paw, the crowns actually either alter the pony's body or transfer consiousness (in this story it's really more the latter) so it's a "permanent" change to the pony and even if the crown is removed it makes no difference.) In neither case if the mind altered, Celestia Sparkle is just as much Twilight after she is changed as before, reading letters from her, if she signed then "Twilight" not a single friend or family member of hers would know anything had changed (discounting the fact that in this story, the old celestia becomes twilight and dies, so 'twilight' is legally dead... but that's not relevant to the discussion ) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stainless Steel Fox Posted March 8, 2012 Report Share Posted March 8, 2012 I know what you mean, Tthings like Cerina Chronicles and Training Tails have exploded (twice ) to their present unlikely lengths, and neither of them i anywhere near finished.As for the actual mechanics of the crown, you could have something like the Doctor's Garden of Ancestral Memory from The Authority super-hero comic. The Doctor is the Earth's most powerful shaman, and every time one dies, he's replaced by another, who is as powerful as all the previous Doctors put together. The Garden of Ancestral Memory is where the souls of past Doctors go when they die, and the current Doctor can visit it to get advice from his predecessors.Althernatively, it could be more like the Egg of the Pheonix from Robert A Heinlein's Glory Road. The Egg is actually a cybernetic device, a super-computer memory that is linked to the Empress or Emperor. Effectively, it becomes a part of their mind and memories so they have access to all the processing power and knowledge of a super-computer linked to the intuition and creativity of a human mind. However, since it is a part of their mind, they leave an imprint on it, so each one also has access to the mind and memories of every previous Emperor and Empress, though their own consiousness still dominates.The Archchancelor's hat (the original one) from the Discworld books is similar, but in that case it's more of a happy accident and a lot less controllable.What you'd really have to decide is, does the crown simply store a copy of the memories, power and experiences of it's users, or do the actual souls of the previous Celestias fuse with it when they die? Can the Twilight Princess (sorry ) hold conversations with them, or are their memories effectively her own, and able to be experienced as such? Either would make for an interesting story. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ashton Posted March 8, 2012 Author Report Share Posted March 8, 2012 My storylines start with 1 idea, then they start expanding and fragmenting (Though usually I try to tie up all the plot-threads by the end). The one I mentioned ("A Matter of Principal") Actually was a simple "somone was murdered, we're all stressed out over it so we're taking a vacation with the pretense of checking on security of the other 'bases'" and became a long story about two major characters learning magic (and trying to keep it secret from the others), about a legendary artifact known as 'The Nexus' and the last twist involving a character who might-or-might-not have turned to evil because of a mistake in a spell... and that's only covering some of the major plotlines!)Your giving me this hilarious mental image of a combination of the Autobot Matrix of Leadership (forgive me, child of the 80s!) and Dr Who...If I was playing this straight, I would probably go with an idea like that (copy of all the past monarch's memories, like a searchable database) but because it's played for laughs (and drama) poor Twilight has to rely on her own intuition and experiances, hense why she had to learn so much about magic and frienship prior, instead of just a random pony who was responcible being chosen and handed the crown and a spellbook Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stainless Steel Fox Posted March 8, 2012 Report Share Posted March 8, 2012 Born in 1972. So you're not the only one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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