Tag: mlp:fim

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(For some reason, I ran into technical difficulties trying to post this as a photo post, so let’s try it like this. Might be more practical to read too? Feedback on whether I should stick to this format for fanart commentary would be appreciated.)

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evaexe: This piece nicely depicts one of the best things about Bonesaw: even with a bunch of blood around her, clearly spilled by her while doing awful things, she’s adorbs.

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Endless_Assault: Man, it’s good to see that smile again. I really like the pose and coloration here, too.

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ArtLounge: The adorableness streak continues with a little chibi Vista! Wait, is she… is she dabbing, to the best of her chibi ability (chibility)? Either way, this is cute.

…is she actually chibi or did she accidentally warp the space around her own head…

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ArtofLariz: Damn, Aisha looks amazing here. Badass and beautiful! Give her some years and she might become a true femme fatale.

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More ArtofLariz: Skitter certainly isn’t slacking on the badassery either. This might be the most badass image I’ve seen that involves a ladybug, which is saying something considering I’m in the fandom for a show with a ladybug-themed badass as one of the main leads.

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Blastweave: It took me a moment to understand what I was looking at, but it turned out the answer was “something very cool”. Oh, and Dragon vs. Leviathan. It’s a visually busy piece, but that fits very well with the chaos of the scene it’s depicting. The rooftop Tattletale in the background is a nice touch.

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diangu246: Don’t litter, folks – if you leave large sheets of plastic out in nature, wild Scions can get stuck in them! Jokes aside, though, this is a really good-looking piece. I love the lighting and the somewhat somber expression, in particular. 🙂

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RespicePostTe: The artists of this fandom seem to be really good at making the girls look cute (when appropriate). This is no exception – between the pose, expression and pretty, bright colors, it’s hard to remember that this is a girl who regularly gets people to kill themselves.

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ChromaCurves: Ooh, I think I’ve heard of this piece before – back after Interlude 11h, someone mentioned that there were more pieces like this one by ChromaCurves (that were still spoilery – I suppose Crawler was the only reason that was still the case for this one).

This doesn’t disappoint. All the Ponyhouse Nine designs look quite fitting! But where’s Pinkie Pie?

Crawler doesn’t look particularly like a pony – to be fair, the original doesn’t look much like a human either – but I appreciate how he’s got components from various species in the MLP universe. The first thing I noticed was the changeling queen horn, but he’s also got the axolotl-like cheek things from Spike (seriously, why can’t I find art of Spike as an axolotl? axolotls are great), a pegasus wing, eye effects similar to King Sombra, at least one pony ear, and transparent spike-like things on his head that I’m sure I’ve seen somewhere in MLP but can’t place. There might be more I’m not noticing too. This is a neat design!

So yeah! The Worm artists continue to be excellent. Keep up the good work! 😀

Krixwell JaceLeave a comment

I had to do something.

At least Skitter is the one here with a ranged power.

Calling on the bugs that had covered Lucy, I stirred up a cloud to grab Grue and Bitch’s attention, then pulled all of the bugs into the alleyway where Panacea and Mannequin were.

Wait, they were far enough away that they wouldn’t immediately notice Taylor getting pulled up by Mannequin, and/or hear him land?

The way I was hanging, with Manneqiun gripping my neck from the back, I had a vantage point to witness what came next.  If my bugs weren’t enough of a signal to the others, Amy’s scream of pain was.  

Fuck.

Mannequin caught up to her and plunged a knife through her hand, pinning it to the wall.

…am I the only one who’s reminded of stigmata here? Especially if it were to happen to the other hand too.

He left her like that, in enough pain that she couldn’t stand, but unable to drop to the ground because her hand was impaled.  Turning, he faced the incoming stampede of Grue, Bitch and the four dogs.

STAMPEEEDE

While I struggled to escape, drawing my knife with my free hand while gripping the chain with the other, I sent my bugs in to assist.  Same tactic as last time.  My bugs drew out lines of silk and plastered them around him.

Let’s see how this goes. Taylor suggested that Mannequin would add countermeasures, and I doubt that line would even be there if she was going to just try this immediately and find out she was wrong.

I focused on his free hand and his legs, aiming to hamper his range of movement.

Something was different from last time.  I wasn’t sure if I would have known just going by the naked eye.  But I knew almost right away by the lengths of the silk I was drawing around him.  His arms were bigger, and the weight of them was making his body hunch forward a fraction.

Both arms? I guess he added something to the one he kept too – he doesn’t seem the type to replace both arms just because he lost one of them.

I tried to scream, to call out a warning, but I couldn’t breathe to do it.  I would have used my bugs to draw words, but the pair were moving too fast to read anything I threw their way.

Oh yeah, how is your oxygen supply doing?

I drove the knife at the hand that held me instead.

I’m not sure that’s going to do anything.

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“We don’t know that,” Aisha said.

“It’s a pretty good educated guess, I think.  I know you want to be useful, but we can make more use of you if you’re with us, going up against someone like Mannequin or Shatterbird, who are far less likely to be able to see you.  Help us defend ourselves.”

Yeah, fair enough.

I’m not sure Mannequin isn’t covered by the same arguments, though. I don’t think he’s perceiving the world through touch and certainly not sight, and hearing doesn’t seem to be the only thing he’s got.

(I’m still partial to my theory that he’s perceiving the world through the sorts of sensors that would be involved in biospheres, such as temperature and humidity. He might be able to sense Aisha’s heat signature.)

“This sucks!”

“Imp,” Grue said, as he glanced at the others at the table and frowned, “We’re in the company of our employers and our peers.  Let’s stay professional and discuss this after.”

Aisha: “Y’know, Professionalism is my middle name.”
Brian: “No, it’s not.”
Aisha: “Aisha Professionalism Laborn.”

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What percentage chance would you give each current member of the Nine making it out of Brockton Bay alive, knowing all you do about factors working for and against them?

  • Siberian: Her power is incredibly good defensively. Battery has been tasked with keeping her alive. 92%.
  • Jack: The local alliances are specifically interested in killing him, and he’s defensively among the weakest members, though the team is protecting him as a result and because he’s the leader. However, the reason they want to kill him is also the reason I’m on record as saying he won’t be killed, unless it’s too late (to recap, I suspect the conversation he had with Theo may have been the critical moment), so it hinges on whether or not it is. If it is or will be too late, I’d say maybe a 40-50% chance of him getting out alive, otherwise 99%. Mixed with the chances of my theory being right… ~80%, perhaps?
  • Burnscar: The only member (except maybe Bonesaw?) whose death would be outright tragic, due to the circumstances of her membership. Not particularly well-defended, except against fire, so it wouldn’t be that hard to kill her. Still, though, I have a feeling Wildbow isn’t going to? 60%, I guess.
  • Pinkie Pie: Does not being in the same world’s version of Brockton Bay mean she can’t escape the city (0%) or that she already has (100%, retroactive)? Does escaping from Ponyville count as escaping from Brockton Bay given multiverse mumbo jumbo? She’s quite likely able to do that, at least as long as her activities remain secret. 85%?
  • Mannequin: Well defended and hard to kill properly because each of his parts are separately sustained. Would be in trouble if the Manton effect didn’t prevent Kaiser from affecting his chains, and if Kaiser wasn’t, y’know, dead. He’s also going up against Skitter again, which might end up forcing the Undertravelers to kill him. Sundancer ought to be quite effective against him, actually. 80%?
  • Shatterbird: Incredibly powerful, but fragile. A true glass cannon. She’s also got an attitude that screams “kill me off”. Battery has been tasked with keeping her alive. 42%.
  • Crawler: Like Siberian, but moreso. How the fuck do you kill him? 97%.
  • Cherish: Poorly defended. Already in trouble with the Nine, not likely to succeed at redeeming herself in their eyes. She’s not likely to survive unless she defects, and even then, she can expect to have Siberian on her tail. 20% at best.
  • Bonesaw: Too precious. Not greatly defended, on her own, but her creations do a good job preventing attacks. 65%?
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He wasn’t in the hallway.  There wasn’t even debris from where he’d torn his way through yet another wall.

…huh. Maybe he’s working with someone who could help him escape?

She activated her power.  Time seemed to slow down as she sped up.  She snapped her head to look up and saw him in the middle of a leap over her head.  He’d timed it perfectly, so he would be above her when she rounded the corner.

Damn, nice one. But with her power slowing down time for her (apparently tied to her speed? this might be inspired by relativity – maybe the speed of light is different for her or something), she might be able to react quickly enough.

Except she was faster, and she could hit harder than he could.  Given a chance.

The momentum in her blows is affected by the slowed time because from an outside perspective, the blow is faster.

Her elbow caught him while he was still airborne, and unable to dodge.  She slammed him into a wall, and followed up with a leaping kick while the effects of her power still coursed through her.

Sweet!

Madcap rebounded off of the wall as though he were made of rubber and ducked beneath her incoming kick.

Twisting around as he rose back to a standing position, he got a grip on her from behind in the same moment her foot hit the wall.  Heaving, he hurled her down the length of the hallway.

TEAM JAMIE IS BLASTING DOWN THE HALL AGAAAAAAAAIN

Krixwell JaceLeave a comment

Random 4 AM prediction: At some point there will be a character (if there isn’t one already) whose civilian name is Rose. It seems like most works I’m actively in the fandom of has one at this point.

Plague 12.8

Krixwell JaceLeave a comment

I know the world can get ya down
Things don’t work out quite the way that you thought
Feeling like all your best days are done
Your fears and doubts are all you’ve got

But there’s a light, shining deep inside
Beneath those fears and doubts so just squash ‘em
And let it shine for all the world to see
That it is time, yeah, time to read Wo-orm!

Ah, ah, ah, ah – Wo-orm!
It’s time to read – this chapter!
Ah, ah, ah, ah – Wo-orm!
It’s time to read – this chapter!

…

Howdy!

Last time, Taylor broke a doll. Whoops!

This time, she’s probably going to be feeling the guilt of not having managed to save the four people Mannequin killed before she could stop him. But even with Taylor, it would be both difficult and excessive to fill an entire chapter with that, so other things are also going to happen. Which other things depends largely on where she’s headed now. Is she going off to her Hive? Seeking out Tattletale and/or Danny? Heading to a different part of her territory to help out there?

I think I’d prefer one of the first two options. The last one just sounds like it’d feel repetitive after 12.6.

No matter where she goes, it’s possible she’ll run into another Slaughterhouse member, though improbable. There’s only eight of them, and a big city. Effectively seven for this purpose, since we’re not running into Mannequin again so soon, and at least three of them are likely to not be anywhere near Skitter’s territory.

But yeah, much like Skitter right now, this chapter could go in a lot of different directions. I should probably just dive in and find out which one it takes!

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“mane six members” that’s unforgivable

Well… literally the entire fandom calls the six main adult characters of MLP:FiM that, so I guess there are a lot of people you can’t forgive. 😛

End of Plague 12.7

Krixwell JaceLeave a comment

Looks like Taylor has another piece of guilt to plague herself with.

This was a pretty good fight. I was absolutely right – Taylor did end up using a simple but clever tactic to turn the tide of it and stop getting knocked around so much. I really liked a lot of what she did here, including but not limited to playing dead to give herself time to think, the crawleidoscopes and the use of webs, glue and dyes to create a sticky situation

for Mannequin.

(Look. I knew. You knew. We all knew, it was just a matter of time before that particular overused pun reared its ugly head. I valiantly held it off as long as I could, but in the end, I’m only human. Supposedly.)

Pacing-wise, it did feel like Mannequin’s last efforts stretched out more than they maybe should near the end, but not so badly that it ruins the experience. Besides, I’m liveblogging, meaning everything is more stretched out for me than for the average reader, so maybe it’s just me.

Other than that, I guess my only complaint is that Taylor found a way to spin her victory to a negative because of events she wasn’t in a position to stop, but that’s more a frustration with Taylor than with Wildbow’s writing. It’s completely in character, I just wish she’d learn to stop doing that, for her own mental health’s sake.

Maybe that’s why we had the bit at the end about Mannequin’s head? I mean this bit:

It was miniscule, but there was a drop of black fluid beading at the seam in the neck where the chain had been threaded.  Apparently that was enough of a flaw for Mannequin to abandon it.  I left it where it was.

Like Mannequin left his head behind because of a tiny flaw, Taylor is letting a (relatively, I mean; four lives is still nothing to scoff at) minor failure overshadow a major victory.

Next chapter, I’m guessing we’ll have Taylor beating herself up some more about the lives she failed to save rather than feeling good about the lives she did save. She’ll probably also be heading back to the Hive and see for herself what it’s like after the Shattering.

If she could, she would probably be trying to contact the Undersiders to hear how Tattletale is doing and tell them about the encounter with Mannequin, but just about every phone in town is busted now, so I don’t think she has any good means of doing so without physically going to their locations.

Actually, maybe that’s where she’s headed. She’s dealt with her territory like Coil wanted, so now she’s going to go follow up on Tattletale and/or Danny? Though I’m not sure she’s actually finished dealing with her territory just like that.

Whatever the case is, I’m looking forward to the next turn Wildbow’s going to throw at me. Maybe Taylor will run into another Slaughterhouse member soon? Who knows. (You do.)

So yeah, that’s it from me for today. See you next time!

Krixwell JaceLeave a comment

In the same vein as using Skitter’s power on changelings or breezies, I wonder if/how Bitch’s power would work if she directed it at MLP timberwolves, which are wolves, but are made of wood.

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I’m leaning towards the conclusion that it wouldn’t work because Worm operates more with physical magic than idea-based magic. MLP’s timberwolves reflect the idea of a wolf, but not their biology. I think that would be the case with most powers affecting wolves, but Bitch’s power in particular is highly dependent on wolf biology to make the transformation happen. What would her power even do to make wolves made of wood into hellhounds?

Now, her power working on these guys is way more plausible:

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Though I don’t think Cerberus particularly needs it.