My Little Pony XCIX: Leakier Than A Changeling Bathtub!

[Rogar Demonblud]

They really have completely wrecked the old order, haven't they?

I wonder how much of the pre-series setting is due to Celestia fighting depression over the whole Luna/Nightmare Moon disaster.

[Forum Explorer]

So... Finished BATTLETECH, so now there is a choice between Age of Wonders III, Spellforce III, Endless Space II, starting a new Pillars II game (really, waiting for more bugfixes) or working out whether I can be arsed to try and make some of my C&C games work. Suggestions, recommendations?

I say go with Age of Wonders 3.

[Pilum]

That sounds like Equestria's geopolitical leadership was only recent then, if there wasn't much friendliness before the Mane6 arrive. :o

Almost as if... The world didn't have any elements of harmony in it...

Spoiler: rock and hard place

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a very grim episode. While a simple retelling of the old "classical (Barbarian) Hero has no place in a modern world", it felt a bit harder in Happy Pastel Pony Land. Also made sense that Yona would bond with him over it, although my brain did attempt to kill the moment by playing the Police "don't stand so close to me" on the inner jukebox! I blame a colleague and his 'oldies' radio at work.

[Aotrs Commander]

I say go with Age of Wonders 3.

Anything I should know/bare in mind before I start (on the basis that I have never played an age of wonders game before - I picked it up for, what £7:50 in the recent PDX sale).

We're hopefully attepting to copy the HDD today, so fingers crossed...

[Pi Pie]

Spoiler: Bonbon!ship

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I consider what Pi Pie said and cme to the conclusion that its is all well and good following the hull formula with the ships, but when I did that with the Xyrait and Phystyulons they were more visibly different (accomodating large features makes for interesting hull engineering), so with this and the PD frigate earlier, I've started to play with the base design a bit more.

I actually quite like this one. Bonnie's colour scheme is actually a rather good one - I might even pinch it for another whole fleet...



Forward view showing why the lower missile pods are at a different angle...

Dang, ignore the black cylinder in the bottom, that's the flight stand hole thingy that I forgot to delete then when doing the picture that I've only just noticed when I posted this...!

That's not a Bon Bon ship. These are Bon Bon ships.

Yes, you brought this on yourself.

Spoiler: No such thing as friendzones.

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Spoiler: Best friends

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Spoiler: Tangled

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Spoiler: Nose to nose

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Spoiler: Together forever

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Can I request a Lyra colored ship docking with the Bon Bon colored ship?

Also, ship happens
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdtTfQJCO2Y

[Aotrs Commander]

Well, after a bit of light faff, it seems we are back in business on the new SSD/HDD, with the old primary now as the backup. Yay.

That's not a Bon Bon ship. These are Bon Bon ships.

Can I request a Lyra colored ship docking with the Bon Bon colored ship?]

Way ahead of you. You must have missed that one the first time around, a week or few ago (between TaviShip and FizzlepopShip).

Spoiler

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[Alabenson]

Well, I finally got around to watching Episode 19;

Spoiler: On the Road to Friendship

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Honestly, I thought this episode was alright, but I found it very predictable, which was a bit of a letdown since Starlight and Trixie have very interesting chemistry together. That being said, there were a few particularly good bright spots;
- While Trixie's and Starlight's reactions to Twilight/Cadance's friendship chant were entertaining, I think Flurry Heart's expression was even better. That look in her eyes just screamed "Oh dear Celestia what are they doing?". Cadance and Twilight are going to do that chant in public when Flurry Heart is a teenager and it will be absolutely hilarious.
- Trixie and Starlight's friendship song was cute, but I think the visuals were more memorable than the actual song itself.
- Starlight continues her streak of never actually thinking her actions through. Seriously, as much as people complain about Fluttershy learning the same lesson over and over, at least she actually makes some progress.

Overall, I'd probably give this episode a B. It was alright, but it got a little bogged down in the middle and never fully recovered.

[zimmerwald1915]

Spoiler: On the Road to Friendship

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- While Trixie's and Starlight's reactions to Twilight/Cadance's friendship chant were entertaining, I think Flurry Heart's expression was even better. That look in her eyes just screamed "Oh dear Celestia what are they doing?". Cadance and Twilight are going to do that chant in public when Flurry Heart is a teenager and it will be absolutely hilarious.

Spoiler

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Cadance at least will know she's noodging her daughter. Twilight will be sincerely devastated that Flurry finds it embarrassing.

Spoiler

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- Starlight continues her streak of never actually thinking her actions through.

Spoiler

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Why should she? A Royal Problem taught her to trust and to not examine her instincts, and the writers' favor has ensured and will continue to ensure that they are always on the money. Whatever Starlight does is necessarily right because Starlight is the one doing it.

[Aotrs Commander]

No problems yet, touch wood - so BigMacShip so as not to waste the day entirely...

Spoiler: Thulagos Beam Destoyer

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[Pi Pie]

No problems yet, touch wood - so BigMacShip so as not to waste the day entirely...

Spoiler: Thulagos Beam Destoyer

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The coloring works really well on this one. I think the green accents are what make this one come together.

Spoiler: S8E21A Rockhoof and a hard place

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Comments as we go.
• It looks like we’re getting another episode with a pillar of Equestria. This continuity is nice.
• Professors dropping graduate students on each other. It is great when art mirrors real life.
• Wow, Flash Magnus' training may actually get the Equestrian Guard up from level 1 minions to level 2.
• Spike’s delivery of the news that Rockhoof is going to be turned to stone is great. That is the perfect minion delivery for when a master has gone full evil and is taking over the world.
• Overall, another solid B. There was some nice nods to continuity and world building but nothing amazing.

Back through the thread.

I noticed a few people considered this episode dark because of the potential stone prison. I never found it that dark because it was ponies, and I knew that there was a happy ending. However, it is another example of the true grim dark horror hidden under pony's pastel colors.

I still think the worst was S6E8 A Hearth's Warming Tale or S5E25 The Cutie Re-Mark. In both those cases, there is a story of a rogue unicorn using magic because she does not understand friendship almost leading to world destruction. That means that the world hangs on a razor's edge and could be destroyed any day because of a small mistake.

Also, if you ever compare Warhammer 40k and My Little Pony, there are a lot of potential overlaps.

[Derjuin]

Also, if you ever compare Warhammer 40k and My Little Pony, there are a lot of potential overlaps.

Spoiler

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Spoiler: Ep21

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There were a lot of little things in this episode that really made it fun to watch, especially Twilight's "eh" at the end when Spike asks if she can actually appoint Rockhoof that way. Overall I enjoyed it, solid B+.

[DigoDragon]

Almost as if... The world didn't have any elements of harmony in it...

That was part of my point to begin with.

Spoiler: rock and hard place

Show

a very grim episode. While a simple retelling of the old "classical (Barbarian) Hero has no place in a modern world", it felt a bit harder in Happy Pastel Pony Land. Also made sense that Yona would bond with him over it, although my brain did attempt to kill the moment by playing the Police "don't stand so close to me" on the inner jukebox! I blame a colleague and his 'oldies' radio at work.

Spoiler: Rockhoof and Hard Place

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Eh, the old barbarian out of time story has been done to death. This one is pretty forgettable. Should get Rockhoof a job in demolitions. No pony thought of that? I did find Yuna kinda cute being all fangirl for Rockhoof.

Spoiler: Ep 22 What Lies Beneath

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The Student6 are pretty good in this one. It's a good episode for them And now the Tree of Harmony is officially creepy. Ugh, that sparkly wide-eyed Twilight is gonna haunt me in my sleep later. Friendship lessons by nearly crushing the team griffon! Sure! This cannot possible backfire. :3

Ocellus continues being most adorable. And I was laughing with her in Chrysalis form. That was rather amusing to see Chryssi's face emote like that. Also points to Smoulder for dressing up. That takes bravery.

Cozy Glow still being all Baby Dahl mysterious. Pretty sure she's gonna be the finale villain.

[zimmerwald1915]

Almost as if... The world didn't have any elements of harmony in it...

Why should that matter? The Elements of Harmony are not cosmically important, they are an unintended product of a magical experiment.

[gooddragon1]

I knew I kept it around for something...

Spoiler

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[Aotrs Commander]

I say go with Age of Wonders 3.

Well, I played the tutorial campaign last night (too late to say anythign then).

My first impression is that is it reminded me of Elemental: War of Magic: Fallen Enchantress: Legendrary Heroes, in the sense that I was going "why I am I not playing that?"

For a game that insists its about war and conquest (the city building is rather shallow), the fact that devs (apparently, as I looked) absolutely insisted you be given no control of how your units deploy because speed and/or because AI is rubbish stands out rather. Especially after playing BattleTech. (Which ALSO doesn't, but also gives you plenty of time to move your units into position before contact. But I guess "combat has to be fast, right?" Fallen Enchantress was just as bad, actually, but the city-building game and quests were more interesting, at least on first blush.

I'm afraid I just think that if I am going to fight battles, they should, y'know, be good battles (see Total War), not a poor compromise between not being Civ and speed. (I mean, both Age of Wonders and Fallen Enchantress are turn-based games! That's fracking easier to deal with, but you don't even get any input in formations in a TACTICAL GAME.)

Out-of-combat healing seems remarkably slow, and I couldn't immediately see any high elf units that healed like apparently you're supposed to field.

The forge was fun - I discovered that right as I was camped outside the enemy throne city, so then spent I don't know how many turns working out the best way to fine-tune my equipment.

The story was... Eh. I was sort of expecting something, given the intro, but it really wasn't.

It is, then... Okay. Bit mardy, and the fact I can't load directly from within the battles (sure, I will allow not saving), but I HAAAAAAAATE it when games lock the main menu out in the middle of a battle. (And, to be honest, not fond of not allowing me to save whenever, since what if I have to go out or something?) But okay enough that I am not totally put-off, if not hugely impressed thus far.

So, I will try the second campaign today and see if outside the tutorials, its better.

But I am not overly surprised that the Age of Wonder forums are apparently mostly dead at this point.

[zimmerwald1915]

I knew I kept it around for something...

Spoiler

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Image isn't showing. Only works then the URL is copy-pasted into the browser.

[Aotrs Commander]

Spoiler: s8e20

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So, we remembdered that not only are th Crusaders A Thing, that they are allowed to be their own characters AND we remembered Scootaloo?

And we put this in an episode where Rainbow Dash has to be responsible one?

And they have a fight?

NOW we're cooking with plasma.

Yeah, more of this sort of thing, pony.

As soon as they said "we're ex-Wonderbolts," I thought: "Lightnign Dust."

S'been a while. Nice to she's just as bonkers as ever.

And I see Spitfire is once again displaying the cool, level-headed professionalism that makes her the... Actually, why is she the leader again...?

(Though I admit, I actually laughed at her insanity for once.)

So... They never brought up that she's, y'know, too young for any of this, so I take that to mean that she's clearly of legal age to be doing insane thing like this, then.


And now Dash is fangirling Scootaloo.

Yeah, I see where this is going to end up in a few years. Is that the distant sound of some sort of heavy aquatic transport, just beyond the horizon? I'm sure those two last sentences are entirely unrelated.

[zimmerwald1915]

Spoiler: s8e20

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And I see Spitfire is once again displaying the cool, level-headed professionalism that makes her the... Actually, why is she the leader again...?

Spoiler

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On come on, that's a persona she's adopting for Scootaloo's benefit at Rainbow's request.

The bit is also a funny SNL reference, which I'll admit colors my appreciation of it.

Spoiler

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So... They never brought up that she's, y'know, too young for any of this, so I take that to mean that she's clearly of legal age to be doing insane thing like this, then.

Spoiler

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She does have her cutie mark. "Legal ages" are proxies for levels of maturity that individuals may meet earlier or later than they're supposed to. We use them not because they're always accurate, but because they're definitive bright lines and easier to work with than tests.

Cutie marks could easily play the same role for ponies, and may be a slightly better proxy for maturity than age.

Of course, another such proxy would be use of the adult body model.

[Forum Explorer]

Well, I played the tutorial campaign last night (too late to say anythign then).

My first impression is that is it reminded me of Elemental: War of Magic: Fallen Enchantress: Legendrary Heroes, in the sense that I was going "why I am I not playing that?"

For a game that insists its about war and conquest (the city building is rather shallow), the fact that devs (apparently, as I looked) absolutely insisted you be given no control of how your units deploy because speed and/or because AI is rubbish stands out rather. Especially after playing BattleTech. (Which ALSO doesn't, but also gives you plenty of time to move your units into position before contact. But I guess "combat has to be fast, right?" Fallen Enchantress was just as bad, actually, but the city-building game and quests were more interesting, at least on first blush.

I'm afraid I just think that if I am going to fight battles, they should, y'know, be good battles (see Total War), not a poor compromise between not being Civ and speed. (I mean, both Age of Wonders and Fallen Enchantress are turn-based games! That's fracking easier to deal with, but you don't even get any input in formations in a TACTICAL GAME.)

Out-of-combat healing seems remarkably slow, and I couldn't immediately see any high elf units that healed like apparently you're supposed to field.

The forge was fun - I discovered that right as I was camped outside the enemy throne city, so then spent I don't know how many turns working out the best way to fine-tune my equipment.

The story was... Eh. I was sort of expecting something, given the intro, but it really wasn't.

It is, then... Okay. Bit mardy, and the fact I can't load directly from within the battles (sure, I will allow not saving), but I HAAAAAAAATE it when games lock the main menu out in the middle of a battle. (And, to be honest, not fond of not allowing me to save whenever, since what if I have to go out or something?) But okay enough that I am not totally put-off, if not hugely impressed thus far.

So, I will try the second campaign today and see if outside the tutorials, its better.

But I am not overly surprised that the Age of Wonder forums are apparently mostly dead at this point.

Oh yes, the AI is pretty much rubbish. AoW is infamous for how easy it is to trick the AI into being stupid. AoW 3 is slightly better in not being able to win any siege by simply opening the far gate of your base, and letting the enemy run over to it before shutting it in their face until they are all killed by auto-turrets.

But the game itself is alright, though the campaign doesn't make much sense without some knowledge of the first two.

[gooddragon1]

Image isn't showing. Only works then the URL is copy-pasted into the browser.

I see what you mean. I have no idea how to share it then. Here's the url:

https://imgur.com/fHkPHRK

[tonberrian]

Imgur doesn't like hotlinks to gitp. It's against the rules there, and they've blocked it here. Direct url links work.

[Spamotron]

Spoiler: S8E22 What Lies Beneath

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It looks like the Mane 6 need to apologize to Starlight Glimmer. The avatar of Harmony Itself demonstrates that locking creatures up and mentally torturing them until they behave how you want them to is in fact a-okay.

[t209]

That was part of my point to begin with.

Spoiler: Rockhoof and Hard Place

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Eh, the old barbarian out of time story has been done to death. This one is pretty forgettable. Should get Rockhoof a job in demolitions. No pony thought of that? I did find Yuna kinda cute being all fangirl for Rockhoof.

Spoiler: Ep 22 What Lies Beneath

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The Student6 are pretty good in this one. It's a good episode for them And now the Tree of Harmony is officially creepy. Ugh, that sparkly wide-eyed Twilight is gonna haunt me in my sleep later. Friendship lessons by nearly crushing the team griffon! Sure! This cannot possible backfire. :3

Ocellus continues being most adorable. And I was laughing with her in Chrysalis form. That was rather amusing to see Chryssi's face emote like that. Also points to Smoulder for dressing up. That takes bravery.

Cozy Glow still being all Baby Dahl mysterious. Pretty sure she's gonna be the finale villain.

Spoiler: Rockhoof

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True, also I think they forgot Applejack and Applefarm again. I mean either he would fit on the farm or actually mess it up again.
Also why is there a General in the navy instead of Admiral? Are they using Japanese "same terms for all ranks" again?
And has the writers heard about "Everyone" after callng out pony who use "creatures" as bigot.

[Aotrs Commander]

Oh yes, the AI is pretty much rubbish. AoW is infamous for how easy it is to trick the AI into being stupid. AoW 3 is slightly better in not being able to win any siege by simply opening the far gate of your base, and letting the enemy run over to it before shutting it in their face until they are all killed by auto-turrets.

But the game itself is alright, though the campaign doesn't make much sense without some knowledge of the first two.

"Alright" is about as much as I'll give it. I got through the first mission of the human campaign, realised (because it was way too late last night) I'd actually clicked "exit" or something and not "continue campaign" and went back to the elf one and have just finished the second.

Yeah.

It is one of those games were it does nothing but play "gotcha." The tactical battles are so painfully poor (direct comparison to BattleTech on one hoof, Total War on another, and Fallen Enchantress on the third) that I have more or less given up and jsut use the auto-resolve. It is REALLY crappy about killing units off. You unit seem way too fragile, and the enmy units way too strong (monsters, anyway, I haven't bothered trying to fight an army where there's more than one stack because URRGH, I cannot be doing with faffing about). It's the range, I think, mostly - even the "long range" stuff is WOEFULLY too short for the map size (the tiny, tiny, map size), so half the time you spend tediously moving units to try and get a shot off at max range (because scattered random deployment is a replacement for AI programming!)

I have found that basically the game punishes you wit excessive casualties for exploring with less than a stack of tier 3 units or two full stacks, and plays gotcha with its armies if you tech up, but that's easier to handle.

So it's a lot of thumb twiddling while clicking "next turn" as you get your one or two starting cities up to the point you can shove out some unit and then send five or six stacks around. (Oh, and even on normal, apparently five stacks to three means you will still take heavy casualties attacking a siege.)

And the campaign, aside from that first mission, takes the forge out of your hands (the most fun I'd had with it), and proceeds to give you very little gear. And apparently hard-locks your character's XP, since I have seen one or two level-ups at best in the two "proper" missions, and neither gave me the race bonuses.

The game is going on Easy, tomorrow, because I might get through the campaigns for the story (such that it is), but...

Yeah.

Fallen Enchantress does a better job of everything except having a story campaign.

Age of Wonders... Doesn't seem to know hat it wants to be. It wants to be a wargame at the expense of being an empire builder - but it SUUUUUUUCKS as a wargame; it has RPG elements, but there aren't enough of them to stand on its own...

Glad I only paid £7.50 for it; with tomorrow, I might get twenty hours out of it, but it is really struggling to grab me.

Suddenly a lot less bother about Age of Wonders: Planetfall.

[Pi Pie]

Spoiler: S8E22 What Lies Beneath

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Thoughts as I go.
• Twilight is discussing the Tree of Harmony, the most powerful artifact known to pony kind and at least partially aware if not sentient. And she is discussing this in class with her students. Does no one think that this would be a bad idea? I know ponies are lax with security (see the royal guard) but come on.
• Twilight makes “root” pun. So terrible.
• I wish Fluttershy was in the tree costume just to talk back to Gallus and freak him out.
• Cozy is so evil. Even when Celestia and Pinkie are trolling, they are not that bad. Ok, well maybe.
• Why would a plumbing grate be in a library? I could understand heating or cooling, but there is no reason to expect water flow in a library. And the off gassing would damage the books.
• She? Smolder is a female dragon? Ok then.
• Ocellus as Chrysalis is very cute. Not quite as cute as Chryallis prance in S8E13, but still cute.
• Tree of Harmony being sentient, confirmed. And now it is a lot scarier.
• Tell the professors about the tree. This is a crisis that could affect the safety and wellbeing of not only Equestria but potentially the entire world. Being worried about one pony being expelled from school is not worth it.
• Overall B+, we get to learn more about the young 6, some nice bonding and probably some good foreshadowing to the finale.

Back through thread.

Spoiler: S8E22 What Lies Beneath

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It looks like the Mane 6 need to apologize to Starlight Glimmer. The avatar of Harmony Itself demonstrates that locking creatures up and mentally torturing them until they behave how you want them to is in fact a-okay.

That is surprisingly on point. Well done.

[DigoDragon]

Spoiler: S8E22 What Lies Beneath

Show

It looks like the Mane 6 need to apologize to Starlight Glimmer. The avatar of Harmony Itself demonstrates that locking creatures up and mentally torturing them until they behave how you want them to is in fact a-okay.

Spoiler: What Lies Beneath

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You know... we never got confirmation if Chrysalis took the elements or not from the tree. So what if in absorbing the Mean6, the tree was tainted with meanness; this would have normally been filtered out by the elements in the tree, but since Chrysalis took them there's no filter and therefore the tree is acting odd? Just an idea.

Spoiler: Rockhoof

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True, also I think they forgot Applejack and Applefarm again. I mean either he would fit on the farm or actually mess it up again.
Also why is there a General in the navy instead of Admiral? Are they using Japanese "same terms for all ranks" again?
And has the writers heard about "Everyone" after callng out pony who use "creatures" as bigot.

Spoiler: Rockhoof

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I imagine they'd just have Rock buck a tree across state lines for comedy effect.

I assumed the writers didn't really care about military ranks for this episode. Though props about the movement of the stars. That is true.

Spoiler: S8E22 What Lies Beneath

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Thoughts as I go.
• She? Smolder is a female dragon? Ok then.
• Ocellus as Chrysalis is very cute. Not quite as cute as Chryallis prance in S8E13, but still cute.
• Tell the professors about the tree. This is a crisis that could affect the safety and wellbeing of not only Equestria but potentially the entire world. Being worried about one pony being expelled from school is not worth it.

Spoiler: What Lies Beneath

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1) I'm pretty sure they always used the female pronouns with Smolder. But yeah, there's not much to distinguish dragon genders. Eyelashes is pretty much it, isn't it?

2) I'll agree only because watching the real Chryssi prance around was just too darn cute to be legal.

3) I HOPE they say something. >.>

[Topaz]

Imgur doesn't like hotlinks to gitp. It's against the rules there, and they've blocked it here. Direct url links work.

Thank you! I had wondered what happened to my avatar. Now it's on a new host.

[t209]

Spoiler: S8E22 What Lies Beneath

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Thoughts as I go.
• Twilight is discussing the Tree of Harmony, the most powerful artifact known to pony kind and at least partially aware if not sentient. And she is discussing this in class with her students. Does no one think that this would be a bad idea? I know ponies are lax with security (see the royal guard) but come on.
• Twilight makes “root” pun. So terrible.
• I wish Fluttershy was in the tree costume just to talk back to Gallus and freak him out.
• Cozy is so evil. Even when Celestia and Pinkie are trolling, they are not that bad. Ok, well maybe.
• Why would a plumbing grate be in a library? I could understand heating or cooling, but there is no reason to expect water flow in a library. And the off gassing would damage the books.
• She? Smolder is a female dragon? Ok then.
• Ocellus as Chrysalis is very cute. Not quite as cute as Chryallis prance in S8E13, but still cute.
• Tree of Harmony being sentient, confirmed. And now it is a lot scarier.
• Tell the professors about the tree. This is a crisis that could affect the safety and wellbeing of not only Equestria but potentially the entire world. Being worried about one pony being expelled from school is not worth it.
• Overall B+, we get to learn more about the young 6, some nice bonding and probably some good foreshadowing to the finale.

Back through thread.



That is surprisingly on point. Well done.

Sorry about being late but I agree with you on this.

Spoiler: What Lies Beneath.

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My favorite being Smolder's tea party.

[Aotrs Commander]

Well, dunno whether it was turning the difficultly down, the draconians are just a better race, knowing how the XP system works better and/or having more heroes, but (aside from a couple of moments), AoW3 was a lot more tolerable yesterday, and I even found I was fighting almost all the battles.

We'll see if this hold in the next mission, which appears to goblins...

Spoiler: WallflowerShip

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As only three colours were listed on FiM wiki, I knocked a load off the RGB values to try and get the darker green like her hair outlines - the Xyritt really need a four-colour scheme.

[Draconi Redfir]

Spoiler: What Lies beneath

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I always knew there was something wrong with letting a Filly into a school that is CLEARLY a highschool if nothing else.