[GRIMDARK] Fallout Equestria: Project Horizons Discussion

ScytoHarmony wrote:

juleppony wrote:*pokes head in*

Oy. Y'all ragtag vagabonds invaded a new place? After running up 3 posts of comments at EqD? Tsk!

You're here now. Soon you will be one of us.

One of us. One of us. One of us.

"One of us"

Oh, I've been one for quite some time.

There you are, Julep. I was wondering a while back if you were coming. Welcome back to the madness.

Funny I joined the group and was thinking mintys not here

o~o i love ya'll as friends letting ya know <3

Nightfire wrote:o~o i love ya'll as friends letting ya know <3

Sure you do...

Admiral Stoic Rum wrote:

Nightfire wrote:o~o i love ya'll as friends letting ya know <3

Sure you do...

I do no joke :mybad:

Nightfire wrote:o~o i love ya'll as friends letting ya know <3

Love you too <3! *Hugs for everyone*

Nightfire wrote:o~o i love ya'll as friends letting ya know <3

Once again, we need a Chrys emoticon.

Sindri wrote:

Nightfire wrote:o~o i love ya'll as friends letting ya know <3

Once again, we need a Chrys emoticon.

No one sends in one member made or ones that we have permission for

Sindri wrote:
That pretty much confirms that she knew the day of balefire. At least a week in advance. Meaning this wasn't one side firing in panic or desperation and the other reacting, this was a conscious decision to end the world.

Your making the assumption that the day in question was balefire. Remember on that day several dozen things of import were going down the Four Stars raid, the creation of the first Alicorn, and Partypooper... was that ordered before or after the first bombs? I seem to remember it was before meaning there was a possible Horse lead OIA plot going down when the Zebra's decided to end the world. Or worse the Ponies had a decap strike plan that went fair or foul, remember Jetstream being set with a targeting talisman to the Zebra capital. It could have been she was nabbed and with the evidence of a first pony strike planned the Zebra's fired early, or it could have been the capital was hit successfully and deadman protocols started a general launch of pre-set firing plans.

It could have been that OIA knew the launch day a week early, or more likely with Sombers twisty plots within plots, Horse had an out and out Coup planned which got side tracked by the world ending.

Yeah, I hadn't known about the move here until Kipper poked me on tumblr -- I'd been mostly hanging out in the FoE IRC.

And apparently "mint julep" wasn't an available nick... but it's not on the memberlist...? So, I guess my doppelganger's been messing about.

Dang changelings.

swicked wrote:Eh... previously we knew Garnet was a primary actor within OIA and considered her Goldenblood's go-to pony. Carto was then able to find quotes of her that mentioned Emerald being a liaison for MAS, but we weren't really sure if that was a perminant position or not. Glass was mentioned, but that name not being a gemstone we didn't know if he/she was even particularly involved with the other two.

Now we know the six ponies working with Goldenblood in keeping tabs on and manipulating the ministries. The ponies working directly under him and, afterward, directly under Horse. That Garnet was by no means a power player, but one of a small consortium that, together, were the eyes and ears of the OIA. Through that we also now have a much stronger grasp of how the OIA was organized.

So... it's more or less a spoiler for future spoilers. If you hear the names of any of those ponies again, in any context, we know what they know through their associations with their primary ministry and the OIA as well as that they are all can be expected to be as suspicious and duplicitous as Garnet has been shown to be.

At least that's what I've taken from the post.

Thank you, you put that much more lucidly than I did.

Sindri wrote:That pretty much confirms that she knew the day of balefire. At least a week in advance. Meaning this wasn't one side firing in panic or desperation and the other reacting, this was a conscious decision to end the world.

We-ell, we kinda already knew it wasn't panicked; the FourStar plot took a great deal of setup and they had to know they were bringing WMDs into a city. So that means at least the zebras and their allies knew they were pulling the trigger on an end-of-Equestria scenario. They can't have been so blind as to think that blowing Manehattan and Cloudsdale wouldn't trigger a full scale response. So the zebras and 4Star had to be aware that they were essentially ending the world. Now we have a good reason to think the OIA had their hooves in it, but I'm not sure how much difference that makes.

Cptadder wrote:
Your making the assumption that the day in question was balefire. Remember on that day several dozen things of import were going down the Four Stars raid, the creation of the first Alicorn, and Partypooper... was that ordered before or after the first bombs?

Actually that made me think of something. Is it possible -- is it even conceivable -- that the bombs fell on the same day all those things were happening by mere coincidence?

Or, knowing what we know about the OIA, is it more likely that they used some subtle influence to push back projects and attacks so that they would not come to fruition until too late? Did Twilight's alicorn project pick that day or were there delays and setbacks that required them to wait? Did the MoM find the incriminating evidence that let them move against FourStar just then, or were they given it? Or were they held back by unforeseeable bureaucratic delays?

juleppony wrote:Yeah, I hadn't known about the move here until Kipper poked me on tumblr -- I'd been mostly hanging out in the FoE IRC.

And apparently "mint julep" wasn't an available nick... but it's not on the memberlist...? So, I guess my doppelganger's been messing about.

Dang changelings.

Minty! ::hugs!::

swicked wrote:Now I just wonder how Horse planned on weathering this storm, let alone the rest of the OIA. I'm guessing Horse had his claws in the organization long before Goldenblood got the boot and was the instigator to his removal.

I wouldn't bet on that. Suppose for a second that Garnet and her group -- let's call them the Inner Circle -- suppose the Inner Circle are the ones who, among themselves, assembled all these plans that involved stealing the meteor fragments and executing EC-1101 recipients. It makes sense that they would try to pull a coup themselves -- six ministries, one Circle member for each. The true Ministry Mares. The real Mares are out of the loop for everything but their own ministries, and most of them have no idea how to lead an organization. Luna's out of the loop except when the Inner Circle decides to pass something along. It's all so inefficient. The Inner Circle already rules Equestria in fact, so why not make it official? Then they can do all the things they really want to without worrying about what a bunch of goody-goody-four-shoes think about it.

Goldenblood started the OIA. He's too hands-on. What they really need is a figurehead who only knows what they tell him. A second Luna, if you will. So they blow the whistle on Goldie, get him deposed, and manipulate the recommendations to get the replacement they want.

And, ya know, there's this huge star metal deposit under Hoofington, incredibly useful stuff -- just hard to extract. But we've come up with a nifty way to make it extract itself! When stimulated in the right way, it'll rise up out of the ground all by itself! Hah, those foolish Zebras who used to live here never even knew what they had...

swicked wrote:I think the raid on Four Stars was a coincidence, the creation of the first alicorn might have been what driven the OIA to destroy the zebra capital on that day, which in turn caused the zebras to launch all their missiles on that day.

But the zebras couldn't just launch and end the world. They had to move bombs into a major population center and a secret high-security facility, and then detonate them in synchronicity with the missile strikes. And they managed it just minutes ahead of the MoM's agents. That sounds like the OIA piggybacking on an existing Zebra-originated plan, not pulling their own shenanigans to start it all.

SilentCarto wrote:

swicked wrote:I think the raid on Four Stars was a coincidence, the creation of the first alicorn might have been what driven the OIA to destroy the zebra capital on that day, which in turn caused the zebras to launch all their missiles on that day.

But the zebras couldn't just launch and end the world. They had to move bombs into a major population center and a secret high-security facility, and then detonate them in synchronicity with the missile strikes. And they managed it just minutes ahead of the MoM's agents. That sounds like the OIA piggybacking on an existing Zebra-originated plan, not pulling their own shenanigans to start it all.

They already had missiles that could strike everywhere in Equestria within minutes. CARE ensured that, if one side attacked with megaspells, the other side would automatically retaliate as close to instantly as possible. If the zebras had successfully snuck balefire bombs into all the major cities, it's possible that they could have used that to either destroy Equestria's capability to retaliate, or forced Equestria to surrender.

Also, was Twilight's place hit by a missile or a bomb?

Derpmind wrote:
They already had missiles that could strike everywhere in Equestria within minutes. CARE ensured that, if one side attacked with megaspells, the other side would automatically retaliate as close to instantly as possible. If the zebras had successfully snuck balefire bombs into all the major cities, it's possible that they could have used that to either destroy Equestria's capability to retaliate, or forced Equestria to surrender.

Also, was Twilight's place hit by a missile or a bomb?

Not the library, Pip visited it as a raider holdout, IIRC.

ketchup504 wrote:

Derpmind wrote:Also, was Twilight's place hit by a missile or a bomb?

Not the library, Pip visited it as a raider holdout, IIRC.

No, no. Maripony.

Somber wrote:

Minty! ::hugs!::

Somber! *hug!*

Pssssssst.

http://juleppony.deviantart.com/art/Wasteland-Orphans-308463038
http://juleppony.deviantart.com/art/Wasteland-Orphans-WP-308519589

(I can't wait for Sunday, hnngh.)

FeatherDust wrote:

ketchup504 wrote:

Derpmind wrote:Also, was Twilight's place hit by a missile or a bomb?

Not the library, Pip visited it as a raider holdout, IIRC.

No, no. Maripony.

I don't think there is really a way of knowing, but a bomb seems likely, as Twilight was caught off-guard, surprised, when the facility was hit. Early warning systems were likely capable of alerting her if it was a missile. This is all based on my unreliable memory, though.

FeatherDust wrote:

ketchup504 wrote:

Derpmind wrote:Also, was Twilight's place hit by a missile or a bomb?

Not the library, Pip visited it as a raider holdout, IIRC.

No, no. Maripony.

Pretty sure it was a missile strike. It wasn't enough to destroy the facility, just shake things when they really should not have been shook; to me that says exterior explosion instead of infiltration and planting.

SilentCarto wrote:That sounds like the OIA piggybacking on an existing Zebra-originated plan, not pulling their own shenanigans to start it all.

I don't know about that. It depends on how much the OIA (or the inner circle) was willing to do, and so far I haven't seen any limits. They may have made first contact with the zebras and made the offer to help. Or, more likely they manipulated FourStar into making such an offer... whatever really.

juleppony wrote:*pokes head in*

Oy. Y'all ragtag vagabonds invaded a new place? After running up 3 posts of comments at EqD? Tsk!

Nice to see you've finally made it, Mint! *hugs*

swicked wrote:So... it's more or less a spoiler for future spoilers.

Well, I didn't trust Garnet already... the only real spoiler would be Glass being associated with them, since his name isn't exactly a gemstone, but otherwise I still don't see it being that bad, but as I said I guess it's just me under-reacting.

swicked wrote:Glass: ...do we REALLY have to call ourselves that? You know, what with me not being a mare and all...
Garnet: Shut up, Glass.
Glass: Sigh... T_T

Poor Glass, no respect. I bet he's really totally the mastermind behind everything.

swicked wrote:They've found a way to make it extract itself? How? Or... do you mean all the death?
I dunno, you lost me at that point, could you explain yourself a little further?

I was just referencing the zebras who tried to raise the EoS in prehistory, and the scientific, industry-oriented version of worshipping it. Waking up Cthulhu by accident without really knowing what you're doing, basically.

ketchup504 wrote:

Derpmind wrote:
They already had missiles that could strike everywhere in Equestria within minutes. CARE ensured that, if one side attacked with megaspells, the other side would automatically retaliate as close to instantly as possible. If the zebras had successfully snuck balefire bombs into all the major cities, it's possible that they could have used that to either destroy Equestria's capability to retaliate, or forced Equestria to surrender.

Also, was Twilight's place hit by a missile or a bomb?

Not the library, Pip visited it as a raider holdout, IIRC.

Derpmind is referring to Splendid valley, as for missile or bomb we don't know, could be either as the Valley was an underground bunker complex and the megaspell detonated on the surface.

Cptadder wrote:

Sindri wrote:

Derpmind wrote:Also, was Twilight's place hit by a missile or a bomb?

Pretty sure it was a missile strike.

Derpmind is referring to Splendid valley, as for missile or bomb we don't know, could be either as the Valley was an underground bunker complex and the megaspell detonated on the surface.

Nope. It was a bomb infiltrated into the tunnels.

Fo:E Ch 29, page 1:
I floated out my binoculars and stared towards the horizon. A sinkhole several miles across indicated where the balefire bomb had been detonated. The bomb had been snuck in underground and detonated. The surface above had collapsed into the toxin-filled tunnels below.

FeatherDust wrote:

Cptadder wrote:

Sindri wrote:

Derpmind wrote:Also, was Twilight's place hit by a missile or a bomb?

Pretty sure it was a missile strike.

Derpmind is referring to Splendid valley, as for missile or bomb we don't know, could be either as the Valley was an underground bunker complex and the megaspell detonated on the surface.

Nope. It was a bomb infiltrated into the tunnels.

Fo:E Ch 29, page 1:
I floated out my binoculars and stared towards the horizon. A sinkhole several miles across indicated where the balefire bomb had been detonated. The bomb had been snuck in underground and detonated. The surface above had collapsed into the toxin-filled tunnels below.

So Maripony was never actually hit at all, it just felt the shock from a bomb going off in the Splendid Valley waste disposal site.

So are we expecting a chapter this weekend.

Sindri wrote:So Maripony was never actually hit at all, it just felt the shock from a bomb going off in the Splendid Valley waste disposal site.

The disposal site was directly underneath Maripony, filling the whole valley. I'm pretty sure it went off directly beneath the facility -- likely in the same spot Pip's bomb went off.