User blog:Guildmaster Grovyle/Queen Chrysalis: Nuances

Wheeheeheeheehee!

WARNING: HERE BE SPOILERS.

As most of you know, FIENDship is Magic Issue 5 (Queen Chrysalis) was released today, and by gar, it blew the three preceding issues out of the water. We finally have the origin story of QC, and it is a blast to read.

However, you may also have noticed that our Chrysalis, because of the FIENDship series, is bound to run into some contradictions with official material because I gave her a backstory of my own creation. Not only that, I also came up with Parlys the Pale and an entire society besides (though I admit to drawing inspiration from the Arachna Hive of Wizard101, a spidery dystopia ruled by a class of prophets and seers). So, now that the issue is how, I have a question to address. What does the official story mean for the character I play?

In reality... it doesn't mean much. The official story is actually compatible with what I've established in the role play, especially since there are so many similarities between the QC developed in the comic and the one in the RP. The comic bolsters the Chrysalis I've been intending to project.

Partner in crime
The Queen Chrysalis of the comic has an armored changeling who seems to act as her primary advisor. He appeared briefly in A Canterlot Wedding and got some lines in The Return of Queen Chrysalis, but he never seemed to have a relationship with the queen until FIENDship.

However, I picked up on this unique changeling's role weeks ago and introduced him in the role play as the Commander, the overseer of the queen's army and her best friend against the ambitious magi. It all fits. The comic validates his role as her #1 guy, since he is actually entrusted with the task of impersonating Chrysalis herself. These two are genuine buds.

The Fall of Troy/Trot
Queen Chrysalis invented the Trojan horse! During the recent scene in the Night Weaver Chamber, as a nod to the upcoming comic, which was revealed to feature a Pegasus city called Timbucktu a week or so before its release, I had Archmagus Secthotep refer to Chrysalis as "the Bane of Fillium, Agreinbah, and Timbucktu." Fillium, of course, refers to Ilium, which is the old Roman name for Troy.

FIENDship is Magic depicts Chrysalis springing out of her wooden horse to lay waste to the city of "Trot," which seals the affair as the ponified destruction of Troy. It is totally a changeling move, and our Chrysalis in the role play has already made it... largely because I wanted to get creative with Secthotep's view of his queen, but the event stands nonetheless.

Break-out
In the role play, Queen Chrysalis has rebuilt her castle in the Badlands, having escaped from the old castle in Wuvy-Dovey Smoochy Land prior to the events of the role play. There isn't much to say here aside from the obvious. The comic proves that Chrysalis was capable of escaping from that castle in spite of Equestria's best containment measures. My idea may have involved much fewer guards and a giant tunnel, but her prison was by no means foolproof.

Origin?
The comic contradicts what I said about the changeling royal line. According to the comic, Chrysalis and the changelings were created when an evil acorn landed in a pool of magical slime, which enabled it to feed on flies and the remains of ponies as it grew into a tree. Eventually, Star Swirl pierced the tree's bark, and the changelings sprang forth. Most importantly, this means that there has never been any queen but Chrysalis.

However, out of all her stories, this one has the least historical evidence. Our heroes already know about Trot, Timbucktu, etc. The acorn tale is just something told by Chrysalis to Twilight Sparkle on the way out, leading to the beautiful line "There is no story. I was born this way."

As lovely as that sounds, would it be unreasonable to suggest that the changeling queen might have lied about her birth-from-darkness in order to discourage Twilight's friendliness or even just to make fun of the idea of reforming? Surprisingly, her official origin can actually be slipped into the role play without contradicting anything.

Longevity
Here's a real problem though. Considering the fall from Canterlot, the imprisonment in the volcano, and the birth from the tree... changelings appear to be completely immortal. They don't die, even when perforated by Celestia's magic, nor do they age, even after one thousand years. I don't have much else to say about this, but changelings are not immortal in this role play. This is one area where the comic and the role play are incompatible.

Transformation
This is a minor issue, but in the role play, changelings cannot transform into other changelings. Otherwise, Parlys would have impersonated Chrysalis and left Chaoscant in her stead, leaving Discord ignorant to his escape. The armored changeling is shown to be capable of adopting his queen's features almost flawlessly, so... I think we'll have to ignore that too.

Voice
Now, this is a really minor thing, but Chrysalis always adds a "z" to words ending in "s" or "se," as do all the other changelings in this role play, save Parlys. I've been doing this because Queen Chrysalis has a slight buzz behind her voice in A Canterlot Wedding and because her quotes always appear in green bubbles in The Return of Queen Chrysalis. However, looking back, the other changelings in that comic arc do not share the green bubble. In FIENDship #5, all the changelings use normal text bubbles throughout the entire comic.

So... Apparently, the green bubble is not supposed to indicate the buzzing undertone like I supposed. I think I'll keep it for the role play, but it is not as pronounced as I have been making it.