Mayor Mare: Fillies and gentlecolts!
Applejack: Here we go…
Mayor Mare: It is my great honor to introduce to you the ruler of our land. The very pony who gives us the sun and the moon each and every day! The good, the wise, the bringer of harmony to all of Equestria... Princess Celestia!
DM: Fluttershy’s birds begin to sing, trumpets break out into fanfare, the curtain of the balcony above pulls apart…
Twilight Sparkle: And she’s not there.
DM: And there is no one to be seen.
Twilight Sparkle: Welp. If you girls need me, look for the purple unicorn whimpering in the corner.
Put off by Celestia, overfed by Applejack, abused by Rainbow Dash, exploited by Rarity, ignored by Fluttershy, ambushed by Pinkie Pie, and sabotaged by Nightmare Moon.
At this point in the episode, it has been Twilight Sparkle's worst day ever.
Note: Guest comic submissions are now open! Guidelines here. Current deadline: 4/13/21.
...Wow. Don't know why, but the words "Trauma Conga Line" come to mind. Granted, I don't think that's what this day has become for Twilight, but it's the first thing I think when I read that last bubble. Type C reaction. Matches it to a tee.
Why? I think we can assume it's just not mentioned, just glossed over like in Darths and Droids, and that Twilight's responding to the cues, realizing that the rotary impeller blade just spun up, and is waiting for the payload.
The usual idea with campaign comics is that anything we see in the comic is being narrated by the GM, even if there's no specific dialogue to go with it. I'm a little surprised that Twilight's player didn't comment on it, but I guess she's already well aware of how this is going down, and doesn't see the need to comment on each individual step on the road to disaster.
There's nothing worse than knowing what's going to happen and not being able to do anything about it. From Twilight's perspective, the god-empress has been disposed, eternal night is about to be imposed forever, and she has no idea how to fix it.
Oh, and all Celestia said was to "make some friends" with the money-hoarder, the brute, the diva, the underpowered shy girl, and the party animal.
So from her perspective, yeah, the world is doomed.
All I know is, if my DM had put my character into a situation like this, there would already be a few NPCs bleeding out, and the building would be aflame.
Poor Twi.
"I told you so" has never been this appropriate.
I wonder how Celestia will be presented ingame? This far there are some possible explanations:
1. Careless ruler: She knows of danger but doesn´t take enough precautions,
2. Ominous oracle: She knows of the danger but does not tell everything for some ominous reason,
3. Mad Horse: She doesn´t know of the danger, ignores the warnings and walks right into it.
Mad Horse, Mad Horse, Mad Horse, Mad Horse
She rules the pony nation, the Goddess of the Sun
Her love of making friends has just killed ev-ery-one
The players are all helpless, and the game's just beguuuun...
Melt the Big Bad with solar rays?
No, friendship's gonna save the day
Mad Horse, Mad Horse, Mad Horse, she's mad
A railroading DM is watching so beware
There is no information you can make her share
So make the Mad Horse gleeful
Or bow to the Nightmare...
You're saddled up, there's no recourse
It's Hi-Ho Silver
Signed, Mad Horse
...Wow. That was...unexpectedly awesome. With only one awkward line, the railroading DM not being an internal rhyme...You are truly the spirit of the internet, taking any random thing and spinning it off into something else, usually better.
You forgot the very nearly canonical (see the Phoenix Episode, among others) characterization of "troll".
That is, she knows what needs to be done but she manipulates people into going about it in what she considers the "funniest" way, rather than telling them.
She's a level 1 wizard, and you put her in the same room with the villain of the campaign. There's "Challenging", and then there's "One dice roll from being deatomized".
She should have saved that drink. It's time for some charisma rolls.
First off: Torg did a great job with that reiteration of Bad Horse from Doctor Horrible Sing-A-Long Blog. Huzzah! You win some points.
With that out of the way: I have a question about why Twilight's player keeps forgetting about the Elements of Harmony that she learned about during the opening spiel by the DM (Page 5) and has yet to try to figure out where IT might be? You would think that she would be doing that research while she was in her room.
At this point in the episode, it has been Twilight Sparkle's worst day ever.