Delivered: >>9541 This was a wild ride of a first draw. Lots of things in here that I attempted to draw for the very first time; and it shows lol. The hands are terrible, body proportions on Anon are weird, perspective is poor, etc. But you know what? I'm really proud of it. When you compare the finished result to >>9549 and >>4340 , even this level of art is something I never thought I could actually do. I'm excited to continue my learning and practice. One thing I realized about halfway through, is that I really shouldn't be concerning myself with trying to color everything in. I need to get my basic sketching, forms, shapes and speed to a higher level before I start doing that. With all the coloring, my total time on this was about 4 and a half hours. I'm definitely not going to be able to spend that kind of time on a single drawing every day. Anyway, let me know what you Anon's think of babby's first digital art with a pen. Rip it apart and tell me what's good and bad. Spoiler: It's all bad Next draw will be: >>9550

>>9564 Wew, that's some difficult requests right off the bat for someone just starting out, especially the next one you're doing. We have some absolutely merciless anons in our midst. As for feedbacks, I'm not confident about giving any concrete advice because I myself am a novice. What I could tell you is to keep on practicing and continue to be critical and analytical of what you produce, and identify a drawing/learning process that works for you to keep yourself from feeling burned out. For instance, I hate drawing living subjects. I too have the same trouble as you faced with posing, proportions, and perspectives, so I try to interspace doing that with things I like, such as drawing distant vistas and natural sceneries à la Bob Ross, because they are much more forgiving in that regard. There's no set shape for tree branches or rock formations, and nobody will know if that distant mountain range somehow, in the process of painting and repainting, crept forward by a hundred kilometers closer originally intended. I'd also like to recommend Marco Bucci's youtube channel, particularly the 'Quick Essentials' and '10 Minutes to Better Painting' playlists. I'm not yet at a level where where many of the high-level concepts he convers can be put to use, but I still find his videos to be a good balance of being relaxing, educational, and motivational. Oh and I probably should've asked earlier, is there any particular art style you have a preference for or wanting to work towards, or are you still exploring your options?

>>9564 Requester here, that's a pretty good draw for your first one. I could do as you asked and pick apart the proportions and perspective but at the end of the day, if people can tell what the hell's going on you've succeeded. Just try to always improve or learn something with every drawing, but don't make my mistake and think that means to always be adding on the final result, consistency and speed are skills too. Hence why I recommended regular gesture drawing and doodles.

>>9575 >>9578 Thanks for the feedback and recommendations. For the drawing itself, I had three basic goals in mind. Did I meet these goals? 1: Does it look like bug is being hugged? 2: Is the beetle hefty? 3: Did it bring enjoyment to look at? As far as "style" goes, that's something I'm trying to not even remotely concern myself about now, much like painting/coloring. As a beginner, any art style I try and produce is going to look like ass. That being said, what I would like to be doing is semi-realistic/realistic drawing. I like my poners/bugs/etc to have a discernible skeletal structure, muscles, etc. In relation to MLP, it's an easy style to get wrong, too. I won't name artists or post examples, but there's definitely some who do it right, and others that just make it look uncanny. It's another of those things where I know exactly the way I want it to look in my mind, but I need to acquire the skills to pull it off first. ...Lots of skills.

>>9579 >1: Does it look like bug is being hugged? Yes >2: Is the beetle hefty? No, but changelings are flat as cardboard (in more than just their butts) so that's probably more accurate. >3: Did it bring enjoyment to look at? It would take a lot to make a bug unenjoyable to look at. Now you can draw another bug hug in a year and see how much you've grown.

>>9581 Huh, the beetle wasn't hefty? I thought I made it fairly big compared to Anon. Although looking at it with fresh eyes today, if the body length is any clue to the proportions, it looks like this bug might come up to Anon's knees when standing. Originally when I started that piece, I had Anon and Notaulix snuggling on the couch in mind, but I quickly realized that I wouldn't be able to execute that in the way I would want. Notaulix is definitely a bigger, heftier beetle than that. I've said it before, but he's basically the changeling equivalent of a draft pony, like Big Mac There's a reason for that Stop fantasizing ^:)

>>9587 Hm, if he's as big as Big Mac, and when he turned into Gerson he became considerably bigger and fluffier, I'd honestly interested to see a pic of Gerson and Anon.

Do a happy bug, that's pretty simple.

Delivered: >>9550 So, this was a really intimidating request to approach, since I knew I'd have to do it multi-panel comic style to do it properly. But once I let go of being a perfectionist, and instead focused on how I could find a creative solution to the request that I could handle at my skill level, I ended up having a lot of fun with this draw. It brings me a lot of joy to be able to start visually expressing some of the dumb things my mind comes up with. I hope you enjoy. Next draw: >>9613

>>9604 When I can actually start drawing at a decent level, I'll do some Gerson art.

>>9617 This came out great, thank you Anon.

>>9604 Fuck it, first time attempt at sketching griffon from memory #360noref #yoloswag

>>9622 That's a big birb, imagine the cuddles. Nice work.

>>9622 That's some pretty good chicken scratch. Pun intended.

>>9622 Majestic. I'm sure Anon could ride him

>>9622 Gryphanon here. Well, your attempt is better than the schlock that I have been able to concoct. Your gryphon actually looks like a gryphon. I can't seem to match the mental images from memory as well. I used to be able to do so as a child, but I lost that ability to form clear mental images sometime during my teen years. You have my jealousy despite your own beginnings. In any case, I have my own simple request. Think you could draw Gilda in the highlanderesque gear I was trying to frame in my work? Or perhaps that of Roseluck and her gear, especially that of her irontail? Even better if you can do both of them cuddling. If not, I am perfectly content with just having one or the other, or something else if this is too difficult. On a side note, that's roughly about the size I would imagine a gryphon would be, with perhaps a pony/changeling reaching up around the neck. Keep up the good work. For reference, this is the last image of mine I drew of a bug, albeit not /our/ bugs here.

>>9639 ... And it seems part of my post got sniped. To clarify, you've done well with what you have with practice. Keep up the good work, and you'll be getting better in no time.

>>9622 Very nice, especially from memory.

>chad birb sketcher.png >virgin deflated bug.jpg fug Delivered: >>9613 A-Anyway here's your daily dose of sloppa, from yours truly. Experimented with some basic shading on this one. I know I've said I probably shouldn't be bothering with the colors at this stage, but I just can't help myself. What you don't see is the 30 minutes-1 hour of practice exercises before I tackle the request. These are my "fun" drawings. I want to color them. By the way, if nothing else, some feedback on if I'm successfully fulfilling the request theme or not would be appreciated. Is bug being hugged? Spooked? Looks happy? Etc.

>>9651 He looks happy and silly.

>>9651 Is happy and is bug. Shading is decent.

>>9651 Already noticeably improving Anon. Good job!

>>9651 You're making good progress! I'm glad to hear you're having fun with your drawings. Keep it up! >>9639 Thanks for the praise, anon. Alas, I'm not terribly skilled or familiar with the subject matter what's an irontail? to fulfil your request. As an apology, please accept this vaguely scottish griff instead >>9660

>>9657 >>9661 Thanks for the encouragement. I'm not so sure that I'm already improving, but one thing I can say is that I'm starting to get used to the drawing tablet and the tools available to me. Yesterday in particular I spent some time to setup the hotkey buttons on the tablet and pen to things that I thought would be useful. My favorite feature thus far, besides the undo button and panning with the stylus, is the little roller dial on the side. Can switch between zooming in/out, brush size and canvas rotation with the push of a button. Very convenient. Also, if there's no suggestions in the next few hours(or any other day), I'm just going to draw whatever I want.

>>9665 Oddly enough the dials on my tablet didn't want to work properly so I had to specifically bind them to the zoom and rotate keys. >Also, if there's no suggestions in the next few hours(or any other day), I'm just going to draw whatever I want. Bug with a bowler and a fat fucking stogie. You rushed me I panicked.

/r/ Changelings discovering water slide technology.

>>9665 >I'm starting to get used to the drawing tablet and the tools available to me That's great. Familiarizing yourself with the tools you use is an equally important part of the learning process. You'll probably spend a while yet fiddling with the UI and hotkeys as you slowly hone in on a setup that works well for you. >suggestions Notaulix wrapped up warm in a small mountain of blankets, with only his face peeking out.

Delivered: >>9667 This rushed request gave me a lot of trouble, especially since I was rushing myself. Was a busy day and by the time I got settled in for drawing, it was about an hour until midnight. I can't be staying up all night, so I dove in with maybe a five minute warmup under the mindset that I have to finish it within around an hour. Needless to say, I don't feel very good about this one. Hopefully someone finds it amusing. Though, maybe this exercise in speed was a good thing in its own way? So for the next draw, I came up with an idea. You friends can get all the requests you want in, but every 5th draw is going to be something of my choice. That way we can strike a balance between you guys challenging and forcing me to learn new things with these suggestion draws, while I get to mix in some things that I want to do. On a similar note, I'm keeping track of a "suggestion catalog" of sorts. There's ones like >>9673 where I immediately visualized what I think would be a fun scene, but I know I need more skill first to execute that vision properly. So it might be the #14, #33, #192 or even #364, but I'll get to it eventually. >implying I have the willpower and mental fortitude to push forward for that many days straight I hope I do

>>9686 I think the draw came out very nice Anon.

>>9686 Hey that's pretty good If you can get yourself to do it, it's definitely a good idea to force yourself through difficult drawings, it'll really help push along your skill with perspective and the like in the future.

>>9687 >>9690 Thanks friends. Here's a little something extra that I just thought may be beneficial to post: The basic sketch construction, the resulting line work, and the two overlaid. don't have it for the first and second drawing because I was dumb and did everything on one layer Am I moving in the right direction here for how one should be "building up" a sketch? Anything I should be doing differently? Also, snoots and muzzles are hard.

>>9708 For the muzzles the trick is to draw an oval further out and connect it to the head; it gets better form than trying to free-hand it.

>>9708 That's probably about right. Something I sometimes do is to construct a skeleton over the rough sketch. Can sometimes help figure out if things aren't where they're supposed to be.

I worked way too long into the night on this one... Should have just finished it early in the morning or something, but I was stubborn and wanted to get it done. This was a lot of silly fun, and somewhat of a thank you to a particular individual who has been supporting my efforts for a bit over a year now. Hope I did my research properly to boop the correct bug, that would be embarrassing if I got it wrong. But you know what? This isn't just any boop; I took a photo of my very own hand and traced over it. My hand is reaching through time and space to boop your bug. This is why I shouldn't be allowed to own a drawing tablet. It's dangerous to let me have this much power. I hope you don't actually mind me drawing these characters and booping your bug Anyway, following the aforementioned advice here, I think I got a pretty decent snoot on Coxa.that IS Coxa, right? Mimesis got the short end of the stick; by the time I got around to him I was already tired and ready for bed, but I still had his lines and all the coloring to do. Looks pretty derpy, sorry. Time for bed. Tomorrow is another day, and another request draw.

>>9732 You got the form down really well on the one to the right. I heard that with this kind of thing the first 30 hours see the fastest improvement and then it gets slower; kind of like newbie gains when you start working out. Your draws are already looking significantly better.

>>9732 Great improvements on the overall head shape, especially the muzzle.

>>9732 Hot damn I didn't expect to wake up to that. It's greatly appreciated! especially while I'm still sick. Yes that's Coxa, although he has one blue eye and one grey eye (Anisocoria, not heterochromia, the entire character is based on David Bowie).

>>9732 >>9708 Also, as far as construction guidelines, there's certainly something to be said about learning your basic 3D shapes, though even I don't know what the hell I'm doing with them sometimes. Some of my pictures are freeform with no construction, most are with.

>>9746 >>9747 Anthro is banned here.

>>9733 >>9735 Thanks for the encouragement. >>9736 I'm glad that you enjoyed it. The eye thing makes a lot more sense now; I noticed when looking up artwork to reference that some seemed to feature different levels of blue and grey eyes, but it seemed to gravitate towards grey so I went with that. Will keep that detail in mind. By the way, is Mimesis another of your bugs, or is it a friends? >>9737 I'm feeling real dumb now. It never crossed my mind to sketch in a 3d cube for placing the muzzle. Making cubes, cylinders, cones etc is part of my warmup practice each session. I'll have to try and remember to make use of those basic shapes for laying things out. Another thing I'm quickly realizing is that it's a lot harder for me to draw heads and faces from an almost straight on perspective, like with Mimesis, and to a lesser extent >>9651 My lines trying to incorporate the anatomy just look derpy as hell. Is this because among other things, I'm making the basic head shape so round? When I actually stop and think about it, most heads, especially changeling heads, aren't perfectly round. I think that's why my effort on Coxa turned out pretty good, since he's much closer to a side profile in that scene. It's easier to visualize where everything goes. The struggles of learning something new.

>>9776 Yeah, course the damaged eye tends to vary between 'actual grey' and 'faded/desaturated blue' Mimesis belongs to my boyfriend. If you've gone looking at pictures of them you probably noticed the majority are romantic. Yeah, rule of thumb is if you want things to look realistic then you gotta think in 3D to begin with. There's tutorials all over the place, but if you want another one from a personal mentor of mine: http://lackadaisycats.com/ishkabibble.php Straight-forward views on characters is never easy though, because at even slight angles, asymmetry looks much less unnatural but you have no perspective tricks to hide behind for a direct view. Part of the reason I got into digital painting though is because that's how you make shit look truly 3D, with proper lighting. But I wouldn't jump that far ahead, baby steps. Also yeah even regular pony heads aren't completely perfect circles, keep in mind that the construction guidelines are just that, and you can tweak. Hell, since you're working with digital, don't be afraid to use stretch tools and the like in sketching, even a lot of professionals don't rely 100% on being able to get perfect lines down all the time. By the way, been doing the gesture/figure drawing practice? (Honestly have no idea if this counts as banned content or not, it's for art example stuff so I hope not.)

>>9778 Just call it a collage of all the sick moves Anon busted at the Ponyville Dance Party

>>9779 That certainly works, this buff motherfucker has to have a few.

>>9781 It was really fortunate to have such a great requested art for BuggyCYOA get made so early on.

Help me out here /bug/, I'm having a huge schizo moment and it's getting in the way of my drawing. I finally noticed when I was working on draw #6 last night that the colors on my monitor vs the colors on the drawing tablet are different enough to be affecting my results. On closer examination with some side-by-side plain white images, the tablet had a very slight red-green tint and maybe a slightly heavier saturation. Went into the tablets settings, and changing the color temp to 9300k plus a tiny boop to contrast gives just about the same "pure white" as my monitor. The colors are still slightly bolder/more saturated, but the tablet also has a better color gamut than my admittedly old monitor. On a side note, the colors look about the same as they do on my phone; slightly more saturated/colorful than the monitor. I would be satisfied with fiddling around with the monitors settings to make the colors a little bolder to match the tablet and phone, but looking online for advice about accurate color calibration, the "experts" consider 9300k to be the great satan, and only 6500k should be used. Well, trying 6500k just makes everything look red/yellow tinted; warmer. White doesn't look white anymore. The same groups of people also say that the average monitor tends to come cool by default, closer to the 9300k range. tl;dr I'm being faced with the reality for the first time that I may have been perceiving digital color incorrectly for a bit over a decade, and now that I'm drawing digitally I'm presenting artwork that other people may not be seeing in the way I intended it to be seen. It's driving me crazy. Do me a favor friends, please describe the colors in >>9732 for me. The skin tone of the hand and the bugs, eye colors, etc. I need to try and figure out which is closer to accurate; the monitor, or the tablet+phone.

>>9811 The hand looks like the hands on people in wikiHow articles, the portal is blue, and the bugs are neutral grey when I check the RGB values but on my monitor look slightly on the warm side. I don't think it makes that much of a difference; with this kind of thing people just get used to seeing it the "wrong" way so having all the colors a little off just becomes normal. Heck, do a little experiment on yourself, expose one eye to lots of light and keep the other in darkness. Now look at the world with one eye open at a time and you will realize that one side is slightly warmer than the other, so even your basic biology is always "off" is some way. Unless it makes the images look like chinese knockoffs a slight difference won't matter.

>>9811 Seconding the other anon. I wouldn't worry about it too much if I were you. The human eye's perception to a color is highly context dependent on the surrounding hues and lighting conditions, so getting your viewers to see the colors "exactly as intended" is kind of a futile endeavor from the start. By the by, do you know about the /bale/ thread on /mlp/? It's basically a place for beginner artists to hang out, post their art, learn, and share tips.

>>9814 >>9823 Yep, I'm just letting it go for now, it's close enough. If I ever reach the point in life where I need to be doing professionally color accurate work, then I can start worrying about it again. Notaulix being comfy in a mountain of blankets is on the way. >>9736 By the way, I forgot to mention this, but >still sick Haven't you been sick a lot lately? That's no good. If you haven't, please consider investing in some Vitamin C(1000mg), D3(5000 IU) and Zinc(15-50mg). It would only cost around $25-40 and last for months. There's other more specialized supplements that I take for various health reasons, but those 3 are the basic trio of immune health and a good, safe place to start. Personally, the last time I had any sort of cold or flu was almost four years ago, and I get exposed to people of questionable health all the time at work.

>>9824 I'm fairly certain I get a lot of that stuff in my diet already, but I'll look into it. It's actually mostly just that the cough stuck around after the sickness and kept getting worse, though it's finally starting to get better. I'll be talking to my doctor about it on tuesday in any case. Now answer about the figure drawing mister you ain't getting away that easy!

>>9826 Invest in an inhaler. If it was a particularly bad infection, then I am sorry to say you'll be stuck with it for some time. Speaking from personal experience after getting a welcoming gift on the ride over to Hawaii over thirteen years ago. Nip it in the bud, whatever you do. I recommend Montelukast as a possible solution. Don't end up like me coughing up your throat after a slight cold.

I've been busy and have had many things on the mind lately, so I've been missing/forgetting to address some stuff in the thread. >>9289 >>9578 >>9778 >>9826 Yes I've been working on the gesture/figure drawing. It's tough going, but I understand why it's so important. Another thing that's tough is that I'm practicing those skills on humans(biped), then trying to translate those concepts and methodology to drawing ponies and bugs(quadrupeds). >>9575 >>9778 And speaking of guides, I'm finding that I'm hitting some sort of Dunning-Kruger valley of despair here. To elaborate, I've spent many hours watching and meditating on various tutorials and guides; I know and understand the concepts of many forms of drawing, how they should be used, and how to practice them now, but it's that last part that's the heart of the matter. Considering that I have only about maybe 20 hours of drawing under my belt thus far between the tablet and the sketch book, I can't help but wonder if I'm just trying to do too much, too quickly. Like, if I'm approaching my drawing sessions with the mindset of "Today I'm gonna focus extra hard on gestures AND composition AND perspective AND shading AND anatomy AND etc...", dividing 100% of my energy across ten different subsets of drawing skill, am I really learning anything? I'm being reminded that just like any other worthwhile skill, there's no shortcut or substitute for raw hours of pen on paper/screen. There's so much to learn and focus on that it feels a bit overwhelming. In some ways it makes me second guess my decision to have started my daily draws so early on, fully realizing now that you guys have to deal with my low quality, babby's first steps results, but I'm committed now. tl;dr art is hard and I need time to really soak in all the things I'm learning

>>9837 Yeah, it is absolutely possible to try and do too much at once. I'd focus on the basics and not even worry about colouring til later, and shading even later. Probably also use the gesture/figures as just a ten minute warmup and not hyperanalyze it, that's actually something that'll improve before you even notice, and is really just to get you the ability to actually put pencil to paper when you want to instead of getting roadblocked by your own mood.

Here, I made a visual. Anyone understand this feel? Oh and going back to the guides and tutorials, I've particularly enjoyed this one. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0ufz75UvHs

Delivered: >>9681 lol, this was such a goofy, wild adventure of a draw for all the wrong reasons. TIL cloth is hard. Colors are hard too. I thought it was a lost cause, but the blend tool managed to make things look not-terrible, somehow. I also felt some immense pressure, because I wasn't drawing just any bug here; I was drawing my bug. Of course he's not looking anything close to the way I want him to look, but there's still a particular detail for the astute viewer to glean. Maybe

>>9842 OR here, thanks for the delivery! Notaulix is one smug bug in a rug.

>>9842 Snug as a bug in a rug. I already lost track of your request list, but I'll add "Sunglasses bug sun tanning" to it. >but there's still a particular detail for the astute viewer to glean. Is it the green eggs and ham tongue or the wrinkly horn?

I'll add another request to the list: >Bug playing tic tac toe.

>>9842 Who else would crawl into the blanket pile and snuggle with bug? It looks warm and comfy

>>9844 Or maybe it's the blue eyes? In settings with multiple hives, it's common to use accent colors or other physical attributes to differentiate them.

>>9851 Yeah but I mean blue is the default bug eye colour that all but two of them have in the show so I doubt that's a unique feature to Notaulix.

>>9844 >>9851 >>9852 It's the horn, though the perspective I chose to draw from doesn't really lend itself to showcasing the design. Still dialing it in, but pic related is approximately how I envision Notaulix's horn from a side profile. In the BuggyCYOA rewrite, it's explicitly mentioned that Notaulix has a jagged horn.

>>9855 Maybe I should read the rewrite.

>>9856 Is that a not-so-subtle hint to get my ass in gear and actually finish the rewrite, so that people can read it and BuggyCYOA can continue?

>>9857 It's more of a I momentarily forgot about the rewrite entirely.

>>9855 Is the rewrite already live? I couldn't find mentioned of jagged horn anywhere on ponepaste and fimfic. Is this an effect caused by prolonged starvation, like that of the other holes appearing on his body, or a subtle hint that Notaulix is of royal blood?

Can we take a moment and appreciate that nobody has asked for any lewd things like bugbutt, bugcock, bugpussy and hoof holding? Surprisingly well behaved of /bug/

>>9873 Treading dangerous waters there Anon. I feel like people are more likely to be nice to a budding new artist, though if anything lewd gets drawn in the future those are certainly flood gates that will never close.

>>9875 Fetish bug

>>9864 No, not yet. I recently talked about this in the last thread. See: >>9029 >>9030 >>9082 If you notice the news at the bottom of the description box on fimfic, it's been in the works since 2/2/22. >>9873 >>9875 What kind of lewds would you even have a shitty beginner like myself draw? Or even if I did have the experience. Not interested in actually doing so, but I'm curious nonetheless. inb4 someone posts the Ball Sweat screencap or that MS paint tack and harness storage **I haven't forgotten* On a semi-related note, seeing as how I've already missed several days, I'm going to take a week off from worrying about daily draws, and instead focus hard on practicing my skills probably.. Maybe something like one week off for practice, then come and do another 5 or so draws, then back to practice, 5 more draws, etc... Does that sound like a good idea? I think I would be getting much more mileage out of my time spent that way, helping me to progress in my critical skills faster. If and/or when I reach a point where I start really getting better, I could try going back to the more regular daily draws. >>9885 Bug fetish

>>9891 I wouldn't suggest any lewds, some of the bugs I like are just really fucking gay.

What's in the bag this time, /bug/?

>>9905 Did you get another tablet, so you can bug while you bug?

>>9906 Nope, just a carrying bag for the one I got. It was a moment of rejoicing when it finally arrived, because it got lost in shipping for almost two weeks. Much more convenient than pulling everything out of the box it came in every time I want to use the tablet. Plus it's soft as a bug's butt on the inside, which is nice for the screen.

Newly discovered drawhack: if you ever struggle to find reference materials for drawing a pony at a specific angle, look up the 'turnaround' tag on the boorus.

>>9922 Isn't the guy who made those a resident here? But yeah, 3D models help a lot with drawing, I think there's some programs for it even.

>>9925 IIRC he was a poster in the /mlp/ /bug/ threads. Don't think he ever visited here. Come to think of it, there were a lot of posters in the /mlp/ threads that never bothered coming here. A bit frustrating and unfortunate.

>>9930 It happens every time anyone tries to take something off 4chan, there's a lot of people who will never leave.

>>9933 Happens with a lot of places and sites. We've become conditioned to the point of visiting a few sites only that most won't bother with any move. Look at YouTube for instance. There are... "Competitors", but there isn't a sufficient reason for most folks to move. It "might" be better here than there, but it would require effort to foster any sort of community, and most are just too lazy to do even that. Tis the way of things unfortunately. Obviously there's more too it than that, but it's more or less the jist of it.

>>9937 I think it's largely the other way around, actually. While there are a lot of newfags on /mlp/ at this point, there's bound to be a significant population of grizzled, salty oldfags who were among the most dedicated to the show. There's a lot of strong, emotional investment involved in that. This is part of the reason why I think /mlp/'s board culture has been in such poor shape for the past couple years now. Most of the "normal" people have long left the board or the fandom altogether, leaving only the most dedicated behind, who inevitably have strong opinions about everything and can't get along with those who differ from them. At the end of the day though, it doesn't really matter. If someone wants to post only on /mlp/ and never anywhere else, that's fine. You can't force people to post somewhere. Let's just be thankful that we have somewhere we can post our buggos and poners in peace. Might want to delete your image, by the way

>>9939 >While there are a lot of newfags on /mlp/ at this point, there's bound to be a significant population of grizzled, salty oldfags who were among the most dedicated to the show. If we're talking about just /mlp/ and not 4chan in general, a lot of the truly dedicated guys who just couldn't move on from tiny horses migrated to /pone/ on old 8chan back before /pol/ got that site shut down by becoming a breeding (lol) ground for mass shooters. Some of the displaced /pone/ guys probably moved back to /mlp/ at that point, but a lot of them also went off to live in Onionland where they can still be found. >Most of the "normal" people have long left the board or the fandom altogether Yep. The smart ones left back in 2012 or 2013 when it was clear that the show had jumped the tracks. The rest of us held out for a few more years in the vain hope that the staff would finally unveil some grand new narrative that would make sense of the FiM setting again all while becoming more disillusioned when that didn't happen each year. I finally gave up in 2017 and only found this place by accident years later. >leaving only the most dedicated behind, who inevitably have strong opinions about everything and can't get along with those who differ from them. That is the sad story of /pone/ before it died. In truth, it was a mercy killing, because after a couple of years that place was absolutely no fun at all apart from a couple good quest threads. It was just people being mad. >Might want to delete your image, by the way Oh Teh Rei! I had forgotten about that. I can't delete the image, but I can delete the whole post.

I had a dream and it told me: Notaulix needs more hugs.

>>9950 Some day he'll get the cuddles he deserves.

>>9950 >>9951 How many hugs does a bug need? Better be careful or he might start getting overweight from all the love.

>>9968 Love is a very energy efficient fuel source, leaving your bugs fit and trim.

>>9969 Actually, it kind of is, isn't it? Considering the examples we got of Chrysalis, who in the presumably short period of a few days/weeks managed to get enough love to mog Celestia, followed by Cadence and Shiny coming up with a spontaneous love blast that sent all the bugs blasting off again like Team Rocket, love definitely seems like a primal force to be reckoned with in Equestria. This begs the question: Has anyone at some point had enough dedication and autism to do the math, and approximate how much something like 24 hours of love absorption equals out to in some standard unit of energy, like joules? Would be fascinating to know how many lightbulbs you could power each time you hug a bug.

>>10000 Happy Bugget. Man, this board is slow enough that /bug/ #1 is still alive. Which makes me realize, what even is the posting, image and thread limits(And I guess filesize limits)? Never saw them written down anywhere.

>>10003 >Which makes me realize, what even is the posting, image and thread limits(And I guess filesize limits)? Never saw them written down anywhere. Bump limit is 500, catalog is 150 threads.

>>10004 Counted the treads and we have 32 new threads before a thread falls off; after that we still have 11 more before the first /bug/ falls off. Guess it will be a bit of a momentous occasion for this board.

>>10003 Even if things are slow here, I think this site is doing quite well for itself. To me, it's a pretty big deal that we've managed to hit 5 digits in under a year. Because as slow as that may seem, it could have been way slower. I remember one post somewhere on here that linked to some obscure Russian pony board, which had been around for years and years but hadn't even reached 7000 posts IIRC. Onward to 100000? By the way, I apologize for how bad my little doodle turned out, but it was exactly that: A rushed doodle It was one of those moments where I looked and suddenly realized... "Oh shit, we're only a few posts away; I want to do something special, but I really don't want to see an adbot or troll post ruin it."

>>10000 checked!

Fellow bug huggers, here's a question for you. If you were in Anon's shoes and were responsible for taking care of Notaulix, or any other changeling, would you have been doing anything differently? Like, would you try and introduce him/her to the ponies right away? Provide double the hugs? Ask different questions? Things like that.

>>10030 I would become the one-armed man for all the hugs that bug would be getting, and probably talk his head off to boot since I turn into one of the boisterous assholes that never shuts up in private. Would be very cautious about the ponies, though I may have started poking around earlier trying to find whichever one I could trust to bring in on the secret. Also probably more outdoorsy stuff, though in defense of the CYOA, it's been raining almost every day so we only got to go foraging... once? twice?

>>10036 Daisy was a lovely bug.

>>10038 She was, it's a shame that CYOA stopped. Although didn't the creator of that make a brief reappearance a few months ago? >>10036 It's fun to think about, isn't it? I think a big part of what makes BuggyCYOA so appealing, or at least to me anyway, is how easy it is to self insert yourself into anons place. I would be spending a lot more time just talking as well. Asking questions, carefully listening, answering the bugs own questions... Same sort of deal as meeting a pony for the first time, there's lots of things to learn about each other when two new races meet for the first time. I think in the CYOA it's implied that Anon and Notaulix are doing a lot of talking "off camera", so to speak. Would be nice to read those conversations, but I understand why they should be left out. Too much fluff that would slow the pacing down to a crawl.

>>10042 Need a side greentext about hangin' out talking with your bugbro.

>>10042 He did Sticc mares, I think. It certainly resembled him if not. And TestTest. He also did some art for draw thread here and there. Most recently he was in the aggie draw thing. From what I understand it's on on hiatus until he can figure out how the story is going to go, because he accidently built up too many hints and has to come up with a satisfactory ending to them. As far as I can tell he didn't even originally plan for Daisy to be what she is. Gave the choice to the players what she is, bless whoever chose changeling. I was the one who suggested hugging her as soon as she was revealed, with a skyrim reference of all things.

>>10044 Oh, it's nice to know that at least it isn't completely dead yet. Maybe one day in the future we'll get to enjoy some more of Daisy.

I'm feeling pretty blackpilled right now about my budding drawfag career. It's been a bit over a week since my last daily draw, and I feel like nothing has changed despite my practice during that time. The real blackpill though, is the realization of just how much I need to put into the raw practice hours and mileage on the paper/digital canvas, and the reality that at this rate, there's no way I'm going to be able to elevate the BuggyCYOA experience for you guys by including the kind of artwork that I desired for it. Watching and reading a lot of these guides/tutorials for learning the fundamentals of drawing, you hear a lot of "I studied (something) for (X amount of months/years), then my drawings started to look like this. After that I spent (X amount of months/years) on..." That's just not going to work. I don't mind the long journey to become competent at a new skill, but if I do that while putting BuggyCYOA on the backburner, everyone is going to lose interest in it, quite possibly myself included. So, yeah... fug. Guess I just go ahead and continue BuggyCYOA as a text CYOA, while practicing my drawing on the side and possibly occasionally mixing in a drawing for important moments? Any thoughts?

>>10125 I somehow blanked on the fact you wanted to turn the CYOA into a picture-per-post one. Also welcome to the artists' life, grab your depression by the door. 'Draw every day' is something I've tried and failed numerous times so I doubt anyone can blame you for that, I would probably pick a couple days a week to practice shit instead, and just make sure you don't sit on it so long you keep getting rusty. As for the CYOA, I'll be happy whatever form the bug comes in.

>>10125 I wouldn't worry too much about not always having drawings for BuggyCYOA. Just draw what you feel inspired to. And try not to put stuff off just because you feel you're not currently good enough, remember that you can always come back later and redo it. BuggyCYOA will be just fine if it continues as text only. It was enjoyable before and it will be enjoyable when it returns. As a bonus, here's some of my most used references when drawing.

In a bit of a "bug" mood

>>10187 >third pic I've always loved this one and the five distinct emotions being conveyed by the expressions of the onlookers. Bug nomming on tree is cute too.

>>10214 There's a story to go with it. Can't remember what it's called but I do remember Crosshair eyed bug can copy their memory into something so it can be displayed, essentially he's a camera.

>>10217 https://www.fimfiction.net/story/205767/changeling-the-movie

>>10128 Adding to this /bale/ links to a very good detailed doc. https://docs.google.com/document/d/15l0GqZp6-NKWDflsBzwAr58vO-DfmsyFCNu3yDR_6Vs/edit#heading=h.hu4fsp7a7shh And i personally like this artist's tutorials. https://derpibooru.org/search?q=artist%3Asorcerushorserus%2C+how+to+draw&sf=first_seen_at&sd=desc

Abstract Bug

Uh oh, is /bug/ deadagain? Better activate my spell card.

>>10330 How much bug could a love bug love if a love bug could love bug?

>>10331 Lots. she cute A question comes to mind, though: How much love can a bug take in? Like is there a limit to how much a changeling can absorb/store/charge up? Is it limited? Limitless? Diminishing returns? And what about the rate of absorption? If you flooded a bug with love, would they only be able to take in so much at once? Would it make them sick? Many such questions.

>>10345 The show certainly never had any adverse effects for too much love for a Changeling, and I'm a little hard pressed to say what kind of affect it would have, but I do kind of follow the idea of "Too much of anything is harmful, that's why it's called too much." What I'd like to know is how Love is stored if we assume they have to share it around the Hive. Love collectors depositing into love battery nanny bugs whose job is keeping everyone fed?

>>10354 >What I'd like to know is how Love is stored if we assume they have to share it around the Hive. Maybe they are like bees and they condense the love into something like honey and pack it in cells for storage. There would also be an extra rich jelly for larva to eat so they can grow.

>>10356 Yum yum, bug vomit. Honestly, I'd try it. This opens up an entirely different set of questions though. Much like real honeybees, would different sources of love affect the flavor and color of the resulting honey? What about different emotions? Could hot sauce be produced from anger? And unlike honeybees, could all bugs produce it? i.e. males and queens. Imagine the special queen buggo honey. Is magic'd into existence? Regurgitated? ...Dispensed by other means? Can Notaulix produce honey? I want to sample Notaulix's special honey

>>10357 I like to think that they are a lot like bees in their roles. The males only exist to breed with Chrissy before she kills them, Chrissy exists to lead the hive and lay eggs, and the sexless workers procure love and build. The biggest difference is that unlike a queen bee, Chrissy can put up a strong fight and harvest love herself in addition to being the mother. As for means of love storage, I haven't actually given that much thought. It's in interesting topic, here's another approach that builds off info we already have: They are shown trapping ponies in green globs in the comics, and they put princess Celestia in a green pod presumably being drained in the show, so I would infer that they either keep ponies intact in the pods and leach love out of them slowly or break them down with chemicals and consume the love sludge. Either way we know that the green stuff has something to do with trapping ponies for later feeding.

>>10358 Kind of reminded me of this oldie.

>>10357 I swear if this devolves into bug anus fetishism again..

>>10434 I'm partial to it being their milk equivalent.

>>10434 I think we've all moved past that phase. >>10435 >bug teats produce honey I didn't know I needed that in my life until this moment. Can you imagine how great that would be? >Settling down with your bugwife for afternoon lunch >Have a fresh cup of tea >Walk up beside her and kneel down >"'Scuse me, love." >Hold your cup underneath and tenderly coax out your preferred amount of honey >Give her a quick smooch on the lips once you're done >Enjoy meal together

>>10486 If that is the case, imagine what the changeling equivalent of a replete is like.

>>10489 >a replete A what now?

>>10493 A caste within eusocial insect hive. They collect food and store it within themselves. Usually the only difference is they look particularly full at all times that there is a surplus of food. Honeypot ants are famous for having ones that get particularly large, but pretty much all of them have it. Honey bees only have them when they are moving hives, cause honeycomb is a lot more efficient.

>>10498 Oh lmao. I was trying to look it up in the context of milk and was only finding pic related. I was very confused. Now we need some art to represent this. HEFTY beetles plump full of love and honey, ready to dispense when needed.

I like bug

>>10592 Based bug liker How's everyone doing today?

>>10601 Not enough bug.

>>10601 I still like bug

It's time for a /bug/ roll call. I've been thinking about two individuals in particular lately. First, anyone remember this Anon with the queen OC based around feeding off of music? I thought it was a fun idea, and he was a fairly regular poster in the /mlp/ /bug/ threads. It just recently occurred to me that this individual has been missing for awhile now. Doing some quick doxxing research, it looks like the last activity on Derpi was approximately one year ago, while the most recent post I could find on /mlp/ was back in early January. What happened? Are you still alive? Are you still out there? Second, what about our Russian bug friend? Are you still present here? Hope you're doing well and staying safe.

>>10633 I remember Medley, don't think that Anon came to nhnb.

>>10633 I may have scared them off accidently. I was the one that brought up putting musical instruments in her in that thread.

>>10634 >>10639 That seems fairly tame, to be honest. Dunno. It's just weird when people suddenly vanish like that; it's not exactly a rare occurrence either. It's like... >Be active in the community for a long time >Be emotionally and financially(commissioned art) invested in your character >Current favored thread reaches bump limit >Decide at that exact moment that you've had enough and get off the ride Many such cases. But why? For what purpose? Even if that anon didn't want to bother with this site, you'd think there would still be at least some trace of activity. Regardless of exiting the ride or not, I do hope that nothing bad happened.

>>10633 Further doxxing research revealed a fimfic account. Just sent short message there and on derpi to check in and see how things are going; hopefully something will come from that. Us bug huggers need to watch out for one another and stick together. Feels like we're few and far between these days.

On the topic of regulars, I wonder if these DieAnonDie and our Anonymous Drawfag are still around?

>>10715 Second guy here. I'm still lurking the thread, just not drawing much lately except for that griffon sketch from a month ago.

>>10732 Thank goodness that at least somebody is still around. It's downright depressing to think about how many changeling fans have recently gotten off the ride and/or disappeared. About two years ago on /mlp/ changeling threads were regularly getting around 70-100+ IPs with several writefags, drawfags and high general activity. Now most attempts at changeling threads can barely last 100 posts. Granted, this isn't necessarily just a /bug/ problem either. /mlp/ as a whole is dead as fuck outside of the few generals that still have active content creation happening. What happened? What prompted this exodus? Were there really that many people who were hanging around, expecting G5 to be a second stroke of genius, only to leave for good when it turned out not to be?

Lurker here, coming out of his shell (ha) with a couple things. 1. Why DO we like the bug? Cute looks? Love-eating? A combination of the two? For me it's the love eating, the looks took a bit to get used to. Please discuss 2. How do we feel about this: https://www.fimfiction.net/story/513304/dont-bug-me Pretty juicy so far, but the weekly updates are killing me. 3. By complete coincidence, I also speak Russian and found this on pikabu that I thought was neat: https://cs12.pikabu.ru/images/big_size_comm/2022-03_6/1648380605197864118.jpg The user WheatyTail responds to every single post with the changeling tag with that image and the comment *pat pat*

>>10744 Their design appeals to me a lot more than the pony's do. It's what convinced me to give the show a second chance after watching the premier and not being very impressed. As far as I remember there was only one other thing that I immediately liked upon seeing it and that's the sprite for Dorumon when it's following in digimon dusk.

>>10744 >1. I read a lot of fanfics and I'm a sucker for that whole standard set of boilerplate melodrama being a changeling invites. In addition, for adventure fics or thrillers, I think the ability to shapeshift and sense emotions to be cool powers to have. >2. >Starscribe Be prepared to be let down by a mediocre ending. >3. kek

>>10744 1: For me, my love of changelings has always stemmed from the near limitless creativity they provide. When they were first introduced, they were truly a blank slate race, which epitomized the heart and soul of what FiM and the world of Equestria used to be all about. Little ponies(and bugs) in a big, mysterious world. Besides that, I just have a lot of fond memories from the absolute gold rush of content creation that followed the S2 finale. The fandom and the /mlp/ experience really peaked at that moment. 2: Dunno, not applicable. I've upheld a pretty strict personal rule for not reading fics and not watching any episode of the show after S3. 3: lol. That sounded familiar, so I went back and looked through the previous threads. Sure enough... Did you ever see >>5974 ? Based beetle patter. It's funny to know the extra context behind the *pat pat*. I wish we had more friends from the ru pony communities here. A lot of them seem like fun and interesting people.

The real question, the REAL question, is what ever became of Ball Sweat Anon?

>>10807 Does the pic imply that somebody rode the changeling as a form of transport?

>>10810 The changeling disguised as a bicycle cause he was jealous of it getting ridden every day.

>>10807 For me, it's the Pepperjack Store.

>>10828 Lordy do I have a lot of posts in that screencap. Even when the threads were drifting by on life support I was usually the one keeping them afloat. Sad days, them.

>>10829 One of those is mine in the screencap. I think there was one other who was keeping the threads alive.

>>10828 Kek, I had somehow forgotten about that. Thank goodness somebody capped the epic quints.

>>10829 >>10832 I don't associate that period of time with life with life support though. That was back when BuggyCYOA was still fairly new and the threads had many posters. Also from the cap, qrd on Breeze? Who?

>>10838 Bug oc. The activity came in bursts sometimes days apart, between them there was only two or three posters, myself being one. Might be online a bit more than we should be. It wasn't exactly dead, was similar to how /both/ is on 4chan right now. The true dead hours came later.

>>10838 I guess I was referring more to the periods of time when it was basically just a bump general. Evening Breeze, a fetish oc. I actually know and talk to the owner, but very much dislike the fetish.

>>10848 vore bugs deserve to get bapped

>>10868 Why do you think I had that set made

>>10869 Because >vore bugs deserve to get bapped

bugs are nerds lol

>>10871 >Comes to different site >Posts art >Doesn't elaborate >Leaves Hey that's my other bug.

>multiple people ITT who seem to know each other Thanks for my daily reminder that I have no close friends to share my interests with So uh... >>10807 pic got me thinking. Can we talk about sheaths for a moment? Assuming the bug in that pic has a sheath Personally, I really appreciate it when I see SFW artwork that includes sheaths. Yet for some reason such art is relatively rare. Why is that? A general lack of knowledge of equine anatomy? Leftover damage from when derpi used to tag any visible sheath as explicit years ago? Personal taste? It's not like they're difficult to draw and incorporate into artwork; at the most basic level if you're drawing show accurate style, it's only two small lines. Maybe it's my preference for realism autism coming through, but knowing how in real life the sheath is almost always visible from most angles on male equines, having it be absent just feels like something is missing. tl;dr the inclusion of the sheath in artwork makes it feel more grounded in reality/believable, and goes a long way for boosting the masculinity of the characters. Thoughts? How do you all feel about it? I'm straight btw

>>10889 I think a lot of people attribute some sexuality to it, realistic or not, purely because they don't exist in the show or most of the art which takes after show style. To be fair to them I really can't name an artist that draws sheathes and isn't either a porn artist or penis aficionado. I think that's all the same reasons you don't see them often, but yeah I don't see them as explicit either. I also like sheathes myself but I'm a gigafaggot who doesn't like girls so I may be biased. I have no other pictures of bugs with sheathes, those might be the only two.

>>10889 Also make some friends Anon.

>>10891 There's absolutely a sexuality aspect to it, but that's kind of the point I'm trying to express here. Let me try to focus my autism on the subject for a moment, and try to better articulate the thoughts in my first post. The sexual factor of the sheath is something I associate with the sexual dimorphism of ponies. It's a plainly visible sign of "male", so to speak, in the same way that a mans well-toned muscles, facial structure, etc can immediately read as "male", which can also carry an innate sexuality. Now, the absence of something as simple as the sheath might not normally be a big deal, but in the context of equines, and by extension MLP ponies, it's actually a very big deal when you think about it. When it comes to equines, there's actually very little sexual dimorphism. Unless you know specifically what to look for, it can be very difficult to differentiate between a mare and a stallion/gelding. That's been the fandoms big meme for years. /mlp/ is constantly posting and replying to pics of real life stallions and geldings, genuinely thinking that they're mares. Meanwhile, the one feature that can make it easy for anyone to differentiate between a male and female at a glance, is the sheath. Or a butt view with a flick of the tail Of course, to get around this issue FiM ponies have had a degree of sexual dimorphism added to their design. Mainly square muzzle vs rounded muzzles, human voices, and to a lesser degree body shape and size. Even so, the conclusion I'm trying to express here is that while it's a small detail, the sheath is a critical component of the masculinity and image of male equines/ponies. The absence of it, while understandable from a show perspective, brings with it a degree of feminization. Hopefully this makes more sense. >can't name an artist that draws sheathes and isn't either a porn artist or penis aficionado Aren't we forgetting someone? /bug/'s very own? >>4352 wonder if we'll ever get to see another draw from him with improved drawing skill that includes a sheath

>>10907 Weirdly I thought you were that artist I was talking to, guess I'm not the best at identifying Anon sentence structure yet. I understand, I was saying more 'sexuality' in how it'd land in people's categories for posting content (safe, questionable, explicit etc)

Chryssi or something, I dunno

>>10968 My wife :)

>>10970 How many eggs? How wide does ahe get when gravid?

>>10973 >How wide does ahe get when gravid? Go to bed Anon.

>>10974 Don't worry, it's just cause phoneposting right now.

>>10974 I mean, is this about accurate?

The taste of a lier

Bugs

>>10980 >Changelings can quite literally taste your emotions >>10983 That's Daisy and other associated Short Trip to Canterlot bugs, right?

>>10987 If I remember it's just some changelings from the same artist.

>>10987 I was trying to call Celestia lazy in a punny way, I don't think it's actually a word however.

Boop the bug Boop the bug Boop the bug Bug's been booped

Have you heard? Chrysalis has a plot

>>11001 She... She does?

>>11001 >>11009 Not in the show she don't, bugs are flatter than cardboard.

>>11009 >>11010 She did, it was to replace Cadence, disarm Shining armor and then let her hive feed to their heart's content.

>>7208 >>7210 >>7211 >>7215 >>7220 >>11111 Taking a moment to weigh your options, you raise your arms above your head and stretch out before laying down on your side, propping your head up with a hand and elbow while you make yourself comfortable. "How long do you think it would take to talk about? Is it deep enough to keep us up until the sun rises?" You ask Notaulix. "No, I don't have that much to say, Anon." Notaulix answers. "Let's hear it then. You wouldn't want to keep me lying here wide awake all night wondering what you wanted to talk about, would you?" You tease him. "N-Not at all!" Notaulix exclaims. "I thought long and hard about the question you had asked me, Anon; about where I came from, and where my hive is. I cannot tell you where my hive is, but I remembered information that is safe to tell you, which could help you understand how I arrived in the Everfree Forest." He then says. "Oh, really? Uh... Are you sure you're okay with that, Notaulix? Can't say I'm not interested, but you really don't need to tell me anything if it makes you uncomfortable." You question him. "Yes Anon, I'm sure. What I have to share with you is something that the ponies in positions of power, and maybe some among the other races, already know. There would be no harm in telling you." Notaulix responds. A twinge of doubt runs through your mind upon hearing this. You worry that Notaulix may not be telling the truth in that regard just to make you happy, though as you gauge his expression, it remains completely relaxed and unbothered. "Well... Alright then, if you say so." You say, now curious of what the changeling has to tell you. "Okay Anon, allow me to explain: from the time of the First Queen digging towards the Heart of The Earth onward, my kind has constructed many great things underground. Among those is an interwoven system of tunnels, originating from the First Queen's Hive, which grew and grew from one queen and hive to the next, spreading far and wide." Notaulix begins. Before continuing, you took note of his left ear flicking a few times as his expression saddens somewhat, casting thin streaks of shadow across one side of your companions face in the pale lamplight. "When I... When I no longer had a purpose within the hive and became a... burden; my exile left me in a very frightening situation." He continues. "Because I was too starved of love to transform anymore, I had no hope of trying to somehow integrate myself with the griffons or ponies. To even try and travel out in the open was dangerous, hopeless... But I remembered hearing some of my hive brothers and sisters speak of the great wild forest, the Everfree, which was sometimes used to move freely around the region without fear of being seen by pony eyes. There exists an old; very old, route through the tunnels that is still safe to travel which has an entry point in the forest. I knew it was my only choice, so... I left my hive and Queen behind to navigate the way underground." He explains.

>>11111 Your eyebrows raise in surprise for more than one reason. There's already several new questions in your mind, though you decide to only interject with one for now: "How long did it take you to reach the Everfree that way?" The question gave Notaulix pause, prompting him to look away to consider the answer. "I'm... not sure, Anon." He begins, focusing on you once more. "It was terribly dark and lonely tracing my way through those old tunnels by myself... Moving, resting, moving again, it was like a blurry dream; a nightmare. Sometimes I risked checking the surface to look for something, anything I could safely eat, which helped somewhat to track the passage of time, but... I think the journey took eight days or more." Notaulix answers. At least eight days?! The very thought sends your mind reeling, followed by heavy pit settling deep in your stomach. You immediately think back to the state you discovered Notaulix in: Tight skin against plainly visible ribs, the sunken face, holes everywhere along his extremities, weak and light as a feather for his size. Notaulix had obviously been starving, both physically and magically, but to that degree? It takes longer than a week or two for someone to end up like that... A horrifying reality emerges: Just how long had Notaulix been slowly wasting away for? How long had he been suffering? If he was in such a dire state even before being exiled, that must mean... His hive...! You feel an urge of desperation to push this matter right now, but your better judgement reins that desire in. Now is not the time for it. "E-Eight? I... Sorry for butting in. Continue." You say with wide eyes. "It's not a problem, Anon." Notaulix reassures you before continuing. "When I made it to the forest, I emerged from a small cave near the base of a steep hill, at night. The forest there was very dense, and very dark, but I was able to see enough of the sky to know which way was east, which went away from the hill and the cave. I knew that if I kept moving east, I would reach the edge of the forest." He explains You then patiently wait for Notaulix to continue, only to surmise that he's now waiting for your response, if his staring is any hint. Taking in a deep breath, which is then released as a heavy sigh, you take a moment to rub your face with your free hand, all in an effort to let go of the darker thoughts clouding your mind, and instead refocus on your original question that prompted this entire discussion.

>>11112 "Uh... Yeah. Right... A cave in a hill, huh?" You begin, musing over the possibilities while visualizing the geography of the Everfree in your mind. "Did you cross the Coronet River?" In response to your question, Notaulix cocks his head to the side. "I-I'm not sure, Anon... What is that?" He asks. "Guess you haven't gotten to that part of the books yet... The Coronet River starts all the way up near Canterlot and flows to the south west. Once it gets down here, it curves further west and runs straight through the Everfree on the way to the ocean. You can't miss it; it's the one wide river out there, and is the dividing line between the Northern and Southern halves of forest." You explain to him. "Oh, I see." Notaulix says, his expression lightening in understanding. "No, I never crossed over any water. I... I don't think I would have had enough strength to do something like that." He admits. Nodding your head slowly, you further contemplate where Notaulix could have been. However, knowing what he has said, you realize that there is only one likely area that matches his description. "Either way, I think I get it now. Sounds to me like you started all the way on the western end of the forest, near the Lost Pass." You say, reaching your conclusion. "The Lost Pass?" Notaulix repeats. "Yes, it's- Mm... Bit of a long story with that place. Longer than I want to spend explaining at this hour." You say. "Oh..." Notaulix breathes out, looking somewhat disappointed. "Don't worry, I'll tell you about it another time soon, okay? Besides, it helps a lot to have a map and the proper book when trying to explain it." You reassure him. "Okay Anon, thank you." He responds with a smile. "Right. Anyway, the point is that if your goal was to exit the forest by going east, well... You just about started from the furthest possible point away." You comment. "Yes..." Notaulix agrees, his ears drooping somewhat at the thought. "But now we both know where I entered the forest from. Has this information satisfied your question, Anon?" He then asks you. How do you respond? 1: Yes (ends current day) 2: Question Notaulix on what he even planned to do once reaching the other side of the Everfree 3: Other Be honest, how many of you thought I've been lying and would never continue this? ^:) Hope this little shot in the arm of Hefty Beetle lives up to your expectations.

>>11113 I want to hug that bug

>>11111 Bastard, five months later and you still manage to post right after I go to bed. But at last my quest to kiss that bug may continue. Slowly. Gotta warm him up first. Lordy I'm trying to remember what our short term plans were, but given how late it is we should give the bug a hug good night to lay those memories to rest and greet him again in the morning.

>>11113 Wow, Our buggo is a survivor through and through. As for my response I pick 1. I think we're done for tonight. Thank him for sharing his story, give him a firm hug and reassure him that despite what he says, he's not a burden. It takes fortitude to undertake the journey he did, the fact he made it through with zero help or provision is proof that he's tougher than he gives himself credit for. >>11111 >the ultra rare self-checking quint I kneel

>>11113 Love to see the bug has returned. I think it's best to rest on this information and see what the next day brings.

>>11111 Oh, so you were planning to post this during the first quints of the board. Bold move! Well, his reaction points to two possibilities: A. He feels bad because he thinks you're telling him he did a stupid thing by starting his escape from the worst possible spot B. He's worried you might figure out where the Changeling Tunnel is. I'd cover the two fronts. Pick option 1, don't press him any further, and first, tell him he had no way to know that he didn't pick the best route to exit the Everfree. Then, assure him that You don't want or need to know where the entrance is, and even if you figured out where the entrance is, you would never tell anyone about it. Since he's a empath and you really wouldn't do that, I'm sure he'll fell relieved. After that, ask him if he needs or wants something before you hit the sack, then end the day. And DEFINITELY don't touch your diary.

Updated the ponepaste, just in case anyone still wants to read that format for some reason. https://ponepaste.org/4086#4839 So, what do you all actually think of this update? While working on the early chapter rewrite, I've been trying to improve the quality of my second person writing. I put extra effort into this update, partially because it's the first one in a long time, and also because of the subject matter being written. You can also clearly see that the posts here are actually formatted now instead of just being big blocks of text. Admittedly, it feels a bit disappointing and discouraging that nobody seems to have picked up on these things, despite all of my emotional investment on this update. And what about all the important bits of lore and worldbuilding implication that just dropped? I still love you guys anyway though. By the way, this update was also supposed to be the first with a corresponding artwork. Unfortunately I got rushed and ran out of time. See next spoiler block. >>11143 I actually wasn't planning this for our first quints. To be honest, this update wasn't supposed to roll out for at least another two weeks, but two things happened. First, the post count snuck up on me. Second, when it was only like 30 or so posts away, someone had posted some sort of anime loli girl type of image(now deleted). Made me nervous that a troll was lying in wait to steal it in the middle of the night or something, so I took action and made sure that such a important moment for the board wouldn't be wasted. Works out in the end, though. I needed to post another update here anyway before I can roll out the early chapter write, because of technical reasons with fimfic.

>>11152 >So, what do you all actually think of this update? It felt good. Been a while since the last update, but what I will say is that it felt consistent with the story how I remember it. Which is good after such a hiatus.

>>11152 >Updated the ponepaste, just in case anyone still wants to read that format for some reason Thank you. I don't use the paste for reading but I find it very useful for searching for keywords and past events. >lore and worldbuilding Yeah when it comes to CYOAs I'm not the sharpest spoon in the shed. I assume you mean the part about the changelings having an extensive network of underground tunnels and passageways? It's another piece of insight into the changeling race and their history. But I kinda glossed over it as it's not too relevant to our immediate concerns, i.e. the wellbeing of Notaulix. The "Heart of The Earth" is probably something that warrants further elaboration, but I think that's about it, barring some larger implications I'm not picking up on. Oh and by the way, how goes your art practice?

>>11152 Yeah as the other Anon stated the lore stuff sounds like something to touch on in the morning, there's not a whole lot of speculation to be done as yet I don't think. Reminds me of WHFB's underway network though. Also I think I may be the one nerd who actually reads the updates off the images instead of the posts. Admittedly I've also been in a perpetual hurry lately, everything and everyone demands all of my time, I had to read that update while multitasking. And for icing on the cake, would it surprise you to learn I am in fact, STILL sick? Seeing my doctor very frequently about it, but our health care has been an absolute mess post-covid. At least I got some drawing done for once, but it's neither bug nor pony.

Friends and fellow bug huggers, just letting you know that there's going to be a small(hopefully) delay before the next update. I'm getting the last of that early rewrite polished and wrapped up in between busy work days. I also have some family visiting soon from out of state for about a week. Once that burdensome chore of the rewrite is out of the way, it'll be full steam ahead once more for regular BuggyCYOA updates. >>11153 >it felt consistent with the story how I remember it Very good, that's a big relief for me to hear that. Over the months, I have worried about style drift occasionally. >>11159 >Art practice Poorly. I had a period of time where I was extra busy for about two weeks and did nothing, not even basic doodle practice/warmups. The next time I picked up my drawing implement, it was like starting from zero again. The rust is real; use it or lose it.

>>11182 >rust Don't I know it, every time I start a drawing I feel like I'm starting over from scratch, and even if I had just finished one a lot of the time I get the sense of "How the hell did I do that last one?" You get some noticable improvement over time though, work at it for long enough and even long breaks won't leave you feeling as rusty. It's just very easy for an artist to underestimate themselves.

>>10807 ♪If it hadn't been for Ball-Sweat Anon♫ ♫I'd been married long time ago♪ ♪Where did you come from, where did you go?♫ ♫Where did you come from, Ball-Sweat Anon?♪

Birthday, post cute drones.

>>11243 That's not a happy bug

>>11243 Angler fish looking bug

>>11243 That would fit in Picasso's Guernica >>11238 That's a pretty cute bug girl >>11237 Does pre-change Thorax count?

>>11254 Well, he was certainly a cutie back then.

>>11256 What would Notaulix think if Anon reached out and grabbed his tongue?

>>11257 I'm sure hilarity would ensue either way. Also hey that middle bug was a gift.

>>11257 He'd be startled, but since he's so polite and submissive to Anon, he'd take it as Anon just wanting to study his tongue. That IIRC is thick, green, long, slippery and prehensile. A perfect carpet leading to his equally exquisite maw.

>>11268 Glows too.

>>11271 It does? Where was that mentioned?

>>11111 option one. we can talk about things more tomorrow.

What kind of art does /bug/ want to see the most? Is there some sort of niche that artists aren't producing enough of?

>>11311 Can never get enough bugs being well-meaning but mal-adjusted dorks. Also kissing.

>>11113 You keep putting these images in my head, I had to get them out again somehow. Here's an illustration of Notaulix during his journey through the old tunnels.

>>11319 That's pretty cool Anon, is that new?

>>11319 And I seem to recall promising that I would upload my next art with an author tag. Well, without further fanfare, here it is: https://ponybooru.org/images/3144430 >>11321 Yep, I started it a day after the cyoa update.

>>11319 >>11324 Oh that's super cool Anon! I've seen the WIP before though, I see you've also been in that gay bug thread. Is everything under that ponybooru tag yours or is there multiple markers? Discounting the MLPG threadpony.

>>11330 Yep, those are all of my _super_ old stuff. If you look at the images' corresponding upload date on Derpi, you'll see that they're from circa 2013.

>>11332 Well may as well go tag all your anonymous draws with your actual artist tag. You're responsible for all but two of them, I believe?

>>11333 Oops, guess the spoiler box stays ticked on subsequent posts.

>>11333 I'm still undecided on whether I want to retroactively claim authorship on my previous anonymous uploads. I suppose I'll just do the ones with my signature for now. Or maybe decide on a case by case basis. >You're responsible for all but two of them, I believe? Not sure which two you're referring to. I see four that aren't mine in https://ponybooru.org/tags/cyoa-colon-buggycyoa

>>11335 Oh, the animated ones aren't yours? My mistake. And I was searching oc:notaulix.

>>11336 Those aint mine. They were posted in the site's first /bug/ thread, I hope that anon's still around.

Bug?

>>11438 grub

Bug. I found this on pikabu, has a pretty good comment thread: "Well of course, your changeling is not updated" "The update did not work and rolled back" "There will be conflicts when they [versions] interact" "Not all the API methods were changed, so it will still work somehow, just throw errors" Fun fact: Russians call changelings "чейнджлинг", "перевертыш", or "оборотень". The first is the English word in cyrillic script, the second means "shape-changer", and the third usually means "werewolf". Since there was no equivalent in their mythology, these are the best words they can use.

>>11444 >the bug fix failed

>>11319 Wow, what a thing to come back to! I've been gone on vacation the past week to spend time with family, so I'm just now seeing this. Things like this are still surreal to me. It's hard for me to believe that my writing has had enough of an effect on people, that they want to draw art of it. Despite how much I consider myself to be a low quality writer, I must be doing something right. Being able to see scenes like this that you saw in your mind's eye while reading, then being able to compare it to the way I have it in my own mind is fascinating. Thank you for taking the time to draw this, friend. It looks great and means a lot to me. I particularly enjoy that it's black and white, because in this scenario its a literal contrast between light and darkness. That and the rich use of black reminds me reading Berserk. Cool stuff. >>11444 I love the Russian pony community accompanied by the oddball sense of humor most Russians seem to possess. Interesting bit of information about the wording too. I wish there wasn't such a language barrier issue between all the international communities. Ever think of the possibilities if just the English-speaking, Russian and Chinese pony communities could join forces and seamlessly produce content together? You could almost imagine it being enough to give the fandom a second wind. Almost certainly will never happen, but it's still a fun fantasy nonetheless. Anyway, now I'm in an artsy mood; it's been a bit over two months since my last art piece. Time to change that.

>>11485 I'm glad that you liked it! I hope you enjoyed your vacation. The art style is partially inspired by Hobbes-Maxwell's Fallout Equestria Illustrated series, which I thought would be particularly well suited in this scenario where there's sharp contrast created by a single light source in a pitch black cave; and having only black and white to work with makes certain aspects of shading easier for me to manage.

Since nobody has anything to talk about or contribute, let's consider the following. Not that long ago on /mlp/, I read an interesting post suggesting to broaden out /bug/ to include moths and other insectoid pony races, rather than just exclusively changelings. Thoughts? Personally, I feel like it wouldn't hurt to give it a try. At this point over a decade into the fandom, new blood is few and far between, while existing fans continue to gradually dwindle away. /bug/'s been quite literally revolving almost entirely around a single writefag for about a year and a half now. That's not a good thing. If he ever dies, that's it; all we'll have left are the useless shitty Chrysalis prompt threads on /mlp/ that are filled with nothing but oviposition cumbrains and other coomers. While I doubt there's very many moth or other bugpony posters still around, any consolidation of shared interests could prove to be a real boon to discussion and general creativity.

>>11713 Moth ponies were never disallowed, but they've already merged with the bats. All that's left are bees, wasps and ants.

>>11717 They don't seem to like each other though, hence why the suggestion was brought up in that thread.

>>11719 That's just play fighting

>>11719 I think it's probably fairly different tastes and groups. I mean there's already a slight divide between a portion of the Chrysalis and Drone fags as is. That said Mothlings would've been a better makeover than skittles (but original design still best)

>>11713 I don't see it growing the thread. Moth and other types of insectoid pony as a category are by nature an even smaller niche that changelings. That being said It can't hurt; you can't really derail a train that isn't moving.

>>11723 Well the thread is called /bug/ so I think bugs like moths and bats are okay

>>11761 >and bats kek

>Browsing desu >Discover this

>>11856 We'll get there someday, Anon. Someday.

>>11856 Will he ever return to us? The myth, the legend... >>11713 You know on further consideration how exactly would you even go about getting people to go from the existing moth thread (/both/ I believe) to join /bug/? I don't exactly browse that thread so I'm not in the know on any of it.

>>11860 By existing. There's not much to it other than giving it a try. After all, the suggestion for moths to move to /bug/ came from within /both/.

>>11863 Oh, did it? Must have been a previous thread, I checked in after this discussion started and saw no mention.

Reminder that Changelings are a mix of reptilian, mammalian and insectoid qualities. Why, if you put aside the resin and cocoons and eggs (the last of those only having shown up in season 6) the insectoid parts of their actual bodies make up the least number, just the easiest to notice.

>>11879 Based and rare viewpoint. Changelings are more reptilian than anything else, but the kind of qualities associated with that have more or less gone completely untouched by the fandom even after all these years. I wonder at what made the collective consciousness of the early fandom decided that they were purely insectoid, and at what point? The cocooning? Chrysalis' name? The wings? Although in hindsight, those were the golden days when the entire setting was still a blank slate and everything was new. In the absence of anything pre-established, those details were the primary things that stuck out for peoples creativity to work off of.

>>11882 Yeah the most prominent thing is probably the forked tongue, which only certain reptiles have and is generally used for smell and breathing. Combined with the lack of nostrils to further that point (although, Chrysalis has nostrils). Frills are also something only certain reptiles have, and fangs are something both mammals and reptiles have. Although their teeth are more in line with mammals, as reptile teeth are far more uniform than ours. I'm sure I'm missing some other things in there.

>>11890 Many reptiles reproduce via eggs as well. The more you really think about it, the more you wonder why "changelings are insects" took off in the first place. Oh well. At the end of the day, be it mammalian, reptilian or insectoid, changebuggos are still made for hugs and headpats. and fug

>>11907 Save it for marriage. Side note but the egg thing would actually be a good argument for female changelings to be larger than males. Egg-laying species nearly all have larger females because they kind of have to squeeze an egg out, whereas animals that reproduce through live birth tend to be the same ones where the males have to fight each other for the right to reproduce, hence larger males.

>>11907 It's because cocooning and wall climbing. That ridge on their neck was interpreted as exoskeleton for a lot of people. >>11890 Reptiles don't use their tongues for breathing. Meanwhile bugs breathe through inconspicuous holes all over their body.

>>11918 Ah, you're right. Head is cloudy today. I could've sworn I found a reptile once without nostrils but I may have been mistaken. I do know bug breathing is incredibly inefficient which only works because they're so small, may be a reason for changelings to have the giant holes on their body.

>>11919 >bug breathing is incredibly inefficient Actually not true, it's very efficient. It's why it hasn't improved in so long. It's why bugs change size to match the o2 concentration that it is effective at in the atmosphere rather than change it.

>>11920 Stop shattering my entire worldview, now I'm gonna have actually go research things.

>>11920 Efficient at the size insects are at, sure. The problem is that insect physiology in general, respiratory systems included, scales terribly with size, introducing an increasing amount of problems unless you have some world scale fuckery going on, like oxygen levels as you mentioned. The thing is, by the time you scale the average insect physiology(and less efficient blood) up to the size of something like a pony, the amount of atmospheric oxygen that would need to be present to even sustain that kind of life would induce oxygen poisoning in everything else, among a host of other major issues. >>11922 I would advise against taking the biology pill and continue to live in blissful ignorance. It can be a bit of a downer when you realize just how many common fantasy creature tropes there are that just plain couldn't work on a fundamental level. On the same token, it's a bit foolish trying to apply real world limitations to fantastical things that don't exist. If you really wanted things to be grounded in the reality of the setting, you can easily just make up new physiology that doesn't suffer from the problems of our real world examples.

>>11923 >It can be a bit of a downer when you realize just how many common fantasy creature tropes there are that just plain couldn't work on a fundamental level. Good thing my favourite thing is the bugs as fey idea because they fit so well into irish myth. Despite all the talk I wrote my own bugs as having two separate methods of reproduction. Eggs from a queen as the norm, and then a male and female being able to reproduce like mammals but expending a shit ton of love to do so. The second method generally produces more unique appearances.

>>11907 >the more you wonder why "changelings are insects" took off in the first place. Considering they live in a hive, kind of have a hierarchy like ants, I think that's where a lot of the idea came from. Doesn't really sound a lot like reptiles to me even if physically they are more similar to them.

>>11927 >They live in a hive with insect hierarchy Which was complete fanon for over four years. You can only say things like that in retrospect. The original debut of Chrysalis and the changeling race was about as blank slate as it gets.

>>11939 It's probably because of the leader being called "Queen Chrysalis" and the scenes where they are swarming Canterlot.

Thought I'd pop over into this thread for some help on a changeling-oriented project I'm working on, if this is the right place for it. If you guys have any suggestions for some lines of dialogue (I'm looking for either a really long monologue or a series of consecutive dialogue from a story) that I could use to test out using my "bug voice", I'd greatly appreciate it.

>>11992 >Even before the sound reaches my ears I can sense their presence >Two pony lovers >With a love so strong, so vibrant, I could sense it from so far away >I hear their voices calling in the distance >Drawing me near >Through the foliage I creep, stalking my prey >My sinewy shape hidden by the dark of shadow >My careful hoofsteps barely making a sound >Closer I draw until I am scarcely a cart's length away >Concealed from their sight, they suspect not thing >Waiting until their backs are turned, until the time is right >To pounce and claim what is rightfully the hive's >Love, in it's purest form >My fellow drones will eat well tonight What I could come up with in a few moments anyway. Curious to see what you come up with.

>>11992 Have you tried combing through some of the popular changeling stories? There's bound to be something that meets your needs there. Or if you want to keep things local, there's BuggyCYOA. Lots of back and forth conversation between Anon and Notaulix, or moments where it's just Notaulix explaining something.

>>11994 I've actually got a few in this document here, though the long ones are mostly retooled from other stories like >>11996 mentioned You can have a look at what I've got here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/17h9cENuVuwTxUjJu7hBsGdMVhOylAKCmn7j7AsOCi2o/

Been a few months since my last piece. Tried doing things very differently this time around. Let me know what you friends think.

>>12025 Is that 3D with a shader?

>>12025 Thought I was looking a hoers for a second. I am also curious the process that resulted in this. >Day 7 Are there others?

>>12025 That's remarkable!

>>12007 Think I'm ready to create the demo sometime?

>>12025 kek oh u

>>12026 That wouldn't be much of a draw now, would it? >>12027 See posts earlier in the thread(s). >>12029 I'm glad you like it! Anyway, here's something quick and fun. Best tag on the boorus

>>12045 Now there's a cutie.

>>12045 Cute! What made you decide to get back into drawing anyways? I know it was hard for you and you felt discouraged for a while. These new drawings are looking significantly better quality so you have clearly found a way to improve.

>>12045 How on earth did you improve so quickly? I'd love to hear about your process, especially with >>12025

What does everyone think about how the current thread on /mlp/ is going? I'm actually surprised and very pleased with how well it's done. >Over halfway to bump limit in less than two weeks >Good IP count >Discussion >Multiple greens and other OC being made >An actual diverse mix of drone, queen, moth and bugpony posters It was definitely the right time to make a new thread, and also broaden things out to include the moths and bugponies.

Do you think Chrysalis could have used Cadence's power over love abilities to harvest love from all of Equestria?

>>12101 As in usurping her powers?

Really starting to feel like there's no changeling fans left these days. What happened? Even the activity on the /mlp/ thread has suddenly turned into more of a bumpfest. In light of this, I've been delving into the international pony communities once more to see what changeling fans around the world are up to. Found this nicely drawn buggo, presumably EaW fanart by 极端唯物, aka extreme materialism. Couldn't find it on any of the boorus, so it does indeed seem to be OC. Source: https://fimtale.com/en/t/35875

>>12154 Well, it's been quite a while since we had any official buggo content (besides Ocellus, I guess). I think it'll be like that until they appear in Gen 5.

>>12157 That is a nice Chryssy pic.

>>12163 It looks like Longinius' work. He always did love horse lingerie.

>>12163 >>12164 >Longinius Correct. It's also the OC queen Polistae, not Chrysalis.

>>12166 >OC Yeah, totally original character. Not Chrysalis, indeed.

>>12154 Also found this gem on fimtale. "Horse Town" cracks me up.

>>12167 Leg holes are filled in with an unknown glowy substance, belly and eyes are different color. The differences I noticed in half a second.

>>12169 Horse town sounds like a good town.

>>12007 So did anything come of this?

So I ended up falling down yet another rabbit hole, where I discovered another little Russian pony community. This time, it's one dedicated entirely to changelings. There's even some familiar bugs being posted there. Pretty neat, huh?

>>12387 Familiar indeed. I wonder how lively the changeling communities would be if not for the language barrier (and government firewalls).

>>12387 Always cool to find a new little cache of pony.

Is Chrysalis an empath or a telepath?

>>12387 >no discrimination against faggot deer >no hatespeech Sadly, it looks like a shithole

Hey friends, I know there's been a lot of radio silence from me recently, so here's some unfortunate news. About a week ago, a barely 15 month old Samsung SSD that I bought to preemptively replace an aging HDD abruptly died with no warning. This happened to be the drive that among other things, I keep all of my files relating to creative activity on, such as my writing, art, music etc. Normally this wouldn't be much of an issue, because I make regular backups of my data, but in this particular case I learned that I had made a big mistake. I'm not going to try and explain the cosmic chain of events that lead to this error happening, but I discovered after the fact that the last backup for a few specific folder chains was about two years ago, including the one that housed all of my personal works. So what does that mean? Well, it means that among other things, the following are now gone: - All of the core worldbuilding/setting/CYOA documents and material for Buggy, Moony and SunnyCYOA - All of the BuggyCYOA rewrite progress - All of my unpublished WIP one shot stories - All of the original project files for my drawings - All of my work towards the NHNB community art pack There's a few other things that have been lost which also sting, but those are the big ones that are relevant to everyone here. Needless to say, life's been pretty unhappy for me lately. I've been maintaining by overdosing on the copium, because the one faint glimmer of hope is that there's potentially a decent chance of the data being recoverable. The drive is currently in the hands of a data recovery center. I'm hoping to hear some good news one day soon; else I'll be overdosing on the blackpills instead. My bank account is going to hurt, but it's worth it to me; I know there's no way I could possibly rewrite everything exactly the way I did the first time around, which was the writing I was satisfied with and felt good about. If nothing else, consider myself a warning example for the rest of you to take heed of. Even if you have a good habit of backing up your data, don't get complacent, VERIFY THE INTEGRITY OF YOUR BACKUPS!

>>12535 Aw, that's a damn shame! I'm very sorry to hear that. Best of luck with the recovery!

>>12535 That's terrible news. Hopefully the data recovery place has some luck with it.

>>12529 I don't think she can read minds, no. >>12535 Mega oof. Wtf I thought Samsung drives are supposed to be the more reliable ones. I wish you good luck with the data recovery. >VERIFY THE INTEGRITY OF YOUR BACKUPS! Yep, I'm doing that this very second.

>>12543 >Samsung drives are supposed to be the more reliable ones Statistically, they are. I've been using a 960 Evo as my boot/OS drive for years now with zero issues. It's gone through a lot of heavy use, but it's still reporting no abnormalities and an estimated 87% lifespan remaining. For the curious, the drive in question is an 870 Evo. If you look that model up, you'll quickly find an unusually high amount of reported dead drives from the early 2021 production of January through April, possibly into May, suggesting a defect in that particular run. Coincidentally, mine was manufactured in March 2021.

Quick update to >>12535 Good news! The data recovery was successful. Everything pertaining to our favorite hefty beetle is safe and sound, now properly backed up across multiple drives along with everything else of importance. For the curious, the controller chip on the SSD's pcb failed, causing this situation. So anyway, progress can continue as normal. Hooray.

>>12747 This is fantastic news!

>>12747 So the part that tells the computer the drives status failed rather than the entire drive? That is kinda dumb, at least the drive itself didn't completely fail.

>>12764 There's a bit more to it than that. The controller chips on SSDs handle everything involved with the process, including being the unique encryption/decryption key for the memory chips where actual data is stored. They can fail in different ways, with levels of severity ranging from partially functional, non-functional, and complete disaster where things went out of control and it overwrites all data, rendering any recovery impossible. Thankfully, mine failed in about the best possible way it could have done so, making the recovery easy and successful.

>>12776 >SSDs Moar like SS Deez Nuts, amirite guise?

bug

>>12842 How fast do changeling's grow?

>>12847 I kind of like the guy who did Rimponk's interpretation, they age at the same rate as ponies but are considered "Adults" at about half the age.

bug is big

>>13227 Why is bug big?

>>13242 She opened up the /bug/ thread.

You didn't forget, right? Right, /bug/? A happy two year anniversary for BuggyCYOA, and our favorite cinnamon roll, Notaulix. We didn't get to experience as much of him this year, but that will never change the fact that he is the heftiest, sweetest and most huggable beetle of our hearts. Hooray.

>>13409 Gosh has it been that long? I hope we see more of him in 2023.

>>13409 I hope we see him return one day, whether it be here or somewhere else.

>>13528 Would you fertilize her eggs?

>>13581 Yes, repeatedly. That's how you end up with a big, happy family.

>>13591 How many changelings live to physical maturity? If they are made in large batches it doesn't imply they live long lives.

>>13593 My headcanon is that most are non reproductive. Like a termite colony.

I miss the Boog If there's two things I'd have liked to see is how Anon and Notaulix relationship would have gone and what horrors lied at the catacombs of the abandoned Celestia castle sinking at the Everfree

>>13723 >and what horrors lied at the catacombs of the abandoned Celestia castle What?

>>13724 IIRC, during Anon's visit at the Canterlot palace, it was mentioned that he was trying to memorize the layout of the castle because countless millenia ago, the Royal Castle stood in what would become the Everfree Forest, and the ruins still remain there. Anon wanted to visit the ruins.

In some alternate timeline where a game focused on changelings got developed, what sort of game would it be? Or rather, what would (You) want out of a changeling game? Buggo Party 6? The Elder Bugs: Equestria? Explicit Bug Visual Novel?

>>13908 Bug Craft: Brood War

>>13910 >>13908 Yes.

>>12535 Uh... if the story is foreverially ended, could you give us an overall summary of what yu had planned?

>>14142 The thumbnail for this looks like a rare pepe. Can't unsee it.

>>14145 You have been corrupted.

Hopefully all the buggos had a successful feeding day today.

>>14142 All I asked was if I lick the lint out of your hoof-holes, what's wrong with that?

Chrysalis?

Hey bug friends, I made a new meme

>>14609 I could swear I had this with a drone. I need to organize my folders.

>>14612 Please post it if you find it. I'm thinking of making more Chrysalis memes later too.

>>14609 >>14613 Here's the meme

More memes here. I never knew making memes on Krita could be so easy.

>>14622 One more.

I can't believe bug is dead, and CYOAnon with him.

bugg

>>15000 What a cute

>>15826 That's an accurate assessment.

>>15826 >>15827 I'm not into bug, but those look pretty cool. Pinkie Bug looks best IMO.

>>15826 Never know whether to bug bug-ified ponies in the bug folder, or the folder for that pony. They're in the bug folder for now though.

I would like to hug a bug

>>15995 >Cute ear twitch and bashful request for hugs. Oh, my heart!

>>13409 Well friends, today marks the third year anniversary of The Hefty Beetle Simulator: BuggyCYOA The beetle may be hefty, yet he has been entirely absent this year. I have some explaining to do, as you all deserve an explanation. Incoming blogpost. tripcode for verification The questions are simple: What happened? Where did I go? Why did the CYOA/drawings stop? Is BuggyCYOA dead for good? The answers are multifaceted, mainly boiling down to repeated disappointments, burn out, AI, and a major change in my life. I'll try and explain everything as succinctly as possible, as it would be really easy for me to bust out too many posts of details that neither really matter, nor would most probably care about. First off, the starting point for where things went off the rails for me, was when I got the idea in my head to insure that the actual CYOA participant interaction side of BuggyCYOA would be safely archived by getting it added to the anonpone.com CYOA archive site. All the stuff that happened on /mlp/ is probably safe for years to come, since there are several 4chan archive sites out there, but because NHNB didn't(and still doesn't...) have an archive, I started getting paranoid about the possibility of NHNB abruptly getting shut down, erasing all history of those interactions forever. So I reached out to the owner and operator of the anonpone site, and asked him what it would take to get BuggyCYOA added on there. He told me that he was aware of my CYOA and wanted it to already be on there, but because of the unorthodox way I originally ran the CYOA in its early format, it was uniquely incompatible with all of the methods he had employed to scrape posts and automatically process and archive their content. He explained that if I wanted to get it added, I would need to do the legwork myself to manually take every BuggyCYOA post along with every response from Anons and assemble it into the formatting that the anonpone site used, which he provided me the information for, up until the point I changed how I ran the CYOA, where his automated systems could take over. So, I did just so, and started down a path that quickly turned into an immense amount of soul-crushing, menial labor that I wasn't prepared for, digging through desuarchive to grab every post, every relevant reply, and then the text of the CYOA itself and assembling it all into a giant document requiring precise formatting, one line at a time. I spent months on that bullshit, all while working to continue running the CYOA at the same time, though to be fair a lot of that time was in procrastination due to how mind numbing the work was. But eventually, I saw the light at the end of the tunnel. I was almost done, and then my work could be sent in, and BuggyCYOA would hopefully then be added and have its archival process automated completely from then on out. ...Except then the anonpone site had a colossal malfunction of some variety, where not only the site got bricked, but everything it had archived was either lost or corrupted or something. Either way, the site owner threw in the towel at that point, abandoning the project completely. That struck a huge blow to me mentally. I spent all that time and effort for nothing, while also bringing my original issue of archiving back to the forefront. It really soured my mood and put me in a bad headspace, breaking the strong flow I had going for running the CYOA up until that point. Nevertheless, I pushed on ahead. A setback like that wasn't going to hold back the beetles. 1/?

>>16827 My next two problems are closely related, and were my real downfall with nobody to blame by myself: The rewrite, and art. At some point, I can't exactly remember when; I had the sudden realization of: "Wow, people really like this!". I have been writing greens and getting involved in small /mlp/ projects(either as Anonymous or a different name I used back then) since 2012, but nothing that I wrote or did ever really amounted to much, just drops in the bucket that were quickly forgotten. But suddenly, between ponepaste and fimfiction, my little comfy buggo CYOA had an actively engaged audience, thousands of views, hundreds of thumbs up/faves, people drawing fan art on their own volition, and even some interest among international pony communities. I had started something that somehow, for some reason, resonated with many different people. BuggyCYOA had turned into my magnum opus, and because of that, a really dangerous idea crept into my mind: I wanted to make it as good as it could possibly be. The first thing that, at least in my mind needed fixing, was the beginning of the story. When I first started running BuggyCYOA after the utter flop that was SunnyCYOA, the degree of effort I put into it basically amounted to being barely more than a shitpost; even though I had already planned out the entire premise of the story before I began, I honestly expected that it would last for maybe 10 posts before people would lose interest in it completely. It was just for a little bit of fun and an excuse to try something different, and so the beginnings were very low effort, which became something that was glaringly obvious when I reformatted the CYOA into proper story format to go on fimfiction. So there I went, getting myself involved in another unnecessary diversion that could have waited until after the CYOA was finished, all while still feeling the burn of my anonpone disappointment. And then, as if I wasn't already enough of a dumb shit, I decided that I wanted to start running BuggyCYOA as an art CYOA, taking time to learn and practice drawing so that I could provide an even more immersive, engaging experience, as you've all seen ITT. As if stretching myself so thin in different directions wasn't already bad enough, not long after I started down the road of drawing, the final nail in my coffin arrived swiftly and without warning, condemning me to be locked away in burnout hell. "AI" exploded onto the scene. I say "AI" in quotations, mainly because I'm mostly referring to Machine Learning technologies, which influencers, the media and a horde of useful idiots have presented under the blanket term of AI, which I find disagreeable for a number of reasons, mainly being that it conveys preconceived notions and ideas to the average person that, for the most part, run contrary to what the technology really is and how it actually functions. More elaboration on that later.

>>16829 Now I want to make this clear right now: I am not against AI(in the broad sense of the term) or ML. On the contrary, I've long found the subject fascinating and support both the progressive development and usage of such technologies, though that support comes with caveats. I would like to believe that I'm in somewhat of a unique position to offer my perspective on matters. When Stable Diffusion became a reality, I was incredibly excited, because it felt like the perfect free tool had arrived just when I needed it. At that point, I had only just barely begun to dig into the frustrating process of learning to draw; I wasn't terribly invested it in like someone who may have spent years honing their skills may be. On the contrary, it seemed wonderful that I could just start prompting art that could be "good enough" for the CYOA, or even better yet if I wanted more control, have the ability to draw shitty sketches and turn them into something presentable. A shortcut. But at the same time SD came around, the internet got hit with a big culture change in the form of an army of idiots coming out of the woodwork to shit on and belittle artists and other creatives, attacking them with a few regurgitated strawman arguments that held no purpose other than to troll and make people angry, prompting some of the more sensitive snowflakes on the receiving end to lash out and have meltdowns, prompting the whole AI vs Anti-AI wars, with a lot of ignorance and stupidity coming from both sides. No matter how you want to look at it, those kinds of attitudes and divisions are incredibly toxic for any kind of community, pony being no exception to these troubles. I quickly became disillusioned with the AI craze as things progressed, not because of the technology itself, but largely because of the kind of "people" rallying behind it, carrying on with a /pol/-tier mantra of it just being two more weeks until it's over for the paintpigs and we enter a new global utopian society full of UBI and tendies, and also partially because I started to think about how big tech, the commercial system and governments may start using AI to our detriment. All while literal same-y zero effort slop was starting to flood in everywhere. Now all of this is a big can of worms, and I could write a novella going off into the weeds on it, but nobody wants to read that. Instead, if you have the attention span, I would highly encourage watching this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MUEXGaxFDA I don't agree with every point being made, but I think it's one of the most well articulated videos on the subject that aligns with a lot of my thoughts and feelings on the matter. Regardless, this whole thing was the final straw that just completely and utterly killed any desire and motivation to work on anything to share with the general public on the internet. I just wanted to withdraw myself from all the bullshit, and instead use my time to go focus on something else, which is exactly what I did, thus leading us to the major change in my life that I mentioned.

>>16830 For a long time, I've wanted to start my own business. I had an idea for a niche that seemed very viable and practical to carry out, especially once the pandemic years rolled in, but I just couldn't bring myself to make that first step and take the plunge. Well last year I finally did it, I started my own business, and I'm happy to report that my idea seems to be working out for me. I've still been working part time on another job, but at the rate things are going I should be able to quit that and go full time on my own thing by the second half of next year. That's great and all, but I know none of the above answers the question that you really want to know: What's going to happen with BuggyCYOA? All of my bullshit rambling is irrelevant in the face of that all-important question. (You) want to tell Notaulix that he's a good bug, (You) want to hug the beetle and feel its heft, (You) want to go on more adventures and unravel the mysteries. Well... Truthfully, I'm not really certain yet. Regarding the issues surrounding AI, I've mellowed out on it a lot over the past year; I went through all the stages of grief and firmly arrived at acceptance, for the most part. After all, much like the video that I linked touches on, it's not going away; pandora's box has been opened, and with it this new era of easily accessible ML technology is here to stay, for better or for worse. We may as well make use of it to its full effect. Even so, I still find myself chafing at certain ideas. At this point, I don't really mind the thought of producing artwork or writing stories and having individuals take that to use as training data. If anything it would be a compliment to me, because as the current tech has started to hit a brick wall, we've learned just how important the quality of your data set is when it comes to training a model. However, in my heart, I despise the thought of producing works that then go on to provide big corpos and other entities a single cent of extra value more than I already have to provide them. Meanwhile, my mind tells me that anything creative I might produce really isn't particularly special, or of value. I'm not a gifted artist who has years or decades of experience, I'm just some guy who has dabbled in these things for the fun of it; for my personal enjoyment.

>>16831 And on the subject of personal enjoyment, I will add that I've continued to casually practice drawing every now and then in my free time. I've saved up about two dozen finished drawings, but much like BuggyCYOA, I'm undecided on what I actually want to do with them at this point in time. I want to continue BuggyCYOA, I really do, but the fact of the matter is that right now I simply don't have the time for it. Between my existing part time job and running my own small business, there's just no way. It would probably work out to be very erratic updates of questionable quality spanning weeks apart, which nobody wants. However, once I'm able to quit that part time job, I'll have a much more relaxed schedule and regain a lot of my free time that I previously had. I think the ball could finally start rolling again from that point. As for my drawn artwork, well... Maybe someday in the near-ish future you'll get to enjoy a big dump of OC from yours truly on here. I've also dabbled in AI-assisted work, but I'm even more wary of dropping those, since there's no shortage of individuals with strong opinions on those who even simply use AI for its best suited purpose: Not on its own, but as a tool to be used in conjunction with the other tools in the toolbox. On the other hand, part of me just wants to say fuck it and roleplay as the Hacker from System Shock, augmenting my meager skills a thousandfold through the latest in military-grade cybernetic implants and enhancements, becoming the mythical AI Power User™ who incorporates those tools into their existing workflow to produce enhanced results more efficiently, critics and ethics be damned. In summary and the tl;dr of all this: I shouldn't have gotten sidetracked and instead should have kept on charging forward full speed ahead while my passion was hot and the adventure was flowing smoothly. In reality, if I had just kept at it, the CYOA would have likely reached its conclusion in another 6 or 7 months of active running. Anyway, in the meantime it's best to consider BuggyCYOA to be on indefinite hiatus. Because of that I think I'm going to temporarily hide its listing on fimfic, since I think it's very unfair for people to stumble upon something that they get excited about and invested in, only for it to possibly never continue. We've all been there. Additionally, on the off chance that I get involved in a freak car accident or some other tragedy and die between now and the next six months, I'm going to spill some beans as per the request from >>13723 and >>14111 I need to stop writing for now and get going, but please feel free to start putting out some questions regarding BuggyCYOA or any of my other works. I'll try to answer as much as I can within the next few days, though it might have to wait until the weekend. I don't know how many of you are still even around and check this site, but I still love (You) guys. I hope you're all safe and doing well, wherever in this tumultuous world you may be. We're all brothers united in our love of pony and changebuggos. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

>>16827 >>16829 >>16830 >>16831 >>16832 I thought some stuff may have happened, though it's nice to hear from you after so long, even if it's sad we may never see little Mister N again. Bug was always a niche sub-interest for MLP with not a lot of people around, and even less contributors of any kind (who were always either depressed or very busy or both), but I keep this thread up even after months of no posting. Kind of sad to see it go when it was the first and most active part of NHNB. May we all become productive fags in the end. I would've posted two hours ago but I was also juggling ten things.

>>16832 >AI It is what it is. The issue seems largely with people's behavior with it rather than the AI itself. Personally I don't think it could ever replace really drawing or writing something yourself. It certainly has it's uses, but ultimately it's not your creation. Nor could it ever really be I think. Because in order to give it enough information to truly reproduce what you want, you'd have already done it yourself. I see it as no different than asking someone else to do it for you. Where I see it's main benefit is potentially for ideas or things that are otherwise just not possible yourself (like the voices). >Too busy, new business Congratulations on the new business. Hopefully it works out for you. I recently started a new job as well and pretty much all of my projects are now suffering, so you're not alone in that department. I do hope to return to things sooner than later. We'll see I guess. >The CYOA I think you should leave it up on FimFic. Just clearly put on the title that it's unfinished and that it isn't likely to change. We all have gotten enjoyment out of what we've seen so far, maybe other people will too. While it's sad to see that it's gone, it is understandable. In some ways I do think you've raised the bar for yourself higher than it needs to be. The nice thing with greens is that the technical side of writing doesn't need to be perfect, as long as you get your ideas across. And perhaps you could try going back to that, no expectations, no pressure, just a bit of fun. Even if it's not with BuggyCYOA. >NHNB archive Be your own archive. https://gitgud.io/mys_elf/nhnb-scraper >The drawings You should share them. You've already put the effort into making them so why not release them to the world? It's good to see you around. And if you do decide to start again on anything, we'll be here.

>5 days later >Not a single question about the CYOA or anything else Welp. I've been gone long enough that either nobody cares anymore, or anyone who does care no longer visits this place. Likely a bit of both. Regardless, on the off chance that >>14111 is still around, here's some carefully curated information that should hopefully allow (You), the dear reader, to formulate a mental picture of where things were going and how they would end up, providing some closure in the event that I meet some sort of untimely demise before I can get around to running this again. First off, starting almost immediately after where the story is currently stuck at, instead of things moving slowly one day at a time, the story would start going through time skips as Anon and Notaulix settle into a routine of living together. This would dramatically speed up the progression of the story, since the focus would shift to how you navigate your way through particular important events, rather than the mundane slice of life. Some of those events are determined by dice roll, others are predetermined. For an example of a dice roll event that already happened, Gilda's introduction to the story was the result of one. I forget exactly when it happened; I'd have to dig back through the archives and find it, but at some point I did a dice roll where the results were hidden. Something like a D20 where 1 = ???, 2-8 = ???, 9-20 = ???, etc. Each of those unknowns were a character that was to potentially be incorporated, and in that particular case it landed on Gilda. Anyway, the first critical fork in the road was immediately coming up. It's the end of autumn, and The Running of the Leaves is approaching, presenting an ideal opportunity for "Gerson" to introduce himself to the denizens of Ponyville. It would be up to (You) to decide how best to go about doing that, or if you'd rather wait for a different time. Regardless of the path taken, unexpected challenges may arise... Depending on your success(or the lack thereof), the story progresses to the middle of winter, arguably arriving at the single most important moment of the CYOA that I had planned. At this point, an entire group of changelings enter the scene. How (You) choose to handle them directly affects the ending of the CYOA. And after that, there would most likely be a certain choice to make. After (You) have decided on that course of action, I would release a short one shot story on fimfic; one in a series that I thought of a long time ago titled "One Hour In The Life Of...", which takes a lighthearted look through a small window in different characters lives. This one in particular that I would release at this time, would be "One Hour In The Life Of Notaulix", a short prequel story giving a glimpse at Notaulix's life as a stick gatherer for his hive, out in the forest happily gathering sticks in the company of [REDACTED], his beloved [DATA EXPUNGED] who _______. After reading that short story, you could then reach your own conclusion about if you feel warm and fuzzy for the choice that you made, or if instead you're an enormous asshole who should feel bad and possibly consider the rope. It's worth noting that I wrote that short story out over a year ago. I've been sitting on it for that long lol. From that point, things get pretty murky and ambiguous without knowing the choices that (You) would actually make. There's so many different ways that things could go between The Running of the Leaves and the winter incident, where I can't really tell you with accuracy of anything else of importance which happens after that. But hopefully (You) would make good choices, and everyone would live happily ever after. ^:) I'm going to leave things at that, for now. If anyone out there has more specific questions, either regarding Buggy, Moony or anything else, let 'em fly. I don't bite; at worst, you may end up with some [[Hyperlink Blocked]] Hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving.

>>16871 >Welp. I've been gone long enough that either nobody cares anymore, or anyone who does care no longer visits this place. Likely a bit of both. I care. I'm not sure what more you expected than people just hoping to see the return of it some day. You do have people responding to you. But thanks for the little bit of BuggyCYOA extras. They are nice to see. I don't know that I have any specific questions, but I will say I did enjoy the story while it was going on.

>>16871 Oh, thanks. I'm >>14111. Also the one who suggested Notaulix' griffon form to be named Galahad at some point. Occasionaly (VERY occasionally) I come to check the thread, but I'll admit it's been at least six months since I bothered checking it. Anyways, it was a very nice story. These were a nice two years of entertainment. A pity the CYOA thread was always being bumped off to oblivion due to the upcoming Gen V or whatever was happening at /mlp/ at the moment.

>>16871 I'm >>16946 again and by the way, some of my inputs on that great post: >It would be up to (You) to decide how best to go about doing that, or if you'd rather wait for a different time I'd suggest doing that, and working up a believable story for his origins with him by combining the origin his hive came up with for his infiltration on the settlement to kill and replace the leaders with how he ended up at the Everfree >At this point, an entire group of changelings enter the scene. How (You) choose to handle them directly affects the ending of the CYOA Considering the pacing I think the changeling group coming from the bowels of Hell would take Gerson off for a talk and fill him in on their intent, which is not good. Notaulix would feel conflicted and talk with you, not letting all out at once of course. I'd work my way according to what he's willing to share... >the prequel For some reason this leads me to believe that Notaulix isn't just a random nobody from the colony... Anyway, I hope you had a good Thanksgiving, and in the following weeks, a Merry Christmas!

>>17157 The truth come out

>>17157 How even? Chrysalis and Cadence are both female.

>>17184 Maybe Chrysalis left Cadence with an egg?

>>16871 >Welp. I've been gone long enough that either nobody cares anymore, or anyone who does care no longer visits this place. Likely a bit of both. Apologies for the late reply, but I couldn't help but chime in after checking on this site to see how things were doing. It isn't a surprise that you got nothing in terms of engagement. Things have petered off in the fandom since your last post, and especially for this site. Add to the fact that you've been gone for all this time, it was safe to assume this project was yet another that could be added into the "deadfic" pile. I certainly thought this project to be of this state after radio silence after all this time. I am happy to see that at least partially, there's a chance for this work to continue in *some* form. But you are going to have to rebuild the community you had once more, seeing as they have probably left for other pastures due to a lack of activity for this work. And seeing how quiet it is here, you'll need to venture to other sites like Fimfiction, /mlp/ and wherever else you can scrounge up some engagement. As it is, the MLP fandom is in a very stagnant, somewhat dead state. Contrary to my expectations and ambivalence towards it, G5 hasn't done as well as I would have expected, playing it rather safe and resulting in mediocre to low engagement numbers. Which, in retrospect, isn't a surprise. The landscape that made MLP popular in the first place is no longer in effect, with it being another passing fad that is now dust in the wind. What is there is mostly self contained cliques that do their own thing, and is certainly no grounds for looking beyond that. Hence, you'll need to actively promote your work if you ever hope to get back into the swing of things, with an update of *some* sort to boot, even if small as 5000 words. -

>>17430 - I must contradict you in regards to hiding your work from common view. Whilst the project may no longer be updating as of its current state, that is no reason alone to hide it from anyone else from enjoying what you have already put up there. Plenty of dead fics get a trickle of engagement of some form, even if they may forever be consigned to the grave for one reason or another. I myself still read dead fics from time to time, enjoying what is there despite the incomplete nature of them. Merely change to title and description to indicate its hiatus, with perhaps an extra note edited into the introduction or elsewhere, and leave it at that. As it is, your work is one of the very few of the "old" guard that I enjoy, having no love for what FiM turned into during its mid and later seasons. I certainly don't care for what they did to the changelings, the gryphons, and other stuff with the lore that is now firmly embedded in the fandom's zeitgeist, having recontextualized all fandom output in terms of discussion and fan creations from then on going forward. They aren't all "bad" persay, but despite filling the world in, it feels emptier and more hollow in some ways than ever, the mystery filled in by what ultimately amounted to just adequate but ultimately mediocre "content" that exists to fill in the void for the sake of it. Alas, the mystery that was left in the earlier seasons where all sorts of diversity was to be had in filling in that void ourselves is no longer present, and part of the reason why engagement as a whole is not what it used to be. Speaking for no one but myself, there is little to nothing that has really engaged me with this fandom or FiM itself, save for in the form of old fan output or some newer projects that somehow miraculously managed to divest itself from modern FiM to do its own thing, such as that 4chan AI episode that turned out quite nicely as a blast from the past. https://youtu.be/QLGlrY7cooY It's a shame to see if your work would truly disappear, but ultimately it is up to you. I only ask you leave it up as a record for posterity, for what once was for anyone else that might eventually stumble across it for what had once been. - As for your other stuff, I can't say I can offer much in terms of comfort. That's a lot to go through for one man, and all I can say is you have to adapt to it, or just give up the ghost and move on to other ventures like you are doing now. As of right now for the CYOA, I never participated in it myself, save for as an enthusiastic commenter. But for the sake of it, I'll try to think of something. Just need to re-read the work and watch the episodes. Hopefully I'll have something soon enough for you, if you ever get back to it. In any case, I hope this post finds you well.

Well, I have something. It ain't much, but it *is* something. Been stuck in a rut, so I'll post here and see how it goes. --- You are Princess Celestia. Imperator of the United Equestrian States. Goddess of the Sun. Sol Invicta. Her Grand Royal Highness. Unifer of Harmony. Co-regent of Equestria. Such is the few of the many, many pretentious titles you have accrued over the many centuries, yet they were the ones you bore regardless. Throughout those centuries, you have seen many a strange thing during the course of your duties. The latest of which being those curious "humans" that have dropped into your lap shortly after the wedding of your niece with your student's brother. Some changed, some not, but many bearing a fantastical tale of not only coming from another world, but one which has ample familiarity with yours as a fiction. It was... Trying to say the least in assimilating them into Equestria proper, especially without derailing your carefully arranged plans. A literal monkey wrench throw into your grand tapestry by none other than the Agent of Chaos himself. A funny "prank" forged from one who has anticipated and preempted your desire to reform him into something less destructive. All now made moot with the draconesque nowhere to be seen nor found despite the best efforts of you, your sister, student and all of the best scryers that Equestria had to offer. And that wasn't even getting to the rest of the headache these humans had to offer with their foreknowledge. It was only by some tender mercy granted by fate did you manage to coral them in some fashion to prevent any more mischief. Not that you faulted them of course, seeing as they were brought here against their will. Though you were glad that some of them seemed happy enough to try and assimilate, making do what what has been brought on their shoulders. It heartened to you to know even as a supposed fiction, you, your student, and the rest of Equestria inspired those beyond its boundaries. Yet even still, there were those who wished to return home to their families, something which despite the best efforts of yourself, your sister, Twilight, and those knowledgeable in such fields, the answer of returning them home was yet to materialize. Long lived as you were, you were no less heartbroken to see those faces of despair when you told them without Discord, those who found themselves here may never find a chance to return home. Still, you were nothing if exceptional in making the best out of a bad situation. With the rest of Equestria at your back, you made sure that the humans whatever their forms may be found themselves a home, taking pains to ensure their assimilation whilst minimizing the impact they had to Equestria at large. You even found boons in the merits they offered in terms of the knowledge and other expertise some of them had, sectioning them off in their own new settlement somewhere near Whitetail Woods to do as they pleased whilst remaining close by to Ponyville to both monitor and ensure they didn't isolate themselves too much. But even still, there was friction to be had in some measure. Not least of which regarding the foreknowledge they had for event that would of come. Would of that is, if not...

>>18532 You shook your head, sighing as you stared up at the sign hanging over your head. (Jan 5 2025 – 7:16 PM: Scrap this section. Introduce herself as Sunbeam. Her sister Moonlight. >"Lies, Delusions, and Fabrications." you muttered to yourself, taking note of the rest of the surroundings. "-At least the last part is accurate." Beyond the trees that marked the border of the Everfree Forest, the only other sight of note was the small abode that was too large to be called a hovel, but too small to be called a proper house. Oh there was more construction being done, indicated by the barren frames and other elements that littered the site. But the area otherwise had little of note. Then again, you were not interested in the building itself. Your eyes shifted to the window next to you, taking a few steps to check your reflection. Staring back was a unicorn with a strawberry red mane that was wrapped together in a loose ponytail. Checking her flank, your cutie mark was that of a sun warming some flowers. Your reflection smiled back, giving you a nod. >“Yup, everything seems to be in order.” you chuckled, giving a quick swish of your tail. “All for a perfect day, too.” Another chuckle escaped your lips as you turned your gaze to the door. >"Well Sunbeam, time to check out what's on offer." You raised a hoof to knock on the door- “My name is Twilight Sparkle, what’s yours?” Blinking, your hoof fell short from the wooden frame. >“Twilight?” You pressed an ear to the door, hearing flash of changeling magic. “M’name’s Applejack. Pleased ta meet ya! We here at Sweet Apple Acres are pleased ta… Ta...” A moment of silence followed for a few seconds, the slam of a forehoof on the ground caused you jerk back. “Consarnit all!” You blinked, creeping up back towards the window. Raising your head, you saw Applejack sans her typical Stetson staring into a mirror. Her muzzle was scrunched up in a scowl, staring daggers into her doppelganger for a few seconds more before running a hoof over her mane with a sigh. A weary smile took to her lips, head shaking. -

“Ya gotta improve on your improv, sonny.” With that, the mare disappeared in a flash. In her place took the form of a black maned, brown coated, brown eyes earth pony stallion fashioned in the most generic, unremarkable ponies you have ever laid eyes upon, which in itself proved to stick out like a sore hoof to your eyes. “Yup. I ain’t worth a damn as a changeling, it seems. Thank God for Zecora.” the stallion nodded in agreement, tossing his head as he turned back to the table to his left. Your eyes followed, spying a vial filled with a pink liquid that found itself in a gryphon’s talon. Without preamble, the stallion took it whole in one go. The pink liquid disappeared down his gullet, the stallion’s form stiffening for a moment before relaxing as he loosed contented sigh. Opening his eyes, he slotted the now emptied potion back on the table as he disappeared into another area of the house. You paused for a moment, considering your next options. A cheeky grin found its way to your muzzle. Your horn lit up, magic defusing around your body as a spell took form. You whispered incantations, layering upon a weave that soon rendered your form invisible. Light warped off your form, your hoofsteps silenced as you eased a lockpick from your saddlebag. With but a few twists and turns, the door unlocked. You slipped inside, careful to ensure the door closed behind you with naught but a sound. You grinned. Stealth was more your sister’s forte, but you picked up a few tricks here and there over the centuries. Lockpicking was not one would normally associate with your person, but there was only so much you could do without allowing your mind to grow bored and wander. It never failed, the small pleasures of a distinct click sending a shiver down your spine. Turning your head, you crept along the hallway’s wall and taking note of the inner surroundings. While nothing to write home about, there was a few interesting things of note within the main room. Nestled in the corner of the room, you noticed a table set with a minor alchemy set dedicated to brewing potions, tools and the like hanging off the wall for whatever purpose. The table centerpiece was clear, save for a flat device you knew to the stallion’s laptop. Next to it a sun crystal glowed, an improvised hodgepodge setup connecting a wire from it to the device. More crystals and other knicknacks littered the space, including a few more of the changeling’s potions. Beyond that, the home seemed fairly normal otherwise. - That's as far as I've come. I'l leave it as is to see what sort of feedback is incoming. Hoping this small morsel satisfies the thread for a little while.

>>18533 Sneaky Celestia! Very cool.

>>18534 Celestia spying on changelings in a human settlement? If I read that right? Interesting. If you want feedback though, I should be the bitch who tells you to work on your grammar, there's quite a bit of engrish in there.

It's time for the REAL /bug/ to rise again...

>>19159 bugs won't fall so easily

>> https://desuarchive.org/mlp/thread/42061388/#42141114 >i think the artist meant for them to look folded I can see the intention but it still looks off for me. But have an elytron for this reason. Another missed opportunity in the show. >father and son, yes Hmm... >guess that makes more sense >i was just thinking up some way to tie the spy being a bug into the continuity of tf2 "lore" >scout being a pegasus is a given though >him being a bug and knowing it while hiding it from his friends could be cool Well Spy can still be a bug and Scout can be his real son but a pony, or adopted, or a changeling like you said. I think it can work still. Is there an official info about the mother? >>19159 >>19195 I'm glad I'm not the only bugfag that remembers this place exists.

>>19159 >>19195 I was the one who restarted the /bug/ thread on /mlp/ after I went on NHNB and seeing how old the last thread was. It was like 2 or 4 years old. So I am glad seeing this /bug/ thread getting some love again.

>>19260 That was a good call, Anon.

>>19260 I was one of the ones who kickstarted the /bug/ thread an earlier time it died like 3 or 4 years ago. Sadly I eventually gave up when it just became a fetish and bump general.

>>9562 MAMMAAAA OoooOoooOooo, Didn't mean to make you cry.

>>19260 the bug thread has been nice to have, so yes thank you i miss the hive and its only been a day.... least this one is here

>>19260 I thought about posting here years ago, but it was really just a ghost town until they fucked 4chan. So, I'm still commissioning artwork of this stuff and writing about it. Are you guys fine with me posting that in here, or not? I'll only post new stuff from here on out, since it's not like bumping will be an issue.

>>20451 ooooooo rarabro ya might wanna delete that before they do they dont appreciate more cultured tastes on this site thinking i might start a bug thread on that new board mlpol just made cant hang with the rules here for long personally

>>20460 I'll see if it gets deleted or not. I've posted here lightly over the years, and the owner's definitely strict about EqG and anthro, but we'll soon see. Mr. Admin, I can definitely make my case, but it's your choice, whatever.

>>20451 >Are you guys fine with me posting that in here, or not? I personally don't like this kind of hyper pregancy because it looks too much like vore. I wouldn't mind if it were eggs and not lings who look like they already had their first molt. But I can hide the files here with just a single click so it doesn't really matter. Well, it doesn't for me, but it might matter for janny since this kind of art may fall under the R2.6. You better go and ask about it in >>/qa/ to know for sure instead of waiting to see what happends. (Janny decides that it is banned without your input and you have to just suck it.)

>>21030 I found the rules page again. Yeah, talking it over seems like a good idea, thank you for the suggestion.

>>19260 Why did you remove the link to these emergency bunker threads in the OP? It was a part of every thread for a long time back when the anon who did buggycyoa was taking the initiative to run the /bug/ threads both here and on /mlp/. It was there for exactly the kind of situation we're in right now. >>20460 >>20465 >>21030 >>21055 I think you're making a mountain out of a molehill regarding the rules of this place. If you take some time and dig around some of the older threads and posts on this board(which I recommend, there's been a lot of good posts and discussions over the years), you'll find that the site owner's pretty lenient and reasonable, outside of obvious things like posting EqG or anthro. There's barely cropped porn, questionable fetishy stuff, teats, sheaths and other similar things that there was no apparent issue with. Personally, I think very preggo buggo is pretty mild compared to a lot of the things posted in the past here on /fim/. Anyway, I'll be very surprised if he says no to it on the rules thread. At most I could see him maybe asking that you spoiler the more extreme images.

>>21472 >I think you're making a mountain out of a molehill regarding the rules of this place. I guess I did ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ By the way if someone missed there's a /bug/ thread on /poner/ too now https://mlpol.net/poner/221 >emojis It's even more cringe than flags are ಠ_ಠ

Notaulix is a good bug.

>>22222 numbaz

The original thread for the cutest boys.

>>22222 Buggy GET

>>22222 nice digits, bugbro

>>22222 Checked

Good news, this will be done soon. I had an awful time paying the artist this time. International sanctions are a bitch.

Imagine you're a changeling in Equestria. Who do you impersonate, and for what purpose?

>>25098 Honestly probably a backgrounder and try to make frens. Bug friends too if they were kinder but that seems like slim chances if they're the old variety (and if it was skittles I'd have to contain my slurs).

>>21472 >Why did you remove the link to these emergency bunker threads in the OP? It was a part of every thread for a long time back when the anon who did buggycyoa was taking the initiative to run the /bug/ threads both here and on /mlp/. im the anon whos been making the /bug/ threads on mlp since their "recent" numbered revival someone brought it back for like two repeat threads and then gave up for a couple days after it hit the limit and fell off so i started making them now that you do mention it though when (or maybe if) they do get the 4chins back up and running i will include emergency links to this and the mlpol sister threads i also need to figure out the whole organizing the old and new pastes and such

coming here and seeing a thread three years old like this feels strange after using mlp only for so long

Have something silly for a change. Unfortunately, the file size limit is too small for the real thing, but you can find it on the boorus if you want.

>Be the Mistress of Manipulation >The Duchess of Deception >The Mother of Harlots! >Queen Chrysalis! Ruler of the changeling hive! >"Alright, Chryssi, I'm headed out. Be good!" >The order is immediately followed by the shutting of the front door >The human has finally left to his pathetic job >Now's your chance to- >"Mom?" >Oh, for hive's sake >"Mom?" >You raise your head from its immensely comfy spot on the floor and poke it out from beneath the couch to see your drone's blank blue eyes staring back in your general direction >"Mom?" "What?" You bark >"What are we-" She pauses to take in a deep breath, "-gonna do today,-" Another breath, "-Mom?" >You groan again and restrain the urge to bury your face in your hooves "Use your spiracles, Drone." >"Oh yeah!" >The drone takes a stance, and a faint whistling can be heard, the tell-tale sign of a changeling taking a proper breath >"Thanks, Mom!" >You roll your eyes as you drag yourself out from beneath the couch >Your drone speaks up again as you're stretching your stiff chitin >"What are we gonna do today, Mo-" "The same thing we do every day, Drone." You interrupt "We're going to play the 'don't talk until Anonymous returns home' game." >"Oh..." The drone slumps dejectedly >The sight nearly makes you take pause >She usually loves that game "Explain your reaction, Drone." >"Well, it's just..." "Go on." >"I thought we'd do something special for Dad today." "He's not your father. And even if he were, why would we do anything 'special'?" >The drone's eyes widen in a silent gasp >"C-cause it's..." She sniffs and casts her gaze to the floor >"It's Dad's birthday..." >You give her a disdainful look >The human's doing, no doubt >He's been filling your drone's susceptible mind with the most inane "knowledge" "Changelings don't celebrate days of birth, Drone." >"But Dad's not a changeling. He's a monkey." "Human." You correct >You'd never admit it, but your drone had a point >And knowing ponies, he'd be getting love and admiration poured onto him all day >How wasteful >They should be pouring all that delicious love onto you! >Maybe... >You smile to yourself as your superiorly strategic mind swirls up a superb scheme "At attention, Drone. I've made a royal decision." >She instantly straightens up, putting on the most serious face she can muster "We're going to bake a cake." -=-=- >You glare menacingly at the tome before you >Somehow, through all your years as Queen, you've never seen a script like this before >Perhaps it's in code? >"Mom, what's an angel?" >You look at your drone who is buzzing in midair beside you to see the book, her legs dangling freely beneath her >You'll have to remember to add proper flight technique to her training regimen "A what? Where did you hear that?" >"Right there." >She points at the book lying open on the counter >"Annngeeel...fooood...cake!" >She scratches her head >"Who would eat a cake made out of angel food?" >You furrow your brow at your subject "You read human?" >Your drone nods ecstatically >"Dad's been teaching me! He says I'm a really good learner." >Hmph >At least he's showing her something almost useful >You slide the book to sit in front of her "Read out the instructions, Drone." You order as you use your magic to open up various cabinets >"Okay!" >She floats a bit closer to the page, focusing intently on it >"O-one...cuuup...fuh-fluh-floor. One cup floor!" "Flour." >This might take longer than you thought

>>29551 "Next?" >"Um, now it says to add the rest of the sugar." >You levitate the bag of sugar and grumble when you feel how light it is >Hmm... >Maybe you could substitute it? >You dig through the pantry but find nothing suitable >Something sweet, something sweet... >Aha! >You levitate the measuring cup in front of your muzzle >Turning your face downwards, your body starts jerking forwards, the sound of heavy dry heaving escaping the bottom of your throat >After about five minutes of this, you finally start drooling out a thick purple slime into the cup >You haven't had to make royal jelly since your last brood >How long has it been? >"Uhm, Mom?" Your drone says once you've finished spewing out jelly >"I-I don't think you should be spitting in Dad's food." "Nonsense." >You dump the jelly into the mixing bowl "He should be honored that I'm willing to spend what little love I have on his silly little birthday." >Your drone looks at you skeptically >You glare in return "Next." -=-=- >You shut the oven door and sit back on your haunches with a huff >Who knew baking would be such toil? >"Mom?" "Hm." >"Why do they call it oven when you of in the cold food of out hot eat the food?" >... >Don't hit your drone, don't hit your drone... -=-=- >"Chryssi! Dot! I'm home!" >"Dad!" The drone zooms into the human's arms, the two hugging each other tightly on impact >"How're my little lovebugs doing?" Anon beams "I told you not to call us that." You sneer as you enter from the kitchen >Anon quirks a brow as you levitate the cake into his hands, the drone clambering onto his shoulders to let him hold the dessert >The final product is coated in black frosting with shaky green lettering that's supposed to read "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" in human text >You had to have the drone write it out >"Did you guys, make this for me? That's...wow. Just...thank you." >Anon's usual chipper smile widens even further >You can taste the gratitude pouring off of him >Close, but not quite what you're after >You pretend to examine a hoof nonchalantly "A queen always knows how to treat her subjects. The real question is if subjects know how to treat their queen..." >You coyly present a cheek to him >Anon rolls his eyes >"I guess it's only fair, my Queen." >Anon leans in and plants a smooch on your cheek >You can't help but let out a nymphish chirping as the love floods your system with it's warm tingling >Anon balances the cake on one arm and uses the other to pull you into an embrace, making your cheeks flush >Human love always seems to make you act like a larva >"Thank you, Chryssi. Really. This means a lot." >You roll your eyes and look away to hide your blushing "You humans are just as bad as ponies with your...your stupid love." >Anon chuckles and hugs you tighter before giving you another kiss on the cheek >Maybe living here isn't all that bad https://ponepaste.org/10975

It sucks that /mlp/ returned so quickly. I don't want to overwhelm the thread with just my stuff. I've been meaning to post this for a few weeks, but I guess I'll hold off on more until I write about her again. This image is huge, so here are links to the full quality: https://derpibooru.org/images/3595858 https://twibooru.org/3507483 https://ponybooru.org/images/3818522 https://ponerpics.org/images/7228837 >>21030 >I personally don't like this kind of hyper pregancy because it looks too much like vore. I wouldn't mind if it were eggs and not lings who look like they already had their first molt. Well, these are appropriately undeveloped. Jotun22 made this, based on the end of this short story: https://www.fimfiction.net/story/564117/3/sexier-short-stories-with-particularly-pregnant-ponies/bug-shy Fortunately for the guard, he remained outside of his queen as she left the throne room for some other part of the hive. Despite the title of guard, his main purpose was to help her move her swollen form at her leisure, and he was thankful she wasn’t yet so big that she would need two guards to help her shift her weight. Wordlessly, she began to rock herself back and forth until her giant rear left the throne, and he wordlessly sandwiched his back underneath it to act as a lift; his four shaking legs moved the queen upwards ever so slowly, and he knew if his legs failed him he would be smashed under her like a common bug, although there were worse ways to die. Thankfully, her thick hindlegs soon helped him, but not to get her standing, for she was easily far too large for standing to be possible. The work of his entire body and her legs amounted to nothing more than rotating her so that she lay on her belly like a knot on a balloon. Thereafter, her wings somehow lifted her into the air, giving her more of a teardrop shape as he lay on the ground watching her, struggling to catch his breath before he followed. His queen was so majestic.

>>29737 >His queen was so majestic. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pXfodm4zTMU

I hope you have a nice Nightmare Night and a happy Halloween. I've been planning to release an anthology about the queen like this for a while now, and the artist for the first chapter took long enough that I realized Nightmare Night was a good release candidate. The artwork's still not quite finished, but the story is. I don't want to overwhelm the thread, and it looks like I will since even I can write a new chapter every few months, so I'll leave it at this for now and post again once I've got the finished artwork for this first chapter, but I won't post future chapters here unless things pick up again. Who knows, maybe 4chan will finally die. Here's the story now: https://www.fimfiction.net/story/582238/1/tall-tales-of-the-one-true-queen-and-her-many-children/snug-in-a-bug Snug in a Bug Queen Chrysalis lay flat on the floor of her hive, in a sense. She was alone, and not. She was rather still, and constantly, violently twitching. Her monstrously bloated belly rested underneath her, every one of her nooks and crannies filled with foals, dwarfing the rest of her body. It was lumpy with its contents, and had no clear shape; despite lifting her hooves well from the ground, it still bulged upwards so that its highest point was past her withers. The queen couldn’t tell, and wouldn’t care, but her thin spine twisted and curved along her gut, leaving her lounging on top in what would be a very uncomfortable position for any pony. She had nothing to do while she waited in the bowels of the cave system stretching from every direction around her, but to admire her body and the bodies of the children within her. She had read every book available to her many times over; she couldn’t plan her most recent military strategy any further, for this was her military strategy; and one of her born children was taking an awfully long time to return with her drink order. She had just awoken from a nap, and could feel that sleep wouldn’t soon easily return to her. The queen stretched her legs and buzzed her wings with a long yawn. Even her mighty wings were incapable of lifting her body, and she took pride in it; the age of austerity, of small batches, was finally over again for a time. Her legs carelessly slammed into her gut, striking whatever unfortunate foals were beneath them. Her forelegs pressed in deeply where her forehooves met her swell, while her hindlegs splayed behind her to rest against a bulge and prevent them from dangling uncomfortably, for her. There was a small window—comparatively—through which she could observe her children; while her transparent membrane revealed all of them set against the flesh, she could only see those directly around her thorax, and not even all of them. The lucky foals directly in front of her head occasionally saw a fang-filled smile, and even felt the rare affectionate rub from her hoof. They may be able to connect her consumption of love in all its forms to their satisfaction. All others were condemned to even more ignorance of their existence, with those at the bottom—or surrounded on all sides by their siblings deep inside—enshrouded in darkness.