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Starlit Spackle
#63
NAME
Satmatnen "Butterscotch" Ormand
Fucking immigrants.
SEX
Male
SPECIES
Pony - Earth
BODY COLOUR
Light grey
MANE COLOUR
Black, with streaks of orange and dark grey
Jesus christ and I thought my OC was boring.
EYE COLOUR
Light green
Literally only one colour on this entire character. What part of ‘Pastel Coloured Ponies’ do you not understand? Fuck, grey is the worst colour to pick for an OC.
FOALHOOD
<Sorry for the length>
He was born the third and final child in his family. His father, his older brother, and his older sister are all unicorns while his mother is a pegasus.
His parents were both nerds. They met in a constructed language club, and really loved this one language that was based solely on predicate logic. They attempted to raise all three of their children to be native speakers,thinking they'd be extra smart and logical. Butterscotch was the only one of their children to hold onto the language, and he still maintains fluency in it despite the fact he is the world's only native speaker.
His name, "Satmatnen" was also derived from this language, but he adopted the nickname "Butterscotch" (after an incident in kindergarten involving a trip to the nurse and an unguarded bowl of candy) to make things easier for Equestrian speakers.
He was his biologist mother's favorite because he loved science and held onto her favorite language. Her older sister, Tujlil, resented him for this, now trapped as the middle child. She developed a narcissistic personality and used any opportunity she could to put Butterscotch down, with her go-to dig being attacking the fact that he was born an earth pony, and had to do everything with his mouth or hooves instead of magic.
Luckily, he was raised in a small farm town in Zebrastan. His family moved there before he was forming any permanent memories. The fact that everyone around him in public was a zebra made Tujlil think twice before saying something bigoted to him outside the home.
He took to schooling easily, and spent a lot of his free time thinking. He thought about various things, such as how he would restructure the Zebrastani (and later, Equestrian) political system, what devices could be produced to help non-magic users out in their day to day life, and why groups of ponies/zebras/other sentient species behaved the way they do, seemingly without logic at times.
His parents did grow a plant that was illegal to grow in Zebrastani jurisdiction, and he was raised to be really secretive about it. This lead to him developing a paranoid personality, which started to grow out of hand. He started to interpret the fact that he had no rivalries, but no close friendship, at school as evidence that he was obviously mentally ill and the other children were too polite to say anything. He prepared contingency plans in case Tujlil's harassment escalated. After hearing about the world threatening events taking place in Equestria after Luna's return, he always kept three days of food and water in his saddlebags if something like that happened in Zebrastan. Most importantly, he was paranoid that no one would like his thoughts that went against mainstream political ideologies, his "just-in-case" attitude towards planning the future, and his long trains of thought involving heavy amounts of science. Because of this, he wore a mask of bubbly cheerfulness and hid his inner self from others to protect himself from the perceived danger of ostracization.
.
<Sorry for the length>
Apology rejected. I’ll accept an apology if what you wrote is shit.
He was born the third and final child
One sin for being the baby born.
They attempted to raise all three of their children to be native speakers,thinking they'd be extra smart and logical
I thought you said that your parents were nerds, not actively working to sabotage their children’s social life. Fuck if anyone tried to list that as one of their skills they’d get beaten up so quickly.
he still maintains fluency in it despite the fact he is the world's only native speaker.
Obviously you haven’t heard the absolute linguistic gymnastics that someone can accomplish when they’re high off their ass on meth during a police traffic stop.
"Butterscotch" (after an incident in kindergarten involving a trip to the nurse and an unguarded bowl of candy) to make things easier for Equestrian speakers.
And it couldn’t have come fucking sooner. Imagine your primary character trait being confusing the literal fuck out of people on a daily basis. Just like parents naming their children with absolutely stupid ghetto names like LaQuisha or DaQuan.
He was his biologist mother's favorite
You can tell when someone hasn’t been a parent yet when they say ‘favourite’ instead of ‘least hated’. I bet that his mum’s going to be a narcissist and he’s going to be the golden child.
Tujlil, resented him for this, now trapped as the middle child. She developed a narcissistic personality
OK I was half right. But seriously, too predictable. Also if you’re going to use a clinical term like narcissist, you should actually know what it means in a clinical context. Being mean to him consistently is not narcissism. That’s just being a dick. Using a clinical term incorrectly just makes you look like an idiot. And since most people are not health care providers - just save yourself the trouble and don’t use clinical terms.
The fact that everyone around him in public was a zebra made Tujlil think twice before saying something bigoted to him outside the home.
Why? There’s no logic here. Also you’re using the word bigot incorrectly here.
spent a lot of his free time thinking. He thought about various things, such as how he would restructure the Zebrastani (and later, Equestrian) political system,
See, this is why you need to beat up nerds in school. Because they end up ruminating on issues that they are not old enough to fully understand, and end up becoming pretentious fucks that don’t shut up about how libertarianism is the optimal way to shape a nation. It’s incorrect, annoying, and absolutely useless when it comes out of the mouth of a naive teenager.
seemingly without logic at times.
Nothing about the last few sentences is logical in any way. It’s actually quite vexing.
His parents did grow a plant that was illegal to grow in Zebrastani jurisdiction
He started to interpret the fact that he had no rivalries, but no close friendship, at school as evidence that he was obviously mentally ill
See, this is why nerds can’t be allowed to procreate. They just set their children up for failure. They cannot instill the proper social competence into their offspring and the only people that end up suffering are the children. They think that there’s something wrong with them, which I guess is half correct. But the other half is that their parents are absentee fuckwits who forgot that the key to survival is social interaction not being able to speak pig latin. The latter is just a fun party trick when the guy with the guitar got sick of playing nothing but Wonderwall for 2 hours.
he was paranoid that no one would like his thoughts that went against mainstream political ideologies
Yeah, no kidding. Being conservative in a city is fucking terrible.
Wait hold on.
his long trains of thought involving heavy amounts of science
None of his trains of thought are actual science. They are on supposedly scientific subjects, but what your character is thinking about is just stupid tween straight to DVD movie plot shit.
he wore a mask of bubbly cheerfulness and hid his inner self from others to protect himself from the perceived danger of ostracization
So he’s just like everyone else?
I love people who parade their so called ‘ability’ to mask their true emotions to protect themselves. It’s not a special ability. It’s not a character trait. Everyone does this, nobody is genuine. Stop flaunting like you’re some sort of special snowflake breaking the mould.
Go do some reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Id,_ego_and_super-ego
CUTIE MARK
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Somehow, It's not there.
I like how you spent literally 7 paragraphs describing how your character was special and different from anyone else and the only tangible method to differentiate your character doesn’t exist.
This is irony.
CUTIE MARK STORY
The fact that it isn't there is something that bothers Butterscotch from time to time. He has always wanted to know why he never got it. He did form a few theories, including, but not limited to:
* He was never supposed to be talented in anything in particular
* He has yet to discover his purpouse
* He has a undiscovered condition that prevents cutie marks from forming
* That zebra filly he rejected in middle school was vengeful and placed a hex on him
* Blah Blah magical matrix hand-wave that the unicorns understand but he doesn't
* His cutie mark is nothing because of his nihilistic world view.
It doesn't affect him when he's busy, but he does have the nagging urge to know engraved at the back of his skull. When people ask him, he usually says "I don't know" and hopes there will be no more follow up questions.
The list of theories doesn’t matter. It doesn’t help to illustrate the point. Just cut it down to “He had an extensive list of endless possibilities and probabilities, somehow being able to add more to the mix as time went by. Each new theory was markably more elaborate and improbable than their predecessors, as he continued to find reason and justification for his incarceration.”
Specific details make for poor character building. I don’t give a flying fuck about the what, I want the why. The above illustrates how he feels about his current situation using implied imagery and metaphor. Write your character’s actions in their emotions, not in their inner monologue.
PERSONALITY
He knows how to read people. Online, he has trouble reading emotions through text, but he can assimilate quickly in real life. When possible, he works as an emotional support or to de-escalate tension. He is always calculating and takes emotions out of important decisions while embracing their evolutionary purpose in day to day life. He tries to manipulate people into seeing the world in a more scientific light, but slowly and in a way that keeps the person he's talking with interested. He knows that sometimes he talks much more about it than others appreciate, and is constantly working to stop it. His views are utilitarian and his moral compass is built around helping as many as possible.
NO. He does NOT know how to read people. If he knew how to read people half of his backstory wouldn’t exist. His literal primary character trait is that he is lonely and isolated. If he knew how to read people, he wouldn’t be isolated. He’d be socially competent and be able to navigate social interaction with no challenge.
Don’t you fucking spend 7 paragraphs whining to me that you’re so misunderstood and isolated then come at me with this shit. This is fucking offensive.
What’s even more offensive is his shitty holier than thou attitude. Like fuck this is why people that call themselves ‘nerds’ are so fucking insufferable. Life is not an opportunity to show people how right you are. Neither is it a playground to put your oh so precious ‘gift’ to good use, praying on people who just want to have a fucking conversation without having to deal with subliminal malicious bullshit. People like this always think they have the moral high ground but they’re really just so socially inept that they subject themselves to the Dunning-Kruger effect and they are too myopic to understand. If they had any sliver of capability for self reflection they’d be cured of their ‘gift’ overnight.
Smart people do not think they’re smart. Smart people only know how dumb they really are.
All you are doing here is establishing that you yourself are the furthest thing from an academic, and are an active contributer to the fucking politics that is causing the Replication Crisis.
LIKES
Discussion about the full implications of scientific breakthroughs, thinking through thought experiments, transport logistics, learning, and teaching others.
Fuck off blank flank. You’ve still got a while to go before you join the real world.
DISLIKES
Anti-intellectualism, logical fallacies (particularly the black and white fallacy), alienating others because of his interests, and literature classes.
Also, fuck you and listing a bunch of shit without actually explaining it.
SKILLS
Visualizing abstract concepts, finding interesting applications for his knowledge (though most are hypothetical), and being oddly sneaky.
All of the applications for his knowledge are hypothetical. It being not hypothetical requires him to possess some sort of practical knowledge to begin with.
DETAILED HISTORY
Throughout high school, he slowly started to create a tight-knit core group of friends. While he maintained the "friendly acquaintance to every one, close friend to no one" attitude towards people outside the group, inside the group there was a lot of idea bouncing, political discussion, and talk about projects they wanted to work on while they were board. While this group was full of people with opposing world views, everyone there was willing to be convinced by a good argument and no topic was sacred. Butterscotch was at home there. Another Equestrian immigrant taught him the basic theories behind unicorn magic, and the two became best friends.
Senior year, he participated in the Manehannesburg science fair, entering plans for a crude telescope that used a phase-shift spell to convert various non visible wavelengths of light into a visible form. While he couldn't preform the magic, he did show that such a spell is possible under the known laws of magic, and made a strong case for why such a telescope would be useful.
He won fifth place, which granted him a partial scholarship to a zebrastani college of his choice. At the same time, the Canterlot Institute of Technology was secretly working on a similar project, and thought the Butterscotch would make a good addition to the team working on it. They offered him a full scholarship and to cover moving costs, while not telling him that he was to work on this project until he got there.
On campus, he became lonely. It took him a while to adjust to Equestrian social norms, and to transition from a high school graduating class of 150 to a campus of tens of thousands of students. These numbers made it harder for him to find close friends that shared his love for discussion. The problem was exacerbated by the fact that everyone was busy with school, many of the students were elitists, and that his "major" was learning whatever he needed to be the asset the institute needed to push the project by the princesses' dead line.
He did eventually make friends with a griffon student, Klaus, that was also recruited just to work on the project. The two eventually got their hands on some cyber security textbooks and taught themselves crude hacking techniques. The two were inseparable and started to do everything together. Klaus helped Butterscotch overcome his paranoia of every little thing else, while Butterscotch helped his friend with his self esteem issues.
The two, with the rest of their team, was dropped from the project when it moved to a new team in the Crystal Empire. Everyone on the team was granted unlimited tuition remission as compensation. Klaus and Butterscotch were finally allowed to be normal college students, both working towards degrees in computer science and establishing a new science-based political party in the Canterlot city council.
Throughout high school, he slowly started to create a tight-knit core group of friends.
This is explicitly contrary to what’s written in the Foalhood section. If this represents a change, you did not give it the due significance, as this would be a significant shift from the paranoid isolated pretentious little shit you’ve been describing so far.
projects they wanted to work on while they were board.
Irony.
While this group was full of people with opposing world views, everyone there was willing to be convinced by a good argument and no topic was sacred.
The wonderful thing about having opposing opinions on fundamental topics is that they become absolutely mutually exclusive, and a ‘club’ like this would never be able to be maintained long-term. Because eventually everyone in the group would homogenize to the single most efficient method for anything. Especially given that they are at least somewhat open minded.
Another Equestrian immigrant taught him the basic theories behind unicorn magic, and the two became best friends.
You’d think the isolationist making a best friend for the first time in his entire life would have received more than just a single sentence at the end of a paragraph.
On campus, he became lonely. It took him a while to adjust to Equestrian social norms,
What the actual fuck? He went from being an isolationist paranoid prick to a social butterfly and now he’s apparently needing to adjust from who he was fundamentally in the first place? Holy shit can you please be consistent with your character, please?
The two, with the rest of their team, was dropped from the project when it moved to a new team in the Crystal Empire.
Haha get fucked.
Everyone on the team was granted unlimited tuition remission as compensation.
This would never happen and is so absolutely unbelievable that it torpedoes any remaining integrity of your character.
See this is a very common issue with a lot of characters. That they are just given the solution to their problems simply for existing. You are making it easy for your character to accomplish their goals - mostly likely from characters commonly being self inserts. You want to imagine yourself as intelligent, witty, and to have purpose or be relied upon. However you only get to own these traits if you actually fucking work for it. Nothing in any of those paragraphs described his work ethic or his dedication to the project - but he’s just given a waive to all future tuition?
Your character didn’t earn that at all. They simply existed. They were given their success. And they are worse off for it. People want characters to go through hardship, and obtain success or victory or whatever other positive thought as a consequence of their dedication. That’s the whole point of every single basic story type. Hero’s Journey, Rags to Riches, Man vs. Whatever. All of that is characters facing adversity and overcoming it through any number of ways. If you are going to write your character like they overcame adversity because they got given a position on a project then were fired, your character is basically the wet napkin of storytelling.
Physical Attributes: 2
Psychological Attributes: 1
Historical Attributes: 1
Unity: 1
No extra points.
Total: 5
Verdict: Requires immediate incineration
That 2 on physical attributes is a consolation prize. Originally I wanted to give you the lowest possible score. Congratulations. Let this be motivation for you to write something that isn’t shit.
TLDR: Superiority Complex: The Character