@Moonatik  
that’s my point though.
 
They had 7 seasons to try and they only half did it maybe a couple of times

@Goddess Erosia  

 
Season 8. Episode 7. Just you wait my dude.

Another thing everyone seems to be forgetting about all of this is, in a more realistic tone, it still makes sense for the alicorn princesses to not immediately throw themselves head-first at any sign of danger. We use names like demigod, immortal, goddess ect for them, but in truth the only thing that’s canon is that they never age or at least age very slowly, and they’re very powerful with magic. But even then we haven’t actually seen either Luna or Celestia have a complete standoff of just their own magic against an entire army. They could still easily lose, and things would be a lot worse if your leaders die or get captured than even if several tens of thousands of soldiers do instead.
 
These antagonists are refereed to as bandits and criminals, though very powerful at that. That makes them a significant threat because of the size of their group and their viciousness, but that doesn’t imply they’re a complete end-of-the-world threat that can’t be easily dealt with by the military, which was created for a reason, obviously. Threats on a much larger scale would be what should warrant the princesses actually leading troops. But even then - the show has taken every step it can to make sure that doesn’t ever happen. Though this is kind of stupid, I think it’s simply because the writers knew that if they didn’t do that then you simply wouldn’t have a story for the mane six. If Celestia herself went to save the Crystal Empire from King Sombra, Twilight wouldn’t have really done anything and wouldn’t experience that kind of accomplishment, and it would just be a Celestia-centered episode. AND GEEE GOLLY I GUESS WE JUST CAN’T EVER HAVE THOSE CAN WE, HASBRO???

@AaronMk  
We seem to be on the same page. My original point wasn’t that they were unstoppable, but that they were potentially devastating. If they are on field they can use their presumably powerful magic to thresh enemies. The poster I was responding to has said multiple times that the princesses should take the bulk of the responsibility for military matters on their own shoulders personally, on the grounds that they are powerful and nearly immortal. If Silfoe’s alicorns aren’t that strong then the point is moot and they need an army to do anything. If they are that strong, having them do everything isn’t going to hold down the destruction, which appears to me to be the primary concern of Moonatik.

@Kamazeustra  

 
Not being familiar with Silfoe’s canon, I will say that an Alicorn can be avoided. The role of war in a supposed situation as I’m assuming would pretty much entail avoiding alicorns at any chance possible. The objective of the war being out manuevering Equestria in the end depriving the regular guard of their resources to fight. You can draw from Clauswitz’s and perhaps even Lao Tzu’s lessons on war as depriving them of their ability to fight. Celestia and Luna even would be like that one ultra-rare super weapon that can’t be deployed enough to make a significant impact on the war effort. They too have presumably fallable judgement and it comes down to deceving them to move them from one point to another.
 
As another point of conjecture, they’re not unsoppable. In FiM canon they’ve been shown to become exhausted. So in the course of whatever is going on if you can tire them personally you could force a surrender. This also reminds me of an Age of Empires 2 video asking if it’s better to go after the weaker units first or the stronger (I think it was focusing the weaker ones first).

@AaronMk  
I’m not 100% on whether you’re agreeing with me about Equestria needing a strong military outside of the princesses, a position I’ve taken on other pages in this series, or arguing against me. In either case, real history doesn’t provide too many examples of outside-context problems like nearly invincible demigods would represent. It does provide plenty of examples of deep reserves winning the day. Equestria’s strength would be shallow and hollow if it relied too heavily on its alicorns to solve every threat.
 
That said, the alicorns would be a destabilizingly potent force, not just a better conventional threat. Mass wouldn’t really be that much of a problem to them personally, just as it isn’t to other fictional killing machines. By Char’s Counterattack no number of regulars could ever hope to threaten Amuro, for instance. The real threat is the fact that any enemy would only need to be able to project force in more than one place. The princesses can only be in one place each and an enemy army could easily be everywhere.

@Kamazeustra  

 
And the historical model suggests that you may also have the greater mass of soldiers versus the greater quality and the mass will when.
 
During the late 18th Century defeated what essentially amounted to seven nation armies with hordes of militia men armed with pikes vs the most well trained armies of Europe and most modern equipped. It is not that French manufacturers were incapable of producing the most modern fire-arm for their time, the native French musket of the twilight of the 1700’s was the more reliably and highest quality fire arm in term of engineering. But they couldn’t produce them cheaply or in mass, as a result those same manufacturers were ordered by the National Assembly to churn out pikes to fight and beat all of Europe with. Why? Levee in Masse. Not only could the French field more men than reliable musket balls could hit, but they could stretch the enemy army thin out over the long Frontier of France and everyone, encouraging the Germans and Italians to panic and stretch their own small armies thin.
 
This was a time when the Prussians were considered and known to be Europe’s primier fighting force, though by this time Friedrich the Great’s less-than-spectacular son was in command I believe.
 
The Battle of Lexington and Concord is also a notable American strategic victory where they outnumbered the British 2 to 1. While the Revolutionaries fled the field, they ultimately succeeded in penning the British up in Boston and prevented further troop movements.
 
Down to some of the oldest military books, mass is given more credit than quality, since quality can be changed by forcing certain conditions. Sun Tzu writes notably about numerical advantages and recommends forcing the enemy to split their force if larger (Napoleon is notable for forcing the Italians to do this in the Italian Campaign), forcing the enemy to engage on your terms if equal, and isolating and defeating the enemy if half your size.
 
Killing machines in fiction exist as killing machines for narrative reasons. If something can keep killing without being stopped then it adds drama and tension as it represents something visibly dangerous for the weak protagonist to defeat and rise to become the equal of, impitous to become themselves a killing machine. Or because massive violent battle is grand spectacle.

@Kamazeustra
 
that’s… brilliant…

@Moonatik  
Do you really think that would help anything? It never really works that way. The Star Wars prequels, Eragon, Gundam, Valkyria Chronicles and 40k, just to name a few examples, all demonstrate that when there is a separate class of better fighter out there regulars get reduced to disposable chaff. Casualties would only increase if the demigods hit the field.

@Goddess Erosia  
Honestly? I’m a pretty pacifistic person, and I can’t side with Twilight in this context.  
Though, I do feel that Tia and Luna should do most of the fighting themselves, being immortal demigoddesses and all. All tactics and methods of warfare change when you have undying flying magical ponies at your disposal.

Don’t worry, girls. It is only P O L I T I C S B Y D I F F E R E N T M E A N S

That’s more like it. Have Twilight be proven wrong.
 
I really just can’t root for her at all in this one.