Taking Earth Ponies Too Seriously 

I think Big Mac wasn't struggling to lift the cake. He was just worried about it toppling over.

There's also the interesting fact that in the episode where Twilight and Fluttershy pack and go to solve the dispute between 2 families, Twilight is shown having an easier time carrying a lot of weight whereas Fluttershy doesn't. It makes me wonder if that's the Earth pony aspect of being an alicorn.

Expecting "Taking Pegasi too seriously" and "Taking Unicorns too seriously".

Can we acknowledge that Zecora, who is not a unicorn, has a magic related cutie mark? That little swirl on her flank with the triangles around it? That's a sun. From what the show has shown, magic specialist cutie marks relate to celestial bodies, like it does for twilight, sunset, and sunburst. Zecora has shown to be capable of magic as well. She made water appear in her cup with just a wave of her hoof in Magical Duel. Heck she trained Twilight! This comment will probably be lost in the comment section and never acknowledged, but hey, I can take things too seriously and get my thoughts our there.

i might be missing something here but whenever i see that scene of big mac carrying the cake i just think that considering how important it was and all the stress and emphasis pinkie was putting on not dropping the cake had freaked big mac out and just made him even more nervous about carrying it anyways this is so good! i hope therell be more on the unicorns and pegasi like this in the future ;o;

The defense I have for Maud destroying that Boulder and not push Holder's Boulder is simple: Adrenaline. Pinkie was in trouble and Maud reacted to save her sister's life, whereas the former had no real danger. That's just my two bits.

Dang it, Josh. I came here expecting theories, and all I got was math. NOBODY SAID THERE'D BE MATH!!

This is *exactly* what I keep telling people. Usually on the side of "Earth ponies have only agricultural or strength abilities." People forget that a lot of what makes up an Earth pony's magic is cutie mark-based. Remember, it was shown in Magical Mystery Cure that Pinkie does not have the magic to buck apples properly.

You forgot to mention that we can infer that earth ponies also have connections to plant life and/or the ground, allowing them to grow bigger, faster, explaining why Applejack spends most of her time harvesting and can grow apples to such large sizes.

I love it when people try to string together multiple writers interpretations. when its just bad continuity

I'm so glad someone finally pointed out that the apples always fall in the nests. I've seen so many videos that try to explain how earth pony magic works and no one has ever pointed that out.

Plus Applejack can kick a tree with a force of a school bus hitting someone at full force

Imma be honest with ya, the part where you mentioned Big Mac having that cake on his back, I wouldn't say that he turned off his strength. I had actually seen another video talking about Big Mac's strength, and they mentioned the cake one as well, but they pointed out that it was more of Big Mac struggling to keep the cake balanced on his back. I mean seriously! Look how tall that cake is! Takes a lot of concentration and effort to keep something like that balanced while trying to move it, and with that, it's understandable he'd get all sweaty and wibbly wobbly.

Please tell me I'm not the only one to giggle when Josh showed that clip of the tree being shaken by that weird claw machine thingy!

what the...math? Real world facts? Did Matpat write this? I can dig it.

Good examples, especially the whole, having to keep in mind we are mostly seeing ponies that are outliers on the high end of the bell curve, like Twi and AJ, or are on their entirely own graph completely like Pinkie. Not base line, average ponies. Though, from what we've seen I'd say Rarity would be a good indication of "Average" unicorn ability. Noponies ever commented about her magical abilities being at all strong or anything. Some good points, if not fully extensive, such as not getting into the whole "only they could grow the food" aspect and how they seem to have some form of Floramancy at work. Also, the speed thing, the takes in the assumption they are moving straight line A->B at speeds, and not doing some weird teleporting like thing, or folding space or some other means of moving from A to B without passing through the space between.

Earth ponies: The master race.

I'm not sure about the strength turning on/off thing. I may be wrong. What's the maximum that Mac carried on his back in the show comfortably? Generally speaking as a horse person, horses can pull a lot more than they can carry, and I've only ever seen Mac pulling things. Draft horses, which are the big muscle horses that are bred to haul things (Clydesdales, Shires, Belgians, ect.), actually have a harder time being ridden than a saddle horse (Arabians, Thoroughbreds, Saddlebreds, ect.) because they aren't bred to carry weight on their backs. I'm not quite sure showing Mac struggling with a heavy cake was justifying his strength.

So good to know that I am not the only one to notice the earthponies' power. I mean it's obvious that they are strong but I think this is the first time I've seen someone take on the magic in earthponies. It's also nice to know I'm not the only one loving math in this world of idiots. P.S. You are my favorite reviewer/analyst please continue and the jokes are great. 😊

Here's something ya overlooked: longevity. It may be possible that on average, Earth Ponies live longer than Pegisi and unicorns. Twilight said that Ponyville was founded over hundred of years ago and Applejack said Granny Smith was there. Dr Whooves said he had 100s of years of research and Pinkie Pie said she planned her parent's anniversaries hundreds of years in advance

aside from the near subliminally fast text flashing, this was a good video.

I love it when you bring math, science and engineering into your analysis Josh, it makes things so much more intriguing and realistic while expanding upon what we can gather/assume/know! xD I'm considering doing a geeky/nerdy series with a lot of that at some point, to help practice my Engineering skills that I'll need as I'm studying it. But... there is one thing that many of us neglect or assume with this show... We're still starting from the basis that their laws of physics/thermodynamics operate exactly the way ours does. It makes it easier for us to come to conclusions, certainly, but we can't rule out the possibility that... what if their acceleration due to gravity is a completely different constant? Or, what if it's localized and only constant within a certain area of their world? OR, what if that new discovery on our part of gravitational waves further challenges absolutely EVERYTHING we also currently know about gravity in such a way that it might be best to start from scratch? In which case, would that explain why some of the physics we've seen in this show don't make sense?!? OR even more crazy... explain why many of our current understandings of our universe are filled with holes?!? OR explain why we've been unable to do certain things that we wish we could do, but have sort of written off as impossible according to our own laws simply due to our core basis for those laws being slightly off?!? Like teleportation of matter? Or a portal gun?!? Or time travel?!? ... I think I hurt my brain, but there's something valuable in all that rambling... I just know it... Despite it being a hypothetical rant from me at 2:31 am... which is when I've decided to enjoy your vids apparently... Thanks for all this hilariously entertaining and insightful analysis btw! I HAVE FAITH YOU CAN CATCH UP IN EPISODES!! CHARGE FORTH AND DO IT JOSH!! FOR NARNIA!! FOR EQUESTRIA!!! :D Ah well. Perhaps I'll be able to better tackle it when I take some extra advanced physics courses that explain gravitational waves and quantum mechanics and such after completing my degree haha! xD :P

I like that you built off of the theory from your Feeling Pinkie Keen review, keep up the good work!

Wow, your theory on earth ponies is almost the exact same as mine. Question: Do you think that their magic is more latent? To me that would explain why Tirek went after them last, since it was harder to get at without him being re-energized to a degree.

🎵IT'S FILM THEORY!!! WHOO OOH! CHARTS AND DREAMS SHATTERED PONY DREAMS! FILM THEORY!!!!! WHOO OOH!!!🎵 Oh wait, It's FOB Equestria

"We've seen strong feats of unicorns and Pegasai that have been explained." Uh... what? When was Starlight's massive buff to alicorn levels explained?

Ok for anyone who wants to know at 1:35 it says "Totally not a dragon egg" , at 1:40 it says "Yeah you push that boulder, Maud. You push the shit out of it." At 1:54 it says "*RETCON" 2:55(for the slow readers) says "I'm Batman"`, at 4:16 it say "Busy stroking his cannon" don't ask me how many times I had to rewind to get tmost of those. Did I miss any FireBrand?

The event premonition power that pinkie has shown must be to help defend against falling and rolling rocks

I waiting for a Taking Alicorns Too Seriously video in the future. If you want do in the first place of course, Josh. ;-)

You could say the locomotive bit was a translation to literal "horsepower."

I think they're like Earthbenders, who, on top of their great physical strength, have heightened senses based in their environment. But in this case, those skills come more naturally rather than being something you have to learn and master.

I'm with you on that, honestly. After all, in the Hearthswarming Eve play, it was shown that Earth Ponies seem to have some sort of connection to the Earth. After all, a sapling GREW in Smart Cookie's hooves when she said it was 'fertile soil', meaning that they can sense good soil for harvest when they are farmers. Thus Rock Ponies like the Pies could potentially know what rocks have something of ACTUAL worth or, in smoe cases, are actually edible. (I am gonna guess the 'edible rocks' are actually a frm of edible clay that they make into 'rocks' since they can just chew it without trying)

I'd say that the train would be about half the size of a normal train, but that's still 57.65 tons per pony.

The fact that this video was posted a few days before Pinkie Pie was announced to be fighting Deadpool in a deathbattle is ironic.

Might as well name this "Pony Theory" now.

Nobody said there'd be math. Overall good theory using evidence and math to back it up. Well done

LOL! Loved the joke with Dr. Hax and his ban-hammer!

you have a valid point. in "Applebuck Season" at the end wherw the rest of the Mane 6 finally help Applejack with the harvest you can see Rainbow Dash buck a tree and the apples do not all fall perfectly into the bucket/wagon and many fall messily around the tree

Looks like commander firebrand forgot the most important lesson of all. DODGE!

I kinda figured their super speed came from magically repelling the earth beneath their hooves

1:36 - Totally not a Dragon Egg. 1:43 - Yeah you push that boulder, Maud. You push the shit out of it. 1:56 - *Retcon 4:16 - Busy stroking his cannon

Something I think needs to be acknowledged is that the rest of the mane six were shocked to see Maud pulverize that boulder. I think it's safe to assume that Maud, and perhaps even the rest of the Pie family who spent their entire lives working on the rock farm, is the exception and not the norm.

Whoo. "Yeah you push that boulder, Maud. you push the shit out of it." That's got to be on screen for like, one frame or something. Also "*retcon" and "Busy stroking his cannon."

Big Mac can carry that huge cake he's just afraid to topple it. Earth ponies ( and donkeys like Matilda and cranky )have a connection to plants and the earth. To flowers to trees, and to sense danger like pinkie in feeling Pinkie keen

Since Earth ponies are not the only ones who can farm they are no longer the master race but unicorns are but when the Equestria was young they were because they were the only ones who could grow food

Boy do I love analysis videos.

Rarity is a good example of an average unicorn. She uses levitation quite heftly, especially with regards to sewing, and we saw Snails use his magic to create a small light in Boast Busters. But I'm fairly certain the abilities of Pinkie Pie and Maud Pie are exaggerated for comedic effect.

Ooh, the Leanbox theme from the first Hyperdimension Neptunia game. Neat!

Ever thought of working in the research team for Screwattacks webshow Death Battle?

Josh, or whoever edits this: For the love of Celestia, PLEASE make those flashes of text at least a little longer. I should not have to take 10 attempts each to pause at the right time whilst double-clicking to cover as much footage as possible. It's irritating to the sun!

Years later I add. Remember when AJ hit the strength-test machine so hard it disintegrated? Remember when she noticed RD conveniently under an apple tree, stunned at seeing it? Then with an offsides single leg buck, she directed a single stream of apples precisely onto RD's noggin? Yeah, them Earth ponies got contact telekenesis.

LOOK WHOS BACK!!! OUR FAVE FLAMEY SASSY UNICORN!!!!

This is awesome love your videos

in regards to your analysis to the ponies pulling the train let's not forget that the world of MLP does have its own set of Physics as explained in 'Cart Before The Ponies'. They have at least some form of Newton-base physics i.e. Kinetic, Potential, Inertia Momentum. So surely there could be tensional force at play within the ropes between the train & the stallions

I think maud breaking the rock was more Adrenaline for saving pinkie than anything else

I'm an Earth Pony. Col. Crimson Wander of the Thestral Royal Guard.

Earth Ponies, Pegasi, and Unicorns do have different biologies. Earth Pony- denser bones and stronger muscle fibers Pegasi- lighter bone density and more flexible joints Unicorn- pretty much middle ground in their bodies but they do have natural magical abilities Now just cause these are the standard biological differences doesn't mean that an individual of a species can't go against the norm. Like Bulk Biceps, even tho he's a pegasi he trained himself to be able to match an earth pony like Big Mac.

and good to seeya piccolo! yeah, ive figured Earth Ponies are pretty darn cool. comapred to the other pony types they have something both more direct and subtle. that analysis of apple bucking is a good way to put it. thats some learned but IMPRESSIVE precision.

Thanks for doing the math for me, Josh. If I remembered anything I learned from high school, I'd do it myself.

Then we have Twilight and Rarity carrying a giant boulder when Discord corrupted Rarity.

You caused me to go to way too much trouble for a few frames of little payoff. Except whats-his-name who took Pinkie's cannon. Also I'm a little surprised you didn't go the whole way and end with "Masakapalakagh!"

trying to measure pinkie's speed, you forget your own rule

You didn't factor the best horse friend power. The train ponies could be friends

When you put it that way, earth pony magic makes sense! BTW my oc is an earth pony. Love what you do, man! Keep going!

ahh yes, a content fit for a Fire brand video title. Dude, even i thought you are taking this too seriously. And I NEVER THINK THAT! haha anyway had fun with this one :3

Maybe in the episode where Apple Jack knocked the boulder over, they didn't want to break or damage it since it meant so much to them.

MLP:FIM likely follows the D&D idea of Linear Warrior & Quadratic Wizard. The idea is that Warriors at lower levels are better than Wizards at lower levels, but as they both level up, the Wizard eventually overtakes the Warrior. To the point that Wizards run circles around Warriors. This likely means that an average earth pony is better than an average unicorn. However, once they reach the level of Starlight and Twilight, then it is better to be a Unicorn. However, not all poinies are like them. My guess is that Trixie, Rarity, and Sweetie Belle are the base line for an average unicorn. They are never shown to do anything amazing in terms of magic. How do Pegasus fit in all of this? Pegasus are likely the most flexible of the ponies, except when Unicorns over take them. Pegasus and Earth Ponies are case of them neither being good or bad, but having different traits that help them in certain situations. It is likely not until near the end where Pegasus over take Earth Ponies, but they do not over take Unicorns. However, while Unicorns are powerful, they seem to not have a lot of endurance. In the magic duel between Starlight and Twilight, they both were using powerful magic but they eventually became tired. Tried to the point where Twilight couldn't use magic. This suggests that while Unicorns are more powerful than Pegasus and Earth Ponies, they trier quicker than they do. And Unicorns need to study a lot to be able to perform high level magic and that is if they are magically gifted. As Sunburst couldn't perform any powerful magic skill even though he studied magic most of his life. Finally, we do not know the demographic structure of Equestria's society. I've seen it suggested that Equestria is made up of 1/3 Earth Ponies, 1/3 Pegasus, and 1/3 Unicorns. However, that doesn't make much sense. It is more likely that Earth ponies are the largest of the three, but smaller than the two combined. Since Earth ponies are the ones who farm, and Earth ponies like AJ and Bareburn don't use advanced technology to plow their fields, they likely need a large population to farm them. We know that AJ's family is pretty big and Pinkie Pie's family is made up of 4 sisters (including Pinkie Pie). This seems to suggest that Earth Pony families are large in size. Pegasus' families have both been shown large like Sky Stinger and small like Vapor Trail and Fluttershy's family. This makes sense as Pegasus were focused on military. In a military culture, Pegasus were likely encouraged to produce a lot of babies to ensure that there were a lot pool to draw on during war time. As they had to draft them for war. However, as a large military force is not needed, Pegasus are having smaller families, but not all of them do. So a large family is likely a by product of when their culture needed a strong military. We can also see this through the Wonder bolt as they are likely paramilitary. We can see this through the outfits of the Wonderbolts which are military in design (at least the older outfits were). Unicorns are the smallest in size as we know that Twilight and Rarity have small families of only one brother or sister. We also know that Unicorns used to have royalty and there are wealthy unicorns. As royalty and wealthy families tend to not have that many children (the more children you have, the more the family wealth gets divided), this likely means that Unicorns are the smallest spices. I'm willing to believe that Earth ponies make up 40% of the population, Pegasus make up 35% of the population (they were likely even with Earth ponies until recently where it has been slowly shrinking), and Unicorns make up 25% of the population (population is stable or shrinking as they aren't producing 2.1 children). So, yeah, those are my thoughts on the three species of Equestria.

and this video is the exact reason why my pony oc is an earth pony

well. time to clear my hard drive

first of all. I love all of your work firebrand second of all. Noone told me there would be mATH!!!!

Yep. you pretty much got it. I made a system that explains everything in the show that is magic-related with each species, but 90% of it is speculation and head-canon. But it does explain Pinkie Pie. Well, ish. More of the "how", instead of the "why".

I think Earth Ponies super strength is like Rock Lee's opening his Chakra gates.

Thank you i missed your voice FJ keep up the good work

Firebrand has become the new Game Theory with all that math.

Apple trees here are growing with arborist around. So they could be groomed so that the apples fall in specific planned spots. Our harvesting methods are more crude so it will be messy. Humans usually do use something like a drape cloth to collect after falling. This is also true of trimming trees and bushes. I’ve found cleaning up the mess is a lot more difficult off the ground without a cloth or net to catch this. Like you said we never got a baseline for most ponies.

Bah. Everyone knows that Pinkie is a unicorn with an inverted horn. Thus her setting breaking powers.

nice analysis Josh.

You know the saying: ''Friendship is Magic'' XD

The theory that Earth Ponies can "turn off and on their powers" would also explain how Rainbow Dash was able to beat Applejack in a hoof wrestle in "The Ticket Master".

Question! Can and will you do one of these for Unicorn, Pegasi, and Alicorns? I'd love to see your analysis on the topics!

I love videos that make me think... And look up references like Bloomberg!!!

dear firebrand I wanted to say big fan of your chanel and how you break down with science and how you make dragon ball z abridged reference. hope to more video your fan johann

2:42 - Wasn't expecting a cameo from Dr. Hax.... #RIPDasBoSchitt #RIPGModIdiotBox

Wow, Firebrand sounds just like Wiz from Death Battle. At some point, I expected some "Boomstick" like character to show up by his side

Oh no, my worst enemy..................MATH!!!!! Also, cool video. Should definitely do Pegasi and Unicorns next.

First KP, now FOB Equestria! Will Tats release their newest count down on SCP-Js soon?

Thanks FireBrand you just made my decision of an OC all the more difficult. (P.S. I was being a bit sarcastic when typing this, but you did make it more challenging for my decision.)

Maud can donut someone. I can hear the JoJo fans crying in the distance.

So in retrospect, Earth Ponies have the Ripple/Hamon.

DasBoSchitt reference, ouch that takes me back.

Man do I miss this series XD

Explosion would DESTROY the Candle

First off, of course that wasn't a dragon egg. It's obviously a ROC egg. Second, we saw a lot of pegasi flying together during Hurricane Fluttershy, could that episode be used to measure Pegasus baseline in any way?

we see many exsamples of ponies with diferent power levels. Trixie as one exsample from season six.

Didn't know you were THAT good in math! You probably got an A+ in math!!

I'm surprised you didn't close out with 'But hey, that's just a theory. A PONY theory! Thanks for watching!'

Sounds like Death Battle has a new fact checker!

When I should be asleep but watches josh do math

Hey fire I dare you to pull that train BY YOURSELF don’t worry, IT WILL BE FUNNYYYY

We can leave Pinkie out of the equation you know, she's been aknowledged to break the laws of physics, even in-universe physics, so she's kind of an exeption when we talk about general earth pony feats