1) Historically? Hair. Easy to replace, abundant, and cost efficient! Mine are metal, though. Not too expensive and very durable, but Luna help you if it breaks and flings the wrong way. Cut my foreleg once. No scar or anything, but a lot of blood and it hurt like crazy! Whole thing scared the crap out of me!

Megaman Legends is my favorite series. I loved it. Loved it. I gave up on there ever being a sequel, though.

I didn’t care for Battle Network, but I don’t know anything about Star Force. I played Network Transmission. It wasn’t bad; it was just… More like okay in spite of it’s mechanics instead of because of them.

2) The gang lifestyle arose from the emergence of a now extinguished drug trade. Upper class has always existed in Canterlot, as far as I know. In fact, some families were ruined from the break-ins.

But there’s an upper Canterlot and a lower Canterlot. Lower Canterlot isn’t visible from the skyline. That’s where ponies with less bits lived and that’s where gangs festered until the source was tracked and eliminated.

3) I don’t mean for a public library. I mean colleges! Scholars! Historians! Why are you being so difficult about this?

4) Hello! Fantastically well I am; certainly not fine by far, but you could say I’m close to spectacular.

You seem to have caught Fluttershy since last we spoke. Is it contagious?

5) You gotta remember that unicorn magic beyond the basics is, for the most part, pretty rare anyway. Most of what I know came as secondary education.

Amplification won’t make any noticeable changes to a body’s natural healing process. At least, nothing that’s yet been accomplished has. It’s just not focused enough. There are healing magics, though.

1) Lyra: That’s fantastic! I’ve always been interested in floorplans and layouts but I’m not very good at designing them.

Bon-Bon: I think he was talking to me.

2) Too many to count. Some I knew; some I didn’t.

The assailants were thugs, criminals. Insensitive and hateful. Not incapable of being civilized, but they found instant gratification and had no desire to change. As the gang tides rose and fell many would wind up died at the hooves of one another.

Not a very bright point in Canterlot’s history, but it’s changed since then.

3) Strawberry, if you copied all the [omitted] books for yourself, then why can’t you just copy all the copies?

4) I do not. Pianos are large, heavy, and expensive.

5) Both. Manipulation subtly alters string density and amplification shifts the sound traveling in the air before it reaches your ear (or a recording device). What you don’t want to do is rapidly shift the lyre’s pitch by it’s tuning pin or by applying improper pressure. That’s damaging to the strings.

1) Bon-Bon: Infamous? Like… bad? I don’t think so.

2) Afraid? Afraid?! I ain’t scared for [omitted]! But I’ve seen it happening and I-…

I don’t… I don’t know…

3) Ah yes; self-defense applications. Amplification to boost muscle mass and manipulation to shield your body from the adverse effects.

There is a certain level of control required, but you’d start to feel pain if you pushed yourself beyond what you’re capable of. If that’s not a good incentive to stop, it’s hard to maintain a spell when your concentration is compromised.

As for casting it on somepony else, yes it’s possible. And I imagine the results could be fairly gruesome. But amplification spells become weaker the further away they’re projected. Substantially weaker. You’d pretty much have to be touching the subject for about a full second for it to even start taking effect. For that matter, amplification spells would be considered a lot more expensive than most other options. It’s just not terribly efficient.

I’ll get to the lyre part later.

4) Bon-Bon: I’ve seen that one too! I like what he does! Just the act of going around and fixing fraudulent or inept work is fantastic!

Bon-Bon: Hey! Have you heard about this new show that’s starting soon? It’s called Renovation Raiders. They do huge renovations, like the ones that take a few days or more, but they do it in only a few hours while the homeowner is out. I can’t wait!

5) Unless you plan to give copies of those books away, that doesn’t amount to anything. Knowledge you possess doesn’t help anypony else.

And while I’m sure you were only joking, a spell like that would require knowledge of the subject’s presence. B is effectively invisible to scrying, even to seers. You’ve never even met.

B: Well… He’s never been aware of it.

Well, I’ve mentioned them on more than a few occasions. Might have even explained it. But if I did, I never tagged the posts.

Amplification is a collection of spells loosely grouped around the notion of taking something in it’s current state, and boosting it to a greater degree without sacrificing it’s form. I got into amplification when studying music; same reason why most non-combatants would. In particular a lyre, which has very few strings, can have it’s frequency amplified or reduced using magic to gain access to a wider range of available notes. However, for a unicorn of my limited magical ability, it’s a very difficult process to do rapid-fire beyond just shifting octaves.

Manipulation is more of a catchall than a legitimate pool of magic. Pretty much anything that doesn’t fit anywhere else winds up being classified as some form of manipulation. I mean, technically all magic is manipulation so it’s really a misnomer, but eh. I began studying a little bit of manipulation in order to learn how to change the sounds notes make. Unlike amplification, which maneuvers best off of set intervals (like a 4C to a 5C), manipulation works best by traveling to adjacent notes (4C, 4C♯ 4D, and so forth). The closer the desired note is to the source, the better.

I play by weaving the two concepts together; using whichever method more easily reaches the note I need.