Thanks to (most recently) Eskobar and Cimmerian for assistance.
Uh. SITE-88!!! <3
Quite happy to see this finally up. It's rare to see a skip work without addenda and other added content. Kudos.
Nice concept, but some parts of the article don't feel quite right.
Things like 'it would wield its chain and scimitar blade' - does that mean they are two separate weapons? You mention a tang, is the chain connected to the hilt of the sword? Why not just plainly say 'attack targets within reach with the scimitar' or such?
Also, the paragraph that begins with 'SCP-2067 could not accurately distinguish between allies and enemies. When it was introduced to Tahmasp' and so on, it feels more like reading a first hand account of events. If researchers are providing a summary of the recovered records, shouldn't it read as something like - 'records also indicated that' 'killed and wounded several individuals' 'attacked/showed aggressive behavior towards any that approached the Shah regardless of their intent.'
You know, just make it feel more like a technical account than a historic one.
Really like these suggestions—I don't always love critiques about making something sound like an authentic SCP document, because they tend to be more pedantry than enhancement.
But, in this case, treating the historical information as such wouldn't necessitate any major changes to style or substance and would much more firmly establish the "legend" of this object, which is the most compelling thing about it. It would actually, for me, tip this over into an upvote.
I'm going with a no-vote for right now. Although I love ORIA and the scip idea seems pretty cool, my feeling is that addenda, logs, pics, etc are major parts of articles for a reason. Without any of those, the article feels very dense with little elaboration on the real-world effects of the scip. Even moving the historical bits into an addendum would help with the flow of the article.
Why do today, what you can put off 'til tomorrow?
I second the opinion that the description should have been broken up into addenda, but I liked it enough for an upvote.
Historical records recovered with SCP-2067 have noted that the creation of the artifact was neither requested by the Shah nor was its presence desired.
I love this line. Brings a great mental scene to mind.
"What a marvelous…floating hat…sword…thing. The Shah is honored by such an…unexpected…gift. Oh, so it follows you…and cuts the hands off of valued servants. How clever. How does one make it stop?"
I was already digging it but
Most notably, SCP-2067 was released by Fath-Ali Shah Qajar in 1813, for whom it prevented an assassination attempt, and by Nader Shah in 1747, for whom it did not.
sealed the +1.
Could I get a quick sketch of this thing?—I have a feeling my mental image isn't quite right.
Takwin! Has someone been looking through Geber's Book of Stones?:D
There's this one line that keeps bothering me about this article:
Containment is thus predicated on the continuation of Iran's Islamic republic.
Why? All that's stated otherwise is that there shouldn't be a Shah of Iran, lest SCP-2067 activate again, but that shouldn't mean there needs to be an Islamic Republic. If a group of oil oligarchs install themselves rulers of Iran, that wouldn't affect SCP-2067 any more than there being an Islamic Republic, maybe disinformation efforts would be better placed to demonise the past Shah and the concept thereof.
It's probably a nitpick, but it's one I can't shake when I'm reading, and re-reading.
It's not that absolutely containing it is predicated on the continuance of the Republic, but that status quo is easiest to maintain and thus the current policy for containing it is to continue the Republic.
Perhaps "Should the fall of the Republic be inevitable, all effort must be made to ensure that a Shah is not instituted in its place