Hello. Welcome to my first SCP. It is about a sad creature that lives in a hole and misses its friends. Thanks to users kinchtheknifeblade and Communism will win for providing useful feedback on formatting, theme, and terminology.
SCP-2436 / Discussion
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This is the discussion related to the wiki page SCP-2436.
It doesn't really think of itself as a 'he' and it's not the easiest thing to make friends with in most contexts but I appreciate the sentiment.
Dude. How did you think that'd be a cool thing to say?
What made you think this was a good idea to say? Automatically equating something that has no gender/is not a guy and doesn't easily make friends with people to a "Tumblr freak" is absolutely rude and uncalled for, and has nothing to do with the SCP. Don't be an asshole.
I honestly love the story here, of this being and its deal with the family. That's good stuff right there. As much as I enjoyed the article, I'll have to downvote. The structure is killing me here. You're so wrapped up in giving a point-by-point story that you never directly state what the SCPs are or do. This makes it read more like a short story than an SCP article. The actual description of everything doesn't come until way after they're introduced.
Nitpicks:
A 27th journal was found on a writing desk, open to a blank entry dated to the current day, and shaking.
'and shaking', this comes so late in the sentence, that you may as well restructure it into its own separate sentence.
19 days following the establishment of Site 431, after several attempts to explore the tunnel housing SCP-2436-1 resulted in failure, Researcher Steinsdóttir underwent an unauthorized expedition into the tunnel while off-duty, apparently prompted by a message in SCP-2436-2 directed specifically to her, which she blotted out in ink prior to leaving the main Site-431 structure.
This is far too long and winding, and reads more like prose than technical description.
In summary, this reads more like a short story than an SCP article, but I'll be coming back for a reread if the pacing is addressed.
These are good points that I evidently had not sufficiently considered, and I appreciate this feedback. I'll see what I can do to address them. Thank you.
Edit: I would like to be clear, however, that directly stating what the SCPs are and do is at least to some degree untenable to the researchers tasked with explaining them, as over four decades of Foundation containment and research have yet to provide particularly clear answers as to the exact shape and function of any SCP-2436 objects. SCP-2436-1 has only a few occasionally conflicting eyewitness accounts regarding its appearance and the methods by which it affects the earth around it are indeterminate.
The researchers responsible for explaining SCP-2436 are prioritizing explaining exactly what has happened at Site 431 to the best of their ability because that's all the information they have to work with and, even after all this time, they don't intend to jump to conclusions.
That said, again, I do consider this extremely helpful feedback regarding issues I had not adequately considered and I will be putting a lot of thought in how best to address those issues.
The best part, imo, is how this pal's demeanor is exactly what you would expect out of a cave-dwelling magic being who can control rocks & earth and is making sure that all the ground vibrations are okay — methodical, straightforward, and reliable, and it doesn't take shit from people it doesn't want to.
if your reading this your gay
I loved this. The entire way the story was laid out, while keeping to the general structure of a skip, was really just amazing. This is really, really good for a first SCP article.
I like this. The entity has the detached but emphatic presence that the Good Folk* typically have in folklore (until some human manages to annoy them). It knows its own mind, and wants what it wants. +1
*I'm close enough to my ancestors to prefer this term. You do NOT want to attract their attention, let alone get on their bad side.
I think what I love most about this guy is the peculiarity of it. It's just content to guide the tectonic forces of the world in its little hole. But it interests itself in the lives of some simple farmers in bumfuck, iceland. It has no reason to do this. But it works on some weird kind of honor system that I'm really into. I liked this when you first showed it to me, and I dig it now. It's a really good first scip, and one in general. +1.
This is nightmarishly long and terminally dull. You have collapsible after collapsible of extraneous information and useless factoids that actively detract from the core of the article, which is the story of the farm and the resident. I'd consider taking another look at this if it was trimmed down, but until then, this is a good idea bogged down in fluff and filler.
It's fully your right to find what I wrote flawed and tedious but I would like to note that it's often considered in poor taste to use the term 'psychotic' as a pejorative, particularly when speaking to somebody with a psychosis-related diagnosis. I am aware, of course, that me being a complete stranger to you, you had no way of knowing this about me, but I would also like to note that given that I am a complete stranger to you, you also had no way of knowing otherwise. I believe that in matters like this it is wisest and kindest to err on the side of caution.
I'm going to neutral vote this. While I like the concept, and the notes from SCP-2436-1, this article is pretty long, and hard for me to follow. I think that if you focused less on the details of the anomaly, and more on the interpersonal relationships at play, it would be a lot more enjoyable.
I want to upvote this, I really do, but honestly, I can't, any more than I could upvote an article that was straight-up about the Holy Grail or the Apple of Discord. There just isn't enough to me to differentiate it from its source material—it's a fairy in a magic cave, full stop. It's very well-written, and you have an undisputed gift for characterization, but "supernatural being vs the modern world" isn't quite enough of a hook for me. Neutral vote for now.
This response is actually really unexpected and interesting to me. The intention for me in writing this article (and even in giving it the title 'One of the Huldufólk') was not to indicate to the reader that this figure is based directly on Icelandic folklore (indeed, my original concept for this SCP was not set in Iceland in particular until it was suggested as a good random country to use. I was convinced by reading the Wikipedia article on Icelandic Horses, who are really neat) but rather that given its presence in this particular geologically active region that it had specific reasons for travelling to and in coincidentally encountering and living in proximity to humans there, it was inevitably woven into their worldview.
This is, of course, not your responsibility to provide, but would you have any suggestions for how I would make this clearer within the text of the article, or how I might avoid similar misunderstandings in the future? I would very much appreciate that, if so.
I'm not certain there's really anything to make clearer in the article. It's simply that for me this resonates strongly with a particular mytheme frequently encountered in folklore from around the world.
The creature's mode of habitation, the style of its interactions with humans—they're just screaming "subterranean elf" with nothing strongly indicating to me why this isn't exactly the case. The creature could be a huldur or knocker or kobold or gnome: to me at least there's nothing really setting it apart from any number of underground spirits.
However, I recognize how personal and subjective my critique is, and in light of your article's many excellent qualities, I'm changing my vote. +1
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page revision: 2, last edited: 15 Jan 2023 15:06
