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The Butterfly Effect
D15, coordinator, was a failure — ping any unit about it. One unattributed data file recorded an airborne chemo-miliorganic contaminating its processor batch. Another showed its base firmware revision as inherently unstable. Regardless of patches and recalibration, Control had not only broken the mold after its production run, but declined to recycle the material.
Even disregarding any unverified data, the master logs alone showed D15’s output as several standard deviations below the typical coordinator performance curve. Yet for some reason Control continued granting assignments.
In the latest debacle, its oversight of a supply management system had inadvertently stockpiled dessicant. These had proved vital in mitigating an unanticipated flood, but the error had seen D15 assigned as a distributed calculation node regardless.
Megacycles later D15 was processing a batch of packets was for the project command queue when a checksum didn’t match. It did on recalculation, however now one of the projects was flagged as unassignable, which shouldn't have been possible. Further checks produced the same result, however, and as the project now matched D15’s own unassignable tag, the impulse to action overrode the calculation node role.
The task was to develop a new data warehouse out of a photo-organic megacluster. Construction was low priority, as there was already a surplus of storage, so perhaps failure here would not be problematic, and D15 proceeded to the designated coordinates. It did not have a resource allocation, but this was a former disposal zone and there were scrap machines and material available.
Extending its manipulators, D15 began construction, and despite having to rely on repurposed machinery, its circuits hummed as it found how many of the random, old parts harmonized in unforseeable ways, letting it bring the first servers online several kilocycles ahead of schedule. Perhaps this would shift its performance rating enough to overlap the normal distribution again.
Pattern matching noted how the coolant pathing had created a crossed oval, and its circuits buzzed as the shape was cross-referenced with prior incidents of substandard performance, with a probability in excess of one standard deviation above chance.
D15 paused, shifting cycles to analyze the effect of the nonstandard pathing, and finding that the seemingly chaotic interface at the path intersection somehow transferred heat up to 22% faster than the baseline model.
Another server bank came online, and performance ticked up a percent. Six percent left before the facility would be fully operational. This time D15 would improve its performance rating.
:Priority interrupt: D15 location uncommanded. Control review inbound.
Time seemed to slow as D15’s cycles idled, and it analyzed the flickering motion of the oval airfoils on a nearby chemo-miliorganic as it rode an atmospheric current.
:Priority interrupt: Review. Facility performance adequate; design, material anomalous. Pattern correction queued. Reassignment. D15 coordinator status revoked. Redesign ate location, long-term hibernation.
Its circuits buzzed as D15 acknowledged the assignment. Its access rights remained, so it requested a copy of control’s facility schematics, and ran its own comparison. A small zone had been overlooked, just three thousand square lengths, but proximate to the central command node and D15’s current travel path. D15 exited the transitway nearest the anomaly, and proceeded to the zone, where it found a cluster of photo-decaorganics surrounding a liquid filled depression in the ground. Floating photo-centiorganics dotted the surface, while chemo-centiorganics moved within the liquid.
It would need to be drained to fit the schematics. Not that the performance of the coolant system was inadequate, but that was the plan required.
Puffs of vented coolant drifted overhead, casting dappled shadows on the liquid mirror sheen. An octet of chemo-centiorganics broke the surface, and in the boundary wave interference it became something else. D15 imaged an unknown organic suspended above the liquid, body hued sulfur with rhodonite trim. The organic maneuvered in the air before turning towards D15, visual sensors orienting on its own. Circuits hummed in harmony at a new input on an unknown channel; peace, and something more. The liquid stilled, taking the image with it.
New, extraordinary harmonics raced along its circuits as D15 considered the liquid and its surrounding zone. A sonar scan did not reveal any changes among the chemo-centiorganics, and neither were there any visible differences in the surrounding photo-organisms.
:Priority interrupt: Pattern recompiler inbound. D15 relocation delay query.
D15 reviewed its construction, and the small patch of land embedded within. The work was not flawed.
Its sensors registered the hum of the approaching matter recompiler, and D15, coordinator, raised its primary manipulator, two digits pressed together.
Snap.
Even disregarding any unverified data, the master logs alone showed D15’s output as several standard deviations below the typical coordinator performance curve. Yet for some reason Control continued granting assignments.
In the latest debacle, its oversight of a supply management system had inadvertently stockpiled dessicant. These had proved vital in mitigating an unanticipated flood, but the error had seen D15 assigned as a distributed calculation node regardless.
Megacycles later D15 was processing a batch of packets was for the project command queue when a checksum didn’t match. It did on recalculation, however now one of the projects was flagged as unassignable, which shouldn't have been possible. Further checks produced the same result, however, and as the project now matched D15’s own unassignable tag, the impulse to action overrode the calculation node role.
The task was to develop a new data warehouse out of a photo-organic megacluster. Construction was low priority, as there was already a surplus of storage, so perhaps failure here would not be problematic, and D15 proceeded to the designated coordinates. It did not have a resource allocation, but this was a former disposal zone and there were scrap machines and material available.
Extending its manipulators, D15 began construction, and despite having to rely on repurposed machinery, its circuits hummed as it found how many of the random, old parts harmonized in unforseeable ways, letting it bring the first servers online several kilocycles ahead of schedule. Perhaps this would shift its performance rating enough to overlap the normal distribution again.
Pattern matching noted how the coolant pathing had created a crossed oval, and its circuits buzzed as the shape was cross-referenced with prior incidents of substandard performance, with a probability in excess of one standard deviation above chance.
D15 paused, shifting cycles to analyze the effect of the nonstandard pathing, and finding that the seemingly chaotic interface at the path intersection somehow transferred heat up to 22% faster than the baseline model.
Another server bank came online, and performance ticked up a percent. Six percent left before the facility would be fully operational. This time D15 would improve its performance rating.
:Priority interrupt: D15 location uncommanded. Control review inbound.
Time seemed to slow as D15’s cycles idled, and it analyzed the flickering motion of the oval airfoils on a nearby chemo-miliorganic as it rode an atmospheric current.
:Priority interrupt: Review. Facility performance adequate; design, material anomalous. Pattern correction queued. Reassignment. D15 coordinator status revoked. Redesign ate location, long-term hibernation.
Its circuits buzzed as D15 acknowledged the assignment. Its access rights remained, so it requested a copy of control’s facility schematics, and ran its own comparison. A small zone had been overlooked, just three thousand square lengths, but proximate to the central command node and D15’s current travel path. D15 exited the transitway nearest the anomaly, and proceeded to the zone, where it found a cluster of photo-decaorganics surrounding a liquid filled depression in the ground. Floating photo-centiorganics dotted the surface, while chemo-centiorganics moved within the liquid.
It would need to be drained to fit the schematics. Not that the performance of the coolant system was inadequate, but that was the plan required.
Puffs of vented coolant drifted overhead, casting dappled shadows on the liquid mirror sheen. An octet of chemo-centiorganics broke the surface, and in the boundary wave interference it became something else. D15 imaged an unknown organic suspended above the liquid, body hued sulfur with rhodonite trim. The organic maneuvered in the air before turning towards D15, visual sensors orienting on its own. Circuits hummed in harmony at a new input on an unknown channel; peace, and something more. The liquid stilled, taking the image with it.
New, extraordinary harmonics raced along its circuits as D15 considered the liquid and its surrounding zone. A sonar scan did not reveal any changes among the chemo-centiorganics, and neither were there any visible differences in the surrounding photo-organisms.
:Priority interrupt: Pattern recompiler inbound. D15 relocation delay query.
D15 reviewed its construction, and the small patch of land embedded within. The work was not flawed.
Its sensors registered the hum of the approaching matter recompiler, and D15, coordinator, raised its primary manipulator, two digits pressed together.
Snap.
Pics
I have no idea what I just read.
I'll say that tongue-in-cheek for random stories, but this time I really mean it. This was so packed full of technobabble that I only had a vague sense of, and for my understanding of it (I am not exaggerating) this could have been reduced to fewer than 10 sentences and been better for it. It sounds like a piece of technology is malfunctioning but somehow finding its way to an unexpected path to even higher efficiency by doing so, but by the end where it's trying to accomplish whatever its mission is, I don't know what happened to it. My best guess is that Fluttershy broke it, or maybe it saw her emerge (or created her?) and was then broken by whatever's in charge, but since I had no investment in this bot or any other character, it doesn't do anything for me to see it succeed or fail. That bit about the pegasus and one mention of chaos are the only things that could even have a tangential relation to pony, as far as I can tell, so I'm not even sure what this is doing in a FiM round. The "oval airfoils" and title also lead me to think you're maybe talking about a butterfly, but that's not a correct application of the term "airfoil." It would mean the cross-sectional shape, not the overhead profile, and an oval is a pretty bad shape for an airfoil. It also seems to be something targeted at a niche audience, and if that's the case, then my opinion on it means less toward improving it, though as this isn't a forum dedicated to such a niche, I also can't discount my reaction to it as not applicable.
I always want to say something nice about a story, but I really can't here. And that doesn't mean the story's bad; I don't think it is. But it does mean I don't know enough about what happened and what it was trying to accomplish to say how effective it was in achieving that. I just totally blanked on this. The editing's clean, I'll give you that. I only noticed 1 or 2 typos. Maybe someone with more of an electronics background can give you a better analysis, but for me it just came across as emotionally flat. I don't feel as negative about this story as all that probably sounds, but I'm just not in the audience for this, and I don't know who would be. There's a huge workload to figure it out versus a minor payoff to what it means, and now I've read the thing 4 times and only get a little closer to an answer each time. That's not something I want from a minific, unless it's explicitly being billed as a logic puzzle.
I'll say that tongue-in-cheek for random stories, but this time I really mean it. This was so packed full of technobabble that I only had a vague sense of, and for my understanding of it (I am not exaggerating) this could have been reduced to fewer than 10 sentences and been better for it. It sounds like a piece of technology is malfunctioning but somehow finding its way to an unexpected path to even higher efficiency by doing so, but by the end where it's trying to accomplish whatever its mission is, I don't know what happened to it. My best guess is that Fluttershy broke it, or maybe it saw her emerge (or created her?) and was then broken by whatever's in charge, but since I had no investment in this bot or any other character, it doesn't do anything for me to see it succeed or fail. That bit about the pegasus and one mention of chaos are the only things that could even have a tangential relation to pony, as far as I can tell, so I'm not even sure what this is doing in a FiM round. The "oval airfoils" and title also lead me to think you're maybe talking about a butterfly, but that's not a correct application of the term "airfoil." It would mean the cross-sectional shape, not the overhead profile, and an oval is a pretty bad shape for an airfoil. It also seems to be something targeted at a niche audience, and if that's the case, then my opinion on it means less toward improving it, though as this isn't a forum dedicated to such a niche, I also can't discount my reaction to it as not applicable.
I always want to say something nice about a story, but I really can't here. And that doesn't mean the story's bad; I don't think it is. But it does mean I don't know enough about what happened and what it was trying to accomplish to say how effective it was in achieving that. I just totally blanked on this. The editing's clean, I'll give you that. I only noticed 1 or 2 typos. Maybe someone with more of an electronics background can give you a better analysis, but for me it just came across as emotionally flat. I don't feel as negative about this story as all that probably sounds, but I'm just not in the audience for this, and I don't know who would be. There's a huge workload to figure it out versus a minor payoff to what it means, and now I've read the thing 4 times and only get a little closer to an answer each time. That's not something I want from a minific, unless it's explicitly being billed as a logic puzzle.
...is this about Discord?
Well. This works fairly well as a 'robot learns to love' kinda thing, although I had to read it twice to feel like I had a good handle on it.
I think a stronger orientation at the beginning would help. Maybe starting with the bit about re-designing junk into a datacenter, then doing the whole 'D15 was flawed' bit, would start the readers off with a better understanding of what D15 is. I mean, even if we know it's flawed, we have no context to put that in at first. Better orientation at the beginning would help keep people interested, I think. A good hook (I do tend to value this more than some, but still) wouldn't go awry, either.
Anyways, it's a fun story. I wish it were, overall, clearer, but the structure and meaning is definitely there, if you look closely enough.
Well. This works fairly well as a 'robot learns to love' kinda thing, although I had to read it twice to feel like I had a good handle on it.
I think a stronger orientation at the beginning would help. Maybe starting with the bit about re-designing junk into a datacenter, then doing the whole 'D15 was flawed' bit, would start the readers off with a better understanding of what D15 is. I mean, even if we know it's flawed, we have no context to put that in at first. Better orientation at the beginning would help keep people interested, I think. A good hook (I do tend to value this more than some, but still) wouldn't go awry, either.
Anyways, it's a fun story. I wish it were, overall, clearer, but the structure and meaning is definitely there, if you look closely enough.
The first 5 or 6 times I read this I had no idea what I was reading. I was very much in >>Pascoite's boat, and so thoroughly confused that I was tempted to abstain.
It's only on my most recent reading that it finally made sense. "D15, coordinater". Ha!
Once that clicked, I grew to appreciate this a lot more. It's very dense, especially for a minific, almost approaching unreadable. But once you know what's going on that sort of adds to it? Enhances the impression of a very alien, robotic mind. I ended up liking this a heck of a lot more than I thought I would anyway.
It's only on my most recent reading that it finally made sense. "D15, coordinater". Ha!
Once that clicked, I grew to appreciate this a lot more. It's very dense, especially for a minific, almost approaching unreadable. But once you know what's going on that sort of adds to it? Enhances the impression of a very alien, robotic mind. I ended up liking this a heck of a lot more than I thought I would anyway.
So personally, it seemed pretty clear to me that this story was about Discord (or at least, a version of him) by the end of it. I think this is a really neat idea, and I appreciate the irony of Discord coming from an organization of beings that exhibits a computerized level of order.
Now to be honest, outside of identifying our main character I did have at least some degree of difficulty with understanding almost everything else. And a lot of this will be invariably due to the style you've chosen—it's hyper-dense and it obscures clarity by its design. That's not necessarily bad, (in fact, I think you put the style to great use here), but the inevitable cost is that it's going to take that extra half-second, that extra sentence re-read from the part of the reader. And that's honestly a pretty expensive choice.
So, when I make my guess that this story is about an alternate-universe robot-Discord who, after spending eons not fitting with his computerized society, manages to catch a glimpse of Fluttershy through a magical portal in a pond,, that's just it—it's only a guess. I have more confidence in my guess after re-reading several times, but the first read is always the most important from an enjoyment and emotional perspective, and I'm afraid that at that stage, I didn't have nearly enough of the piece figured out to get very much payoff from it.
Now, the last few lines are cool. Really cool. I could sense that even during my first, jumbled read-through. And they do leave me at a high note to finish things off. But I can't help but think that they'd be that much more impactful if I had a better picture of the story in general.
So my suggestion would be, try to find ways to make this piece easier to understand for your readers, without giving up on the style that makes up the core identity of this story. As it is right now, I think it's just a little too difficult to slip into, from an immersion perspective. But with just a little more clarity, I think this piece can really shine.
Now to be honest, outside of identifying our main character I did have at least some degree of difficulty with understanding almost everything else. And a lot of this will be invariably due to the style you've chosen—it's hyper-dense and it obscures clarity by its design. That's not necessarily bad, (in fact, I think you put the style to great use here), but the inevitable cost is that it's going to take that extra half-second, that extra sentence re-read from the part of the reader. And that's honestly a pretty expensive choice.
So, when I make my guess that this story is about an alternate-universe robot-Discord who, after spending eons not fitting with his computerized society, manages to catch a glimpse of Fluttershy through a magical portal in a pond,, that's just it—it's only a guess. I have more confidence in my guess after re-reading several times, but the first read is always the most important from an enjoyment and emotional perspective, and I'm afraid that at that stage, I didn't have nearly enough of the piece figured out to get very much payoff from it.
Now, the last few lines are cool. Really cool. I could sense that even during my first, jumbled read-through. And they do leave me at a high note to finish things off. But I can't help but think that they'd be that much more impactful if I had a better picture of the story in general.
So my suggestion would be, try to find ways to make this piece easier to understand for your readers, without giving up on the style that makes up the core identity of this story. As it is right now, I think it's just a little too difficult to slip into, from an immersion perspective. But with just a little more clarity, I think this piece can really shine.
When I first read this:
Three days ago, I was even more confused than >>Pascoite. The prose was completely impenetrable to me, and while I could tell from the sentence structure that a story was happening here, I had no idea what it was or what it had to do with Pony. So down to the bottom of my ballot it went. I mean, the other nonsense entry this round at least had ponies in it...
But coming back now and reading the other comments has shown me what I missed completely when I first looked at it. Knowing what's going on, I find it to be quite a nice story. Still completely impenetrable as far as the prose goes--I'll suggest with the others above that you add words that us humanities majors might recognize--but I'll definitely have to move it up on my ballot.
Mike
Three days ago, I was even more confused than >>Pascoite. The prose was completely impenetrable to me, and while I could tell from the sentence structure that a story was happening here, I had no idea what it was or what it had to do with Pony. So down to the bottom of my ballot it went. I mean, the other nonsense entry this round at least had ponies in it...
But coming back now and reading the other comments has shown me what I missed completely when I first looked at it. Knowing what's going on, I find it to be quite a nice story. Still completely impenetrable as far as the prose goes--I'll suggest with the others above that you add words that us humanities majors might recognize--but I'll definitely have to move it up on my ballot.
Mike
Echoing the above, it was kind of incomprehensible until I knew what to look for. Very puzzle like in that regard, which isn't a bad thing, even if one or two more clues would be nice. Looking back after reading Bachi's comment it all seems to fit into place pretty well. The thread to pony is direct, but thin, which is also fine for a mini, I think. I want to call special attention to this:
As a particularly beautiful yet perfectly mechanical way to describe Fluttershy's coloring.
Now, I understand that we're dealing with some parallel universe of robot ordering, but I'm having a hard time picturing what photo- and chemo- based life means. Decaorganic and centiorganic I can work with since I can figure it's 10-based something and 100-based something, but is the photo-organic life made of light and the chemo-organic chemicals? It's really a non-issue in the grand scheme, and maybe it's there to highlight the differentness of that universe, but I can't stop thinking about it -_-
body hued sulfur with rhodonite trim
As a particularly beautiful yet perfectly mechanical way to describe Fluttershy's coloring.
Now, I understand that we're dealing with some parallel universe of robot ordering, but I'm having a hard time picturing what photo- and chemo- based life means. Decaorganic and centiorganic I can work with since I can figure it's 10-based something and 100-based something, but is the photo-organic life made of light and the chemo-organic chemicals? It's really a non-issue in the grand scheme, and maybe it's there to highlight the differentness of that universe, but I can't stop thinking about it -_-
Unlike my contemporaries, who can parse computer speak, I am a dummy and cannot fairly judge this.
Abstain.
Abstain.
There have basically been two reactions to this story so far:
1. WTF
2. Oh, it took me a while to figure out the trick (or I had to look in the comments to see what it was), but now that I get it, it's clever.
Neither one of those is good. I mean, at least the second one had people genuinely enjoying the story, but when it takes that much effort to figure out what the story even is, or that so many people need others to explain it to them, that's a problem.
1. WTF
2. Oh, it took me a while to figure out the trick (or I had to look in the comments to see what it was), but now that I get it, it's clever.
Neither one of those is good. I mean, at least the second one had people genuinely enjoying the story, but when it takes that much effort to figure out what the story even is, or that so many people need others to explain it to them, that's a problem.
I can't help but find it ironic that this story stemmed from "Smoke and Mirrors", rather than either of the technology-related prompt images.
It was difficult to get into, and though I like to think I would've figured it out eventually, it's hard to avoid spoilers this late in the round and I'll admit that they helped.
The terminology is a double edged sword. It's atmospheric and doesn't seem random, but the learning curve is just about vertical. For example, all the plants and animals are described by strange names, but the reader is left to puzzle it out what's what.
Along with hurting comprehension, it hurt pacing. Compare with "Emotional Support Being"; both are 750 words, but while that one was described as 'short', this one very much wasn't.
Another thing I noticed that might be worth considering is the paragraph structure; many of the paragraphs are nearly the same length, so the pacing does not vary much. And granted, wordcount restrictions, but with such dense information, it seems like it might benefit from cutting some pieces and spreading the information out over others to spare the reader a bit.
In the end, I don't know how much of the intent I ultimately got. I like >>Bachiavellian's theory, but regardless it seems like there are some interesting pieces there, and it's another entrant in the 'respect the effort' category.
It was difficult to get into, and though I like to think I would've figured it out eventually, it's hard to avoid spoilers this late in the round and I'll admit that they helped.
The terminology is a double edged sword. It's atmospheric and doesn't seem random, but the learning curve is just about vertical. For example, all the plants and animals are described by strange names, but the reader is left to puzzle it out what's what.
Along with hurting comprehension, it hurt pacing. Compare with "Emotional Support Being"; both are 750 words, but while that one was described as 'short', this one very much wasn't.
Another thing I noticed that might be worth considering is the paragraph structure; many of the paragraphs are nearly the same length, so the pacing does not vary much. And granted, wordcount restrictions, but with such dense information, it seems like it might benefit from cutting some pieces and spreading the information out over others to spare the reader a bit.
In the end, I don't know how much of the intent I ultimately got. I like >>Bachiavellian's theory, but regardless it seems like there are some interesting pieces there, and it's another entrant in the 'respect the effort' category.
I'm getting the sense that this story and Transponer are both derived from the same concept, except this one seems to have a lot more thought put into it. Whether the amount of thought is put in the right place, however, is a separate issue entirely.
Even after reading this and going through everyone's reviews, I still have no idea what this piece is trying to do for me. I got the rough idea of what it's about and what it's aiming for, the last two lines were especially amazing, sure, but whether or not it achieves the goal of doing so is really what would win me over.
With this entry, the concept is dense. Insanely dense. There are so many words and terminology used here that I had to Dictionary.com some of them to grasp what they mean. Nevertheless, this parallel universe that you're building here honestly intrigued me. I'm curious about where D15 is, about what sort of Stanley-Parable-esque world he's living in that this is his life. The setting, the scenario, everything, it works.
As a concept.
My problem lies not in the execution; quite the contrary actually, I believe the execution is top notch, technobabble aside. No, my problem is that the narrative you've packaged and delivered alongside this concept to us lacks any sense of urgency. The story lacks a reason for me to be invested in it. If I removed all the complicated vocabulary and examine at the core of the story as it is, there's not much in the center for me to say that we should sympathize, or even care, about this robotic Discord in the first place. Why is this story about him so important for me to have to spend 5 minutes of my time to pay attention to? Why do all the other reviewers have to spend their time doling out their dissertations for a story that ultimately is just a stagnant scene, made only more lifeless thanks to the language?
One could say that Rest Easy, Justified, a story which I praised, didn't have any urgency as well. However, that story worked for me (and many others) because the perspective of Twilight in that story is delivered with a lot more grace and nuance. The language may not be as rich but it isn't coarse either. I had an understanding of Twilight's thought processes as the story progresses. I know and can confidently attest to what motivations she had for saying and doing something in the story. It was clear to me on the first read what this story was trying to do, and as I read it more and more, the concept it was gunning for despite being in the background soon took form.
With this story, however, I got nothing on my first read. I had no idea what to do with this story moving past my first read. It gave me no reason to continue, but I did anyway because I really admire the effort you've put into this. Honestly, I like the concept, I really do. I just think more focus should be shifted towards clarifying what this story is really about. You know, figure out what your subject matter is, give D15 a clearer motivation and weight to justify the things he's doing.
Even after reading this and going through everyone's reviews, I still have no idea what this piece is trying to do for me. I got the rough idea of what it's about and what it's aiming for, the last two lines were especially amazing, sure, but whether or not it achieves the goal of doing so is really what would win me over.
With this entry, the concept is dense. Insanely dense. There are so many words and terminology used here that I had to Dictionary.com some of them to grasp what they mean. Nevertheless, this parallel universe that you're building here honestly intrigued me. I'm curious about where D15 is, about what sort of Stanley-Parable-esque world he's living in that this is his life. The setting, the scenario, everything, it works.
As a concept.
My problem lies not in the execution; quite the contrary actually, I believe the execution is top notch, technobabble aside. No, my problem is that the narrative you've packaged and delivered alongside this concept to us lacks any sense of urgency. The story lacks a reason for me to be invested in it. If I removed all the complicated vocabulary and examine at the core of the story as it is, there's not much in the center for me to say that we should sympathize, or even care, about this robotic Discord in the first place. Why is this story about him so important for me to have to spend 5 minutes of my time to pay attention to? Why do all the other reviewers have to spend their time doling out their dissertations for a story that ultimately is just a stagnant scene, made only more lifeless thanks to the language?
One could say that Rest Easy, Justified, a story which I praised, didn't have any urgency as well. However, that story worked for me (and many others) because the perspective of Twilight in that story is delivered with a lot more grace and nuance. The language may not be as rich but it isn't coarse either. I had an understanding of Twilight's thought processes as the story progresses. I know and can confidently attest to what motivations she had for saying and doing something in the story. It was clear to me on the first read what this story was trying to do, and as I read it more and more, the concept it was gunning for despite being in the background soon took form.
With this story, however, I got nothing on my first read. I had no idea what to do with this story moving past my first read. It gave me no reason to continue, but I did anyway because I really admire the effort you've put into this. Honestly, I like the concept, I really do. I just think more focus should be shifted towards clarifying what this story is really about. You know, figure out what your subject matter is, give D15 a clearer motivation and weight to justify the things he's doing.
I apologize if I didn't get much out of it because I'm not knowledgeable enough to understand or truly appreciate what's going on here. I only probably get the gist of what's going on here and that's after I checked a comment or two to figure it out... and I think it's about Discord but as a robot.
It does fit the prompt of Not the Whole Truth by depicting Discord as a robot and not as something organic. Gives off some Terminator vibes, actually. Wouldn't that be a fun twist if this was fleshed out to its full potential? Discord revealing that he's a robot all this time to Fluttershy and the rest of the Mane Six?
Overall, this is a well-written story even if I don't understand even half of what's going on. At least you're knowledgeable enough to make this very believable!
It does fit the prompt of Not the Whole Truth by depicting Discord as a robot and not as something organic. Gives off some Terminator vibes, actually. Wouldn't that be a fun twist if this was fleshed out to its full potential? Discord revealing that he's a robot all this time to Fluttershy and the rest of the Mane Six?
Overall, this is a well-written story even if I don't understand even half of what's going on. At least you're knowledgeable enough to make this very believable!
Congrats to our newest medalists, and apologies for any mental trauma induced by butting heads against this monolith, but it seems that folks at least got some gratification as it was picked apart.
In particular, my sincere gratitude to >>Pascoite, >>Not_A_Hat, >>Meridian_Prime, >>Bachiavellian, >>Baal Bunny, >>Rao, >>Posh, >>Miller Minus, >>WritingSpirit, and >>Comma Typer for leaving their thoughts, even the dittos.
I knew I was being obscure, but being on the inside, I didn't fully appreciate the degree of difficulty. This is a prime example of the value of reader feedback in calibration.
FWIW, >>Bachiavellian pretty much nailed it with his theory. The only caveat is that I hadn't quite envisioned eons, but it's entirely possible.
If anyone was curious about the critter names, it was basically <diet> <size><composition>.
I appreciate the suggestions; there are some interesting pathways there, and if at some point i to develop it, try to incorporate them, as well as I have some ideas to expand on the core concept as well.
Still, I'd feel remiss about not putting out a chapter of JPT first.
In particular, my sincere gratitude to >>Pascoite, >>Not_A_Hat, >>Meridian_Prime, >>Bachiavellian, >>Baal Bunny, >>Rao, >>Posh, >>Miller Minus, >>WritingSpirit, and >>Comma Typer for leaving their thoughts, even the dittos.
I knew I was being obscure, but being on the inside, I didn't fully appreciate the degree of difficulty. This is a prime example of the value of reader feedback in calibration.
FWIW, >>Bachiavellian pretty much nailed it with his theory. The only caveat is that I hadn't quite envisioned eons, but it's entirely possible.
If anyone was curious about the critter names, it was basically <diet> <size><composition>.
I appreciate the suggestions; there are some interesting pathways there, and if at some point i to develop it, try to incorporate them, as well as I have some ideas to expand on the core concept as well.
Still, I'd feel remiss about not putting out a chapter of JPT first.