I just keep walking into these things, don't I? · 7:15pm Dec 19th, 2016
So... Bad Horse got 1638 respondents.
That... that means I rather have to write a story now, doesn't it?
...
...did I mention I'm holding down three jobs? Well, more they me, than me them, really.
Hooboy.
Okay. I'm going to tabulate the votes. The rules are that offering a comment is worth a point and I will award a point for every like and remove a point for every dislike. In the case of multiple comments saying the same thing, I will take the one with the highest count and add a point for every other comment.
I will also give every story idea a deliberately silly title because I've not slept in... some hours and I've regressed mentally to the point where I think this is funny.
That all taken into consideration the results are:
1. Bookplayer with Orange is the New Banned: The Rise and Fall of the Apple Imperium: 6 points.
2. Bugsydor with Okay, Who Else Wants To Negotiate: SG92 Self-cocking Crossbow Owner's Manual: 9 points.
3. Jordanis with How Solar Freaking Roadways Came To Equestria And Why That Wasn't A Good Idea: 2 points.
4. MrNumbers with High Energy Romance -or- The Missile-Toe -or- How Dotted Line lost his Rocketry license but gained a Marefriend: 4 points.
5. FanOfMostEverything (supported by Naderb, Troubleshooter, and originally proposed by Axis of Rotation) with The Celestia Code -or- The Secret Messages in the Paintings are Really Just Dirty Limericks: 10 points.
6. Spamotron with I Don't Share State Secrets On The First Date, What Sort of Stallion Do You Think I Am: 5 points.
7. Eruantalon with Today's PM's Question Time Will Be About The Apocalypse And 101 Other Marvels in the Equestrian House of Commons Rules of Order: 10 points.
8. Admiral Biscuit with I Married a Shark Cellist: Myths and Marvels in the Pages of the Equestrian Inquirer: 2 points.
9. Oliver with I Don't Think Ghost Suffers Enough And Did He Mention He Has Three Jobs And Hasn't Slept in so Long He Now Talks in Third Person: 3 points.
10. Shrink Laureate with Civil Palaver: How To Threaten A Sentient Crown With Dandruff And Other Tricks of Master Diplomats: 5 points.
11. Gvozdengrom with The Annotated Canterlot Phonebook: 2 points.
12. Yamgoth with How Do You Discord-sit And Will You Be Able To Walk Properly Afterwards: 4 points.
13. TheJediMasterEd with A Day Off: How To Bore Your Workaholic Cabinet Secretary into Staging a Coup So You Can Finally Do A Spot of Gardening: 6 points.
It would seem we have a tie (unless someone wants to complain about how I tallied the points). The podium finish is the Celestia Story neck-and-neck with Reacting to Chaos, and Griffonstone bringing up the rear with only one point to spare. Therefore I declare a tiebreak round with, just to make it interesting, the dark horse candidate in third place still in the running. Below this post I'll leave three comments you can up or downvote to indicate your preferences.
UPVOTE this comment if you want a story about Celestia.
DOWNVOTE this comment if you do not want a story about Celestia.
VOTING LOCKED AT 42/19
UPVOTE this comment if you want a story about the Civil Service reacting to some disaster.
DOWNVOTE this comment if you do not want a story about the Civil Service reacting to some disaster.
VOTING LOCKED AT 42/17
UPVOTE this comment if you want a story about the Civil Service (and Dotted in particular) interacting with Griffonstone.
DOWNVOTE this comment if you do not want a story about the Civil Service (and Dotted in particular) interacting with Griffonstone.
VOTING LOCKED AT 27/22
Hmm, so many choices...
As much as I like Celestia I think I have to downvote her simply because I like not knowing much about your take on Celly, she keeps that air of mystery so perfectly that to go behind the curtain feels like it could harm things.
It gives me a sickly, greasy feeling down-voting for anything other than someone being a prat.
Oh, well.
Yay, I'm a dark horse! The Evil League of Evil will be sure to at least look at my application this time as it makes its way to the incinerator!
I almost downvoted the Celestia one, but then I remembered how she went about naming various parts of the royal palace and I could not bring myself to do so.
While I am pulling for my own idea, I wouldn't be sad to see any of them triumph. Best of luck!
Oh please DO WRITE MORE! Your stories are epic!
Also, civil service reacting to Celly' shenanigans as the disaster. Because those are hilarious.
Ah, sorry about the three-jobs-holding-you-down thing.
Options 4 and 13 sound excellent, I immensely enjoy tales of civil servants being driven to the brink of insanity and back again from the other direction.
Neat. I knew appealing to the masses' hunger for Sunbutt stories would pay off.
I mean, uh, goshum golly, Mr. of Heraclitus, I sure am surprised.[/judygarland]
In any case, best of luck with the overemployment situation.
Your deliberately-silly story titles are marvelous.
I'm looking forward to whichever of the finalists wins!
I think you're going to have to settle for a story about the Civil Service dealing with a disaster caused by Celestia. :)
I don't care how low the points I got for this compare to others, you and me are discussing these titles at some point.
Maybe when your three weekends overlap for once, eh?
Yipe! It appears, at least at the time of this posting, that a lot of people really dislike the idea of a Griffonstone fic. 9 upvotes to 9 downvotes.
It does amuse me, though, that the original tied ideas continue to have duplicated scores at 15-4 votes.
You're, like, married to three jobs? Jeez... what kind of shotgun wedding was that? It's like a Mexican Standoff wedding or something. And most the guns are pointed at you. I mean, the job's families gotta keep an eye on each other, so like 49/60 guns pointed at you isn't so bad. I mean, it is, but in comparison, that's still much better than all of them :B
Ok jeez, Ghost. How are you holding down three jobs? Is there some secret? I'm going to assume that it doesn't involve drugs in your case, but I'm not taking out the possibility that you like smashing things in fits of rage, cuz man, I know that smashing things makes me feel waaaaay better.
4346460 Count me in on that chat. we'll hafta try and pry him out of his shell.
As much as I would love to see a Celestia story, I had to downvote that and upvote the Civil Service posts because we need lots more Dotted Line already.
There are WAY TOO MANY good ideas in this blog...
I have no idea what's happening, but I like pushing buttons.
…Upon further reflection… Here's an idea, take it if you like, forget it if you don't.
Celestia does something innocent, perfectly sane and rational. She promises something compassionate and just.
Unfortunately, it happens to be a disaster for the Civil Service, because it’s not something they’re ready for, something that would involve astronomical amounts of work that cannot possibly be done in the time required. You know the kind. Many a software bug is of that kind. After some time spent running around in circles, they are left with no choice but ask Celestia to rescind her decision.
But she won’t budge, and explains her position. To her, that it’s such a disaster is a surprise. It’s a matter of foundational principle, and what actually happened to cause the problem is an error committed long before anyone except Celestia was even born. What’s worse is that none of her godlike powers can make things easier.
So now they have to work together to find a solution…
4346601 I want you to write this. I'd like to see how you handle the civil service crew.
Oh my gods, I want all of them. Not just the three options, all of those inspired titles stink of your genius.
4346449
...I upvote this one. I mean come on, this is the perfect choice here.
Something on the Civil Service dealing with the important issues of the day while something trivial is going on in the background would be intriguing.
"Dottie! Dottie!" The panic-stricken pegasus came swooping through the door of Dotted Line's office in a flurry of loose paperwork⁽*⁾ before skidding to a halt in front of a desk which seemed to have its own walls and towers of paper as defense against the world, with only the tromp of little paper soldiers to differentiate it from the Canterlot castle. Well, that and one more thing.
(*) Only 11b/4 Requestion forms and 1067.5c/m Urgent Request For Payments, nothing serious.
"Changelings!" shouted Leafy Salad. "They're all over the castle, Dotty! They've got the guard glued down to the floors and--" Leafy looked down at the paper-strewn floor, which was occupied by another Leafy Salad, only this one was drooling a little and had a distinctive lump on his forehead. "Uh. Dottie?"
"Can it wait just a moment?" came the invisible Dotted Line's impassioned plea from behind the paperwork ramparts. "Princess CadEnce didn't get her 7547.76/g Request For Addition Of Prince/Princess Consort To Equestrian Royalty form correctly filled out, and I'm having to redo the whole thing."
"Why am I laying on the floor, Dottie? asked Leafy, who had rather been looking forward to the wedding buffet before the sudden insectile invasion, and still was on several mental levels.
4346778 Yes. You write this one, and let Ghost handle 'Celestia done explode something' because that's funnier.
I mean it could be simple. You know, like Og the Somewhat Menacing tries to take over Canterlot, and in driving him off Celestia sets the Hall of Genealogical Records on fire.
4346371
I just downvoted something by GhostOfHeraclitus. I'm... I'm just going to be over here washing my hands all night, okay?
Anything from the list is bound to be awesome.
But... #5?
Yikes! How did I miss the original poll?
Come on Celestia you're almost there!
Also, killing yourself trying to write something would be bad, so, you know, please don't do that.
Quit work if it comes to that.
4346550
4346962
Who would have thought it would come to this. I feel kind of sad now :(
4346778 4346961
I’m not sure I could handle the Civil Service, if only because I can’t match the style. :P
Do you have, or have you ever considered starting up a patreon? I can't speak for others, but I know I'd pay for more Civil Service stories, and I highly doubt I'm alone in that, plus it just seems right to help out any author I love that's juggling 3 jobs.
4347372
Nope. Gotta do it now. You have summoned the story gods and they will not go back behind the starry veil unsated. Blood must be spilled. Well. Ink. Well. Digital ink-substitute.
Besides, who says it has to be done in my style, insofar as there is such a thing.
4346434
Goshum Golly could totally be a pony name.
4346437
I had more fun than was decent writing them, I must admit.
4346460
What? They are perfectly innocent and reasonable titles. Staid, even.
4346526
It's not a shell so much as some sort of oubliette.
4346540
4346550
I know! I have this board of button-things that make a fun clickety-clicky noise and glow pretty colors and I've been pressing them for years and sometimes people are happy when I do so I press them more.
It's very strange.
4346949
"Changelings are transitory. Paperwork is forever."
Also, I must write another story about Leafy Salad because what with yamgoth thinking he's named 'Lofty' and you thinking he's named Leafy Green, it's clear y'all have rather forgotten the poor fellow.
4346828
Well, tell you what, if you figure out a way for me to clone myself, I'll gladly direct some of my clone-self to work on all thirteen.
4347486
Well, I suspect I wouldn't be able to get any interest if I did open one, but the question is moot. I can't receive funds where I live.
4347536 ".... it's clear y'all have rather forgotten the poor fellow."
Well, I'm forgetful enough I joke about naming my children One, Two, Three and Four, so remembering 'Leafy' at least is doing pretty well.
(corrected)
4347547
I don't mind, I hasten to add. I just find it funny that it happened twice.
Also: the Romans totally did that. Sextus Empiricus (whose name sounds like a fake Roman-y name you make up for a joke) the great skeptic of late antiquity was, rather obviously the sixth son. Or possibly born in the sixth month. Records are hazy and, worse, in Latin.
I would just like to state for the record that at the time of this comment...
sixteen people are EVIL!!!
seriously how can you downvote celestia by ghost
4347536
I barely remember whatever happened last week. It's like some teensy miracle I can even remember Greeny Greens and the jam incident from when I read your story over a year ago.
...Just throwing this out there, but you could have some character be an exceptional dick, constantly calling Leafy different names, whether through being a prick or being genuinely forgetful– who knows it's funnier that way. I dunno. I think Leafy's indignation would be hilarious.
Ok... either Ghost is on keyboards in some band he hasn't told us about, or he's at the controls for the treat dispenser at some human testing lab in Someplacia, the land of ??? and space magic.
...If it's the latter, does that make Ghost evil? <.<
4347547
My parents keep on mixing up me and my brother's names
4347682
What? You know I'm evil, Axis. You should've expected this. I'm going for the option that leads to something blowing up, for explosions are cool :B I dunno. With the way Ghost writes Celestia, I don't think the chances of things fall down go BOOM! are high enough. Although, things are liable to be filled with other things with her and Luna around. Explosions, homes being filled with whipped cream and pudding... pretty much the same difference. They have very similar effects, except in one the audience is laughing their ass off and the other the audience is scared and death stuff (personally, I'm laughing my ass off at this one too. What?!). Hmm... might re-evaluate this. The chance of things getting filled with other things is cool. Like a shack being magically filled with Nutella (yum!)
4347372
Gotta go with the others, you kind of have to do this now.
Who in their right minds would vote for anything but 4346327 ???
4347372 Myself, I'd love to see how you handle the Civil Service... especially a version of the Civil Service in a United Kingdoms of Equestria with all your background worldbuilding. If you can't match Ghost's beautiful style, at least give us your own specialty!
4347718
You are evil.
But you get a pass. ^.^
Oh God, this was too good to not mention, though I'm sure you've already made your choice...
Equestria used to celebrate the Winter Solstice just like it does the Summer Solstice. It being the year's longest night, Princess Luna presided. The custom fell into disuse over the past thousand years, for obvious reasons. Hearthswarming came to be celebrated in its stead.
So now that Luna's returned, a bunch of NeoSelenes want Winter Solstice to become an official holiday, and they get incensed when someone wishes them "Happy Hearthswarming!" and the traditionalists are all like THIS IS THE WAR ON HEARTHSWARMING!...
And poor Dotted Line has to reconcile all this (you laugh, but in our own history there have been large-scale riots over what calendar ought to be used...)