May the muffins be forever in your favour.I updated the description of "The Strange Case of Dinky Hooves' Cutie Mark Curiosity" to clear some apparent confusion..... · 1:56am May 16th, 2017
So, I guess this blog entry is signifying a bit of an emergency..... As it turns out, Chapter 2 of "The Strange Case of Dinky Hooves' Cutie Mark Curiosity" isn't perceived well and only gets incredibly low views. Despite that the first chapter fared relatively well (even with the terrible quality the first version of it had), Chapter 2 has only gotten 41 views so far and it is published for 72 hours now.
This is something I've barely seen happen with my fics and when it did, it was only due to either bad timing with publishing a fic (NEVER publish a horror fic on October 31st!), because it was a fic about a not well-known OC pony or because it was a fic about something mystical many don't believe in. Never did it happen to a fic that had already garnered some attention, though.
So, in other words, something is at stake.
I can see a few things that might be causing it. First off, when the first chapter got released by me in November 2015, it was horrible. I was very stressed while writing it, so it turned out badly. But I revised it before writing Chapter 2 and it is really good now and up on my usual writing level, so, this alone can't be it. I'm also giving another signal call here; if you read the first chapter back when I started publishing the fic and you didn't like it because of the mess it was, the chapter is different and better now, so please give it a read again and I promise it will be actually worth it this time!
Then there's of course the fact that a lot of time has passed since I started the fic. And it is the first time that I actively continue a fic after starting it a long time ago, so, some low views are to expect, I guess. I still doubt, though, that this is the only reason.
More likely seems that it is because of the fact that, with the time that has passed, things have changed. We now know about Tender Taps and that he is the first one that Applebloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle helped with getting a cutie mark.
Which wasn't a problem when I started the fic and I originally planned to write it and wrap it up between Season 5 and Season 6, but the events in my life at that time didn't allow me to, so Season 6 started and "On Your Marks" came and I couldn't write this fic anymore during a time where one could still imagine that things will come this way and that Dinky would indeed be the first one (which also was my great hope after they got their cutie marks).
So, I can see that this fic seems weird, outdated and maybe even redundant to a lot of readers who started with it, because of the knowledge we have now.
I was thinking about the problem that we have seen them helping a pony to get a cutie mark for the first time now with Tender Taps and how to solve it and I did come up with something to bring it in accordance with the events seen in "On Your Marks".
What I didn't expect, though, was that this could pose such a huge problem and make people mostly ignore the fic now. As it looks, I stand corrected.
Which is why I updated the description of the fic now and added an explanation, clarifying that it won't ignore Tender Taps and that the fic will make perfect sense even with the events seen in "On Your Marks" in mind.
How this is going to happen, I unfortunately can't explain without giving out heavy spoilers for the future chapters, which definitely won't get the fic more views either, revealing the full plot like this now.
All I can tell you is that Tender Taps might be the one they helped with getting a cutie mark first, but that, going by my fic, he was actually not their first client in general. Dinky is and her cutie mark problem is a lot more special than Tender Taps' problem was and falls into a specific category that will get revealed in due time.
There will be lots of mystery, confusion and some plottwists on the way, which I know will keep the fic exciting, even though the description already gives a hint at the nature of her problem.
With that in mind, I hope you give the fic a chance. I will continue writing it until the end either way, but I have good ideas for it and I know it deserves more attention, so I hope you decide to give this fic another chance and see what I'm cooking up with it.
In my Option, this Story is good regardless how you write it
4534405
Thank you, I know you are one of my most loyal readers.
I can see where it comes from, though, a story that seems to contradict something in the show without any explanation or being tagged "Alternate Universe" causes a lot of confusion and makes it look like the story doesn't make sense.
So I hope the updated description clears the confusion about how the plot fits together with what we've seen in the show and increases the views it gets.
4534892 You're welcome, I hope so too.