SCP Foundation

A rewrite of a skip by hambling.

Definitely not the final version, I would like to expand upon it, if it needs to be expanded upon.

http://scpsandbox2.wikidot.com/theunlikelyacerewrite

Ehhh. This is waaaaay overpowered. For example:

When SCP-2153 undergoes long-term memory loss, object(s) forgotten will subsequently 'fade' and erase from existence. This extends to (kinds of, types of, instances of) places, people, materials, and in some cases, other human's memories.

It's inherently impossible for people to keep every single thing they have ever learned/experienced/trained in active in their long term memory indefinitely. Also, given the ridiculously wide spread of this, it seems like if the guy forgets meals that he's eaten, he'd cause starvation due to the disappearance of the food.

Besides, how discrete/mutually exclusive is the ability? If the guy forgot about his pet fish, would other fish of the same species disappear, or all pet fish, or pet fish of the same age and species, what?

I'm further unsure about how the Foundation would be able to monitor this guy's forgetfulness (since you can't really ask the guy "So, have you forgotten anything lately?)

Overall, I'm just not sure about the idea. It somewhat reminds me of SCP-2442's ability, which states:

SCP-2442 is an actively hostile, anomalous humanoid capable of causing the disappearance of anything it is made aware of. In order to activate its main effect, SCP-2442 will behave as if it is bringing the attention of an unknown entity to an object, usually through verbal indication. The object will disappear within 12 hours through an unknown means.

It's also very close to the (currently-featured!) article, SCP-1467:

Unless constantly reaffirming its existence, SCP-1467 slowly fades out of reality. The effect manifests in a gradual decrease in the ability to perceive SCP-1467 by any known means until it eventually vanishes. This has been known to affect objects and personnel in SCP-1467's immediate vicinity.

_{and erm… this is just my pickiness with semantics and excess of conscientiousness, but outright saying that someone's article is a "failed" one you've rewritten is a little harsh, especially given that the point of a rewrite is to give the article a fresh chance, regardless of the fact that it didn't go the best before.}

The overpowerment issue can be fixed. My original idea was that memories only with extreme sentimental significance to the subjects fade, apparently due to some kind of malicious intent to impact the SCP negatively. You don't have to work within this, but it jumps the overpowerment hurdle. There are other ways to jump the hurdle if you don't want to go along with that idea; changing the kind memories it forgets is key here. To make it less overpowered, essentially.

Nor is the similarity to other skips; I would personally like to see much more of a story being told with this idea, such as going into detail about which memories it loses. If this was done, I can see it being set apart from something like SCP-1467. Changing the kind of memories it forgets, or the way it forgets them, would also set it apart.

If you developed it into something more large-scale rather than just a description of what it is and what it does, I'd probably enjoy it more. I don't think it works as a straight-up short article.

Question: Is the [Data Lost] thing caused by this SCP forgetting stuff to do with its documentation, or is the article… glitching? I've never seen it before, and I'm not so convinced by it and I don't get it. Also, expungements need to be capitalised: [DATA EXPUNGED], [DATA LOST].

As the original idea-comer-upper, I can say that I honestly see this being done successfully. I might be disillusioned because I like the idea, but that's not to say it can't be done. I quite like where this is headed, but the issues raised by Zyn are paramount and need to be sorted.

Thanks for all of the feedback. I'm fixing it, and we'll see how it turns out.