Talk:Melton Telephone

I would like to add a new IRM entry to Melton's page, based on my interpretation of them in my fic, CONVOLUTUS.

The gist of the interpretation is that they are the parent of Jess and Sebastian, and reappeared in the main Blaseball timeline after the Magic's shadows were alted. The original tree-person Melton was not sent away from this dimension, but was instead freed from the obligation of having to play Blaseball. They are an older person who time travels using a custom motorcycle.

Here's the article!

Hi! I love that you liked our funky payphone dryad enough to include them in your fanfiction and IRM!

However, since we as a team haven't been able to have a lore jam to update our starter IRM with additional lore, the way your IRM is structured right now makes it look like it's meant to be a semi-official continuation of it after the alternate.

It might be best if you rephrase a bit to make it more ambiguous, referencing the alternation event without specifically talking about the dryad interpretation.

I'll be sure to give your fic a look, since it looks like you've put a lot of time and effort into it.

Thanks for the consideration!

Hi--thank you so much for reaching out! I'm glad to change the way that section is written, I originally added it to make sure that it didn't come off like I was excluding the more established interp or sending that interp off to another dimension. I know my take on Melton is a little nonstandard and I'm glad to work something up to make it fit better. I intentionally tried to make the whole thing kind of ambiguous, though the interp is specifically a post-alt interp, but I don't want to step on any other interpretations.

Would this wording be better for the introduction? I took mention of the other interpretation out.

"In the chaos that ensued after the Yellowstone Magic’s shadows roster dealt with a particularly nasty infestation of invasive Path Bugs, the sudden appearance of an entity connected to Shadows player Melton Telephone was equally unexpected.

The person who was sighted on Parkpark trail cameras clambering out of the Morning Glory Pool, soaked in sizzling water was not immediately recognized by Parkpark staff. When approached, it was noted that they were wearing some sort of reinforced armor suit that allowed them to survive such high temperatures as are common in the Morning Glory Pool, along with a helmet hiding their face which displayed various lights and shapes, including those which resembled a glowing circle of rotary buttons"

Thanks for the prompt reply! That looks great to me.

Really appreciate all the thought you put into this too - connecting the article it to the SIRs is a great angle.

I also enjoyed your fic. I'm not too up on my telephone lore, but I like the motorcycle a lot.

Fix IRM, format as Filebox

It's been days, so I'm getting on that now! Thank you for the talk page!

Hi Magic! I'm really new to contributing to the wiki, but I wanted to start with IRMs. I started writing this before Melton got shadowed but I still wanted to get this posted and get some feedback. I'm not sure how unique this is compared to the existing IRM, so some of it could just be added to the one that's there. Anyways, here's the full text. I just had some ideas I thought were cool and a slightly different take on them. Thanks for checking this out and I hope this is good!

The idea of having them only able to communicate through telephones is a new one, and it's pretty neat! Their initial reaction to catching a ball is hilarious, and paints a neat little image on how you see them. The end of it is a little abrupt, however: Do you have any idea on how to round it off? Maybe with some notes on their performance last season, maybe, and the chomp?

Thank you! I agree about the end and I’ll put together some more stuff tomorrow about what you mentioned. Maybe ending with something about returning to the shadows. I think I was just a little too excited to post something.

Ok I've made some edits and additions, the bulk of them are below.Everything can be found back on the Google doc too.

Telephone got their chance to pitch when they were subbed in for Francisco Preston in Season 17. After helping the Magic reach the postseason, Telephone was attacked by Consumers in a game against the Hawai’i Fridays. Their performance dropped after this event and many noticed a significant decrease in the maximum height Telephone grew to. Over the course of Season 18, their bark grew soft and mossy and phone parts were noticeably rusty.

At the end of the season, Telephone requested some time off, which their teammates obviously supported. The deteriorating payphone stepped behind a nearby tree and disappeared entirely. The current whereabouts of Telephone are unknown, but Magic players are confident they will answer the call when the team needs them most.

Love this lore, can't wait to see it on the wiki.

Only thing I'd think (and this is honestly a very me thing in how I write, please disregard as you want) is when you say that they're made up of "several species" I'd say which ones - something like: (Quaking Aspen, Silver Birch, Common Oak, and several other indeterminate species have been identified within Melton)

This would help give a level more precision to the IRM which is something I personally really enjoy.

It's approaching 24 hours so I'll put up one final update using Cuttlefish's idea with my own rewording. The sentence now reads:

"Their body is mostly comprised of tree trunks and branches from various species (Douglas fir, white ash, giant sequoia, and several unknown species have been observed) while their head consists of telephone parts."

Thanks for the help you guys!

Ooh I like that. Is it ok if I take exactly what you wrote but remove the last two words ("within Melton")? There's just something I like about the formality of last name only or no identifier at all.

The Yellowstone Magic chat has recently finalized the vote on Melton Telephone's initial concept, after the usual 24 hour process! The final result of the community poll is as follows:

"Melton Telephone is an upbeat, dilapidated payphone dryad. Their tree, located near the Prismatic spring, has an abandoned payphone embedded in its trunk. While dryadic, the forces that brought them to Yellowstone left them a little incomplete, filling in the rest of them with telephone parts and forest flora as needed.

Long ago, a one-in-a-million flux of the Parkpark's natural arcane currents brought sentience to the combination of Park and Nature, and thus one Melton Telephone entered the world. Before joining the Magic, they spent their time tending to the Spring, often giving a stern lecture and occasional bonk on the noggin to any visitors who disrespected it by littering or otherwise harming the long-term integrity of the Spring. One day, Merlinmeyer misdialed a call for backup. Now Melton is a shy but enthusiastic rookie who loves prank calls. They look forward to the their new teammates and experiencing the epic highs and lows of professional Blaseball!"

Keep in mind, this is only for their first interpretation, decided by community vote! Any other ideas can be added as an IRM once this has been posted, as well as further details, and are just as important.

The flow of "Before joining the Magic, they spent their time tending to the Spring, often giving a stern lecture and occasional bonk on the noggin to any visitors who disrespected it by littering or otherwise harming the long-term integrity of the Spring. One day, Merlinmeyer misdialed a call for backup. Now Melton is a shy but enthusiastic rookie who loves prank calls" feels awkward. Maybe you could have that Melton is a shy but enthusiastic dryad who loves prank calls earlier in the entry and then have the sentence about Merlinmeyer misdailing be where it is, adding in something about Merlinmeyer recruiting Melton when they were the one to answer.

To get the ball rolling, I would like to expand on the Merlinmeyer call. Who was he calling for? General Call or somone in particular? And how did Melton get involved?

What if Merlinmeyer had to do PBS-style phone drives to get players?

Edit 1 will be to a phrasing error on the last paragraph, where "They look forward to the their new teammates and experiencing the epic highs and lows of professional Blaseball!" was meant to be. "They look forward to being with their new teammates and experiencing the epic highs and lows of professional Blaseball!" Whoops.

For the phrasing that Malgic pointed out, do you have an idea in particular on how to manage that? My writing juices are a little tapped out at the moment as may be obvious, so I'm wondering how best to shuffle those words around to lessen awkwardness.

I think you could fix it by making it a new paragraph.

"One day, when Alf Merlinmeyer misdialed a call for backup, Melton answered. Charmed by the young dryad's enthusiasm, Merlinmeyer signed them to the team on the spot."

(I would continue but that would require me typing out a riverdale reference with my own hands and I can't bring myself to do it. /lh)

Actually, I searched the wiki for the phrase "Epic Highs and Lows" because I thought, surely this isn't the first time this joke has been made. The only other place it appears is Curry's page if you can believe it.

Viva's fix was perfect.

Alrighty, I think that can be done easy enough!

In summary, with these edits in mind, the entry would be: "Melton Telephone is an upbeat, dilapidated payphone dryad. Their tree, located near the Prismatic spring, has an abandoned payphone embedded in its trunk. While dryadic, the forces that brought them to Yellowstone left them a little incomplete, filling in the rest of them with telephone parts and forest flora as needed. Long ago, a one-in-a-million flux of the Parkpark's natural arcane currents brought sentience to the combination of Park and Nature, and thus one Melton Telephone entered the world. Before joining the Magic, they spent their time tending to the Spring, often giving a stern lecture and occasional bonk on the noggin to any visitors who disrespected it by littering or otherwise harming the long-term integrity of the Spring.

One day, when Alf Merlinmeyer misdialed a call for backup, Melton answered. Charmed by the young dryad's enthusiasm, Merlinmeyer signed them to the team on the spot. Now Melton is a shy but enthusiastic rookie who loves prank calls. They look forward to being with their new teammates and experiencing the epic highs and lows of professional Blaseball!"

Does that look about right to everyone?

A possible addition to the end of the entry could be:

When pressed about the similarity of their last name to the widely known Telephone Twins, the response varies from a simple "No relation" (which is immediately followed by a series of five claps coming from an undetermined origin) to "It's pronounced [some variation of Telephone]", which despite protest is the same pronunciation.

While I agree this is something that'd be worth entry somewhere, that sounds like the place for a more detailed IRM, unfortunately! Or our fan culture page (which is well cultivated). This one is just our template that we base a lot of other diverging interpretations off of!

Makes sense to me! Thanks for the feedback!