A Hunter's Story

For all his elusive capabilities, I have finally found him! Let me relate to you the tale of the great hunt which started roughly 15 months ago…

After honing my abilities for years and reaching the level of 80, I chose to take on the challenge of hunting the rare beast, Loque’nahak. So I set out for Sholazar Basin, having heard rumor that Har’koa’s Mate had chosen to take residence there. I spent hours on end, following trail after trail. Once or twice I spent days on end, just looking for a sign to prove that he did exist, and that he was still in Sholazar. Every once in a while I thought I saw him, but it turned out to be a false being, pretending to look and act just like Loque.

After many months of no sign, I began to get a little discouraged. Instead of spending every waking minute on the hunt, I began to put my energy elsewhere, sparing only time when I could to continue looking. You can imagine my fury when in one of these trips, I managed to find King Krush locked in an epic battle. After spending so much time looking for one rare beast only to come across another! I’d say that I wanted King Krush to lose that battle, but the truth is I wanted him to win. But only so I could have the pleasure myself of flaying him with my arrows. However, the warrior was successful, if only just barely. Thus I continued my in my quest. You can imagine my surprise when months later, I came across a familiar trail. I checked the markers and double checked them… It was King Krush again! I can only surmise that while I previously thought Krush was dead, he was only fooling the warrior into a false sense of security. After I left the scene, he must have torn that warrior limb from limb! I quickly called m’lady, a druid, to my side and we followed the trail to its end. Having seen Krush in battle before, I knew he could be viscous. I crept up, took careful aim, and let the first of many arrows fly. Took all my ability to keep him at range, disengaging at strategic moments, for I feared those teeth. I managed to get grazed once or twice, but I knew the nourish would come from m’lady so long as I kept Krush distracted. When I saw him fall, I took no chances and loaded a few extra arrows into him, and then had m’lady skin him just to be sure!

You can imagine my surprise when months later while out tracking again, I came across something new. I had never seen these tracks before. It was a bird of some kind, but certainly exotic! When I finally saw him through the trees, I was filled with awe. It was Aotona, one of the most beautiful birds I have ever seen. I knew I had to have him as one of mine. On my way to tame, I was still in such shock that a wandering gorilla managed to cross my path. Now alerted to my presence, I had the two after me. It was a close shave, but I managed to take down the gorilla and then tame Aotona. In his rebirth as a companion of mine, he now bears the name Vree. At times he’s a little vain, but mostly mischievous. Now having seen two exotic animals, I knew I had to be close. I was on the right track, and obviously had the ability – now I just had to hone my efforts.

Many more days and weeks passed with no hint of a trail, until one day. I was in the area, hoping to catch some clue or mark, but mostly focused on mining ore to replenish my stock of arrows. I was flying the perimeter on my trusty drake when I saw something flash below. Quickly we went to ground and I saw it was a true track! Heart pumping, I searched around, knowing the importance of both speed and stealth. And suddenly, there he was! Nocked an arrow and let it fly. It struck home – I landed a successful concussive blow! Keeping my wits about me, I knew he would pounce as soon as he could, so I lay down a strategic trap. Lucky for me, in came the pounce, his blood thirst strong enough for him to not expect it! And then he was mine. A few heartpounding moments while I wove the intricate layers that would bind he to I, and I to he. There was a great flash of light! And then he stood by my side. From past experience, I knew he would be hungry so I reached into my pouch and found some chilled meat. From that moment on, he became my loyal friend. With the new relationship, I also gave him a new name – Macavity. For all my searching, he would always disappear by the time I was there, and now that he grows big and red when wrath hits in the heat of battle, I believe it fitting. I returned to town alive, elated, and exhausted. And so ends the tale of the great hunt.

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I must say, I am still in shock. After searching so long, I had just about deemed it a lost cause. Especially with already having two other exotics, Aotona & Arcturis. I basically just cleared my cache & used NPCScan every time I was headed in the general direction of Sholazar and made a few laps on the off chance he might be there. Couldn’t believe I actually found him, after how many times it went off on some other hunter’s pet! But anyway, in case you’re curious where Macavity comes from, here’s a video for you.

Details later, but ZOMG, I FINALLY TAMED LOQUE!

Wow. Can’t believe it’s Friday already. Been a crazy week, but since I say that pretty much every week, maybe I should say it was a normal week… Only difference was that I held a 2-day event with 15 different departments that we had about 400 people go through. So yeah, just a little crazy… Thus I think this is a perfect time to do a “What do you do when you’re bored?” type of post, since I’m so busy with everything else, lol. So here it is, in no particular order:

• Level an Alt – Not a top priority for me, since I have three 80′s all geared for ICC. And between the 3, I can do each role (DPS/Tank/Heals). But we are working on The Insane, so we need to get our rogues a couple levels higher.
• Level fishing – Already have Salty on 2 characters, but why not go for a third at some point, right? Besides, this past weekend Lady X randomly said “I want to try the Booty Bay fishing contest on an alt” since she only has the Salty title on one character. So we teamed up & she won it. Now all she needs is the right daily in Outlands to come up and she’ll have the title on 2 chars too!
• Do a random achievement – Did this one not too long ago. But seriously, just flip through. There are so many out there that it’s fun to take your main and go do something random, literally just for the achievement.
• Farm – If I’m bored already, I might just put on a movie and farm. I’m still looking for Loque, but farm ore, plants, etc. Good way to make money, though it might make you even more bored…
• Read a book – Pick a good path and run in circles. Might make you dizzy, but might keep you entertained. See how fast you can make the circuit. ‘Sides, you might end up with a pet out of it! Warcraft Pets has a good article on it.
• Tank/Heal – Sometimes I’ll just hop on my tank or healer and do randoms. It helps 4 other people, gets some extra badges. Nothing really special, but maybe it’ll make you feel good that you helped decrease queue time for someone else.
• Think up random GMOTD’s – Heh, don’t need to do this in our guild. We just need to have more than 1 person on vent and this one happens pretty naturally, lol.
• Do something else – get up from the computer and go do something else. Clean the house, watch a movie, play outside, get some extra sleep… The list truly is endless, lol.

So anyway, there’s your Friday post. A list of things to do when you’re bored, or when you should be working instead of writing a post like this because you have lots to do but are avoiding it for a few minutes, lol.

Woohoo! I have a new pet! Was doing the blood fishing quest down in Borean Tundra and Lady X suggested I fly up and check for Loque. So I’m flying around, NPC Scan goes off. I figure it’s just some hunter with a tamed Loque out, and then I realize it’s Aotona. So I look around, figuring no one really has him as a pet, and sure enough, just northeast of the Frenzyheart area, he’s flying around. I quickly tag him, to make sure he’s mine, and start taming. Of course an extra mob agros, so I had to kill it first, and Aotona did his nice little wing buffet thingy to make me go flying, but after losing a few extra heartbeats, he was mine!!! Now named Vree, he’s probably the prettiest pet I have. Now I just need a Hyacinth Macaw to tag along with us, lol.

So long post today, since I’m on vaca this week and Lady X is afk. Anyway, a good addon to get if you use the auction house is Postal. I won’t tell you what it is I’ve been making & selling so you won’t fight me for it and bring the price down, but the short version is that I sell 40+ of this item each day pretty much. So previously I had to open each piece, collect the gold, open the next, etc. But at the suggestion of a guildie, I downloaded it and it is SO nice! Just click “open all” and it collects all your gold for you. Quick couple tweaks to the settings, and you can make it only open the AH mail, leave X number of slots open in your bags, and so on. Postal. Good addon.

So final part I was going to talk about, are jerks. Two guys actually, that were such jerks I’ll even call them out by name. First is Bodie-Antonidas. I was helping a guildie out by running a low level dungeon with her. Took my 80 tank so we’d get in the dungeon quick, and could fly through it pretty fast. Of course, at the same time I was also on my main & running Lady X’s main to grind some rep back with Booty Bay & the other 3. But it’s a lowbie dungeon, so pretty easy to have a divided attention. When we get to the end and down Anub’Arak, and he says “Scrub-ass pally that just had a 74 out damage you”.

Now yes, that was true on that one fight. Considering it’s mana intensive for the tank, I’m a TANK and don’t do much dmg, and I was tri-boxing all at the same time, yes, a 74 out damaged me. I averaged 931 dps and he had 1120. Wow, big gap. Of course, he didn’t bother to check overall damage where he would have seen I did 38.3% of the damage in the dungeon and he only did 29.7%. But tbh, that’s hardly the point. What a jerk! Why would you say something like that? An 80 just ran you through a dungeon and made it easy for you. Just helped you out. Even if you are an idiot and think you did more dmg than him/her, why would you say something like that and ditch immediately after? The guy was being nice and running you through – be nice back! UGH. I hate jerks.

So jerk #2, Maglin-Garrosh. Running HoR, and notice the tank is taking forever, just standing at the entrance. After a few minutes, we ask if the tank is ready, and she replies “Sorry, my guildies and I were busy laughing at the shammy” and then starts the dungeon. We’re all like what? So my wife says “At me?” since she was on her shaman. Tank says yes, “Your gear and weapons are hilariously bad”.

Isn’t that just plain mean? I mean, seriously, if that’s true do you really have to say it? Jerk! Especially considering that she’s wearing all 200+ epic gear. Like, has 232, and 245 gear even. So she’s not poorly geared, that tank was just being a jerk. How mean is that?!?! I mean, if someone’s gear was really bad, then talk to them on the side or something. Don’t just be like “my guildies and I were too busy laughing at you to start the dungeon”. Especially when it’s not true! UGH, I hate jerks. So we figured rather than run with the jerks, I said “Well, that comment just lost you your healer too” and we both dropped group. Not our fault that the tank waited 5 minutes to start the dungeon, and then after starting it proceeded to insult one of the DPS, who happens to be in the same guild as the healer. I wonder how many waves they got through before wiping, but however many it was, I hope Bliz gave them double repair costs just for being jerks.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot the very helpful tip I wanted to get up on the web! If you are thinking about the insane title, or the bloodsail one, when you want to get back rep with Ratchet, Booty Bay, etc… Yeah, go to the place just south of Ratchet. Kill the Southsea guys. If you have some way of not dieing when jumping off cliffs, it’s fast, easy, and awesome. Start in the south next to Northwatch Hold. If you run north along the coast, then up the hill, then south, then jump off the cliff and start over, it’ll go real fast. The respawn timers are short and you’ll be able to go nonstop, or until you get hungry/thirsty and need to make a trip to the kitchen, lol. It does not hurt your Bloodsail rep, so the only downside is that it’s boring. But then, so is every grind, but it’s a lot better than the Evacuee’s in Grizzly Hills. Zomg, we killed those for ages, but their spawn timer, while quick, is not very quick. Plus that little ship gets real boring real quick. Great way to level Vree though! Lol. Got him up to 80 by grinding rep there. But seriously – the Barrens is really the place to go. I think there’s another place or two similar, but those level 13 mobs go down real quick, lol.

Ok, back to gaming and… grinding… Oh well, better than work! Lol.