Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Cataclysm Miscues: II: Hemet Nesingwary

This is the second in a series of posts about the little things that cataclysm messed up on this expansion.  These little things are things that mostly go unnoticed or are easily overlooked because they are usually not game breaking but they do leave you having that feeling of something being off.

Past posts:
Cataclysm Miscues: I: Healing & Mana Potions

Where in the World is Hemet Nesingwary?

The Hemet Nesingwary series of quests is one of those things that go back as long as the history of the game itself.  Hemet is a big game hunter, not just a big game hunter, the big game hunter.

You first meet Mr. Nesingwary in Stranglethorn Vale where he and his fellow hunters will send you on various quests to kill the local wildlife.  You will hunt panthers, tigers and raptors on your way to hunting the ultimate big game.

We later run into the hunter extraordinaire in another realm where he has us helping him hunt down clefthoof, windroc and talbuk once again in an effort to hunting down the ultimate game.

When we run into Mr. Nesingway in northrend he seems to have found the most tropical of paradises in a snow filled world to stage his hunting adventures.  He has us hunting down crocolisks, dreadsabers and rhino while we work our way to the ultimate hunt once more.

Every step we have taken in the game, with each advance we have, there are always new adventures to be had with the greatest hunter to ever live.  He will always have some big game in his sights and he will always seek us out to assist him.  He has become as much a part of our lives as anything else in game.

Every skinner in the game waits with baited breath for the next Nesingwary quest line because it is a paradise of leather and even once they are done with it there are always new people passing through doing the quest that are not skinners that will leave a trail of gold, I mean skins, behind for them to collect.

The Nesingwary quest lines are not exactly game breaking.  Nothing in actual game play changes if it is there or not but it is something we have all become comfortable with and it is something that seems to be missing.

While we all like new things there is something to be said about things we are comfortable with, something we are familiar with.  Just like you will always stop to watch your favorite show on television even if it is a repeat because you are comfortable with it.  The nesingwary quest line is like that.

While talking to someone about this a while back he mentioned the reason he believes there is no Nesingwary quest line this expansion and it makes a great deal of sense.  He said that cataclysm takes place in the old world basically, just in zones we have not visited yet, so being there is already a Nesingwary quest line in the old world there was no need to add a new one.

Well, I say, those areas are new to us, which means they are also new to him and if there is anyone that can find something that is worth killing it is our good friend Hemet Nesingwary.

Where would it have fit this expansion is another story.  There is a fair amount of animal life in Uldum which would make it ideal.  We have birds, bugs, snakes, crocks and wolves among other things.  Twilight Highlands would have been another option but Deepholm and Hyjal seems sort of out of the question because of the lack on beasts in the former and the desire to help the beasts, not kill them, in the latter.

In the end I think it would have been Vash'ir that would be the best place for the master hunter to venture off to.  Despite my own personal dislike for the zone as a whole it is does offer a few good reasons why it would have been the perfect place for Hemet to kill stuff.

Uldum, Twilight Highlands and Hyjal are all part of the current (old) world so excluding them makes sense based on there already being an old world version of the quests leaving only Deepholm and Vash'ir as options.  Deepholm, as mentioned, doesn't have a great deal of beasts so Vash'ir it is.

Vash'ir would also offer us another type of big game hunting bought to us by Mr. Nesingwary.  I can see a little humor involved with malfunctioning equipment and the land loving hunters getting used to underwater life.  There is an ample supply of underwater wildlife for us to slay in our aim of the great hunt and it would be different from all other quest lines Hemet has offered us before as it was underwater, something Nesingwary had yet to do.

Either way and for whatever reason there is no great hunt for the big game this expansion. Hemet is nowhere to be found.  The comfortable quest line we just do in passing each expansion was forgotten about.

So if you are playing cataclysm, like it or not is irrelevant, and you ever felt like some things just did not seem right then perhaps this is one of those things you subconsciously noticed.  While not game breaking the lack of a big game hunt is one of the miscues of cataclysm.

Here is hoping that with MoP and new areas it will bring new wildlife as well that Nesingwary will need our help killing.  You know he can't take that long off from the great hunt.  Can he?

3 comments:

  1. Two words:

    WHALE SHARK.

    (Great post, something I hadn't thought about until now!)

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  2. We should have had a brand-new Green Hills of Stranglethorn quest, too. The Blue Fathoms of Vashj'ir, or the Dusty Dunes of Uldum.

    (And yes, as a skinner, I LOVED the Nesingwary quests. Adored them. I think if you managed to get to 375 skinning/leatherworking in BC, you should have gotten a title: "King/Queen of the Clefthooves!")

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  3. When I first set foot in Borean Tundra on the second day after LK released, I wondered if the ultimate hunt was going to be Nesingwary himself because of the D.E.H.T.A quest line. I was excited to find him in Sholazar. In Cata, the first thing I did was look for his achievement, and wondered which one of the myriad extra achievements it would turn out to be. I was disappointed when I completed Loremaster of Cataclysm, that Hemet was not a part of my journey.

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