We mention a ninja of
the Onyxia mount in
this week's Guildwatch, and while researching that, some other forum threads came up, including
these two, both from General, where people say with conviction that given the chance, they'd take the Onyxia mount and never look back. They have a point -- it's one of the rarest random mounts in the game, on a raid that's definitely PuG-able.
Chances are low that you'll ever see it, much less win it on a random roll, and so for a lot of people, it'd be worth the namechange and the server transfer you'd have to pay to escape your new ninja reputation.
Personally, I wouldn't do it, but that's really only because I know there are lots of rare mounts in the game that I'll never get (sigh,
Red Proto-drake, I covet you), and one more isn't that big a deal. Not to mention that I like the guilds I'm in and the people I play with, and who knows what they'd think of me if I stole the mount from them or someone else. But not everyone feels the way I do, I'm sure, so let's ask: if you had the chance, in a PuG or a guild run, to steal the Onyxia mount as your own, would you take it? And if you would, is it just because it's so rare and special?
Tags: drama, game-discussion, gamer-discussion, guild, guildwatch, mount, namechange, ninja, onyxia, onyxia-mount, pug, random-roll, rare, red-proto-drake, reputation, world-of-warcraft-discussion, world-of-warcraft-hot-topics, world-of-warcraft-topics, wow-discussion, wow-hot-topics, wow-issues, wow-topics
Filed under: Items, Odds and ends, Instances, Bosses
Nov 6th 2009 at 8:00AM 
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 12)
Evaid Nov 6th 2009 12:47PM
Can't forget this one on Shadow Moon :P
http://wowjackass.com/shadow-moon/comment-page-1/#comment-228
Heath Nov 6th 2009 1:03PM
1. Master looting a PUG: On my server you cant run a PUG without master looting it. There are too many jackasses that would roll need on everything, even if they couldnt use it.
2. The mount: I ran a PUG (25man) were the Ony mount dropped. I will admit I thought about ninjaing it real hard for about the min it took to roll/hand out the other loot. But I didnt. Amazingly I won the roll with a 99. Guess what? I immediately had about four people in the raid calling me a ninja. I get back to Dal to go hang out over the well and show off, and theres about ten people (none of them who were in the raid) going on and on about how I just ninjaed the mount. Out of that entire raid only two people stood up for me and said I didnt. Luckly most people seem to believe me when I tell them what happened, but I had to put five people on ignore just because I got that mount.
Axolotl Nov 6th 2009 8:05AM
I need it for the 50 mounts achievement, so I would roll NEED
Since my characters rarely group, it wouldn't bother me at all
LilBanshee Nov 6th 2009 8:08AM
So you're saying... you want a crappy albino mount from that achievement, so as a stepping stone to that you'd ninja the best non-frostwyrm dragon mount in the game. Mmmkay.
Pexxle Nov 6th 2009 8:13AM
lol What Lil Banshee said.
Tremelizzer Nov 6th 2009 8:15AM
Really getting 50 achievement isn't that hard anymore. On my rogue I have it and I have currently all Alliance mounts (Humans, Dwarves etc.), all gryphon flyers, bronze drake from timed CoS, all 8 talbuks, bear mount from dalaran and Sons of Hodir revered version mammoth.
Vandersveldt Nov 6th 2009 8:16AM
Needing on Onyxia isn't ninjaing, wtf. Ninjaing is when you have master looter and steal it.
Keveline Nov 6th 2009 8:30AM
Agree with Vandersveldt. Guilds will have their own rules of course, but in PuG the rule oughta be if the mount drops, everyone needs on it, problem solved.
I'm a bit surprised at the number of responses from people who say they would Ninja it. It's surprising because the title of this post could just as easily be, "Are You a Loser Scumbag".
Ratskinmahoney Nov 6th 2009 9:52AM
yeah, but no raids use need/greed looting any more. Not on my server at any rate. Even ten-man pugs are ml without exception. I always try to make sure my ony and voa pugs are being led by someone I at least know, but tbh, looking at the forums linked to in the article, I can see that even running with an ml you've run with a few times before isn't going to ensure that the dark side doesn't seize them.
Sad as I'd be to see this ninja'd from under my nose, I think I'd rather have more gear anyway.
Derick Nov 6th 2009 11:25AM
"best non-frostwyrm dragon mount in the game"
Invincible is a contender. A week ago I would have agreed with you, but the steed of the Lich King in life and undeath is just as tempting.
Seaborn Nov 6th 2009 11:37AM
The 50 mounts is stupid easy now. I got 50 without even trying for it and i still have not bought any of the tourny mounts or talbaks. The only rare drop i have is the raptor from ZG.
West Nov 6th 2009 1:22PM
my guild runs 10s and we are free to pug 25s during the week. This dropped last week during a pug 25, and the RL/ML took the mount and all the loot he could. there was just a *little* bit of anger in /ra
Since they are implementing the vote feature for booting someone from a pug, why isn't there an analogous feature for pug raid looting?
how about a pug loot option that means no ML (hence no ML ninja opportunity), and need before greed. this way, when that Ony/Vault/etc uber rare mount drops, everyone gets a fair shake at grabbing it. Also, to change from pug loot to ML requires a vote from the raid members (75%/100%/etc in agreement) prior to the pull.
There has to be a decent enough technical solution to this social problem.
pandaba Nov 6th 2009 2:03PM
There's an astonishingly simple solution to problems like this. Blizzard can keep having bosses that have a miniscule drop rate for rare mounts, but when the mounts do drop, they drop for everyone. There would be nothing to ninja because everyone in the group would get one.
There would still be a less then 1 percent chance it would drop, so people would continue making as many Onyxia runs as they could, making Blizz happy about keeping people in the game longer. And I think the players would be happy knowing there wouldn't be any risk spending their save slot on a pug. If anything, I think such a fair system would actually make people play more, not less.
Chris1 Nov 6th 2009 2:56PM
Couldn't Blizzard just implement some sort of automatic Need/Greed on super rare mounts? So ML can still pass out normal loot but rare mounts just automatically have the Need/Greed window pop up and everyone rolls on it. This way everyone has the chance to roll on it and loot gets passed around but the mount cant be ninja'd. It would require some coding for just the mount item and it would prevent a lot of problems.
SUnwing Nov 6th 2009 4:01PM
I would ninja it in a heartbeat and my guild would lol at those who whined. If it was an amazing piece of gear that might be an issue, but mounts are and have always been fair game
Noah Nov 6th 2009 4:23PM
@Derick
The person said "best non-frostwyrm dragon mount." Invincible is not a dragon mount, even if it has wings.
L33T15T Dec 1st 2009 10:35AM
All of the fanaticism that surrounds "ninja"-ing something never fails to amuse me.
First of all, in the pure sense of what a ninja is (a person skilled in ninjutsu -- the traditional Japanese technique of espionage, characterized by stealthy movement and camouflage that was developed in feudal times for military purposes and subsequently used in the training of samurai), they're pretty awesome. Why the community has given people whose actions are likened more to a parasite a title that has a cooler connotation befuddles me. Actually, I think from now on I'm going to use the word parasite (an organism that benefits at the expense of the host) rather than ninja to refer to those people.
While I understand the animosity that surrounds a parasite, for me it's usually not a big deal unless I've had a particularly rotten day. They took a cool piece of loot, so what? That's not why I'm raiding. I'm raiding to a) have fun playing a game and b) see the content. Anything gained as a result of those two things is icing on the cake.
If the host makes WoW a place that doesn't benefit a parasite, said parasite will find other venues to exploit.
theleoflower Nov 6th 2009 8:06AM
I'd probably take it :o
Nick S Nov 6th 2009 12:08PM
I like how a response which honestly answers the precise question posed in the article gets modded down.
The "I DISAGREE" button is working.
Rydawg0014 Nov 6th 2009 8:08AM
indeed. :D