Everquest memories- The Great Pet Pulling Nerf .

It is impossible to talk about the biggest nerfs in EQ history without mentioning pet pulling. A pulling tactic widely used well into the first decade of the millennium.. I like to think of it as something easy to learn but hard to master. Summoning a low level pet that you could send into a pack of angry red conning mobs and pull one out safely was its main function. It could mean the difference between a group winning or a group losing. It could elevate a lowly insignificant pawn into a superstar. Once the knowledge about it got out and more people started to use it, it's days were significantly shortened.

One of the best things about playing a pet class during the early years was learning and applying this tactic in the group as well as solo game. It was incredibly simple in concept but hard to pull off in practice.  Summon a low level pet send him in and get a single mob in return. Sounds easy enough. The problem was the pet getting destroyed in one hit. If that happened the mob and his friends would agro you. It was risky but rewarding.

The tactic at the time I learned of it was not considered an exploit. It was surrounded by shades of gray at worst. I thought it was simply part of the necromancer arsenal. Those who look back and just see exploit is not thinking of the time period. It was the early 2000s. Most of us were still completely new to the game and still learning the ropes. I honestly didn't know a approved of tactic from a game breaking exploit. Only as time went on did it become apparent the magnitude of it all. When guilds started to use it to circumvent raid mechanics the writing was on the wall.


In late 2006 the nerf hammer was brought down. The end of one of the greatest tactics in a pet classes history came to an end. I miss it.




Fcseven (updated 3/30/23)