Harpy Wraith Luring Failure ; (

So I got bored today and decided to experiment with the much-discussed Harpy Wraith luring. My plan was to try luring it across the map just to see if it is possible to get it to Dreamweaver and thus into FB79 by normal means.

Note that my intentions were purely for educational purposes - I made very sure that I would not be luring it into any towns and constantly adjusted my path to avoid all players that appeared on my map. Only one person actually got killed due to me, but this was when I did the initial aggro and didn't realize he was close by farming a mat. I did apologize to him though, rezzed him and was forgiven. Apart from that, I had absolutely no intention of actually beating the boss nor luring it into any guards (e.g. I made sure to avoid all towns) but just wanted to see if it was even possible to lure it that far.

http://s22.photobucket.com/albums/b334/Keripo/Perfect%20World%20International/Harpy%20Wraith%20Lure/

The actual luring is quite possible and just requires a bit of practice and good timing. Have equipment that boosts your normal speed to 5.1 m/s (that was the speed I had - didn't experiment with the other speeds but a mount is too fast). Plume shot the boss at max range while the boss is turned around and going in the other direction. While the plume shot is being completed, start flying away. Count for ~2.5s and double spark. Continue flying and, if you timed it right, your double spark will allow you to survive. Keep flying and maneuver your path such that the boss has to pause and go around a few obstacles before exiting the Ancient Wall area. This will give you a good and safe 2-3 second distance in case you accidentally stop flying. Meanwhile, the boss will keep following you, catching up, start casting its AoE, get interrupted because you moved out of range, and then continue following you.

The end result after ~3 hrs of perfecting the lure and a 46% EXP loss (as I said, I was bored ; P), my conclusion: luring the boss to the other half of the map is impossible. b:surrender

From the Ancient Wall area there is only two ways of getting to the other side of the map: over a bridge or around Dribbling Spring. Going all the way north won't work since the Originia River flows off-map and going far west and through the Dragon Wilderness area won't work since the boss cannot climb the slope. From testing, the boss is also unable to cross any type of bridge, be it small ones like Tradewind's or big ones like near Etherblade. As shown in the screenshots, it turns out Dribbling Spring doesn't work either - the boss got stuck at the narrowing point right before the spring (I then died and lost aggro when I backtracked and tried turning the boss around).

So, was there any lesson or meaning behind this experiment? No, absolutely not. Just my own little experiment into seeing the mechanics of boss luring. My conclusions are that Harpy Wraith does not lose aggro nor need attacking to maintain aggro, and that luring Harpy Wraith to the east half of the map is impossible due to the land boss not being able to cross bridges, swim, or go around Dribbling Spring, the only same-altitude strip of land connecting the two parts. Another observation is that the map can probably be divided into just three continents in terms of land accessibility: the Broken Plains section, the Archosaur/Etherblade section, and everything else (ignoring the islands of course). The Dragon Wilderness section can still be accessed by foot through Dreaming Stronghold, though its quite a long roundabout route but the Arch section can only be accessed via bridges.

T'was an interesting experiment. And as a disclaimer, apart from me (and that other guy in the beginning), no NPCs or other players were harmed in this experiment nor was any benefits gained (I did lose 46% EXP and two rez scrolls, but that's beside the point ^_^).

~Moonlite