My Story of the Spectral Tiger – Never Give up on Your Dreams

**Zomtorg** · 07-26-2012

My Story of the Spectral Tiger – Never Give up on Your Dreams

History

I started playing World of Warcraft in the year of 2007, when I was 12 years old. I was pretty young compared to my other guild mates who raided Black Temple, Tempest Keep, and Serpentshrine Cavern until 2-3 in the morning, and I didn’t have the chance nor the skill to raid with them. One day, while I was waiting for our Karazhan raid to form, I saw our guildie, a 70 Undead Rogue with the Warglaives of Azzinoth, chilling in front of the Auction House. THIS was the day, in which I first lay eyes upon the Reins of the Spectral Tiger. I was very interested in the mount, and googled it only to find out it was a rare loot from the Trading Card Games. At the time I could barely talk to my parents and make them pay my monthly fee, and it was impossible for me to make them pay over $800 for an almost invisible tiger in the game. That was the day I realised that I would probably never get the Spectral Tiger, Ashes of Al'ar, neither would I ever get the Warglaives of Azzinoth. And the worst thing was that I knew I was right. Or was I?

Shifting Sands
STOP the song that you're listening to, and click on the link down below, then start reading after you click it:
Zack Hemsey - Mind Heist (Inception Trailer music) - YouTube

September, 2011. I took the challenge to make my dreams come true. No matter what, I just thought that if I was dedicated enough, I'd be able to succeed in getting everything I ever wanted. So I logged on my forgotten 70 "twink" rogue, and started making groups to SWP and Black Temple. The legendary bow Thori'dal? Took me less than 5 runs. Thunderfury? Took me exactly 2 runs. Warglaives of Azzinoth? Got the first one on the 11th run and the second one on the 27th. However, that was not enough. I had to get everything I could never get on my rogue during the Burning Crusade. What I thought I was missing, was Ashes of Al'ar. I started making raids for Tempest Keep, but I could never reserve the mount for myself, neither I had the gold to pay for it, so I had to take my chances and just state that the loot would be group loot. And so it began, run after run, every week was a heartbreaking experience to see that Ashes of Al'ar doesn't drop until it came the day of the 17th run. This week's group was a little messy, and I thought that we weren't going to make it. Wipe after wipe on the trash until we finally got to Kael'Thas. When we pulled the boss he started killing us one by one. The healer died, and as the druid ressed him, he died again. It was almost a sure wipe. I was dead as well, and I just thought that if they don't kill him now, I was just going to ragequit. Three players left alive. Two of them almost dead. Only a few thousand hit points left. He throws them in the air, and as they fall I expect them to die, but they survived. As they killed Kael'Thas somebody was eager to loot him and there it was, popped on the bottom of the group loot - Ashes of Al'ar. I look at my bags, and see that I've only 6400g to offer if I didn't win it. In the chat another player offers 50,000g. It was almost certain that if I didn't win the roll, I've no chance of getting it anytime soon. I stare at the screen to see who wins it. Finally the roll has passed - Ashes of Al'ar was won by Laotzu. There's no time. I can't let the other player give him 50,000g. I open the trade window and just put 6400g, and I started spamming the druid that I'd buy and give him 100k+ later. I was lying like crazy because I just couldn't let it go so easily. It was the first time I'd seen it drop, and probably the last time. I was writing with the speed of light. He puts the mount in the trade window. I thought he was trolling as I hit the accept button, and the next thing I see - Trade Complete. This was the moment I thought I had reached the climax of my WoW "career", but I was wrong.

The Spectral Tiger
A few months ago I set my goal to obtain the Spectral Tiger because even as I got the Ashes of Al'ar, I still thought that my goal to obtain the TCG mount was impossible. I looked at my bags to see that I only have 7,000g, whereas the Spectral Tiger costs more than 350k in my realm. Now here's more or less my story of obtaining the gold to get my dream mount:

I opened the AH and I saw the Blade of Wizardry for 4.5k only (it usually sells for 8-20k). It was only 1, so I bought it asap, and put it again for 27k. Then I relogged to another char and started advertising in the Trade channel that I'm selling the sword, and in less than 25minutes I got it sold for 15k.
Later I was lucky enough to meet Doom Lord Kazzak, and he was kind enough to give me the Exodar Life-Staff. I put it in the AH for 30k+ just because it looked awesome, and it REALLY got sold!
I already had 50k+, when I saw this level 1 character who was selling TONS of Sands of Time for 350g each, and I literally wasted all my gold on those, and started reselling immediately. I sold some of them for 1,200g/each and some of them for 800g/each.
This is where I got really lucky. I bought a Big Battle Bear for 87k and wanted to resell it for 95k+, when this guy offered me a guild in exchange for the mount. He was in a hurry because he was going to transfer, and the guild he was offering me had over 1100 achi points, more than 800 members, and some pretty hard achievements, such as Guild Gladiators. I agreed to make the trade, we met in Dalaran, and he gave me the guild in exchange for the Big Battle Bear.
Two weeks later, after I played a little bit with the guild, I sold it for 270k. Even though I could've gotten a lot more, I just didn't want the guild anymore, and I wanted my Spectral Tiger. I found a person who could sell me the mount for 340k on the next day, and I finally achieved everything I wanted (probably), BUT WAIT, I was still missing X-51 Nether-Rocket X-TREME because for me it was a symbol for my favorite expansion - the Burning Crusade - and the connection between Netherstorm and everything I'd done there,and just recently there was a guy selling Sands of Time cheap, bought them, resold them and gathered gold to get my final mount.

I just wanted to reach out to everybody and prove that if you want something badly, you just have to work for it, and there's no doubt you'll achieve it, and that's not only in-game. The game just serves as an example of what you can achieve in your real life. Now my next goal would be to get through Firelands/DS heroic and get the mounts, or at least the achievements, and get all the TCG loot (such as the disco ball, and stuff like that), but I'd leave that for the future.

Here's a small gallery that I made just to show the people who are interested:
ImageShack Album - 16 images

Here's the armory links if you want to check something:
Uzkill @ Neptulon - Game Guide - World of Warcraft
Toshko @ Stormscale - Game Guide - World of Warcraft

P.S. The druid to whom I promised 100k+ was a person, who I met 2 days ago, and who said it wasn't necessary to give him anymore gold because he was just quiting WoW and just wanted to help me, and didn't really need the mount. If he reads it anytime during his lifetime, I'd like to say THANK YOU once again

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**Master674** · 07-26-2012

**Devanh** · 07-26-2012

Awesome story, reminded me of myself in a way, back when I used to farm for legendaries but I never actually expected them to drop. +rep for a great read

The part leading up to the spectral tiger reminds me of this: one red paperclip - Kyle MacDonald

**yellowspark** · 07-26-2012

9/10 would be 10/10 if u used a nice remix of that song

, awesome story bro +rep

**Zomtorg** · 07-26-2012

Well I have to say that my story would've been many times better if I actually knew how to write stories >.<, but thanks anyways for the support (sun).
@Master674 - For you it might be nothing special, nor for anybody else, but for me the Spectral Tiger is everything I ever wanted in the game

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P.S. I just started reading the story about the Red Paperclip and the idea just amazes me ;d. Thanks for sharing

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**ketrish** · 07-26-2012

gz

btw. give me ****ing eye from ragnaros so i finally will shoot 5 legendary FoS'es in 1 day xD

**LoveOne** · 07-26-2012

too bad my realm is soo dead that the only chance il ever have to get that kind of gold is if i only kill moobs that drop gold as there is almost nothing in ah that is worth farming or selling or shuffeling. anyway i liked your story.

**Zomtorg** · 07-27-2012

Originally Posted by ketrish

gz

btw. give me ****ing eye from ragnaros so i finally will shoot 5 legendary FoS'es in 1 day xD

Seems like you've had more than enough in 1 day ;d

Originally Posted by LoveOne

too bad my realm is soo dead that the only chance il ever have to get that kind of gold is if i only kill moobs that drop gold as there is almost nothing in ah that is worth farming or selling or shuffeling. anyway i liked your story.

Because of the new patch coming - 5.0.4 - all the mounts will be account-wide, so if you get your Spectral Tiger on an alt who is on a populated realm, you'd have it on your main aswell when the patch hits

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**xmodxdrx** · 10-18-2012

I don't want to burst any bubbles or urinate on anyone's fire but that's only the Standard Spectral Tiger:P just a mere lookalike I wouldn't count that as any type of accomplishment :P Sorry but Congrats on everything! Those who seek shall find!