Fishmonger

From SWILwiki

Monster name: Fishmonger
Dates used: 1996?-current

Wanders about the Pterodactyl Hunt selling fish. Idiosyncratic, flavortext monster. One of the few places to spend money outside of Hunt Central.

Evolution and History

Date of Creation: Fall 1996
Creator: WillQuale
First Player (if different):

The 1996 monster list describes the Fishmonger:

FISHMONGER--  This mysterious character wanders through the feild
selling fish, which can be thrown at monsters.  What effect
it has on monsters in unknown, but the players reportedly feel
better about themselves after a good throw.

There are actually two monster list files on the server, both last edited in 1996, one with the Fishmonger, one without. Either this indicates that the Fishmonger was created in 1996, or it indicates that the server is glitchy and bad, or simply that that is the date when files were transferred from a previous location to an organization folder on ITS' server.

Will says: I created the Fishmonger because I wanted a noncombative monster which didn't involve lots of running, since I was sick that week. The Fishmonger concept was, like most of SWIL, more or less spontaneous and random. Initially the Fishmonger didn't have a purpose in the hunt: I had a shoebox in front of me (on a cord around my neck) containing some number of cardboard fish wrapped in duct tape and a bag of Swedish Fish. I threw the cardboard fish at players who tried to attack me and gave out Swedish Fish to players who came up and asked who I was. The cardboard fish did not kill players or in fact do anything, and I think I spent much of the hunt trying to retrieve them in the dark after I'd thrown them. By the next year I think we'd worked out the "fish can be given to the Cat" thing. But players were not told this: they had to figure it out for themselves, and a number of players experimented with all sorts of things, including offering them to the Oracle. Giving fish to the cat intially just prevented her from attacking that player; I'm not sure if they eventually led her to render further assistance as the next paragraph suggests. I know I Fishmonged for at least two years ('96 and '97); I can't remember if I did so my senior year (the '98 hunt) as well or not. [end Will's comments]

By 1999 (possibly before), the fish were no longer thrown at monsters, but could instead be given as offerings to such characters as the Cat and Oracle in exchange for assistance.

Chaos' description for the Panic Book, written fall 1999:

fishmonger (1): cannot kill or be killed. the fishmonger wanders the playing field selling fish. 
there is not a fixed price for the fish. it is not appropriate for the fishmonger to tell hunters what 
the fish actually do, but he should try to come up with other reasons they might want them. this part 
is largely irrelevant to the action of the hunt, but can be a lot of fun if played enthusiastically. 
if there is no fishmonger, sell fish at hunt central for a fixed price.

The 2002 description is brief:

The Cat is playful but can be deadly.  The Fishmonger sells fish, which,
if given to the Cat, will please her greatly.  The Oracle is also said
to be fond of fish.

Anecdotes and Lore

• There was something about Fish Songs. I know nothing. [Will adds: I sang silly fish jingles which were rather made up on the spot. This may have become sillier and more formalized as the years went on. I don't think I ever had specific songs, but I might've.] [Kyra adds: I didn't know that Will did fish songs, but, when I started fishmongering in 2000, I did fish songs. I had a whole collection of silly fish songs at that point, but I ended up mostly singing a song based on a Chinese folk song my mother had introduced to my brother and me. My brother had, at some point, randomly changed the lyrics (the song was originally about flowers) to those that I sang while fishmongering - "Fish are so beautiful / Fish are so colorful / Budding and / Blooming and / Making the earth colorful / When I see them in my garden / I feel happy deep inside / When I see them in my garden / I feel glad that they're alive."]

• Kyra also carried along fish flyers, mostly including bizzare statements she had come across involving fish, complete with randomly chosen images of fish. She always carried at least one flyer with the lyrics of the fish song, as mentioned above, and would try to get players to sing along. In her senior year, feeling that she had no further use for the fish flyers, she auctioned most of them off. [I think we stumbled on some crumpled remnants of these when cleaning out George III. Sadly, they are no more. --JillianWaldman]

Illustrious Fishmongers of the Past

• 1999 - Ben George
• 2000-2002 - Kyra Jucovy
• 2003 - Abby Friedman
• 2004 - The Fishmonger was played by Qian Li '05 in a last-minute emergency backup change.
• 2005 - Miriam Newman '07
• 2006 - Emmanuelle Wambach '08

	Characters in the Pterodactyl Hunt	(view·discuss)
Admins	Hunt Wizards | Squires
Current	Pterodactyl | Jabberwock | Vampire and Shadow | Black Knight | Oracle | Race Kings | Orcs and Hobgoblins | Werewolf | Dactyl Guards | Cat | Fishmonger | Hydra | Kobolds | Turtles | Sphinx | Spondees | Phoenix | Imp | Troll (treasure)
Planned	Grue | Kraken | Assassin | Dragon | Harpies
Retired	Cardboard Tube Samurai | Achilles | Wraith | Siren | Medusa | Bug-Blatter | Unicorn | Grunts | Troll (riddle) | Necromant | Thief