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Sparks
Aug 12, 2019 20:58:08 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Aug 12, 2019 20:58:08 GMT -6
Morgan was super pleased with this new outcome; this meant that success was at hand, or at least that was how they felt about it. This would only need to be practiced a few more times before he really got it. They were lucky, perhaps, that they had worked on several ways of getting the hell out of dodge before this one, so all the houluh had to work on was making sure that whatever was trying to grab him would only get hair that would come out. They continued practicing this, working between the two, with the creature receiving lots of praise, petting, and treats in-between the grabbing of the fur. The houluh was even reacting less and less harshly as time went on to having his fur removed by the snatches. Morgan worked with him, getting faster and harder with the snatching, until finally the houluh was reacting the same way every time, getting out of a grab with only hair left behind.
[15] - [END of 'Loosen Fur']
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Sparks
Aug 12, 2019 21:22:39 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Aug 12, 2019 21:22:39 GMT -6
The last thing that Morgan wanted to work on today was going to be the most difficult. They weren't really running up against a time issue, but there were other things that Morgan needed to do today, other than teach the houluh things. The next month was a long way away anyway, so for now Nico shouldn't be in too much danger anyway. Perhaps, if they were lucky, Morgan might take him out for a short stint to the Training Gym? His dexterity could certainly use some work; he had not been able to keep up with Morgan still.
Morgan had to figure out how to teach him this lesson; it was an extra way of getting out of some damage from an enemy, but it wasn't the only thing he'd be taught for that. This was like the trick 'play dead' only it was more serious, meant to pretend to be dead so that an enemy failed to attack right then.
[16] - [START 'Play Dead' - move]
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Sparks
Aug 12, 2019 21:43:56 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Aug 12, 2019 21:43:56 GMT -6
This command was also going to have to be a whistled one, Morgan realized as they looked at the houluh. He might have to do this at a moment's notice, and Morgan wasn't going to be able to get him to do that if they were using a hand signal or something else. Morgan chose a quick long and loud whistle for it, thinking that it would sound funny if they were in a situation and then the whistle command would fly; and immediately the houluh would 'fall dead'. The opponent would probably be confused and not know what was going on both by the loud sound and the sudden but apparent 'death' of the houluh that they would have been trying to attack. They had to have lots of tricks up their sleeves, since Nico was a hound and might not be able to do too many sound-related things to help with enemies... He'd never be a battle creature, and that was fine.
[17]
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Sparks
Aug 12, 2019 21:54:03 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Aug 12, 2019 21:54:03 GMT -6
Morgan was just worried about him being able to protect himself, in all honesty. Morgan gently patted the creature, and hoped he understood that they were going to try to accomplish here. Morgan gave the whistled command, and then gently pushed the houluh over onto his back, and then had him stick his little tongue out. Morgan crossed their fingers hoping that he would stay there, until given a treat. After a moment or two of waiting, Morgan breathed out a sigh of relief. Soon, Morgan tossed the creature a piece of jerky and smiled as he got up and ran to go get it. This was going to be easy as long as the creature started doing this on his own, Morgan was sure.
After he was done with his treat, Morgan gave the command again, and the houluh looked at them for a long moment before rolling onto his back, dropping like he had been shot, tongue out.
[18]
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Sparks
Aug 12, 2019 21:59:04 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Aug 12, 2019 21:59:04 GMT -6
The houluh didn't do it quite perfectly, but it was just good enough for Morgan to consider it a success thus far. Morgan waited for a bit to make sure that he would stay down until commanded to do something else, and then Morgan called one of the commands he already knew (dash) and watched as he got up and raced from his position incredibly quickly. Perfect for drawing a creature away from him for a second, thinking he was dead all of a sudden. This was certainly quite required, Morgan reminded theirself. Morgan tossed him a piece of jerky again, and as soon as he was done, Morgan called the command for the 'play dead' move again. Immediately, this time, perhaps having noticed Morgan's happiness at his success earlier, Nico dropped to the ground as if dead. He was on his back, complete with a tongue sticking out and all. The little ham.
[19]
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Sparks
Aug 12, 2019 22:04:58 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Aug 12, 2019 22:04:58 GMT -6
Morgan was pleased with this; he got better and better so quickly. Morgan didn't know of course that he was doing this by triangulating tall of the avenues of information that he could indeed get from Morgan (body language, emotion, even the RoT in bits and pieces) and since he had such a strong desire to do well for Morgan, he immediately got better and better. Morgan gave him a treat for doing properly, and then began the repetition process that was so common with their training. Morgan would give him the command, he would fall over as if 'dead' (getting more and more skilled at making himself looking convincing the entire time), and Morgan would let him stay like that for a moment before calling him to do another thing out of it, and then he would receive a piece of jerky and lots of praise. After a while, Morgan was convinced that he knew it well enough; and the pair went on home.
[20] - [END of 'Play Dead'] - [The pair goes home.]
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Sparks
Sept 14, 2019 12:17:39 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Sept 14, 2019 12:17:39 GMT -6
It had been a while since Morgan had the chance to train Nico, what with Waar and the Tat-lungs requiring absolute attention lately. However, Morgan finds theirself with a two hour block with which they could work on at least two more things, with any kind of luck. Morgan leads the houluh at heal, wearing his creature pockets and carrying a strange... Barrel thing that he had found hiding among the toys that the Jackalope had finally given them at Morgan's commission. Morgan had him drop it gently on the ground nearby, and then took off his creature pockets. Nico shook himself at that, and then looked up at Morgan for instructions. He seemed to know what being at the park meant! "You ready to learn something, boyo?" Morgan asked, and immediately Nico just about leaped for joy. "Alrighty, but this time it's more body training, not really a command or anything."
[1] - [Start 'Endurance']
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Sparks
Sept 14, 2019 15:04:39 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Sept 14, 2019 15:04:39 GMT -6
Morgan had worked on creatures to be able to dash more commonly, and well, run a lot further, several times now successfully. At that, it was time to get Nico worked on as well with it, especially since he would need it for the future. Nico was already an incredibly well-rounded creature. Morgan could not wait to get to use him for an obedience contest, but so far none had been running in the contest hall since Morgan had gotten him. That was fine though, it just gave them more time to learn more things! Morgan gave Nico the command to dash, and Nico ran away, excitedly prancing. Morgan continued to give the command over and over and over again until the poor creature was just heaving from tiredness, and Morgan allowed him a drink of water. They would continue as soon as he was done drinking the nice cool water.
[2]
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Sparks
Sept 14, 2019 15:08:12 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Sept 14, 2019 15:08:12 GMT -6
Morgan wanted to work with him on some more utility work after this, but this was going to take quite a while of work anyway. As soon as Nico had a bit of a rest, Morgan was back at it again, giving him commands to dash, dash, dash repeatedly. Nico was more than happy to do anything he could to please Morgan, regardless of what it was. "Good boyo, Nico!" At that, he started to slow up, and Morgan continued giving him the command to dash. The poor houluh dashed and dashed until he was quite tired again, not lasting any longer than he had earlier. Morgan wasn't surprised, it usually took a long time for him to catch up with it, for certain. This training usually took a lot of work. Nico was once again taken to the water and allowed to rest for a moment. Then it was time to continue!
[3]
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Sparks
Sept 14, 2019 15:12:35 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Sept 14, 2019 15:12:35 GMT -6
This sort of thing was mostly boring repetition until the creature's endurance improved, but Morgan wanted to do something extra special after this, to get him really good at it. However, to get to that point, Nico had to break through to the other side of speed, err- well maybe not that much. Houluh could only run so fast. As soon as he was done resting, Morgan started again, making him dash around as endlessly as he could, alternating it with the run command this time. At this, the houluh was really showing a bit of progress. This was repeated until he was tired, and then he was given another drink and this time no rest. Morgan continued repeating this with water inbetween the runs until finally, they were blending together, and Nico was running as many times as Morgan gave him the commands to do it, even without breaks at all.
[4]
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Sparks
Sept 14, 2019 15:16:47 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Sept 14, 2019 15:16:47 GMT -6
They continued working for the first hour the best that they could, until finally the houluh was really displaying some excellent continuous running and dashing. As soon as Morgan noticed that, they gave him a quick chance to drink some water, and then set up a little bit of an obstacle course. At this, they were going to throw things at him while he went through the little obstacle course, while giving him commands to dash as they did so. Morgan began to run him through that as well, showing him how to do it as they had done before, and finally gave him the commands to do the dashing. At this, they began throwing things at him in an attempt to hit him at the same time, and finally, Morgan saw the fruits of their labour; the houluh was able to dash away each time, without fail and without tiring. Morgan was pleased with the outcome!
[5] - [End of 'Endurance']
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Sparks
Sept 14, 2019 15:24:37 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Sept 14, 2019 15:24:37 GMT -6
The next thing that Morgan wanted to do today was to teach Nico to howl! A well placed howl can make an opponent really scared, and it may just pay off in the end with the weaker ones. Morgan figured that since he was a hound, he should be able to howl pretty decently. "Alrighty boyo, I'm going to teach you something you don't know today. I've heard you howl and wail at sirens, so I've got a siren on a recorder here, since you do it naturally. Then we're going to transfer this idea over to a command, how's that?" Of course, Nico had no idea what Morgan was talking about speech-wise, but a little bit of the ideas crossed over the RoT enough for him to understand that he was going to howl, and that it would be to a noise that Morgan made, like everything else they did.
[6] - [Start 'Howl']
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Sparks
Sept 14, 2019 16:24:47 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Sept 14, 2019 16:24:47 GMT -6
Howl was hopefully going to be very simple, but Morgan was sure that something or another would throw a monkey wrench in everything. That happened every now and again, and though Morgan hated redoing things, sometimes it needed to be done and it was always Morgan's fault when it happened. "Alrighty boyo, let's get started." Morgan chose another whistle for the command, that way he could be told to do it from far off; they chose as high a sound and soft a pitch as possible, to make it difficult to discern for any but the best ears, like Nico. At this, Morgan gave the command, and then turned on the recording of the siren. Immediately, the houluh did what he always did whenever he heard a siren, and he went; "AWWWWWWWWOOOOOOO!" Which had to be the cutest thing ever, according to Morgan anyway. It was probably annoying to anyone nearby.
[7]
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Sparks
Sept 14, 2019 16:30:25 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Sept 14, 2019 16:30:25 GMT -6
Morgan quickly switched off the recording and then tossed the houluh a piece of jerky. "Great job, boyo. Great Awoo." Morgan said, tousling his ears as he ate his piece of jerky. This was the kind of stuff they enjoyed teaching, after all! "Alrighty boyo, let's do it a few more times..." Before they would get him to do it without the recording, at least. Morgan gave the whistled command from earlier, and then switched on the recording again. The recording of the siren prompted another howl from the houluh, which was pretty loud, but still puppyish. Morgan was sure that they could work that out with enough work. "Good boyo, Nico!" Then he was given another treat, and he was petted again. At this, Morgan stood up, and gave the command again, playing the recording again to the same effect. Another treat, and more pets.
[8]
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Sparks
Sept 14, 2019 16:33:08 GMT -6
Post by Morgan on Sept 14, 2019 16:33:08 GMT -6
Morgan repeated this entire process a few more times; giving the command, and then playing the siren recording, which would then be replicated as an 'awwooooo' by the houluh, which was rewarded with praise, treats, and pets. This was repeated until Morgan decided that it was time to jump off of the deep end and try it without the recording. The houluh was quite smart for a dog, Morgan was hoping that he would get it the first time. He did not, so Morgan repeated it again with the recording. Afterwards, Morgan tried it yet again without the recording, and this time (triangulating what Morgan wanted from the emotional reaction he could feel so clearly) the houluh howled without the recording, just to the command. Morgan was overjoyed! "Good boyo, Nico! Great job!" Morgan gave him another treat and some more petting. He was doing a great job so far!
[9]
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