That sucks I really feel bad for you honestly you have no idea what you're missing. the best way I can describe how a northern fights, even the littleones, is imagine a rabid pit bull on speed getting stuck in the rear with a cattle prod then hooking it in the mouth and trying to fight it with fishing gear. They just go crazy. Now muskies I would say asmallmouth orlargemouth bass on stereroids with the ability to make 4-6 foot jumps out of the water a number of times. You just can't imagine the feeling of hooking into a 20-40+ pound 40-50+ inch freshwater fish and seeing them launch themselves out of the water trying to throw the hooks and then just bulldogging straight down andcoming up and doing it again a number of times. They are the two greatest freshwater fish IMO. You just have to try them out sometime. You won't be sorry.