Please fix fishing

1. Getting skill on fishing is at least 10x more difficult than ANY other trade.
2. 90% of my catch it items/monsters. I know you're going to say "use the gear that reduces items" but how can i ware it if i can't even get to the skill level to purchase it?

I love fishing in ffxi, but to combat gilsellers, it has been getting less and less fun. Please give us a compromise! Better skill accumilation would be a great start! I am using pelican rings and wearing them on both finger slots and still getting no skill up!

thankyou

I think fishing is fine the way it is. I believe the reason it takes much more longer to skill up is because you can get all of your skills literally for free (while selling your catches for about 10k a stack without really spending anything). Fishing everyday until the 200 fatigue cap from level 0 (only on fish that give skill ups of course) can get you level 100 fishing in about a month, maybe 2 months at most if you stayed dedicated. Now unless you were rich, leveling a normal synthesis craft to 100 would take roughly 1-2 months as well with enough dedication.

As for catching many items or monsters, have you tried checking wiki for a good bait combo for the fish you're trying to catch? Although sometimes wiki can be wrong, certain baits (or even the location) may not be that great for catching certain fish. Areas like Bastok tend to have a lot of rusty buckets or items compared to other locations.

fishing absolutly should be changed. Its beyond a tideous and boring task. Im in the process of finishing my WW from 95 to 100 and my very last subcraft from 51 to 60, but i will not touch a fishing pole again. I simply cant stand it. You can sit their for hours fishing and not even get a single +.1

I am greatly curious as to how much of this is possible. With Pelican rings, fishing gear, and a Lu Shang you can literally stand in one spot 0-86 within a few months and be making 50k+/day from vendoring the fish to an NPC standing 5 feet away.

It is true skillups get slower and slower, especially 70+, but I was about to do 11-40 in less than a week of fishing to cap.

not to go all "back in my day," but really, stop complaining, it used to be a lot worse.

i did 0-70 under the original system, and at one point went three weeks of fishing every day for minimum 4 hours a day, without a single skillup.

if you're getting a majority of monsters/items, you're doing it wrong.

go to www.finalfishing.com and use the database to find a rod/lure/bait appropriate to your skill level. their database is up to date up to WotG (and if you're still skilling, that means it covers any fish you can catch).

showmo is absolutely right, fishing is the only craft where you can make money skilling up at all times. do you have a lu shang's? if you don't and your skill is higher than 35-40, stop what you're doing, and either start fishing moat carp every day, or find a fish that either sells well on AH or NPCs well and fish those and buy your carp.

but honestly, just do some research. if you're only interested in skilling, find a fish that's 10-20 levels higher than your skill, that bites a lure (so you don't spend money on bait) and won't break your rod/snap your line and just fish. you are literally pulling gil in with every fish.

The major problem with fishing is that it is all but impossible to catch a fish without using a fishing a bot. It takes about a half second to respond to the pole moving into position so that the fish can be weakened. It stays there for a half to two seconds and then moves back to the neutral position. During the half second it takes to release the button at least all of the health that the fish had lost recovers. With a bot the response time is fast enough to actually catch a fish.

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Originally Posted by Nicholiathan

The major problem with fishing is that it is all but impossible to catch a fish without using a fishing a bot. It takes about a half second to respond to the pole moving into position so that the fish can be weakened. It stays there for a half to two seconds and then moves back to the neutral position. During the half second it takes to release the button at least all of the health that the fish had lost recovers. With a bot the response time is fast enough to actually catch a fish.

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This has been an issue with newer and fast PCs for a couple of years now. The issue is related entirely to client side lag, so there is no easy solution for Square Enix to work with other than reducing the difficulty of harder fish, which in return will make the fish incredibly easy for slower PCs and PS2 users. Because new and fast PCs have almost no lag, the response times to react while depleting fish HP is instant, giving little time to react.

Basically, the more lag you have (to an extent), the easier it is to deplete the fish's HP. This means older PCs and PS2 users are at an advantage while fishing. Users with fast PCs have been known to use programs such as CPUGrab to add some extra lag to their CPU, thus simulating a slower PC and making it easier to pull up targeted fish (or rather, simulating the difficulty it was intended to be).

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Originally Posted by Martinius

and at one point went three weeks of fishing every day for minimum 4 hours a day, without a single skillup.

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yea.. thats kinda the point of asking for it to be revised. Not only does everyone not have the option of spending THAT much time on a game every day for such a long period of time, but even if you do, its a waste of ALOT of time. Time that ppl could use doing more important things.

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Originally Posted by Godofgods

yea.. thats kinda the point of asking for it to be revised. Not only does everyone not have the option of spending THAT much time on a game every day for such a long period of time, but even if you do, its a waste of ALOT of time. Time that ppl could use doing more important things.

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that was under the OLD system. back when there was no "mini-game." your delay between casts was determined by your fishing skill (14 seconds to start, removing 1 second every 10 levels), there was no fishing message about good feeling or terrible feelings, and the only way to discern fish (or for that matter, monsters) was to go into first person mode and try to see how much your character was sweating.

that all changed with the major fishing update in early 2005. the rate of skillup is honestly not that bad. vonn, i don't know how you managed to get two pelican rings and not know where to fish with appropriate bait/lure, but as i said earlier, use finalfishing.com to find the best combos. (all i can think is that you read somewhere that you could use robber/rogue rigs to catch moat carp and are using that instead of insect paste, but you didn't give enough info in your post)

@nicholiathan, the best advice i can give is to get a controller for your computer. that will make it significantly easier to catch fish. there are still fish that are awful to catch, but most of the time they become manageable using albatross and penguin rings. that said, when i was going for my ebisu, i dug out my old ps2 for fishing gugs. they were the only fish i was unable to catch on a pc. and no, i've never used a bot.

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Originally Posted by Martinius

vonn, i don't know how you managed to get two pelican rings and not know where to fish with appropriate bait/lure, but as i said earlier, use finalfishing.com to find the best combos. (all i can think is that you read somewhere that you could use robber/rogue rigs to catch moat carp and are using that instead of insect paste, but you didn't give enough info in your post)

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I typed like 3 long responces to this already and they didn't post right, so i'll TL;DR it. I know rod/bait combos and research them on all fish i go after to isolate them from other fish. Items and monsters aren't prevented by rod/bait combos they bite on all rods and baits. It's probably because i am going after too high level of fish. my fault.

ah i see. do you have a lu shang's? if you don't, that's going to play a large role in how well you can catch fish above your level. i wouldn't go after anything more than 10-15 levels above your skill w/o a lu, and even then, i wouldn't go much above 25 levels w/ one.

the fishing system is fine how it is imo. Like people said its pretty much free to to fish and you make gil with ever catch. Don't think they need to make it easier or increase skill ups or anything. If you are having trouble skilling up you need to use the skill up rings, change your tactic (how many levels above you the fish is you are trying to catch), etc. And I hope you are doing your daily guild points.

I tell people who complain about gil to fish, even though I usually complain about not having gil (I spend it all on gear/spells)
I've fished from the start and though I miss the no-real-need-to-pay-full attention of the old days, I do like the new system better...I do wish skill-ups were more frequent some days, but I'm trying to get from 95-96 on Black Sole, so I know it's slower, but the money is good...I'm not looking forward to 96-100 because it's almost all legendary fish, but fishing really does pay for itself at least 100 times over for every skill level you go up...more if you're using lures instead of bait...I only fish a few hours a week right now, but it still is a nice, steady in-game income
plus if you're 30+ fishing skill, ferry fishing for marlin can net you pop items for the fight to get merc kris, which still goes for 3 mil or so

sad thing for me atleast, i have no deisre to realy fish for the sake of gill. I jsut want to be able to skill it up since the rest of my crafts are done (or nearly done). So when i would fish for hours on end, and not get a single +.1 skill up, its highly fusturating and highly discourageing. Hell, id trade every fish back to the ocean/lake/river/stream/water if it gave me better skill ups.

Or, dispite even useing the best rod/bait/location combos (minus lu shang) get two casts into the process and then get 20 'not even a nibble' lines.

Elaborate. What skill, what gear, what fish?

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Originally Posted by Corwin

Elaborate. What skill, what gear, what fish?

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its been so long now..
i think the last time i fished was around lvl 20 for nebs with a hyclone rod and shrimp lure/crayfish paste.

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Originally Posted by Corwin

Elaborate. What skill, what gear, what fish?

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If your want to get fishing skill to 27 Godofgods has the right set up, halcyon rod and shrimp lure or crayfish balls (i always have more luck with the crayfish balls) then after that swap your setup to halcyon rod/minnow for cone calamary which will take you to lvl 48.

if fished through 12 stacks of paste before and not gotten a skingle skill .1 skill up

Sounds like you haven't touched a fishing pole in ~5 years. While Moat/Neb/Cone are still an option, Nashmau has proven to be best route for quite some time with Lu Shang with Rogue Rig and Shrimp Lure. No monsters, targeted fish, no rod snaps, no line snaps, no lack of skill, AH/Moogle/Vendor less than a minute walk away, and you can level 0-90 catching three different fish with pure profit. And honestly you don't even *need* a Lu Shang, it just makes it easier with no rod snaps and losing a 10k lure.

And you don't know frustration until you go 0/1000 on Ebisu trades (over 15M in fish).

fishing 100 6/23/09 (G 1/104~~L 1/44) ebisu 10/18/09 took 4 years, buddy of mine would form a fishing alliance & we just had fun & cheered when someone got that elusive skill up!! only fished when time allowed. Quested lu shang's, took 2 months, w/buddy's help, & I bought 1/3 of moats

My brother went 0-27 in 4 days in SSG with a halcyon rod fishing nebs.


It's fine the way it is.

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Originally Posted by Corwin

Sounds like you haven't touched a fishing pole in ~5 years.

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Hasnt been quite THAT long. Tho after fishing for 5-10 min.. i sure FEEL like its been 5 years lol

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Originally Posted by Corwin

While Moat/Neb/Cone are still an option, Nashmau has proven to be best route for quite some time with Lu Shang with Rogue Rig and Shrimp Lure. No monsters, targeted fish, no rod snaps, no line snaps, no lack of skill, AH/Moogle/Vendor less than a minute walk away, and you can level 0-90 catching three different fish with pure profit. And honestly you don't even *need* a Lu Shang, it just makes it easier with no rod snaps and losing a 10k lure.

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I wasnt aware of that. What kind of fish are targeted, if you dont mind? And yea, iv losted to many lures, thats why i stoped fishing with them lol

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Originally Posted by Corwin

And you don't know frustration until you go 0/1000 on Ebisu trades (over 15M in fish).

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Probably not quite like that.. But i do d/c every three hours on the mark, with some occastional d/cs thrown in the mix.. that can get rather furstrating when your doing something important or timed.

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Originally Posted by kaht

My brother went 0-27 in 4 days in SSG with a halcyon rod fishing nebs.

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well be sure to /slap him for me next time you see him. and while your their, steal soem of that skill and bring it over here.

I got into the 40s just getting my lu shangs, I was targeting the moat carps but gold carp which isn't even hard to catch caps at around 45 or so, no monsters and the worse thing is the crayfish, well rusty gear but you can always tell you have that on the line, just sit out in north sandy and you will get lu shangs/skill in no time

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Originally Posted by skirmishinghowl

just sit out in north sandy and you will get lu shangs/skill in no time

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Im sure their are many a fishermans from the days of old in FF that would love to /slap you for saying such a thing.

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Originally Posted by Showmo

I think fishing is fine the way it is. I believe the reason it takes much more longer to skill up is because you can get all of your skills literally for free (while selling your catches for about 10k a stack without really spending anything). Fishing everyday until the 200 fatigue cap from level 0 (only on fish that give skill ups of course) can get you level 100 fishing in about a month, maybe 2 months at most if you stayed dedicated. Now unless you were rich, leveling a normal synthesis craft to 100 would take roughly 1-2 months as well with enough dedication.

As for catching many items or monsters, have you tried checking wiki for a good bait combo for the fish you're trying to catch? Although sometimes wiki can be wrong, certain baits (or even the location) may not be that great for catching certain fish. Areas like Bastok tend to have a lot of rusty buckets or items compared to other locations.

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You can only fish up to 200 a day? or up to 200 can get exp a day? That's lame.

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Originally Posted by Nicholiathan

The major problem with fishing is that it is all but impossible to catch a fish without using a fishing a bot. With a bot the response time is fast enough to actually catch a fish.

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wow are you kidding me? really? slow reflexes? SE please get this persons info, bet there boting or was. These is nothing wrong with the fishing system. Been fishing for years and never have to farm. what would you like next? free bait? lol ^^

O and with that name Nicholiathan, bet your on my server. I'll be keeping an eye on you. :)

For the past week or more I have only been able to get about 150 fish per day, often considerably less. Using lu rod and robber rig for trumpets in Vunk with the crafted fishing gear. Did they change something recently or am I somehow getting more fatigued than normal for no reason...

If they make it easier to get level 100 fishing then the profitability of fishing + cooking would crash due to the market being flooded.

I don't see how getting to 100 easier would reduce profitability, if you can get to about 50-60 fishing then you're pretty much good as far as profitable fishing goes, and even at that skill you can still catch a lot of fish that are higher levels which are used for cooking. What I would like to see is higher skill up rates when the pelican ring is active though, I know it works, but it feels like it doesnt some times.

After reaching what you think is the stamina limit, have you tried zoning to a different area and fishing for lower level fish?

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Originally Posted by Godofgods

fishing absolutly should be changed. Its beyond a tideous and boring task. Im in the process of finishing my WW from 95 to 100 and my very last subcraft from 51 to 60, but i will not touch a fishing pole again. I simply cant stand it. You can sit their for hours fishing and not even get a single +.1

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I'll bet your very last subcraft from 51 to 60 is goldsmithing :)

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After reaching what you think is the stamina limit, have you tried zoning to a different area and fishing for lower level fish?

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I will try that today to see if it's a limit with the fish for some reason.

Changing zones, logging off/on, waiting several hours, trying to catch lower level fish or anything at all does not work when I hit my (very low) fatigue cap for the day. I'm guessing this is why they have to do the update next month.

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Originally Posted by Godofgods

I wasn't aware of that. What kind of fish are targeted, if you don't mind? And yea, I've lost too many lures, that is why i stopped fishing with them lol

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Stage 0.5: Nebimonite
Fishing Levels: 0-27
Area: Ship between Mhaura/Selbina or Sea Serpent Grotto
Bait: Halcyon Rod (or Lu of course) & Crayfish Paste
Notes: Skip moats and hit these up for 27 levels. They sell incredibly fast on the AH for about 9k per stack. To save more gil, buy the crayfish paste at the fisherman's guild for dirt cheap. I'm sure they were exaggerating, but people said they made almost enough to buy a Lu from AHing these from 0-27 instead of spending time on Moats and random other fish. I imagine if you would like you can start Istiridye earlier than 27 assuming you have a Lu, a friend began them at level 7 with a Lu.
***ADDITIONAL NOTE: I've heard Nebs dont bite very well until around 15, so it may be best to just do moats from 0-11.

Stage 1: Istiridye
Fishing Levels: 0-53
Area: Nashmau
Bait: Robber Rig
Notes: These are incredibly easy to reel in and stack. If you are a bit patient they will sell on the AH for 7k a stack, or find a high level bonecrafter who synths them into black pearls and sell to them directly for a negotiable price. They also NPC for 300ish gil. I made 70k my first day just NPCing these while racking in a couple fishing skill levels from 30-33ish. I currently dbox them to a high level bone friend for 5k a stack.

Stage 2: Mercanbaligi & Ahtapot
Fishing Levels: 53-90
Area: Nashmau
Bait: Shrimp Lure
Additional Location: Talacca Cove, W exit of Nashmau through Caederva Mire near Einherjar entrance.
Notes: A friend prefers Talacca Cove, the difference is in Talacca you will also fish up Dil's which you will not in Nashmau. NPC rates seem to vary on these from about 600g on Mercs to 700gish on Ahtapots. Mercs are the Eastern equivalent of Bastore Breams and Ahtapots are the Eastern equivalents of Grimmonites. Dil's npc for almost 800g each and are the eastern version of black sole which cap at 96.

[i]This is where a few options seem to open:

Stage 3 Option A: Pterygotus
Area: Nashmau
Fishing Levels 90-99
Bait: Lugworm
Notes: Biterate is acceptable, and these will not break a Lu.

Stage 3 Option B: Dil
Area: Talacca Cave
Fishing Levels: 90-96
Bait: Shrimp Lure
Notes: You will also hit Mercs (single !) which are already capped, and also Ahtapots (!!!) which cap at 90 but the bite rate of hooking dils is similar to Pter's and you will make nice gil off the other 2 fish in the meantime.

Stage 3: Option C: Cave Cherax
Area: Quicksand Caves
Fishing Levels: 86+ or more likely 99-100
Bait: A MEATABALLS
Notes: These will snap a Lu Shangs and/or your line. If you go this route and do not have WW high enough to repair consider buying multiple Lu's.

Stage 4: Option D: Armored Pisces
Area: Oldton Movalpolos
Fishing Levels: 86+ or more likely 99-100
Bait: Sinking Minnow
Notes: These *will not* snap a line or rod if the fish is completely depleted. Bite rate seems to be equal or possibly better than Cave Cherax.

Stage 5: Option D: Lik/Gugs
Area: Lufaise Meadows, Open Sea Route Mhaura/Al Zahbi
Bait: Minnow, Meatballs
Notes: If you are lucky enough to have an Ebisu by the time you cap Ahtapot 90 in Talacca Cove skilling off these is a profitable option. I personally skilled 90-100 off Liks and made quite a fortune bazaaring some for 15k and unloading others to lsmates for 10k each and helping them obtain an ebisu. This really wouldn't be a great idea if you had a Lu, but if you were lucky enough to have an Ebisu at this point, the skill ups were quite decent.
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TLDR Fishing for Dummies Version:
All done in Nashmau:
0-53 Robber Rig, Istiridye (If no Lu, Halcyon to 27 on Nebs)
53-86 Shrimp Lure, Mercanbaligi & Ahtapot
86-99 Lugworm or Sinking Minnow, Pterygotus
99-100 QSC, Meatballs/Cave Cherax OR Oldton Movalpolos, Sinking Minnow/Armored Pisces, OR Lik/Gugs Minnow/Meatballs

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Credit for the guide goes to cdgreg