[dev1008] Fishing Updates! Hurrah!

[Kari]

Thank you for considering updating the Fishing system, SE!
I really, really like what you have displayed for us so far.

I'd like to give three small suggestions towards the future of Fishing, though.

1> Allow us to keep our line out during Fishing, until we get a bite.
Currently, if you fish and don't catch anything right away, you reel your line back in, forcing you to cast it back out.
Not only is this really annoying, but it's not very realistic for a fishing system.
What kind of Fisherman reels in their line every 10 seconds, just to throw it out in the same spot due to not catching anything? =P

Basically, if we don't get a bite, display a message saying you didn't get a bite, but don't reel the line in. This way, we can still get messages explaining that we didn't catch anything [mostly for fatigue notices], but we can continue waiting for a fish to bite without waiting the delay to re-cast.

2> More possibilities to alter what we catch.
Currently, I'm a bit above 40 fishing and own a Lu Shang's Fishing Rod.
My problem, is that whenever I go fishing, 60% of my catches are monsters/items, 20% are "You didn't catch anything", and 20% are my target fish.
It should be fairly obvious that this results in extremely slow skill-ups and fish catching.

My suggestion towards this, is to give us access to more options to change what we catch. Gear, consumable item buffs, food, etc. Maybe even new bait? Basically, I want to be able to reduce item and monster catches. And maybe in other situations, reduce fish catches for more items or monsters.

I do know that there are a few pieces of gear that do have similar effects, however they mostly require what I don't have yet.
Like the Fisherman's Apron, which requires higher skill and guild rank than I currently have. I also don't know how much these items alter your catches.

3> Allows us to catch more fish in bulk. Currently, we do have a few fish that can be caught in 2s and 3s from Rigs and such, however, for many fish that we want this for, it's simply impossible.
It'd be nice to be able to use a rig of somesort to reel in 3 Moat Carps by chance! [I know you can very rarely catch a Moat Carp with a Rogue/Robber rig, but you can't catch more than one.]


Again, thank you for the updates SE, everything you've been doing lately has been awesome.
Hope you take some consideration for more options in Fishing! Thanks for reading.

[oopsiedaisy]

I love fishing, I don't do it a lot but when I do it is mostly to relax and reduce stress. My problem though is that it is so difficult to get skillups. I have fished to 2 hours without a single skillup yet I am fishing for the fish that is at my lvl range. I know SE changed things a few years ago because of the problem with fishing bots and RMT but isn't there someway to get better skillups without bringing back the RMT problem?

[Randwolf]

Yeah, I'm all in favor. It is really annoying when I could easily catch a fish 20 levels above my skill but would struggle to reel one in 20 levels below my skill.

[Duzell]

I do love the challenge of reeling in fish that are 50+ levels above my skill in the current system, it reminds me of reeling in a Hylind Loach in Zelda OOT. It its a challenege and gives a sence of accomplishment when you manage to land something like a Bastore Bream with 12 skill.
I love the changes to the monster and large fish text as well as the small fish and item text since it allows to esc out of reeling in norg shells and damp scrolls, which have behavior very simmilar to a nebionite, thus allowing us to catch more money fish and less trash items.

[Xyon]

Fishing is the best! I myself just hit 70 skill recently, i hit that skill level while fishing up the GP fish of the day which finally brought me up to 100k GP so I got my apron and turned it into a smock right away! A glorious day indeed. Skill ups do seem sporadic though, I could use 2-3 ring charges in a row without a single .1, and then I could get a total of.8 in a single use of the ring.

I can understand wanting to have better control of what type of things you'd use to catch fish, I myself have dreamed of SE changing it so that fishing equipment looks something like this:
Main: Rod(lu shang, ebisu, hume, etc) Sub: Line (different types of line for reeling in lighter or heavier fish) Ranged: Hook/Lure Ammo: Bait

Kit out with the rod, line, and hook/lure you want to use, and then put the bait you want onto the hook/lure. All though its probably too complicated of a system and doesnt need to be that complicated.

Since you're fishing 40, I suggest keeping at it, maybe try to catch bhefhel marlins for treasure maps as well as skill ups, you'll hit about 60 after a time and then can move on to the next step.

[Ravensbane]

I like the new messages they are adding, but I think they need to figure out a new method of dealing with RMT/botters. I gave up on fishing when they added the 200 catch limit because I was intending to fish up the carp for a Lu Shang's, not buy the rod or carp for the quest. I understand that SE is a bit paranoid of RMT, but destroying one of the best minigames FFXI has to offer does not seem to be the way to go about it. Do they think that RMT and botters will only have one character fishing? All that that limit of catches has done was destroy honest players ability to realistically do the quest with their main character in a semi-timely manner.

It is not my intention to make this a gripe-fest post. I love the "fight the fish" method. It added a lot to fishing and took most of the boredom out of it. I would just like to see SE give the GM's back the power to look into matters in-game if players point out botters and RMT, rather than relying upon the report submittal on the SE site that requires multiple complaints before anything is done. If they plan to leave the 200 catch limit they should at least increase the skill-ups for fishing, a little, so it does not take a month for a .6 increase in skill.

[Kari]

Wow, I was sleepy when I posted this.
I started out saying "3 suggestions" and posted 2.
Nobody caught me there, but it's edited in now.

[Windblade]

Also, since Fishing is separated from other crafts (like you can get Lv.100 alchemy and Lv.100 fishing), I think it would be nice if we could also turn in fish for guild points as well as turning items in to at least one other craft without having to cancel fishing. I got to Lv.28 fishing only to find I can't turn in fish for guild points without canceling my Alchemy contract.

As for the items fished up, I agree with the original poster. It's frustrating to have stayed away from fishing for months, only to mule all my gear over and end up frustrated because I'm using the right bait and rod, but I'm catching junk, monsters, nothing, and an occasional fish I can skill up on. Add to that the low rate of skill ups, and it makes fishing even more annoying.

[Windblade]

Here's an idea... This is a game set in a land of magic. There's no reason why we can't get more of the fish we want through the use of magic. So what about low-level guild point key items that give you a special spell you can cast on yourself which works its way down through your pole, your fishing line, and on in to your bait or lure? It would ward off unwanted fish, attract more of the fish you want, and prevent junk from hooking your line.

As I recall, fishing was nurfed because of gil sellers, but why should legitimate fishermen be punished because of the actions of gil sellers? It certainly wasn't MY fault gil sellers came into the game.

Having junk and monsters does no good anyway. All I do is hit Escape because I don't want to stop fishing to kill something I can kill in two or three hits. I really do want to like fishing, but it's impossible to be thrilled with it the way it is now.

[Limecat]

I like the sound of all the changes in the pipeline. It's already not(usually) very hard to know what you've got on the line after spending some time with a given bait/location, but this is even better. One good thing about the critical bites for me is that I find it harder to tell some lower-level fish apart since they generally reel in easily. I wonder how often the crit bites will occur, if it's proportional in some way via comparison of your level and the fish, or if it's going to be a blanket proc rate as long as your level is one over that of whatever you hook. I'm also kind of curious if they'll work when you're wearing fishing gear to put yourself over.