Fishing... we need to talk.

[KupoSan]

Credentials: I've caught all but 1 fish that is located under the pre-heavensward fishing category* at this time. I've caught over 13,000 fish. I fished before Heavensward, and after Heavensward. Due to content drought, I decided to complete my fishing log. Here are my questions, complaints, and suggestions:


1. Fishing takes a very long time. I know it's meant to be soothing and relaxing. I know it's meant to prevent RMT from abusing it. I know it's meant to mimic real life. But, why is it so slow and restrictive? For example: On Botanist, I can pick my own item I want to gather (unless it's hidden, of course). On Botanist, I can gather probably 100 logs in the time it'd take me to gather 20 fish, and of those 20 fish maybe 3 are the ones I actually wanted. The time in which I cast my line to when I reel (on a normal fish) can take anywhere from approximately 5 seconds to 10 seconds. It's varied per fishing hole, per zone, per area, every time. We're not even talking about 'big fish' right now. For big fish, I've watched my Patience timer go from 35-0 before getting a bite. Wut?

2. Fishing is restrictive. Taking from Point 1, I cannot choose the fish I want. I cannot choose if I want to make it HQ 100%. I cannot catch multiples of the same fish at the same time (Botanist can use Blessed Harvest I or II and gain multiples) unless I get really lucky and catch them back to back. To a point, you can argue we can. You can say, "But Kupo, can't you use certain bait? Honey worms always catch silver fish!" I'd retort with, yes, out of the 423 fish, maybe a few of are bait exclusive, but I'd wager less than 5 fish are. We aren't even talking about mooching yet. I don't want MORE bait, but I want the option to choose which I want. Maybe if "Release" worked where you released the fish and never caught that same type again for a short duration, that'd be nice. . .

3. Fishing is TOO RNG BASED. I completed Feast of Famine quest just recently. I've caught all but 1 big fish. Why are we heavily plagued with RNG? Let me explain.

• Weather: Has to be a certain weather to catch your fish. This makes sense, right?
• Weather> Weather: Wha? I mean, I guess I can understand, but this reduces the chance of your window in that zone being open...
• Bait: No brainer, that's fine. I wish our fishing log would tell us what the fish's favorite bait is after we catch it, though. Otherwise, let me open Google...
• Mooch: Okay, not too bad. But 1/10 I catch with max perception is HQ. That's not fun?
• Mooch> Mooch: This is evil. Sorry, but evil. I like the concept IF 5/10 fish we caught were HQ.
• Time of Day: Every gathering class has this. I'm okay with this. Leave this.
• Multiple big fish pull on same line. "This is not the big fish you are looking for *waves hand*"
• Not 100%: Just because it bites, doesn't mean you can reel it in. This is despite your gear. On top of all the above.
• All of the Above: WHAT? WHY? Weather>Weather at a certain time using a certain bait mooching and mooching your mooch with a high percent chance to fail reeling your fish despite your gear.... Srsly?

Quite simply, there are some fish that I'm searching for that have only had the *right conditions* appear once in 24 real life hours. If you miss that window, good luck finding it until tomorrow. Better hope you aren't at work or school when that one opportunity arises. Why are we plagued with multiple RNG factors? I don't want them all taken away. I quite like a challenge and a grind, but it's frustrating when I can't even try to fish because the weather isn't right, or the combination of weather effects aren't in order, or I can't get the mooch or double mooch, or the weather happens... at the time which the fish can't be caught. Of these big fish, how many of them are actually useful? You know, out of over 110 big fish we can catch, maybe 10 of them had the chance of desynthing into useful items, 10 of them were used for quests or items, and the other 90 were worthless. More fine sand for all! Also, if I'm max Heavensward gear with OVER 200 Gathering and Perception PAST the cap of which we were able to catch these fish, WHY do they still get away? If it was a 50-50 chance, I could be on board. These are LEGENDARY fish, so they need to be hard. But after I've met all of your qualifications to have a *small chance* of catching it, I can't catch it after all.

4. Our abilities are crap. Now, they are MUCH better than pre-Heavensward... but let's be honest. Chum takes 145/623 of my GP. That's too much. Patience does a great job to increase the rate in which I get my HQ fish, but when I use Precision or Powerful Hookset, it does NOT negate the inefficient hooking status. Reading the tooltip, it says it should "Negate the inefficient hooking status." It decreases it greatly, but I still miss my HQ fish (I am not talking about big fish, just normal fish). I understand it says it does not work on certain types of fish, but I'd argue it doesn't work on all types of fish 100%. Patience II says it increases the likelihood of catching big fish, but I'd like to know what % it is. It would be nice if they included that in the tooltip, since they've included every other percentage. Once you use these HUGE GP sucking abilities, you have hardly any for your hooksets. You have 4-5 tries over the two minute (1 game hour) period. Also, better hope you're not typing and ACCIDENTALLY hit WASD because if you do, and you get up... all of your GP is now gone and your abilities reset. Thanks Square Enix, that's really cool of you. Why is it we can't use cordials while the ability is on? Is that really TOO OP? But then again, if Botanist can't do it, I'm okay with us not being able to as well. Also, we don't know for sure what fish need Precision versus Powerful hookset. We are assuming that normal tug = precision, and big fish tug = powerful... but we don't know for sure. And also, shouldn't the GP be reversed or at least the same for these abilities? I use precision hookset more than powerful, so why not reverse the GP cost?

5. Inventory is trashed. I have a HQ fish, and a NQ fish. I have at least 20 types of bait on me. My desynthesis is capped, but it takes about 5 minutes to desynth all of my fish. And I can't even build a sandcastle with all of my fine sand. We don't have a tacklebox *PS3 LIMITATIONS I'm looking at you.* Really? What are half these fish for, anyway? Out of the 423 fish we can catch, let's assume that 200 of them have purposes (cooking, questing, desynthing, etc.). What are the other 223 for? I love to read the biographical information on my fishing log, but that's... really all they are worth. They clutter things up. I'm not upset about the variety. I'm upset about the lack of purpose these fish have. I'm maxed on water shards and hit all the desynthesis achievements involving quantity desynths. Plus, if you desynth fish while you go, you will have even LESS inventory because you now have fine sand NQ, fine sand HQ, all spectrums of the rainbow pigment colors, and then some random junk.


Suggestions:

• Decrease the time by 1/3 that it takes once we cast our line out. It should still be realistic, but it's way too long for a game.
• Let us choose, after we've already caught the fish once, what fish we'd like to *increase the likelihood of catching*. For example, I arrive at a pond. I look at my fishing log. I want to catch Black Eels. It says, "Select the fish you want." I select Black Eel. "Select the bait you want to use." I select a certain bait. There is a menu with a % near it that shows the percentage increases and decreases depending on my bait, i.e. if I use a sinking lure my percentage is 85%, but if I use honey worms it's now 80%. It should never be 100%, as in real life sometimes you can't always catch what you want, but there's a pretty darn high chance if I'm at a pond that has bass in it, I'm going to nearly always get bass (or a coke bottle... a twig... maybe a shoe).
• Reduce RNG. You can do this 2 ways. Either have one or two restrictions (weather and time, or mooch and time, or mooch and weather), but not all of them at one time. OR, give us an ability to negate the weather. For example, let it cost 250GP and for 3 minutes, it negates the weather condition. It's tooltip can be something like, "You hone your senses and add a special attractive bobber on your line, making it irresistible to even the sneakiest of fishes for a short duration." Time of day restrictions should still apply, as they apply to nodes for Botanists and Miners.
• Fix our pre-existing abilities. Reduce the GP for all abilities. Example: Move {after/before} GP cost
  [Chum should be 50/145]
  [Patience 250/470]
  [Patience II 300/560]
  [Powerful Hookset 50/74]
  [Precision Hookset 40/85]
  [Release 50/0 (Additional affect: for 3 minutes, no longer catch this fish NQ or HQ)]
  [*new ability* Bobber 300/0: Negates all weather restrictions for fish for 3 minutes.]
  Allow our status to stay active regardless if we move or not. I can understand not allowing us to use cordials since Botanist can't after they've started gathering, but we have to move if the "fish sense something amiss" while Botanist can stare at the same tree for hours (unless it's a special timed node).
• Implement a tacklebox, or allow us to use some of the "Key Item" slots for our bait. Allow a "Quick Desynthesis" button that we can check off the fish we want to quick desynth. Give the fish more purpose. For example, something that I'd love is being able to trade a NPC a bunch of fish and get a random item in exchange. Sort of like Mutamix. Don't make it broken by giving really good items, but allagan goldpieces, or rare dyes, or crafting materials. Example: "A gormet chef loves to make fish stew. Bring him 5 fish, and he'll give you what he thinks it's worth!"
• Also, let us change our bait while we are on our chocobo. I don't see how this is not a thing already. Also, allow desynthing on your chocobo. I can desynth fish on the go.

tl;dr: Fishing takes too long. Fishing is too random. Fishing abilities are better, but still crap. Fishing inventory is stupid. Fish are super worthless. Fishing has a bunch of flaws. Fishing can be better. Fishing is fun, but could be really fun. Tweak abilities and GP costs please.

This concludes my rant and ideas, my questions and concerns, and my thoughts and feelings. By no means are these cure-all fixes, but I hope to stimulate discussion and ideas. I do hope the dev team takes note of how fishing is as unpopular as it appears to be when talking to people around me. Granted, it may be popular to a lot of people and me not know it. You know, I asked 20 people about fishing (gotta love my sample size...) and 1 said he liked it, 18 said it was boring and they hated it, and 1 said he wanted to do it but it was pointless.

And before I leave... Please look forward to it:



P.S. There's a glitch that's very annoying that occurs. If you hit Patience I or II and cast rapidly, with a macro involved "I.e. Hook/cast wait mooch macro" it will use all your GP and freeze your character not allowing it to do anything unless you get up, then lose all the GP you just used. Thought you guys might be aware of how screwy this is.

*editted the wording. I believe some were misreading what I wrote. I thought I explained it, but I have done a majority of my big fishing during Heavensward. I caught only a handful of big fish pre-Heavensward.

[Kazzoey]

Why not just have Chum work as aa 1-2 min buff? That would solve most of your problems.
Most of your complaints are really nitpicky and minor imo. The class isn't in high demand anyways so most people I know play it for fun and relax, which is how it should be played.

[KupoSan]

That is a good suggestion. I'm fine with any change that will benefit fisher moreso than what we already have.

[EddardStark]

I got to the part about double mooch and couldn't read anymore. Patience is enough of a nerf, stop whining.

[Bebekurenai]

I got to the part about double mooch and couldn't read anymore. Patience is enough of a nerf, stop whining.

Gotta love these guys, always a joy to look forward to their answers. Who would have thought you'd come to a forum to read eh?

Anyways, I'm with you Kupo. Fishing is fun yes, but waaaaaaaaaaaaay too much rng. It's very very time consuming too. Relaxing? Yes. Not serious? Depends. I like my check marks on stuff like fishing log and it's not complete and honestly, a pain.

Also I would add:

Fishing guide: make it a guide. Now it's just like the log but everything together in one place. It would be soooo muc more useful if it included the bait. This ain't a guide imo.

Also still after more than 2 years, the fatigue. Yes you can just move a few steps and it resets. Still, annoying. Serves no purpose. You say rmt? Botting? As if they would get a way around it...

I'm taking a break atm from fishing, I found out recently that I can't finish my log anyways cause there's special fish that needs a blue scrip book... and I thought there would be a hint somewhere >_>

:goes to the corner and whines:

[KupoSan]

EddardStark: If you're not going to read the whole post, please don't bring negativity into this thread. I want ideas, suggestions, etc. Thank you kindly, sir.

Bebekurenai: I agree. I touched briefly on the subject that after you catch a fish, it should give more information (such as which bait gives the highest percentage catch rate, etc.). It does need to feel more like a guide, in my opinion.

I don't want fishing to be... nerfed to the point where it's easy mode all day. I just want tweaks that make it more desirable for everyone to try fishing. I want it to be similar to Mining and Botany in terms of mechanics but yet still remain true to its fishing roots. If that makes sense.

[Tint]

i almost hate all of your ideas. but i have to agree: fish should not be that worthless D:

fisher is one of the last grind heavy things in the game (excluding glamour stuff) and i really like the grind. we have enough easy content. if you don't like the RNG and grind play botanist or miner. we don't need another class / gameplay element wich is just a copy from another class...

[Rufalus]

Maybe they could add an npc who takes your fish of a certain size or rarity in exchange for prizes like bait/lures and glamor fishing rods and clothing. Just thinking of some kind of fishing reward that doesn't rely on you having culinarian desynth skill. Oh, and consumables like aether tickets and magicked prisms could be offered so we still have things to exchange our fish for after we've obtained all the glamor pieces.

[MistyMew]

I dont hate your ideas at all Kupo, in fact you are 100% right and see it as it is, not with blinders on like some do.

I dont spend hoards of time fishing for the very reasons you mentioned.

There IS too much rng in fishing and I agree about the abilities as well, especially Patience.

[LineageRazor]

I agree with some of these points and disagree on others.

On "too RNG based", I'm in near complete disagreement. All the RNG-heavy fish are completely optional - there's little or no market for them (and, in fact, the hardest to catch aren't even tradable). You fish them up because you want to catch 'em all - that's it. Making them easier to catch undermines this achievement, bigtime. Filling out your fishing log is a test of patience and persistence, and that's just how it should be. For the majority of "commercial" fish (useful, sellable fish), there's usually a lure or bait or location that makes fishing them up in large quantities easy; we don't need any additional methods for "focusing" on such fish.

I'm in agreement that some of the FSH abilities aren't well thought out. Chum is an excellent example - there's almost never a good reason to use Chum, and it's WAY too expensive for what it does. Another peeve of mine is the fact that you can no longer use Hooksets when Patience wears off, in spite of the fact that the catch rate penalty for Patience persists. I can see no good reason for this.