Heavensward Fishing Abilities: I don't understand.

[Ninster]

Granted, I've actually mainly through catching up my Fishing Guide from 2.x, so I haven't hit any of the Heavensward spots yet. Anyway, thanks to how ridiculously fast FSH seems to level, I'm lvl 54 right now and I can't make much sense of what I've earned.

1. Snagging: When did we get this? It's a pre-50 ability, but I don't remember having it before. So given the vague description, what am I suddenly able to catch by having this on?

2. Patience: No questions on the skill itself, but...

3. Powerful Hookset: "Negates the Inefficient Hooking status. Has no effect on some fish." From my usage of this so far, it's hard to tell just what it works on and what it doesn't. Sometimes I wonder if it's better to save 74 GP and roll the dice on Hook anyway.

4. Chum: So... the amount of time that's reduced is about the same amount of time it takes for the animation?

[Nezerius]

1. Snagging was added in 3.0, it allows you to catch timeworn maps, so you don't accidentally catch one while fishing normally
2/3. Powerful Hookset is used on fish that cause a medium/heavy tug, larger fish that have a more noticeable animation when biting onto your lure/bait.
Precision Hookset (lvl 56 ability) is used on fish that cause a light tug, smaller fish that have a less noticeable animation when biting.
4. Guess it can be used if you want to squeeze in one last catch before the patience buff runs out, personally never used it as I wouldn't have the gp for it at that point.

[kuma_aus]

I've found Chum really useful for just normal fishing. I needed a bunch of Red Coral for some crafts and Chum reduced the time I spent fishing by a large margin.

[Gralna]

chum is also good for catching legendary fish, when you only have a short amount of time to catch them while you have the fisher's Intuition buff.

[Keldion]

Chum has been useful to me in Diadem fishing.

[Sida]

Snagging, yes, before the HW you got maps semi automatically whole fishing, while on the miner and botanist you could always choose if you wanted to pick them or not (say, you were fishing on lower level node you wanted that day's map). HW introduced skill snacking you have to have active when you want the maps so no accidentally getting lower level fish map than you intended.

The powerful and precise hooksets only become useful when you have enough GP that you can use them for whole duration of the buff that requires them. After that point though, they are rather useful because otherwise actually pulling up stuff under the buff that uses them is hard. About which one to use, if you used rumble enabled controller, the fishes give either one or two rumble pulses when they bite. Powerful hookset to those with double rumble.

[LineageRazor]

Note, there are some fish that require Snagging to catch, as well - mostly corals and bivalves. It's not just for maps. Though it IS pretty glorious, not catching maps by accident anymore!