Fishing

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Fishing is an alternate way to learn Foraging, Animal Lore, some Mechanical Lore, and Skinning. There are no requirements to fish other than possessing the proper gear, however fishing will cause Empathic Shock.

Gear

Required

• fishing pole (comes with line and hook)
• bait

Optional

• hook and string
• line
• hook
• hide scraper

Know Thy Enemy, Fisherman!

(table of fish data goes here)
(explanation of terms goes here)

How to Fish

Finding the fish

If you want to fish, you have to find a fishable body of water where fish live. Though you might find it tempting to try, there are no fish living on dry land or in most of the decorative fountains and horse troughs you might come across in life. The fish that do appear in these water bins can't be enticed to bite, either, if some sort of guard isn't coming around to drive you away in the first place.

So where are the fish? Most of the time it's fairly obvious, large rivers such as the Segoltha and Faldesu and lakes such as Lake Gwenalion in Therengia or Tethloren Lake in Aesry are teeming with the beasts. Some of the more friendly fisherfolk have strung their fishing-hole knowledge together at drtanning.net, but many tend to keep such things to themselves (no sense in giving away the one that got away, right?).

Regardless of who does or doesn't know about it, if you get this message then you can't fish there no matter how well-told the fish story was.

You can't cast the fishing pole here.  Try finding a body of water.

Getting your pole into the water

Ok, you finally found a good spot, now what? Well, first, you need a pole. There are a few fishing holes that someone has thoughtfully set up barrels of poles, extra line, extra hooks, and extra bait for us to use. Other places require you to bring all your own stuff.

Be sure to use the MY keyword or otherwise specify the container in your inventory if you are working with storebought gear and supplies in places where the free stuff is available, otherwise these commands will attempt to use those things

1. GET POLE -- gets a pole from the barrel of free poles, or a storebought pole from whichever container you stowed it in (free poles and storeboughts you haven't used yet are already baited)
2. OPEN POLE -- used to expand a storebought pole (that's collapsible, some aren't) so that you can fish with it
3. LOOK POLE -- lets you see information about your pole, such as what type of line, hook, and bait are on the pole as well as how much (if any) line is in the water
4. GET LINE -- adds line to your pole
5. GET HOOK -- gets a hook and ties it to your line
6. GET BAIT -- gets some bait and attempts to put it on your hook (it might take awhile to do, so stock up on patience)
7. CAST POLE -- lets you rear back and let fly, you can almost see the fish drool

How to get bites

Like all fishermen, each swears by different methods they are sure will catch more fish than any other way. Most are just superstitious, others might know a thing or two about what they're claiming. Here are some popular ones I've heard:

1. Let it drown -- cast your pole, get comfortable, and wait for something to happen (it will, too). Very easy on the scroll, at least until you catch something.
2. Snag, your it! -- cast your pole, then PULL POLE until something bites or you draw the line all the way in.
3. Dance for me (err, the fish) -- cast your pole, then use some combination of PULL POLE, PUSH POLE (puts more line in the water), WAVE POLE, and YANK POLE to cause fish to bite more. Doesn't really seem to work, and you may want to avoid doing so if you aren't the only one fishing there.
4. Beseech the Fishin' Gods -- cast your pole, then perform some sort of ritual with it involving DANCE POLE and SHAKE POLE. Not sure this does any good, but, hey, we can call upon the gods to make us better whatevers so why not?

Hey, I got a bite!

While the pole is in the water, you will get two types of messages.

The first message is about some sort of slight tremor. This is a fish testing out the bait it found, but it's not on the hook just yet. You can attempt to do things like above to entice a bite, but it's not clear this works.

The second message is about some sort of tug on the line. This is either a fish on your hook, or you've snagged some sort of junk (right now, the only thing it can be is seaweed). The way to tell is that a fish will start fighting, causing your pole to jerk around and your line to move around; seaweed doesn't do anything. Depending on the type of fish and what kind of gear you've got or what sort of life you've lived (ie, stats), it may eventually wear itself out or will do something bad to your pole--snatch it out of your hands, break it in half, break the line, etc. Sometimes it will just slip the hook on you.

To land the fish, just PULL POLE until you grab hold of the fish and remove the hook. Once landed, it's back to baiting the hook.

Things to know about

• Either not paying attention (skill-related failure when you have a bite) or moving around with the pole in the water will cause your line to tangle up. You have to UNTANGLE POLE before you can do anything else.
• There's a chance of breaking your pole if you PULL POLE when there's no line in the water.
• You have to wait 10 full minutes before grabbing another free pole, if for some reason you dropped or lost your previous one (this timer is started the moment you grab a pole, not when you lose it).
• You can't climb things with a pole in hand; without a container to put them in, this means the free poles can't be taken to every single nook and cranny where it's possible to fish.
• Look before you leap, a few fishing holes are in places where dangerous creatures can wander in on you and fishing poles are very terrible weapons to kill things with (note: they are literally not coded as weapons).
• Bait that has "never been alive" requires much less mechanichal lore skill to use than bait that is currently, or was previously, alive. Examples of easier baits: handmade flies and metal lures both sold on Ratha, and handmade worms sold in Langenfirth. This bait is suitable for novices or those with little mechanical lore skill.

What to Do with Your Catch

After you have caught a fish you can do several things with it, depending on what sort of fisherman you want to be.

1. Catch and release -- simply THROW FISH and you'll toss it as far away as you can manage
2. Keep it for later -- simply STOW FISH and you won't have to worry about putting down the pole
3. Stringing the fish -- Hooks and strings can be freely obtained from the fish buyer(ask buyer for string). They are wearable, and hold somewhere around a couple hundred stones. To string a fish, just PUT (fish) ON STRING. Strung fish are unable to be removed, so make sure you really want to do this before trying.
4. Gut the fish -- using a Light Edged weapon (size doesn't matter, so long as it fits this category), you can SKIN FISH to harvest parts from the fish. Possible choices are fish bones, fish eggs, (fish) giblets, and (fish) guts. The eggs, giblets, and guts are all edible. Fish can be gutted this way up to at least 4-5 times before the fish is completely consumed.
5. Scraping the fish -- After skinning the fish one time, you can then SCRAPE FISH for skinning experience. It's the same process as for pelts and skins, but you're unable to eat, throw, or sell the fish.
6. Sell the fish -- GIVE FISH TO FISH BUYER, and he'll give you a few coins for it. He pays by weight, but don't expect more than a few bronze (depending on fish size). The buyer will also take strung fish.
7. Weigh the fish -- if you have access to a leaderboard scale, you can put your fish on the scale to see if you have a champion or not. If you do, your name goes up on the leaderboard and the buyer will pay you more for it.

fish buyer locations

• Ratha - first tier near the docks
• Crossing - Amusement pier (estate holder only)
• Riverhaven