Fisher

**SephYuyX** · 2010-07-25 15:04

Mod Edit: Updated 8/30/10, credit for the 30+ abilities goes to Gulkeeva.

Hook, Line, and Sinker

Fishers are the harvesters of the realm's marine and freshwater animal resources. The goods they obtain from their catch place them in direct dealings with both culinarians and goldsmiths.
Be it from the shore of a sea, the bank of a river, or the deck of a boat, Eorzea's anglers must constantly account for a wide range of factors to optimize their success, including season, time, place, tools, and bait. In addition, the sometimes perilous nature of desirable fishing holes, be they on or offshore, above or below ground, prompts many fishers to employ the protection of more combat-oriented professions. The primary tool of the fisher is the fishing rod.

Abilities
● Gulleye (Rank 1 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: 12s )
◦ Survey the landscape to locate grade 1 schools of fish.

● Dowse (Rank 3 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: 60s )
◦ Survey the landscape to discern the number and direction of grade 1 schools of fish. Increase movement speed when deposits are far.

● Nature's Bounty (Rank 5 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: N/A - Recast: N/A )
◦ Increases your chance to locate rare items while gathering.

● Gulleye II (Rank 8 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: 12s )
◦ Survey the landscape to locategrade 2 and below schools of fish.

● Dowse II (Rank 10 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: 60s )
◦ Survey the landscape to discern the number and direction of grade 2 and below schools of fish. Increase movement speed when deposits are far.

● Veteran Trade (Rank 10 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: N/A - Recast: N/A )
◦ Increases your chance to hit items aimed for while gathering.

● Way of Plenty (Rank 15 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: N/A - Recast: N/A )
◦ Increases the remainder of gathering location.

● Gulleye III (Rank 18 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: 12s )
◦ Survey the landscape to locategrade 3 and below schools of fish.

● Dowse III (Rank 20 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: 60s )
◦ Survey the landscape to discern the number and direction of grade 3 and below schools of fish. Increase movement speed when deposits are far.

● Gulleye IV (Rank 28 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: 12s )
◦ Survey the landscape to locategrade 4 and below schools of fish.

● Dowse IV (Rank 10 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: 60s )
◦ Survey the landscape to discern the number and direction of grade 4 and below schools of fish. Increase movement speed when deposits are far.

● Wavekin Eluder (Rank 30 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: N/A - Recast: N/A )
◦ Temporarily avoid enemy encounters. Effective only against wavekin.

● Gulleye V (Rank 38 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: 12s )
◦ Survey the landscape to locategrade 5 and below schools of fish.

● Dowse V (Rank 40 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: 60s )
◦ Survey the landscape to discern the number and direction of grade 5 and below schools of fish. Increase movement speed when deposits are far.

● Gulleye VI (Rank 48 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: 12s )
◦ Survey the landscape to locategrade 6 and below schools of fish.

● Dowse VI (Rank 50 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: 60s )
◦ Survey the landscape to discern the number and direction of grade 6 and below schools of fish. Increase movement speed when deposits are far.

Extra Abilities(requirements currently unknown)
● Deft Grasp (Rank 1 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: N/A )
◦ Temporarily increases your dexterity.

● Tidal Faith (Rank 1 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: N/A )
◦ Temporarily increases your piety.

● Llymlaen's Ward (Rank 1 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: N/A )
◦ Temporarily increases your chance to obtain wind crystals.

● Clever Arc (Rank 1 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: N/A )
◦ Slows the rate at which a gathering location's remainder decreases.

● Master of Fish (Rank 1 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: N/A )
◦ Increases your chance to obtain high quality items while gathering.

● Thaliak's Ward (Rank 1 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: N/A )
◦ Temporarily increases your chance to obtain water crystals.

● Truth of Seas (Rank 1 - MP Cost: N/A - TP Cost: N/A - Cast Time: Instant - Recast: N/A )
◦ Increases your chance of obtaining crystals.

**Akujin** · 2010-08-16 01:12

Fisher Actions up to Rank 10: ffxivstrawhats.com/jobs/Fisher/

**Norellicus** · 2010-08-22 21:55

Seriously... am I missing something with fishing? The blind guessing on the jig meter is driving me to insanity.

**lvicious** · 2010-08-23 02:08

Well there is a decent guide out already. It might be posted on here or a link but I'm too fcking tired to search around. I don't have the link but it's like disciplesoftheland.com I think. It's the same dude who did Kida's final fishing or whatever for ffxi.

I feel like I got it figured out and got up to lvl 8 or 9.. forgot. it still is a guessing game and luck.

"The fish is taking line".. so you do the jig the complete opposite way but how far over is just pure guessing for example. If the fish is tired then you just jig to the exact same spot. so there is some logic to it but we'll see. I don't really care for fishing so far and I was die hard fishing in ffxi but it's early still.

Eventually I guess you'd get a feel for it like I kinda did but it just seems really random to me and I figured it out more on my own than trying to follow that guide.

Most info is speculation and theory and I'd give it time to get out of beta.. maybe even a few months or you will lose your mind.

At least it's not trying to run around doing leve quests and running out of time cause there are not enough mobs to kill. chiglet? pfft. ram? pfft lol.

**Norellicus** · 2010-08-23 04:58

Well no I actually get what I'm supposed to do once I get that text feedback, "The fish is taking line" and such; at that point it's a game of hot/cold. But the very first jig is completely blind with zero feedback, and it's really irritating to have to constantly recast lol.

**Acturus** · 2010-08-23 08:42

Originally Posted by Norellicus

Well no I actually get what I'm supposed to do once I get that text feedback, "The fish is taking line" and such; at that point it's a game of hot/cold. But the very first jig is completely blind with zero feedback, and it's really irritating to have to constantly recast lol.

According to the first link I clicked on when I searched for "ffxiv fishing guide" on Google, if that first jig doesn't hook the fish, and you do not change your depth when you cast a second time, then you are attempting to hook the "same" fish with you next cast.

http://www.gamesonsmash.com/2010/08/...hing-in-ffxiv/

If you do not pick the correct area, your character will pull in his line and recast–bringing you back to the interface to choose “Depth.” Do not change the depth and continue with that choice because now you know one of the four incorrect areas (he believes that you jig in one of 5 areas as part of the hot/cold). My experience has shown that the hookup area does not change unless one of two things happens: You change the “Depth” or you hook the fish.

So, that first blind jig, if the guide is correct and nothing changes with the mechanics, actually helps you narrow down hot/cold metric on subsequent casts.

**miokomioko** · 2010-08-24 05:53

It's unfortunately not true... I'm Rank 12 fisher and have done a lot of Grade 1~4 fishing points, and even that one Grade 9 right outside of town. I have hit dead-center repeatedly (I generally have the best results with that, and is statistically more likely to hook) and got nothing over and over... then recast, hit dead center again and got a hook. I'm pretty confident that each and every cast is blind luck whether you hit the invisible spot on the cast gauge. Just go to a high-grade fishing point and you can be there all day without hooking anything as it's unlikely you'll ever hit the spot, even if you eventually cover the entire Cast gauge with attempts.

As you have no bites, to a nibble, to a bite is making that sweet spot larger and larger so you're more likely to land in it the longer you wait. I -always- wait for a bite before even bothering with a Jig.

Your Fishing Rank vs. the grade of the fishing point also affects the size of the sweet spot as well as how many wait commands it will take to get a bite.

All these things in combination make it incredibly unlikely to pull anything out of a fishing point way past your skill.

**Tearshang** · 2010-08-24 07:06

I'm rank 13 fisher and I have never used the wait command. I noticed that when I kept at a certain depth the fish always spawn on a certain section of the Jig-dar (like mostly spawning on the right side, middle, left side, middle left, middle right.). Of course 7 out of 41 jigs hit outside this supposed spawn section. But like its said. Staying at the same depth the fish will not move on the jig-dar till you hook and catch or hook and fail after either of those it moves. This has been my experience without using wait.

**miokomioko** · 2010-08-24 15:58

So, I'm now Rank 13 playing around, grinding on Grade-1 crap and testing baits. I can hook a fish in first jig, no waits, about 90% of the time at this fishing point, so I know what I'm doing for the most part. Now, I usually go for dead-center, if that doesn't work, I go just barely left/right of it and work my way to the catching point (if I didn't catch first try, shit's easy here). Here's the last fish I caught...

First Jig
| | |o| | |
Nothing.

Second Jig
| | | |o| |
Nothing.

Third Jig
| |o| | | |
Hooked but couldn't reel it in.

Fourth Jig
| | |o| | |
Caught the fish.

Now if that doesn't imply that the fish moves around on the Cast Gauge between attempts, I don't know what could be going on.

Just a few tid-bits about bait usage that I've discovered/read. Also, when you hook a fish and fail to reel it in, there's a chance you'll lose your lure (which do catch kelps in any waters).

Bloodworms: All-purpose
Rat Tail: All-purpose (?)

Lugworms: Saltwater
Floating Minnow: Saltwater

Chocobo Fly: Freshwater
Moth Pupa: Freshwater

Crayfish Ball: River (are there any rivers in the game yet?)

Also, I noticed there's a secondary animation when you catch a fish that seems to indicate a difficult/rare catch. I've only seen Grade 1/2 of these catches, are they always the same depending on the grade/water?

Grade 1 Saltwater: Finger Shrimp
Grade 2 Saltwater: Helmet Crab

**Deadgye** · 2010-08-24 16:12

All disciples of Land seem to be 1 part hot and cold, one part random. With botany I've noticed that choosing your notch on the tree means nothing. You can choose the same spot over and over again and it won't even matter. I've picked a spot and failed at it or got the message "You damaged what felt like a blahblah". And then I picked that same notch again and got a completely different item and/or the sweet spot was somewhere else.

**miokomioko** · 2010-08-24 16:37

The game tutorial keeps saying that the angle at which you chop/jig/etc. is going to be determined by your notch/depth/etc. It might be just a... tendency for your target to be in a certain area based on your notch/depth/etc. but not 100%.

**miokomioko** · 2010-08-24 17:07

Ok, there must be something like an invisible "hook the fish" sweet spot, and when you hit that, a different invisible sweet spot appears that will catch the fish. I'm assuming the distance apart these two spots are is affected by the difficulty/rarity of the fish itself as well as the rank/grade difference.

This separation would explain why you could hit every spot on the gauge, then hook a fish, and the catch spot is way back where you've been trying before.

**Deadgye** · 2010-08-24 17:09

Originally Posted by miokomioko

The game tutorial keeps saying that the angle at which you chop/jig/etc. is going to be determined by your notch/depth/etc. It might be just a... tendency for your target to be in a certain area based on your notch/depth/etc. but not 100%.

That would make a lot of sense actually. And if it's true it would make it easier for you to try and go after a certain type of item. Hopefully more information on how this really works comes into the light.

**Loaar** · 2010-08-25 00:58

Fishing Skills so far:

Fisherman 1-10

Spoiler: show

**miokomioko** · 2010-08-25 01:23

Dowse II should be in there somewhere, I want to say it was like Rank 9 or 11...

description is obviously the same as Dowse, just for Grade-2 schools.

**miokomioko** · 2010-08-25 04:52

Also, I just got Nature's Bounty at Rank 15 Fisher.

Nature's Bounty (Trait)
Action Cost: 1
Fishing Optimal Rank: 5
Requires Discipline of the Land
"Increases your chance to locate rare items while gathering"

pretty damn sweet.

edit: I have yet to see it "activate" like Veteran Trade often does... but I did start repeatedly hooking obviously tough little fish that kill my Remainder bar extremely fast when I don't Jig in the correct direction. I did, however catch a Nautilus from these attempts. The item description is cut off too, heh.

"A giant cephalopod characterized by its spectacular whorling shell. Commonly found in the nutrient-rich Bay of Dha'yuz, the wavekin are thought by sailors and pirates to be the heralds of the"

**miokomioko** · 2010-08-26 01:57

Excuse my spamming of this thread, but... I figured I would post my current fishing system guide (at least as of Phase-3 Beta) here so it has somewhat of a home, assuming there are no completely severe changes in this system come launch. Will be edited if any changes or discoveries arise come Open-Beta. A majority of this information is personal experience cross-referenced with experiences of those reported on BG as well as some other very fishing-dedicated sources.

***Still unknown at this point is the effect of the Depth gauge. It is assumed to possibly encourage your target to tend towards a certain area of the Cast gauge or focus on a certain type of catch. It is also entirely possible that it does nothing at all yet.***

Fishing Points

Just about any body of water can be fished in, much like in Final Fantasy XI. The items that can be caught will be determined by said body of water's location, water type, "Grade," and the bait chosen. On top of the incredibly numerous areas to infinitely fish at any given time, there are also "Schools of Fish," which are exhaustible points that yield additional types of fish as well as higher quality catches than a non-school fishing point in the same vicinity could offer. Attempting to fish simply involves equipping a rod, bait, approaching some water and choosing "(!) Fish" from the main interactions menu.

Basics of Hooking/Reeling

Hooking: To successfully hook a fish, you must land the orange circle in a predetermined and invisible section of the Cast gauge with the "Jig" command. The location of this invisible sweet spot does not move unless you hook the fish or give up by using the Cancel command. Thus, you have infinite attempts to eventually hit the sweet spot and it is important to be thorough and aware of which areas of the gauge you have or have not landed on between successful hooking.

Reeling(Jigging): Once you hit this invisible hooking sweet spot and hook a fish, your "Remainder" bar will fill up to a certain amount (usually 50~75%). This Remainder bar represents your remaining stamina versus the currently hooked fish. Each attempt at reeling it in with the Jig command will deplete this stamina unless you either run out of stamina or successfully reel in your catch. If the Remainder bar depletes completely, you will lose your catch and your bait. If you failed while using a lure, there's a small chance snap your line and lose the lure.

After hooking a fish, your new goal is to, again, land the yellow circle on a new invisible sweet spot on the Cast gauge, which will successfully reel in your catch. This is essentially a vague game of Hot & Cold based on the resulting messages.

"The fish is taking line." = colder
"You take in some line." = warmer
"You take in a great deal of line!" = hot
"The fish has tired..." = you are on top of it but need to hit it one more time since your catch is strong.
"You catch the fish!" = success

Upon your initial hooking, you will automatically attempt to jig once from that same angle, immediately depleting one attempt-worth of your stamina, usually yielding the message "You hook the fish but cannot reel it in." This just means you didn't get lucky enough for your hooking sweet spot to line up with the catching sweet spot for an instant-catch. If you did get lucky, you, will either catch the fish instantly, or get a 'tired fish' message.

When you finally do succeed at reeling in your catch, you will receive up to 3 of the same item as well as a chance of up to 3 of a single element of aetherite shard/crystal/cluster believed to correspond with the item fished up.

Waiting
Before you attempt to jig, you are given the opportunity to "Wait," which can slightly increases your chances of success corresponding with the resulting message you receive from waiting which enlarges the invisible hooking sweet spot. This is primarily beneficial for decreasing your chances of wasting precious time during a Fishing Fieldleve or wasting your limited amount of attempts from an exhaustible school of fish, as even failed attempts at hooking expend an attempt at fishing a school. It's a very smal decrease in difficulty but it is also suggested to wait until you get a "bite" when fishing in high-grade waters for the very best possible chance at hooking something.

The messages received from waiting are in this order from smallest chance to hook a fish, to your best chances to hook a fish at your current fishing point.
"You feel no bites." > "You feel a nibble." > "You feel a bite."

Once you receive the "bite" message, there is no longer any reason to use the Wait command and you can proceed to jigging.

Baits/Lures

Very little is known about the exact effects of baits other than the small amount revealed in the official beta site's "Game Manual" thread and minimal testing. It revealed a few specific uses for certain types of baits. I had done quite a bit of testing and it is still foggy whether each bait has a list of specific fish it can catch, if it's simply restricted to usage in certain water types, or a combination of the two. Every bait, regardless of water type, is always capable of catching non-fish items like kelps, corals, etc.

Initial tests/information show the following bait uses:

All-purpose: Bloodworms, Rat Tails, Floating Minnows
Saltwater: Lugworms, Goby Balls
Freshwater: Moth Pupa, Chocobo Flies
Rivers: Crayfish Balls

Note: At this phase in the beta, there is only one Freshwater location (Grade-4) and zero River fishing points.

Grade/Rank/Fatigue

There are a great number of factors that can increase the difficulty of hooking and reeling in a catch at any given fishing point. Choosing to wait until you get a bite message will always reduce this difficulty by a small amount. However, using high-quality baits (+1~3) will significantly increase the size of your invisible targets on the Cast gauge, drastically reducing fishing difficulty.

Water Grade vs Fishing Rank: Each body of water (or subdivision of said body of water) has a Grade that represents, not only the difficulty of the fishing there, but also the types of fish that can be caught at that point. The higher your Fishing Rank is in comparison to the Grade of the water, the larger the invisible sweet spots will be on the Cast gauge as well as the less Wait commands it will take to obtain a bite on your line. Higher-Grade waters also yield increased amounts of Fishing Skill and Experience Points. As the game currently only has Grade 1, 2, 4, 8, 9, and 10 waters, and it is currently difficult to ascertain accurately which Ranks are capable of fishing realistically at which Grade waters. A rough estimate would be:

Grade-1 = Rank 1~8
Grade-2 = Rank 8~15
Grade-3 = You get the idea~

Fish Strength vs Fishing Rank: At just about every fishing area, there is one or more more difficult-to-catch fish that will challenge even a capable fisher in low-Grade waters. These tougher catches will noticeably drain your Remainder bar much faster, sometimes only giving you one chance to guess the right spot after you've hooked them. Also, these items tend to have a catching point significantly spaced apart from the initial hooking point. These catches can often be noticed by the alternate and much more intense animation that occurs when reeling them in. It appears that these tough catches can never be found in multiples or higher qualities.

Fatigue: Like everything else in the beta up to this point, too much fishing repetition will induce fatigue. Fishing fatigue causes reduction in the size of both sweet spots for hooking and reeling and compounds on top of all other difficulty-increasing factors making some fishing virtually impossible if enough of these factors are stacked against you. Fatigue also significantly reduces the chance of success at Spearfishing, which is mentioned below.

Spearfishing

One of the easiest and best ways to give a significant boost to your Fishing skill is making use of the Fisher's secondary tool, the gig. You can purchase a basic Bronze Gig from the Fishing Guild, which is essentially a long spear with a pitchfork-like tip, used to spear small fish, insects, foliage, etc. They are very few and far-between, but it is recommended search out any accessible Spearfishing points for gathering on a regular basis. They will always be in close-proximity to normal Fishing points and either in generally waist-high bushes/foliage or shallow waters you can walk through. Spearfishing points emit a glow of light-blue dots/streaks that are usually visible from quite a distance.

To spearfish, simply have a gig equipped in your off-hand, walk up to a spearfishing point and choose "(!) Spearfish" from the main interactions menu. That's all there is to it. It is simply chance whether or not you succeed in catching something from spearfishing, mostly based on your Fishing Rank and the Grade of the waters themselves (including any fatigue), as there is no other interaction involved. A success/failure at spearfishing will grant the same amount of Fishing Skill Points as a success/failure at reeling in a hooked fish in waters of the same Grade but will not yield any Experience Points. Upon successful spearing only, the spearfishing point will move just slightly but will always be immediately nearby.

Spearfishing points generally have anywhere from 6 to 9 attempts at gathering each time they are ready to be harvested, which is a significant boost to your Fishing Skill for very little effort. It is also a great way to find high-quality bait for use during important Fishing Fieldleves, Schools, or decidedly difficult fishing points. It will take several Earth hours to be able to Spearfish at the same point for a second time once you have exhausted it.

**Acturus** · 2010-08-26 13:15

I noticed my very last time of logging in, late Tuesday night, that when I started fishing, I was given a warning of sorts:

When I dropped my line initially, the warning was something to the effect of "You have 5 remaining chances at this harvesting point".

Curiously enough, when I caught a fish after 3-4 casts, it said "You have 4 remaining chances at this harvesting point."

Was I picking up someone else's chat log notifications, or was that part of the fishing minigame? I was west, I think, of Bearded Rock, in view of the town. All I remember was that I didn't see that information any previous time while fishing.

**Dakin** · 2010-08-26 14:11

Originally Posted by Acturus

I noticed my very last time of logging in, late Tuesday night, that when I started fishing, I was given a warning of sorts:

When I dropped my line initially, the warning was something to the effect of "You have 5 remaining chances at this harvesting point".

Curiously enough, when I caught a fish after 3-4 casts, it said "You have 4 remaining chances at this harvesting point."

Was I picking up someone else's chat log notifications, or was that part of the fishing minigame? I was west, I think, of Bearded Rock, in view of the town. All I remember was that I didn't see that information any previous time while fishing.

This is how Mining Points work. They start at a given amount of "attempts", and decrease by 1 each time you successfully obtain an item, or fail. So, I'd assume it's the same for fishing spots.

**miokomioko** · 2010-08-26 14:24

That seems really odd. And you weren't doing a Fishing Fieldleve at all?

I've experienced every time that even failing to hook something will expend one attempt at a school of fish (quite annoying) since schools are the only fishing points that can be expended. The only instance I've seen that involved schools of fish dispersing only after you actually hook a certain amount of fish is during a Fishing Fieldleve that involves investigating "promising" fishing points.

I'm going to have to assume it was either simply glitchy in your favor or you were getting someone else's messages...

This is how Mining Points work. They start at a given amount of "attempts", and decrease by 1 each time you successfully obtain an item, or fail. So, I'd assume it's the same for fishing spots.

This is only how it works for "schools of fish." You can always fish any time and anywhere there's water. Schools of fish appear at some points and are expendable but yield additional fish and higher quality catches. I guess the balance that fishing gets since you can do it anywhere is that it's more difficult and expends bait.

Thread: Fisher

Thread Tools

Fisher

Latest Threads

Up & Coming Threads

Hottest Threads