Game Mechanics: Fishing up junk

[Bigcountry23]

I believe that a minor modification needs to be made to fishing post 100 skill. I remember catching a lot of rusty daggers and cloth sandals in the early skills of fishing, but they tapper off as your skill grows (post 50 skill IIRC). Post 100, they should be a VERY rare catch and yet I am seeing them as being 20-30% of my catch.

Unfortunately, I can't find anything to back this up, but I wanted it to be said.

[maximum]

Bump.

[Dolalin]

I found an Everlore forums thread from 1999 that has a few guides to what expected success rates for fishing should be.

posted 08-17-1999 09:58 AM

I just mastered fishing yesterday I got a skill of 102 and then quit for the day. The great thing about fishing is you can do it completely in your spare time, unlike most other trades. It did take months, since level 5, my first trip to Freeport *wipes a tear from his eye*. I bought a fishing pole and some bait and fished off the Kaladim docks. But every wait on every dock I gained about 5 skill points. Not too shabby. And fyi, you pretty much stop getting rusty's after 80 or so. I get 1 rusty for every 20 fish I get. And I get 1 fish basically every 1.5 casts or less. Hope that helps.

~Jerunell M'Laine, bard of Fennin Ro

https://web.archive.org/web/19991118...ML/000004.html

[Dolalin]

Oh this is great too. A japanese site where a guy posted his takes at skill level 178.

Items			#	price

Fresh Fish		37	1s9c
Tattered Cloth Sandal	1	2s3c
Rusty Dagger		3	2s3c

https://web.archive.org/web/20010921...ysd/eq/nr.html

[Dolalin]

From Everquest Express:

When you are new to fishing, all kinds of crazy things happen. I’ve pulled up old sandals, rusty daggers, and even half eaten fish. It takes a while before you can get a sensitive enough feel for the line to be able to pull back fish most of the time. Until you’re at least below average at it, expect the following things:

Moldy sandals, fish scales, and rusty daggers.

Losing your bait to the fish.

Long sequences of throwing our your bait and getting nothing.

Broken poles. This happens 2 or 3 times in the beginning, but I’ve been using the same pole now for about 2 months, so it’s definitely an early risk that goes away.

Potentially the worst thing I’ve seen is this: sometimes, you spill your beer bringing your line back in. Once I had to jump in after it, and it tasted a bit funny after I rescued it from the vasty deep. Thank Brell, I had some backup beers to wash the taste out.

The good thing is that as you get better, you pull back more fish. I’m at the point now when I get a fish every 3 or so tries, and rarely get anything else, or lose my bait.

https://web.archive.org/web/20000618...sue68/fish.htm

[Dolalin]

Another sample set from the mailing lists, with a skill of 70:

----- Original Message -----
From: Joe D <joed@...>
To: <EQ_Tinkering@onelist.com>
Sent: Sunday, December 19, 1999 6:28 PM
Subject: [EQ_Tinkering] Animated Bait


> From: Joe D <joed@...>
>
>
> The journals imply that the tinkered animated bait is superior to the
> store-bought stuff. I had a bit of time on my hands, and needed some fish
> to practice cooking, so I decided to put it to the test.
>
> I tinkered up 40 animated baits. Then I gated back to Freeport, bought 40
> baits from the store, sat on the dock, and started fishing.
>
> The results? No difference.
>
> Here's the breakdown:
>
> 40 STORE-BOUGHT BAIT
> Casts: 115
> Fish caught: 38
> Scales/sandals/daggers: 10
> Beer spilled: 18
> Bait lost: 2
>
> 40 TINKERED BAIT
> Casts: 121
> Fish caught: 38
> Scales/sandals/daggers: 13
> Beer spilled: 13
> Bait lost: 2
>
> Each cast also took 11 or 12 seconds for each bait. My fishing skill was
> previously maxed at 70.
>
> Joe D
>
>

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/db...html/1655.html

Seems to also confirm that, in 1999 at least, there was no bonus for using tinkered bait.