Fishing
Fishing
General
Fishing is considered to be a harvesting tradeskill because it gathers raw materials, fish. The main tool used for this is a fishing pole. Fishing poles can be bought or made. If you want to purchase one they are sold by fishermen. If you want to make one, you will require the skill of carpentry (for more info look at carpentry). To fish you need to be close to water, water barrels and water troughs do not count. You can be standing on dry land or on a boat to fish. It is possible to fish on a boat that is moving. Equip the fishing pole and double click on it. A targeting cursor will appear and than click on the water. You will see a splash in the water if it is done correctly. You will be able to fish sandals, shoes, boots, thigh boots, backpacks, eight different types of fishes (Fish, Beige fish, Purple fish, Gold fish, Odd fish, Peculiar fish, Strange fish, and Eccentric fish), treasure maps and MIBs (message in a bottle). The skill check to fish up maps is 90 and for MIBs it is 100. This means that you can fish up a map with as little as 70 skill and a MIB can be fished up at 80 skill. The higher your skill is above these the better your chances are to fish up one of these items. Not only can you fish these items but you can fish up trouble as well. At times you might attract the attention of a wave elemental or a pesky walrus will come out to see what you are doing. The pesky walrus will scare the fish away so you will not be able to continue to fish till you move or kill it. Fishing poles can break, it is a random event, so it might happen after 10 uses to 100 uses.
Nets
Fishing with nets is very dangerous so please be cautious when using them. Fishing nets can only be found as loot on mobs. To use a fishing net you will need a fishing skill of 70 or higher. To use fishing nets simply double click on them and select the spot you want to fish. There is one small catch though, they can only be used in deep water. Deep water is considered to be at least 20-25 tiles away from the coastline, meaning that you will probably need a boat. There are some docks out there that will take you out far enough to use them. The benefit of using fishing nets compared to fishing poles is time. With one use of a fishing net you will be able to haul out multiple fishes. Sometimes you will haul out several sandals, shoes, boots, thigh boots, backpacks, even maps and MIBs. This of course does not come without a price, meaning trouble. It is possible to attract the attention of several wave elemental and/or dredge up several tentacle beasts and/or even disturb a sea serpent. You might get lucky and not haul a single mob or you can be really unlucky and haul out several wave elementals and several tentacle beasts at the same time. That is why it is recommended to take some friends along to join in the fun.
Message in a Bottle (MIB's)
The nature of MIBs (message in a bottle) is very similar to treasure maps. You do go out in search of the treasure chest filled with goodies. The are some major differences though. One is the location of the MIB, is not on land but out at sea. Double click on an MIB and in it you will find a note. This note is an SOS message from a ship that has gone down. The note will include some coordinate where the sunken treasure can be found. You will need to sail to those coordinate on a boat (for more info look at boats). To figure out where you are at sea use a sextant and it will tell you the coordinates of where you are at. Once you arrive to the coordinates from the note you are ready to fish up the sunken treasure chest. Make sure you have the note in your main backpack. Wield the fishing pole, double click on it and select the water. You will than fish up a treasure chest, it that will appear your feet and the note in your backpack will disappear. The treasure chest will be locked, so you will need the skill of lockpicking to open it. The skill to open sunken treasure chests is random. So sometimes 60 skill in lockpicking will be sufficient to unlock it while at other times it will require 90 skill to unlock it. Once you pick open the treasure chest you will find some very unique items. I will not tell you exactly what you will find in them, but some of these items can only be found in MIBs. There is also a slight chance these treasure chests to have magical items in them.
Tip. If you do not have UOAM (Ultima online auto-map) I suggest you get this program. Use it whenever you go out to fish MIBs. It will keep track of your location, helping you to find the sunken treasure chest out at sea.
