Fishing tables were quite recently changed in an attempt to address the incredibly high income that was possible with it. Players could easily make over 200 gold an hour while naked with under 3g in equipment at no risk. I see fully why there was a perceived need to nerf this. The issue I have is how they decided to go about nerfing it.
Fishing has generally relied on a system where certain fish appear at certain heights with certain hook sizes and baits. The nerf has effectively removed the restrictions on many fish leading to rare fish becoming impossible to catch consistently and 90% of the caught fish being effectively trash (herbreus,canna,trudis, etc.). Where you could prior use a certain hook and bait setup to reliably catch boarfish you now catch over 90% of these trash fish. Boarfish is not very good or profitable.
Why this matters:
Some fish like calxfish or the rays serve a certain purpose that cannot be filled through any other means, they need to be obtainable reliably for them to serve their function. A quite significant draw of fishing is and always has been finding and catching the rarest fish, which took a massive amount of time and effort. The current system makes the discovery of new fish beyond impractical and bordering on impossible. Before, using the proper setup at the right spot and time of day would yield a relatively high catch rate on these special fish, generally in excess of 50%. This meant that if you used the right setup you would catch that fish in a few casts and could note that you found a working combination. Some fish have relatively narrow time windows to catch them, some less than 60 minutes of real life time. With the catch rates as low as they are, it is quite possible and in fact probable that you could fish with the proper setup in the right spot and time and not catch even one of that special fish for the entire time window allowed. This is incredibly unfulfilling and discourages discovery, the very core of the fishing system. There are also simply better ways to address that issue.
There are a number of choices for what to do instead, the only thing they have to accomplish is to reduce the income from fishing to levels that are in line with other methods at similar investment.
A) Reduce the bite frequency of rare fish and/or the reel rate. Maybe instead of getting a silkray to bite in 3 minutes then reeling it in for 7 minutes and getting 30g it could take in excess of 10 minutes for each stage and halve the income per time. This still allows the player to consistently obtain rare fish and still allows for discovery though it does slow it slightly.
B) This is the most obvious one, just reduce gold value of fish, fish meat and fish scales. Its really that simple. Also probably reduce blood kua nourish
C) Raise the investment to fish. This can be done with special crafted rods. Perhaps the player must craft lures which have a more significant cost. Perhaps fishing as a whole would require more than just 100 primary points. Maybe the very large fish need a deep sea rod or the rod snaps?
D) Make rare fish no longer 10g per unit. In mo1 rays were 20g per unit. This effectively halves the income generated by fishing assuming the weight of fish caught is constant. It also makes the logistics of transporting fish much more important which further harms profitability. It also reduces the capacity to generate masses of scales. If 20g per unit isnt enough, just go higher.
All of the solutions I proposed allow for the discovery that is essential to fishing. All of the solutions proposed still allow for the targeted fishing that has always been a part of mortal. The changes frankly felt like a slap in the face for anybody who liked the old system or intended on utilizing it in any way. On top of that some of the things that can be caught in the new fishing tables are just absurd. Why are there frogs 10m under the surface of the water?
Fishing has generally relied on a system where certain fish appear at certain heights with certain hook sizes and baits. The nerf has effectively removed the restrictions on many fish leading to rare fish becoming impossible to catch consistently and 90% of the caught fish being effectively trash (herbreus,canna,trudis, etc.). Where you could prior use a certain hook and bait setup to reliably catch boarfish you now catch over 90% of these trash fish. Boarfish is not very good or profitable.
Why this matters:
Some fish like calxfish or the rays serve a certain purpose that cannot be filled through any other means, they need to be obtainable reliably for them to serve their function. A quite significant draw of fishing is and always has been finding and catching the rarest fish, which took a massive amount of time and effort. The current system makes the discovery of new fish beyond impractical and bordering on impossible. Before, using the proper setup at the right spot and time of day would yield a relatively high catch rate on these special fish, generally in excess of 50%. This meant that if you used the right setup you would catch that fish in a few casts and could note that you found a working combination. Some fish have relatively narrow time windows to catch them, some less than 60 minutes of real life time. With the catch rates as low as they are, it is quite possible and in fact probable that you could fish with the proper setup in the right spot and time and not catch even one of that special fish for the entire time window allowed. This is incredibly unfulfilling and discourages discovery, the very core of the fishing system. There are also simply better ways to address that issue.
There are a number of choices for what to do instead, the only thing they have to accomplish is to reduce the income from fishing to levels that are in line with other methods at similar investment.
A) Reduce the bite frequency of rare fish and/or the reel rate. Maybe instead of getting a silkray to bite in 3 minutes then reeling it in for 7 minutes and getting 30g it could take in excess of 10 minutes for each stage and halve the income per time. This still allows the player to consistently obtain rare fish and still allows for discovery though it does slow it slightly.
B) This is the most obvious one, just reduce gold value of fish, fish meat and fish scales. Its really that simple. Also probably reduce blood kua nourish
C) Raise the investment to fish. This can be done with special crafted rods. Perhaps the player must craft lures which have a more significant cost. Perhaps fishing as a whole would require more than just 100 primary points. Maybe the very large fish need a deep sea rod or the rod snaps?
D) Make rare fish no longer 10g per unit. In mo1 rays were 20g per unit. This effectively halves the income generated by fishing assuming the weight of fish caught is constant. It also makes the logistics of transporting fish much more important which further harms profitability. It also reduces the capacity to generate masses of scales. If 20g per unit isnt enough, just go higher.
All of the solutions I proposed allow for the discovery that is essential to fishing. All of the solutions proposed still allow for the targeted fishing that has always been a part of mortal. The changes frankly felt like a slap in the face for anybody who liked the old system or intended on utilizing it in any way. On top of that some of the things that can be caught in the new fishing tables are just absurd. Why are there frogs 10m under the surface of the water?
