The fishing skill is learnable at the School of Body for a tuition of 1 papyrus. When you learn the skill you are given a "Basic Fishing Pole". The only other source of basic fishing poles are other players who have inherited them from departed players, so be careful not to lose it.
Having a pole in your inventory allows you to fish when near water, by clicking on the "FISH" icon in the top right of the screen.
You will get a message in your main window saying one of three things:
- "You failed to catch anything, and the water appears totally dead." This means you won't catch fish here at this time of day. However, you may wish to try a few times before giving up if you know you are near the Phagrus end of a fish band, as Phagrus is often caught when the message switches back and forth over several tries between this and...
- "You failed to catch anything. You do notice occasional rings in the water, indicating fish." You're in a fish band and it's the right time of day. Keep trying; if you go several attempts without a success, try moving over a little bit.
- "You caught a (type) fish weighing (number) deben!"
Factors which can affect Fishing
Poles
- basic - the basic pole everyone is given when they learn the skill
- craftsman - rare, rewards for in game events; allows users to catch fish 24 hours, and seem to increase success rate.
- huntsman - rare, reward from Contest of Seven; allows users to catch fish 24 hours but non-peak times will be small fish; allows users to catch larger fish during peak times; increased success rate, and seems to give carp rather than dead water if there was a chance of some kind of fish in the location; allows catching Malupturus fish.
Times
People seem to catch more fish at night than during the day, peaking around dawn and dusk, but people have also reported individualized "fishing peak times". Roughly midnight - noon game time it can be possible to catch fish.
Stats
Speed seems to get larger fish each success, but does not seem to affect the basic success rate.
Cooking and
The Test of the Bedouin can increase speed.
Bands
The types of fish seem to be distributed in diagonal "bands" across the landscape.
Carp > Carp/Oxy > Carp/Perch/Oxy > Perch/Oxy > Perch > Perch/Abdju > Perch/Abdju/Catfish > Abdju/Catfish > Catfish > Catfish/Tilapia > Tilapia/Chromis > Chromis/Tilapia/Phagrus > Chromis/Phagrus > Malapterurus/Carp*
* Only caught with a Huntsman Pole so far
This is in one continuous stretch of approx. 200 coords (going West to East, or South to North). There are several hundred coordinates between the Carp end of one fish band and the Chromis/Phagrus end of the next.
New Fish
There have been reports of a new type of fish, Malapterurus, although it is not clear whether these can be caught with a basic fishing pole or where they fall in the fish bands.
People have also had Razor Fish and Moon Fish show up on Banquet menus, although no one has ever reported catching them.
Nephte has received a banquet menu that asks for a dish with Poisoned Fish.