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Abashera’s Lunker Fishing Journal

Hey guys. I just got finished fishing up the lunkers for Nat's mount (Crimson Water Strider). Next up, fish for the Land Shark pet!

Due to a lot of speculation on lunker catches per hour, and whether or not beer makes a difference, I turned my fishing adventure into an experiment—which incidentally helped me stay awake!

So here are my finds…

.

FORWARD

I noticed that a few people have said they averaged approximately three fish per hour. Other people have lamented that "the drops are dismal," pointing out that they've been at it for an hour or two with no catches.

Rather than take guesstimates of how many lunkers drop per hour, I decided to turn on my [Blizzard UI] Stopwatch and record the amount of time that had past between each lunker catch, so as to get a more accurate idea of DROPS-PER-HOUR … which I believe is what the average person wants to know… “How long is it going to take me to get my mount and/or pet?”

This is the purpose of this journal, to get an accurate idea of how long it takes to get 100 lunkers for Nat’s mount. This way, players can plan their fishing schedule accordingly. (Note: This journal is not however to figure out the drop-rate of lunkers, which is determined by the number of lunkers per cast, which percentage wowhead has already data-mined).

I also notice some debate on wowhead as to whether or not “…(beer) really brings in the big catch,” as Nat Pagle suggests in his dialogue. I have to admit that when I read that, I too thought Blizzard might have added a “beer mechanic” into the game that increases the chances. Therefor, along with logging my catch times, I also split my lunker catches in half: 50 lunkers with Rumsey’s Lager, and 50 without.

Regarding Sample Size: 100 Lunkers may look like a small sample; however, consider too that I caught 10,408 Enormous fish, along with hundreds of smaller fish, bait, lures, etcetera—so the 100 lunkers represent well over 11k casts.

If others want to perform this same experiment and add their numbers with mine to further increase the accuracy of catches per hour, and [with and without the beer buff], please do. However I’m off to fish up 75 more lunkers for Nat’s Land Shark pet, and the fishing pole, and maybe a pet to sell on AH; but I personally won’t be continuing this experiment, the grind is GRUESOME!

I applied bait, while casting, using the following macro:

/use Anglers Fishing Raft
/use Sea Scorpion Bait
/use fire Ammonite Bait
/use Jawless Skulker Bait
/use Blackwater Whiptail Bait
/use Abyssal Gulper Eel Bait
/use Blind Lake Sturgeon Bait
/use Fat Sleeper Bait
/cast Fishing

I hope you will benefit from my records.


LUNKER LOG

Here’s my log of [time passed between catches]. I rounded each catch to the nearest minute (however I rounded all catches under a minute, up to one minute).


50 LUNKERS WITH RUMSEY BUFF:
a) 13 / 13 / 28 / 1 / 65 / 12 / 64 / 47 / 12 / 6 / 43 / 7 / 2 / 4 / 119 / 26 / 26 / 4 / 8 / 66 / 33 / 77 / 18 / 9 / 15 (= 718)

b) 18 / 27 / 10 / 75 / 11 / 71 / 2 / 131 / 44 / 9 / 3 / 16 / 9 / 52 / 9 / 54 / 2 / 45 / 26 / 45 / 5 / 11 / 22 / 1 / 66 (= 764)

1482m / 50L = 29.65m per Lunker
Approximately two Lunkers per hour.


50 LUNKERS WITHOUT RUMSEY BUFF:
c) 72 / 32 / 61 / 47 / 9 / 1 / 36 / 1 / 12 / 1 / 1 / 8 / 27 / 138 / 34 / 4 / 24 / 30 / 21 / 26 / 47 / 46 / 1 / 5 / 13 (= 697)

d) 50 / 11 / 14 / 8 / 49 / 15 / 1 / 24 / 6 / 12 / 5 / 4 / 28 / 90 / 15 / 51 / 55 / 1 / 61 / 6 / 28 / 23 / 46 / 38 / 39 (= 680)

1377 min. / 50L = 27.54m per. Lunker
Approximately two Lunkers per hour.


GRAND TOTALS - 100 LUNKERS
— 2859min / 100 = 28.59 min. per Lunker
— Approximately two Lunkers per hour = Plan approximately 50 fishing-hours to catch 100 Lunkers


CONCLUSIONS

Captain Rumsey’s Lager didn’t make any difference. In fact the drops were better without it, though marginally, likely due to RNG.

Because Captain Rumsey’s Lager didn’t make a difference, I recommend not using it for the simple reason that 1) obviously, it makes no difference, and 2) you have to stop every three minutes to drink, and that only interrupts your fishing rhythm. For the same reason, I also didn’t apply lures, hooks, or Worm Supreme, it makes you have to stop fishing to apply them, and lures and bait have a [cast time] to apply. The less time you spend applying buffs that don’t increase your lunker chances, the more times you can Cast & Catch, and the more catches you can pull in per hour… the faster you’ll get your booty! (mount/pet/etc)

So what about Nat’s mention of drinking beer to bring in the big catch?

Nat also says “Don’t EVER go fishing without a cooler.” Are we to conclude that we need to have a Portable Refrigerator in addition to drinking Captain Rumsey’s Lager? And what about the Discarded Lucky Coin, which bears more than a remarkable resemblance to Nat’s Lucky Coin? …I mean, it’s the same icon, and the name is only one word off.

But I would expect a lush to recommend beer and a cooler. Truth is, I don’t think Nat’s a good fisherman (or he’s just too drunk to fish), which is why I have to catch his food for him.

But go ahead and drink the lager if the placebo effect makes you feel good… or for the actual +10 fishing bonus.


THE CATCH

3 Tentacle Hat
6 Highfish Cap
20 Grieffish
31 Ephemeral Fishing Pole
100 Lunkers
157 Sharpened Hooks
174 Worm Surprime
193 “Fragrant” Pheromone Fish
204 Awesomefish
10,408 Enormous Fish


NOTABLE (favorite) FISHING SPOTS

(These are spots where you won’t be interrupted by hostile NPCs. Although it also helps to have the Anglers Fishing Raft.)

Frostfire Ridge
36, 38 (Jump to island in middle of lava)

Gorgrond
61, 55 (I prefer darker places)
40, 76 (This spot is the quickest to access for Horde)

Nagrand
72:15 (on raft, under rock overhang)

Shadowmoon Valley - Blind Lake Lunker
36, 48 (BEAUTIFUL ZONE! Path entrance @ 41:53)
33, 36 (Deep, clear pool)
53, 77 (Drop down waterfall from lvl 100 zone)

Shadowmoon Valley - Sea Scorpion Lunker
68, 33 (Just offshore on the boat with the Draenei Fishers. They won't attack Horde)

Spires of Arak
60, 13 (Note: seems to be the greatest chance for fishing pole and hat - easy to catch 5 poles in one session.)

Talador
72, 63 (By waterfall)
57, 41 (Under bridge by waterfall)


FISHING FACTS

— The Nat Pagle Follower must be assigned to your Fishing Shack to catch Lunkers.

— Lunkers are unique, and only 5 can be caught and owned of each species before needing to return to base and turn them in. Therefor you should figure some garrison trips into your fishing schedule, and whatever else you get caught up doing while you’re there.

— The addon Fishing Buddy is nice, and helps pass the time.

— I fished up between one and six Ephemeral poles per day, and just kept equipping the newest pole.

— My fastest lunker catch was 3 seconds after the first cast; and my longest time between catches was 2 hours and 18 minutes (eternity). If you go over two hours without catching a lunker, it’s just bad RNG. It evens out when you catch two or three within a few minutes or seconds.

— I alternated fishing spots (zones), catching equal amounts of all “enormous” fish types, mainly so I could send them to alts to level fishing through the Fishing Shack dailies.

— Saberfish are the best way to level cooking, I leveled up the cooking skill on four toons, and have more than enough Enormous Crescent Saberfish for the rest of my toons (if they were all lvl 100). I’m even sending some to friends so they can level cooking.

— I did the Pandaria Nat Pagle dailies at the same time, and got my rep from buddy to to Best Friend (exalted) in just four days! I highly recommend doing this first if you don't already have the fishing raft.

— Nat Pagle is a real putz. Oh, and “GET THE HELL OFF MY RAFT NAT!” If you ever fish in the 1st person view, Nat WILL make you lose a few fish! They should have named him Gnat.

— If you like your friends calling you nuts, this will be very good for you.


SCREENSHOTS

http://s1315.photobucket.com/user/Abash ... sort=9&o=0


HAPPY FISHING!


—Rx

Thanks for your insights into the lunker hunt! Great post, I particularly like your best spots list, as I waste lots of time staring at my map for inspiration (or procrastination perhaps).

LAND SHARK...you will be mine!

Remember, Sea Calf is missing in game at the moment, but before you buy a pet to sell you may want to hold some in reserve for his release (may be 6.1).

Thank you for the time and effort you put into this. I've only got 17 coins at the moment having put it on hold while I did the rep grind for the Sky Fry*. Once I restart I will put your info to good use.

*This is also a good way to level your bodyguards. By the time I got to Revered with the Sha'tari Defense two of my bodyguards made it to Wingman.

Any thoughts about skill affecting catch rates? I have heard conflicting reports that yes higher is better, I have also heard that skill doesn't play a part.

I am leaning to not, I once landed in Nagrand and stepped over to the pool to fish for the Fat Sleeper Lure before I moved to where I wanted to fish for the rest of my time out there. I didn't buff and in 11 casts that it took to get the lure I got 2 lunkers. My skill was 805 I think, 5 on the hat and 100 for the rod(I did not have either of the temporary hats). Later I was buffed to near 1100 and didn't catch one for 270ish catches.

I know this is a pretty small sample and RNG has a big factor in it, mainly just curious if I should bother with lures or not.

It would be interesting if skill didn't play a part. I still lure up, because I want higher value fish, but it would definitely be interesting if your chance to catch lunkers was equal, as long as your skill was higher than X.

Food for thought.

A very informative post!! I'll have to fish where you do and see if my luck changes

Morlis wrote:Any thoughts about skill affecting catch rates? I have heard conflicting reports that yes higher is better, I have also heard that skill doesn't play a part.

I am leaning to not, I once landed in Nagrand and stepped over to the pool to fish for the Fat Sleeper Lure before I moved to where I wanted to fish for the rest of my time out there. I didn't buff and in 11 casts that it took to get the lure I got 2 lunkers. My skill was 805 I think, 5 on the hat and 100 for the rod(I did not have either of the temporary hats). Later I was buffed to near 1100 and didn't catch one for 270ish catches.

I know this is a pretty small sample and RNG has a big factor in it, mainly just curious if I should bother with lures or not.

Hey Morlis. Good question.

Of course like you, I can't be absolutely sure. HOWEVER...

This is one of the many reasons I logged all my catch times.

50 LUNKERS WITHOUT RUMSEY BUFF:
c) 72 / 32 / 61 / 47 / 9 / 1 / 36 / 1 / 12 / 1 / 1 / 8 / 27 / 138 / 34 / 4 / 24 / 30 / 21 / 26 / 47 / 46 / 1 / 5 / 13 (= 697)

From that line I would like to point out the following string of what one could call “good luck.”

1 / 12 / 1 / 1 / 8

Personally I don’t believe in luck. Those are just die rolls. I remember those two 1 rolls very clearly. I cast my line in, and I got the 1st lunker in 3 seconds. I stopped my timer to log it down, then cast again. Only a few seconds later, another lunker. That’s two in less than one minute. But the whole string of rapid strikes looks pretty amazing.

I guess we have to ask, are those kinds of numbers possible if fishing skill mattered?

That said, maybe someone else can try this without a fishing pole applied, without bait, no lures, or any fishing buffs, and see what the numbers say. If someone else fishes 25 to 50 fish like that, and still averages about 2L every 28-30 minutes, than I think we could conclude that fishing skill definitely doesn’t make a difference.

All that said, I was always running from +910 to a little over +1000, between the bait, the Ephemeral Pole, and the seven day fishing hats.

Either way, I only used what the waters supplied me with to up my skill. So anyone who puts enough time into this to fish up a pole and hat, will be averaging the same skill level, at level 700 Fishing. I’m going to fish up my next 50L on my Rogue because her fishing is only 55 of 700. I guess that’ll give us a pretty good idea. lol

Darolyn wrote:It would be interesting if skill didn't play a part. I still lure up, because I want higher value fish, but it would definitely be interesting if your chance to catch lunkers was equal, as long as your skill was higher than X.

Food for thought.

Hey Darolyn.

I didn’t apply Sharpened Fishing Hook or Worm Supreme, and for several fish types I didn’t even get one full stack (200) of medium or small fish. But if you or someone else keeps track of their logs, they could always compare them with mine and see if lures help bring in more Enormous Fish than small, medium, and junk items.

I fished up the following average sized fish…

85 Abyssal Gulper Eel
86 Fire Ammonite
103 Blind Lake Sturgeon
106 Jawless Skulker
133 Blackwater Whiptail
206 Fat Sleeper
239 Crescent Saberfish

That’s 958 small fish to 10,408 Enormous Fish.

I didn’t write down my “junk” catches in my main post, only because I was listing the items I thought were noteworthy or of value.

But for the record I also got the following junk items…

28 Strong Fishing Pole
29 Fishing Pole
33 Big Iron Fishing Pole
145 Burnt Clump
154 Shiny Bauble

(I list Shiny Bauble is junk because you can buy it from your shack, and sharpened hooks and worm supreme is better. I believe Aquatic Fish Attracter is also better than baubles.)

I also got a total of 2248 Bait (using the macro above, the bait buff never dropped off).

(P.S. For anyone who wants to keep track of their catches, I mentioned the add-on Fishing Buddy. It’s best to download and activate it BEFORE beginning to fish up lunkers. Otherwise there will be a discrepancy between what you have, and what the logs say you caught. Fortunately I realized this after only my 1st lunker catch, after which I activated the add-on (I keep some add-ons off if I’m not using them).

It’s also good to note that Fishing Buddy doesn’t count CASTS. It’s counting total fish, and the percentages are based on that number. This doesn’t give anything near an accurate idea of RNG, because it’s like a Boss or NPC kill. If an NPC drops two pieces of gear and some junk, none of the items it drops have anything to do with the drop-rate (drop percentage per-kill) for each INDIVIDUAL item. I brought this up to the writer of FB, and he said he hand't considered this, and would see about adding in a cast counter. Hopefully he will, and hopefully he will also make it negate canceled cast numbers where a line was re-cast in 2 seconds or less, because casting in schools would also give a false RNG number.

Anyone who wants to request this feature on fishing buddy... the more people who request it, the better, I guess.)

Would love to see this post placed on Wowhead! Great info!

I finally uploaded the screenshots from my fishing journey.

I know some of this information is about to become slightly outdated when the next patch hits. But I hope all of this will inspire YOU to take on the task of fishing up lunkers. I know fishing can be boring (and cause drowsiness). But knowing you worked hard for something is rewarding in the end.

http://s1315.photobucket.com/user/Abash ... sort=9&o=0


—Rx

Interesting post, thanks for making it.

Especially handy now that El's Anglin' seems to have disappeared forever.

Looking at your fishing spots, assuming you main horde. If you're alliance there are two good spots in Nagrand. Sleepers are easy to fish since you can simply fly/hearth to your outpost and fish the lake behind the inn. Its also easier to fish ammonite in Nagrand as Alliance then going to Frost fire. Ammonite can be caught in the lava pool at Hall of valor. If you fish from the shore by the southern urn to summon the rare you won't aggro mobs(or the rare when he is summoned). You can also almost feather to the area from your garrison.

This also makes Nagrand very good for lunker grinding as alliance since you have two lunkers you can cap on before turning them into Nat.

Abashera wrote:
— The Nat Pagle Follower must be assigned to your Fishing Shack to catch Lunkers.

Not to disagree with what I have found to be the absolutely most useful source of information out there on lunker fishing (I'm in the middle of it) but I have caught one lunker without Nat Pagle assigned to my Fishing Shack (outside of the quest you have to do to officially get him as a follower, technically he is not assigned but you do have a Fishing Shack 3).

I got my first lunker while working on my Blind Sturgeon Angler achivement over in Shadmoon Valley. I was kinda shocked. I just tossed it in my bank until I finally got to Fishing Shack 3 and then I had it for when I had to catch each of the Lunkers to get Nat Pagle as a follower.

However, knowing that during my time to get to level 700 Fishing (which I had never fished before) plus Pandarian Angler Achivement I had only caught that one Lunker - not a very good drop rate.

I wish I had read your information (which I first saw on wowhead) before selling my Big Iron Fishing Pole. I thought when I got that Ephemeral Fishing Pole I was golden with the 100+ added to my fishing. I didn't realize it only lasted so long and then ** poofed **. Like a dummy I put my BIFP on AH and someone snatched it up 10 seconds later. Now I'm stuck with one I picked up in Pandaria until I can get better rep with the Anglers or friendlier with Nat.

Graven wrote:Interesting post, thanks for making it.

Especially handy now that El's Anglin' seems to have disappeared forever.

Holy Crap! I didn't know El's was down. I was just there about a month ago. It seems you can still visit her archived pages though. It might be a good idea to just save all her webpages to your computer for future reference. It's odd that he hasn't played the game, and shut down the page at the same time - it seems deliberate. I can only guess why he would do it. Health? Finances? I can think of one more.



And to Abbotta...

You can fish up another Big Iron Fishing Pole pretty quick in Draenor. As I posted above, I threw out 33 of them when going for the mount. Maybe I should have sold them if they go that quick on the AH.

Don't forget too that all the Azeroth quests were reset in the Cataclysm. So you can do Nat's quest line in Duswallow Marsh for Nat's Lucky Fishing Pole. I just did it on an alt a few weeks ago. It's a pretty quick quest line, and the pole is +25 (and it's a blue item, which feels way cooler than the Big Iron pole).

http://www.wowhead.com/quest=6607/nat-pagle-angler-extreme

Then there's the Dragon Fishing Pole from The Anglers, if you're revered with them.

http://www.wowhead.com/npc=63721/nat-pagle#sells

My personal goto is the Mastercraft Kaluak Fishing Pole (although I'll never grind the rep on an alt). The main reason I like that pole is that fishing tends to put me to sleep. Then when you're sleeping, your finger has a tendency to fall down on your left mouse button, sending you running into the water. I've woken up dead in the water more than once. With this pole that's not a problem, because you can breathe under water. I've woken up in lava more than once too - usually my GTFO wakes me up.

http://www.wowhead.com/item=44050/mastercraft-kaluak-fishing-pole


By the way, I didn't bother with Nat's Draenic Fishing Pole. The lure has a 10 minute duration, and a 20 minute cool down to apply it, which means every other 10 minutes you're without the buff. That also means you can't macro it together with the hat, because the hat's lure will alway end up being applied over the pole's. The Arcanite Fishing Pole is still the best in the game... But have you tried to do the tournament lately!? Everyone and their grandmother is there. It's nuts!


—Rx

I just added a cool spot for fishing up Sea Scorpion Lunkers (which weren't in the game when I originally made this post ).

In Shadowmoon Valley, just to the left of the Temple of Karabor, there are Draenei along the shore. They appear "Hostile" to Horde, but the ones right on the shoreline are not aggressive and don't attack unless attacked. You can fish anywhere on the shore. I've taken to fishing from the boat with the two Draenei fishermen. This is nice because on my Paladin I use the raft, but I don't have the raft on my Rogue, so the boat is perfect (you can also set up your fishing chair or mushroom chair on the boat).

Coords are 68, 33.


—Rx

I found that fishing with my bodyguard nearby is handy for when the pheromone fish drop!

I haven't done a lot of Tanaan fishing, and it has mostly been from pools, so it is completely possible that I've just been astronomically lucky, but so far my rate for getting the Lunkers in Tanaan has been around 1 Lunker per 2 pools (5-8 casts total). I've only gone fishing on two separate days, though, and both were in passing while running bonus areas, so I'm really sceptical about the accuracy of that data.

I'll update once I get a chance to do more testing, though it likely won't be until after Midsummer is over (too many alts, too little time).

Like Dicrostonyx, I anecdotally have had some amazing luck too in Tanaan. Have only fished two pools whiles waiting for the Whale Shark and got a Lunker out of both.
Maybe the red strider is in reach?