Now that you have the pole in one hand and your bait in the other, head to some water. If there is no fish in the water, do not fret, when you cast out, fish will start appearing. This is where the fun begins.

To cast, click on your fishing ability (located in your abilities window, in the general tab). This will show your character casting, and you will see a bobble fly out into the water. While the bobble is flying out, you can hit your fishing ability again to make the bobble fall into the water (not pressing it, will make the bobble fly out as far as it can). If you cast too close to a fish, it will become scared and swim away, so watch out where you cast it. Also note that fish can come in a variety of sizes, if you manage to catch one of the larger fish, it will weigh more than if you catch a smaller fish (visuals do matter in most cases!)

Now pressing either the S key or the back cursor arrow (by default) will result in you reeling in a bit of your line. You will need to keep pressing the key in order to keep reeling it in. When a fish does eventually catch onto your line, a small fishing game will commence.

Before I talk about the actual fishing game, I will talk about how fish are named. Before you actually hook a fish, all fish will have the same name. They will all be named just "Fish". When you hook a fish, you will discover the true identity of it. If you have caught a real fish, the name of it will be revealed over the fishes head, including the weight of the fish as well (which will appear next to the name).

Some fish will turn into an Unknown. When this happens, you will usually reel in items. Some items can be really bad (such as a boot, or a log) but there are items that you can receive that are very useful (including armor and weapons and other fine treasures). There is also a very small possibility that you will lure in a monster that you will have to defeat (or run away from, if the case may be).

Now on to the fishing game. When you do catch a fish be ready for some quick reflexes. By using either the W,A,S,D keys or your cursor keys (both by default) you will have to match the fishes movement that he makes in the water. Therefore, if the fish moves left, you will have to hit your Left cursor button (or A key), if the fish moves towards you, you will have to hit the Down cursor button (or the S key).

You will only have a short time to hit the correct button. If you hit it in time, then a little bit of the fishes health will go down. If you fail to hit it in time, or if you hit the wrong button, a little bit of the fishes health will go up.

Now you can also Master a fish by learning its combo. A combo consists of 4 cursor keys (or W,A,S,D) that need to be pressed in the right order. A combo will begin automatically when you are in the middle of playing the game with a fish. You will notice that a big blue circle with an arrow (either pointing Up, Down, Left, or Right) will appear above the fish's head automatically. This is the signal that a combo sequence has begun, and you will need to figure out what the other 3 directions are by trial and error. You will only get one shot at it at a time, as pressing a wrong direction, or waiting too long to press anything, will result in the combo to fail. If you complete the combo successfully though, the fishes health will be reduced drastically and the fish will become much easier to kill.

Also note that if you keep failing to press the correct key, the fish will begin to learn a combo off of you. The more you miss, the more the fish is able to learn what combo is necessary to beat you. When the fish learns your combo, get ready for a long fight, as every successful combo the fish gets off, will drastically regain the fishes health, making it extremely hard to take the fishes health down.

Now after all the fish's health has been drained, you will automatically reel it in. If the fish that you were fighting turns out to not actually be a fish, then a loot window will appear with the actual item you got. If it is a fish, then its corpse will be by your feet, and you will need to right click and loot it in order to receive your fish.

So you have caught all this fish, and have learned a bunch of combos, but how are you going to remember it all? Well, why don't you check your fishing log! Open up your quest window, and you will notice that there is an Achievements TAB that you can click. Open it up and you will find information on all the fish that you have caught, including what type of water it's found in, the combo of the fish (if you have figured it out), and the fishes favorite bait (also only if you have figured it out). You can also find here, a leader board of the biggest fish caught in the day (vanguard day), as well as a list of the largest fish ever caught.

You should now be versed in the art of Fishing. Go forth my fishery friends and discover the wonderful world of fishing in the lands of Telon. I will see you by the docks!

One big tip I want to mention to everyone is how much your graphics settings affect fishing. In order to fish without frustration, you have to know which way the fish is moving. At first I had to do this by watching the fishes name, which was often hard because of the water "swells" that would cover the name. Why did I have to watch the NAME and not the fish? Well because I often run in "Highest Performance" mode, especially shortly after patches. However if you are in that setting -- and possibly "High Performance" as well -- the water is opaque and you can't see through it. Thus you can't see the fish. In order to not pull your hair out trying to figure out the fish movements, I recommend you set your graphics to at least "Balanced" so that you can see THROUGH the water and see the fish itself.

Thank you for this walkthrough. It was perfect. I just wish I had read Agathorn's comment about "Balanced" before I got so frustrated. hahaha.

Thanks for writing all this! I´m still training this combos and your hints are good. Thanks

I just started fishing last night. Reading through this I believe will help a bunch, but I still don't think I grasp figuring out the combo. Like I said, I will try again.

How does your fishing skill go up? is it when you catch a fish? because all i seem to catch is boots and algae.

One tip I learned is DON'T MOVE, if you start that combo your used to doing on a fish and the first move finished it then you'll end up moving and losing your fish you worked hard to get.