Fishing For Gold

We may have all asked ourselves before... What is the quickest way a greedy pirate can make the most coin?
Is it fishing? Perhaps, but maybe not. However, for any pirate inquiring about the amount of gold that can be made by fishing I set out on a 2 hour voyage to find out myself.

To start, I'm going to factor in the cost of launching a fishing boat (1,000 gold) and the cost of buying full legendary fishing lures from 0 (3,000 gold). This puts us 4,000 gold in the hole right out of port. This won't affect our gold per hour figure but simply cut into our bottom line. I am not going to factor in the cost of upgrading your fishing rods, however, because anyone seriously fishing for money is already going to have max fishing and the master fishing rod. If you must know the cost of upgrading your rod to Journeyman at fishing level 5 and Master at level 15, it is 1,000 gold and 10,000 gold respectively. Let's start the voyage.

I launched from Padres as I've found that my "honey hole" has always been on the backside of the island near the beach. Once parked I got the clock ticking and started casting away (Using only the Legendary lure of course).

I was aiming predominantly for the Sand Tiger Sharks as they reward the most gold per catch (aside from legendaries) but at the same time was grabbing the semi-rares along the way (Lumpfish, megamouth, Angler).

Although I did my best to scare away the lesser deep sea fish I did manage to snag a Coelacanth and Marlin here and there due to either bad mouse timing or simply because that was all that was left in the frame.
Luckily the legendaries that I did catch on this trip were usually caught in these moments so it would refresh the fish stockpile in the frame. Win win :)

I'm sure by now you guys are tired of hearing me ramble on about fishing so I'll cut to the numbers.

Out of the 2 hours spent on the water 105 fish total were caught, 9 of which were legendaries.
Now I'm going to break it down by each species. If you only care about the bottom-line statistics then you are welcome to skip to the bottom.

Sand Tiger Shark - 125 Rep
Total Caught - 47
Total Weight - 22,566 pounds
Total Gold - 12,011 gold
Average Weight - 480.13 pounds
Average Gold - 255.55 gold
Total Rep - 5,875 rep
Gold per Pound - 0.53 gold

Dragon Fish - 200 Rep
I only caught one at 190 pounds and 63 gold or 0.33 gold per pound.

Goblin Shark - 220 Rep
Total Caught - 12
Total Weight - 8,845 pounds
Total Gold - 1,488 gold
Average Weight - 737.08 pounds
Average Gold - 124 gold
Total Rep - 2,640 rep
Gold per Pound - 0.17 gold

Coelacanth - 60 Rep
Total Caught - 10
Total Weight - 4,739 pounds
Total Gold - 839
Average Weight - 473.9 pounds
Average Gold - 83.9 gold
Total Rep - 600 rep
Gold per Pound - 0.18 gold

Marlin - 125 Rep
Total Caught - 12
Total Weight - 1,269 pounds
Total Gold - 948 gold
Average Weight - 105.75 pounds
Average Gold - 79 gold
Total Rep - 1,500 rep
Gold per Pound - 0.75 gold

Megamouth - 300 Rep
Total Caught - 3
Total Weight - 2,083 pounds
Total Gold - 385 gold
Average Weight - 694.33 pounds
Average Gold - 128.33 gold
Total Rep - 900 rep
Gold per Pound - 0.185 gold

Angler - 250 Rep
Total Caught - 8
Total Weight - 2,837 pounds
Total Gold - 1,417 gold
Average Weight - 354.63 pounds
Average Gold - 177.13 gold
Total Rep - 2,000 rep
Gold per Pound - 0.499 gold

Lumpfish - 275 Rep
Total Caught - 3
Total Weight - 948 pounds
Total Gold - 323 gold
Average Weight - 316 pounds
Average Gold - 107.67 gold
Total Rep - 825 rep
Gold per Pound - 0.34 gold

Legendaries - 150 Rep
Speedy Lou - 5 caught at 700 gold each for a total of 3,500 gold.
Fogbell - 3 caught at 1,000 gold each for a total of 3,000 gold.
Mossy Moses - 1 caught for 1,500 gold.

I didn't include weights of the legendaries because it really doesn't matter. Whether you catch a 1 pound Speedy Lou or a 2 million pound Speedy Lou you are still getting 700 gold and 150 rep.
Ok now that we have the breakdown of each species out of the way... Here are the final numbers for a 2-hour fishing trip.

Total Gold - 25,474 - 4,000 for lures and fishing boat for 21,474 profit.
Total Rep - 15,890
Gold per Hour - 12,737
Rep per Hour - 7,945

The one variable I did not factor in is the loot you can plunder while fishing including cutlasses, sea charts, rams, etc. Just consider those icing on the cake.
I hope this analysis helps you guys out and Happy Fishing! Arrrr!
 
One thing to remember is that legendary fish require you to launch a boat and waste 1000. They also tend to take longer to catch than other fish. From my experience going after Tiger sharks is the quickest way to make gold and wouldn't waste time on legendary unless you are trying to get a bonus on Raven Cove. Not to mention even when you are right where you should be for a legendary it still takes some time and luck for one to showup. If you aren't sure you have at least 30 minutes to spend on the game launching a boat and trying for a legendary can be a big waste of money compared to just fishing from the dock for free.
 
One thing to remember is that legendary fish require you to launch a boat and waste 1000. They also tend to take longer to catch than other fish. From my experience going after Tiger sharks is the quickest way to make gold and wouldn't waste time on legendary unless you are trying to get a bonus on Raven Cove. Not to mention even when you are right where you should be for a legendary it still takes some time and luck for one to showup. If you aren't sure you have at least 30 minutes to spend on the game launching a boat and trying for a legendary can be a big waste of money compared to just fishing from the dock for free.
You are correct that fishing for legendary fish is not a good way to get gold, it's much more efficient to get large fish. You are wrong about the boats though, the large fish are shallower and quicker and easier to get from a boat so it's definitely cost effective to spend on a boat.
 
You are correct that fishing for legendary fish is not a good way to get gold, it's much more efficient to get large fish. You are wrong about the boats though, the large fish are shallower and quicker and easier to get from a boat so it's definitely cost effective to spend on a boat.
Maybe its just been my luck... but I've gotten junk fish more often on a boat than on the dock. Trick is to just hit the "sink" button as soon as the lure hits the water. Hardly ever get junk... Normally the only time I've gotten junk has been when I try to real in the lure empty because I didn't see the fish I was looking for.
 
Maybe its just been my luck... but I've gotten junk fish more often on a boat than on the dock. Trick is to just hit the "sink" button as soon as the lure hits the water. Hardly ever get junk... Normally the only time I've gotten junk has been when I try to real in the lure empty because I didn't see the fish I was looking for.
If you are decent at fishing you will always get the fish you want, it's not difficult to get any of the specific fish if they are in the area you are fishing.. Catching junk fish is an error on the fishermans part and has nothing to do with whether you are on a dock or boat.
 
The fastest way to get gold fishing is to only catch Sand Tigers from a boat. If you've depleated them you will need to move over to the next spot on the boat or catch other fish until they respawn
 
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