Bait

For more information, see Bait.

Bait is a group of items used for Fishing. Most consist of Critters caught via the Bug Net. When a Fishing Pole is cast, at least one Bait item must be in the player's inventory or nothing can be caught. Fishing Poles will cast their lines with no Bait, but there will be no "bites" and no catches.

Bait essentially serves as ammunition for Fishing Poles. Unlike ammunition, however, Bait has a type-dependent chance of being consumed, which can only happen on reel-in (rather than on casting the line). Also like ammunition, they can be placed in the Ammo slots of a player's inventory, but unlike most ammunition, bait in ammo slots will be consumed last.

There are several items that can serve as Bait, and they must be obtained in different ways depending on the type:


 * Most Critters that are insects, snails, or worms can be used as bait, and must be caught with the Bug Net.
 * Blue, Green, and Pink Jellyfish bait items are unrelated to the Jellyfish enemies. They must themselves be caught via Fishing, and aside from bait can be used only for decoration (Jellyfish Jars or in Item Frames)  or sale.
 * Apprentice Bait, Journeyman Bait, and Master Bait are acquired as rewards for completing quests for the Angler NPC, as well as Crates. They can also can be sold for, , and  apiece, respectively.
 * The Truffle Worm is unique in that it is listed as having "666" Bait Power, however it does not actually function as Fishing Bait. It instead summons Duke Fishron (when used in an Ocean biome). It cannot be used for ordinary fishing; if it is the first bait item in inventory (and the player is not in an ocean biome), the rod will act as if there was no bait at all.

As of 1.3.1, Critters spawned by Statues cannot be caught with the Bug Net, so Statues do not aid in the collection of bait.

Bait Power
Bait power influences the quality of the catch (see Fishing for details and other factors), as well as the chances that the Bait item will be consumed: Higher bait powers mean less chance that the Bait item will be consumed.
 * 5% Bait power means the bait will be consumed immediately
 * Higher multiple of 5% means that bait will last approximately that many fishing attempts (50% bait = 10 catches on average, or 10% chance of bait consumption)
 * Tackle Box adds 5% of bait power that is used only to compute the chance of consuming bait. That means it is not very useful for the high profile baits, but can significantly improve the number of fish caught with 5% or 10% baits.
 * If you have multiple bait in your inventory, they are used from the left-top slot of the inventory to the bottom-right. So, the topmost/left-most bait item will be used first.

Spawning

 * Worms, Grasshoppers, and Jungle baits (Buggy, Grubby, and Sluggy) can be found while destroying background objects on the surface:

!width=150| !! width=220| Short grass/plants !! width=220| Tall grass/plants !! width=220| Dirt piles !! Spawn limit
 * Worms
 * 1/400 (0.25%) chance per tile || 1/200 (0.5%) chance per tile || 1/6 (16.7%) chance per tile || align=center| 5
 * Grasshoppers
 * 1/100 (1%) chance per tile || 1/50 (2%) chance per tile || || align=center| 5
 * Jungle baits
 * 1/80 per tile in the Jungle|| 1/40 per tile in the Jungle || || align=center| 8 total
 * }
 * If the number of bait critters on the map has reached its upper limit, no more will spawn. The 3 types of Jungle baits share a total upper limit of 8.
 * The presence of NPCs nearby is very beneficial for the proportion of Critters (including those used as bait) in the number of total spawned creatures, as it reduces the spawning of enemies. NPCs can even prevent enemies from spawning entirely, provided they are in a sufficient number and no special event is happening. In this case, the only creatures that can still spawn are harmless critters.
 * Worms spawn most frequently in Forest biomes during rain.
 * Worms tend to mass themselves in the lowest part of terrain as they cannot even climb a one tile high wall.
 * Forest biomes at night tend to spawn large numbers of Fireflies, especially when close to one's home base and it's a new moon. The same applies to Butterflies during the following day.
 * The spawn rates and spawn caps of critters are affected by many of the same factors as those of hostile enemies, so Water Candles, Peace Candles, Battle Potions, Calming Potions and Sunflowers will affect critter spawns.
 * Worms tend to mass themselves in the lowest part of terrain as they cannot even climb a one tile high wall.
 * Forest biomes at night tend to spawn large numbers of Fireflies, especially when close to one's home base and it's a new moon. The same applies to Butterflies during the following day.
 * The spawn rates and spawn caps of critters are affected by many of the same factors as those of hostile enemies, so Water Candles, Peace Candles, Battle Potions, Calming Potions and Sunflowers will affect critter spawns.

Tips

 * The player can transform vast expanses of land into Farms. Just make an NPC house each half screen (so that there are always 3 NPCs in the vicinity), and have a stretch of flat land on another level, on which you can run back and forth collecting critters. Ideally, you'll want NPCs high in the sky or underground, so that you can jump for catching flying critters.
 * This is especially worth the trouble on the nights when Fireflies spawn rates are high, or when it is raining (for Worms). Alternatively, a flat expanse of hallowed grass allows you to catch the more effective Lightning Bugs.
 * One of the best ways to acquire bait is to farm Fireflies with a Bug Net at night. They tend to congregate near your NPC houses or trees in the Forest biome and often spawn in very large numbers.
 * Fireflies are a good source of renewable bait, since their 20% Bait Power is quite desirable and can be buffed even further with fishing gear. Using the Tackle Box (+5% bait power) puts them on equal status to worms, and with Angler armor and Angler Earring you basically have an unlimited supply of bait which can be recovered almost every night.
 * If you build a platform in the sky such that the ground is not visible but one of your NPC houses are in view (e.g. by housing an NPC on the top floor of a tower), you can get more Fireflies to spawn due to the absence of land critters.
 * The Water Candle causes Fireflies to spawn faster (do note that it does not increase the spawn limit, so be sure to gather Fireflies periodically- collecting every two hours is sure to net you 25-40 Fireflies, or even 60+ with a Water Candle).
 * Wings will speed up the job of catching Fireflies considerably. If a player does not have wings, a network of interconnected platforms will also do the trick - just be sure to return to the top after you have finished collecting.
 * Fireflies will not spawn during rain, however the Worm spawn rate will increase significantly.
 * The spawn rate of the Fireflies is randomly determined at the beginning of the night, therefore on some nights you will see massive swarms and on other nights very few will spawn.
 * You may compensate for this by collecting Fireflies during a new moon, when Fireflies spawn in notably higher numbers.
 * Spending a rainy day catching Worms with a bug net near NPCs can result in a lot of worms.
 * Running through a Forest biome during the Rain is a good way to gather Worms for bait.
 * An effective way to gather Worms for bait is to create a new world, and then walk around the forest biomes and small surface caves destroying background objects like stones, patches of dirt and big rocks, which seem to have pretty high chances of dropping worms (or even several worms in some cases). All you need for this method is any pickaxe and a Bug Net.
 * Standard placed blocks being square makes a perfect trap for them. It is possible to catch several dozen in one rainy day, by just collecting them in a hole at the end. Note that the hole must be at least 2 tiles wide for you to stand in, preferably larger for the Bug Net to function properly.
 * A long corridor of jungle grass will regularly be saturated by background jungle plants, whose destruction will almost always result in a Grubby, Sluggy, or a Buggy.
 * Flower Boots combined with a Flare from the Flare Gun shot at your feet will provide significantly more bait than most other methods. A normal Bug Net on auto-swing is all that is necessary, the Golden Bug Net is not required. For best results, use Mud blocks to farm Jungle bait, and leave a heavy object on your mouse button to hold it down (using an auto clicker with hold option works also).
 * Using Flower Boots, and a Bug Net, one can quickly farm grasshoppers and worms in a multiplayer server. One person stands on the ground with a Yo-Yo out to break the grass, while the other uses a Bug Net to collect the grasshoppers and worms.
 * Fishing with a Crate Potion and Sonar Potion, and ignoring catches of white fish, will most often return more bait from the crates than is spent catching them.
 * It should be noted that critters spawned from Worm Statue, Firefly Statue, Snail Statue, Buggy Statue and Butterfly Statue cannot be caught; attempting to do so will cause these critters to vanish in a puff of smoke.
 * On the mobile version there is a bug with the bait that can work to the players advantage. Place a piece of bait beside something stackable anywhere in your inventory. Something that's easy to acquire such as gel. Exit the game and re-enter. Then switch places with your gel and bait. Then exit and re-enter. The gel will now function as bait with the same power as the original bait. This does not seem to work with the truffle worm but you can turn 1 master bait into 999 gel master baits then place your original master bait in a chest. Be warned this will work with nearly any item and the only way to reverse this effect is to move the affected item to an empty item slot in the players inventory that has not held bait since most recently entering the game. Then exit and re-enter the game. The item should be free of the "% bait power" tooltip. If not, then hide it in a chest until you are done fishing. This bug can potentially destroy very hard to acquire items but when used carefully you will never have to collect bait again. At least until they fix it.

Trivia

 * The Master Bait's name is a double-entendre on the word "masturbate". This is a common joke in the fishing industry, used by real-life fishermen, bait shops, and in numerous hook baiting tutorials.

History
鱼饵 Appât