Fishing

Fishing is accomplished by using a Fishing Pole while having a Bait item in your inventory. By standing on dry blocks and clicking a point over water, a line is cast into the water. Re-click when the bobber moves in order to reel in the line, and hopefully, a caught item.

Requirements
Aside from actually landing the bobber in the liquid there are some requirements for fishing in a pond.

There is a minimum required size of 75 (50 for honey) connected tiles (i.e, Buckets) of liquid for a successful fishing attempt. The game calculates the size by first checking how many tiles of liquid there are on the bobber's left and right sides before hitting solid blocks or a shore, then the depth of all those tiles. Hence, a pond holding more than 75 tiles may not be fishable if its shape causes the game to calculate a number less than 75. These mechanics also allow for fishing in odd ponds - the player may successfully fish in a 1-tile wide pond as long as it's 75 tiles deep.



It is not possible to fish when submerged in liquid, even partially, and even if it's in a completely unrelated body of water. It is also not possible to fish while Mounted. Fishing can however be done while moving, flying, or while grappled to blocks.

Fishing in lava specifically requires the Hotline Fishing Hook (not even the Golden Fishing Rod will work in lava). This seems to take longer than fishing in water.

The distance of the bobber to the shore does not matter.

Quest fish
Catching a quest fish for the Angler has some further requirements:


 * If a fish is not biome-specific, then you will have a much better chance to get if you fish in the purity/forest(no snow, desert, jungle, Corruption, Crimson, Hallow or Ocean)
 * You must be fishing in the proper biome and height for the day's current quest, which can be determined by talking to the Angler. You need not talk to the Angler beforehand, or even have ever encountered him, but without knowing where to fish you're unlikely to get the quest fish.
 * The player must have not yet turned in the quest fish to the Angler.
 * The player must not have the quest fish in his or her inventory. Placing it in a container will allow another to be fished. A quest fish can also be dropped on the ground in order to fish another, but multiple identical quest fish cannot be picked up by the same character. Multiples can exist in a player's inventory, but can only be placed there manually; multiples cannot be picked up from the ground by any one player. If saving multiples for yourself, it is best to use a container (any storage item).


 * Tip: Collecting extra quest fish can be useful, as quests often repeat. Saving extras to give the Angler in future quests can save you the time of having to head out to the correct biome again, and save potion resources. Piggy Banks and Safes can be used for this purpose.

Factors
Given the prerequisites for fishing are fulfilled, a number of factors influence whether an item will be caught on a particular attempt, and what the quality/rarity of the caught item will be. All factors listed here are combined to determine the chances of higher-quality catches. See the sections below for possible fish types, and other items that can be caught.


 * The Fishing Power of the Fishing Pole used.
 * The Bait Power of the Bait used.
 * Equipped items and Potions.
 * The time the player is fishing.
 * The size of the lake: a lake  times smaller than 300 tiles (200 for honey) results in   times less fishing power. However, a lake larger than 300 tiles does not increase fishing power.

The following details the equipment, potion, and time boosts or penalties that apply. Most equipment must be acquired by completing quests for the Angler, but the Potions can also be crafted normally.


 * *Moon phases are numbered according to the graphic shown on the Moon page.
 * Bait Power also influences the chances that a Bait item will be consumed from the player's inventory. Items with higher Bait Powers will tend to last through more fishing attempts, as their chances for consumption will be lower.

Tips

 * When a lake is at least 300 tiles (200 for honey) in size or your total fishing power is at least 50 you will no longer gain any junk. (Except for Seaweed in the Ocean.)
 * When fishing, the bobber will move two or three times per "catch", after which the fish will go away but the line will remain cast. It doesn't seem to be necessary to reel in as soon as the bobbing starts, the player will get the catch as long as they click before the animation ends. The timing doesn't seem to affect the quality of the catch, either, at least across different tries in the same place.
 * It is possible to get a day's quest fish without having asked the Angler about it, though it's a lucky event since the player won't know where to fish in the first place. Taking it to him will then successfully complete the quest, but a day must still pass before the player can get another quest.
 * The most reliable way of obtaining Bait seems to be fishing in a surface forest, at night, close to one's base: staying still and restricting the spawns to critters will result in a lot of Fireflies spawning, and if alternating fishing and catching it's easy to end with dozens more bait. Water Candles and Battle Potions can be used to increase the spawn rate of critters.
 * To fish in a particular biome, the player only needs to be standing in it in such a way the background music and backdrop change to those specific to that biome. One notable exception to this is the Ocean: the player must specifically fish in a body of water whose surface is connected to the world's edge for it to count as Ocean fishing. Doing so in an unconnected lake, or in the ocean with an unconnected surface, while inside the Ocean biome will just net Bass and similars.
 * A good way to grind for Lightning Bugs is to either convert a large slab of land to hallow or one can dig a large hole (lined with dirt) and convert it to hallow then at night lightning bugs will spawn.
 * Crate contents are determined upon opening them, this means that crates caught in normal mode can give hard mode ores/bars when stockpiled and opened in hard mode.

Trivia

 * The Clownfish quest description is a reference to the 2003 Walt Disney film, Finding Nemo.
 * The Bumblebee Tuna quest fish name comes from the 1995 Jim Carrey film, Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls, in which he mispronounces the Wachati tribe greeting "bumbawe atuna" as "bumblebee tuna".

History
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