Yes yes, I know, fishing is a "secondary skill" and you can slap it on anyone. But if you spend a lot of time at sea, you'll quickly learn that a melee build isn't exactly useful a lot of the time, and pets' primary damage is their melee, so they leave you wanting when it counts as well. This build is for dealing ranged combat damage and lots of it!
If you want to explore professional fisher quests, and make sure you are the one in your friend group supplying shipwrecked deco items and white nets and chests, this guide is for you! But this is so much more than just a template guide. I'm going to briefly mention the professional fisher quests as well, because ultimately, you'll want that 120 fishing scroll!
At 80.1 fishing skill you will start seeing delicate scales (used for adding use best weapon skill via imbuing) and white pearls, and you'll still fail to catch quite often. At 100 skill you'll have a 25% chance of pulling up Osiredon, the Scalis Enforcer when you throw in a white net (at the correct location). If you really want to adventure in the high seas, you really need to work to get your fishing up to 120, which means a LOT of professional fisher quests to get the scroll.
There are 8 fish mongers on tram side and 8 on fel side (Britain, Moonglow, Skara Brae, Trinsic, Jhelom, Vesper, Papua [via the serpent pillars], and the Floating Emporium). Ultimately you'll want to decide where you're going to do the lion's share of your fish monger quests (tram or fel), because canceling these quests is a step back in your fishmonger reputation. While sailing you will be fishing a lot, and the rare fish you can catch differ from one facet to the next and by water type, so if you're a collector, you'll have to work extra hard for those big fish on the opposing facet. I won't go into how the fish monger quests work here unless someone asks for a guide on them.
The Britannian Ship has the largest hold of any of the galleon-class ships, so that is the one you will want. It costs 1200 sovereigns. Trust me, you'll need all the space you can get. The template is tight if you want to make the most of it, and will have heavy gear requirements, so I do not recommend you make your first character into your professional fisherman.
This is not your run-of-the-mill, kill a few water elementals and deep sea serpents template. This is so you can be the leader of your group who will take down Corgul, Scalis, and Charybdis, so you don't want to be squishy. Both Corgul and Scalis have corrupted aura, so necromancy is out, you don't want to kill yourself trying to leech life from either of them with vamp form. If you won't be able to use a skill to its fullest, you might as well find another skill.
120s are not absolutely essential on all skills, but each has its own benefit to the template. In the case of high seas bosses and even lower end "hard" monsters like leviathans, you want to have the best possible chance of survival.
The Template
100-120 Fishing
120 Magery
120 Meditation
120 Evaluating Intelligence
120 Wrestling**
120 Resisting Spells
120 Spellweaving
As much Focus as you can get (preferrably in increments of 20).
The Gear
For this template, I highly recommend you have, at a minimum:
All 70s resists
2 Faster Casting
6 Faster Cast Recovery
100% Lower Reagent Cost
40% Lower Mana Cost
As much + skill in your main 6 skills as you can get (for more focus)
As much mana regen as you can possibly squeeze in.
SDI is a bonus. The LMC and Mana regen are for the long fights, and ultimately no mana regen with max SDI is less effective in prolonged battles.
The Reason
There will be times when you are in melee range (eels thrown at your boat, leviathans alongside the boat, etc.), so you want the defense chance wrestling provides. Wrestling also allows you to hold a spellbook to push your skills or casting speed or whatever you need up, as well as a shield, without your defense chance suffering. DCI is also a helpful modifier if you can get it without sacrificing anything listed above.
Again, if anyone wants me to write a complete guide on the high seas bosses, the fishmonger reputation system, or the professional fisherman quests, please let me know and I will do so! I spent the better part of three years at sea after High Seas came out learning all I could (and drinking while fishing, a lot). If anyone has any questions, feel free to ask!
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