So yeah, it is what makes an MMO truly awesome. Things that you do when you are bored, other than the actual content of the game, right?

Fishing is a popular "time sink" in MMOs. We have water in Spiral Knights in Haven. It can also create crown sinks, as well as promote player interactions. I hope you like the idea / this sparks a better idea for you.

>>> The fishing pole. These are obtained from lockboxes, and fishing poles are not tradable. This does not promote the trading of fishing poles themselves. But what this does promote, is the opening of more lockboxes and the discovery of those accessories that seem as though they do not exist. Other accessories will be found as well as shadow keys, promoting player interactions.

Types of fishing poles: Dusky, Military, Cool, Fancy, Prismatic, Shadow, Divine, etc. etc. you get the picture. This way, those crazy collectors can find the rare Shadow Fishing Pole / Volcanic Fishing Pole and such which go well with their whatever set of gear (personally, I would farm for the Prismatic fishing pole to go with my costume).

The chance of a fishing pole showing up in a lockbox is not as rare as some of those impossible-to-find accessories. It is something actually do-able. Remember, that this is mostly made as a crown and time sink. The chance of finding a dusky / regal fishing pole will be much higher than a Prismatic / Shadow / Volcanic fishing pole etc.

>>> The Master Angler. This is an NPC that does four things.

The first thing is that they will buy the fishing poles off of you which you find inside of lockboxes. This way, the people opening lockboxes for non-fishing purposes will be less mad to find a fishing pole. The Master Angler will buy it off of them for somewhere around 30,000 crowns.

The second thing is that he shows you the fishing leaderboards, explained later.

The third thing is sell you bait for 50 cr a piece, and fishing line for 200 cr a piece. Some bait is better than other bait and will negate the chance of catching bad fish / help you catch more good fish. Overall, the whole design of fishing is going to be luck based with a crown sink (as it should be).

Finally, the Master Angler will judge the fish you have caught, also explained later by a random number generator (RNG).

>>> Fishing Mechanics. The fountain in Haven has now been populated by fish, and we are given a lovely crown and time sink.

Now the actual mechanics of catching a fish. You first cast your line into the haven fountain by walking up to it, facing the water, then activating the fishing pole from your inventory. You will be able to hotkey the activation of the fishing pole, so you do not have go back into your inventory every time.

Once you have hooked a fish, you will have a little battle between the two of you. A small blue bar will pop up on your screen, with a small fish in the center. Whenever you click, the fish will pull in towards you or to the right of the bar. Sometimes, the fish will attempt to get away and move towards the left of the bar. If it goes all the way to the left of the bar on your screen, it gets away with your bait. If you reel it in all the way to the right of the bar, the fish is yours. When the fish is attempting to resist and you pull in by clicking the attack button, the blue bar is damage similarly to a shield: slowly goes from blue to red. If it snaps, you must use a new fishing line. You should avoid doing this to save crowns.

So you lose bait by A. Catching a fish, and B. letting a fish get away by going all the way to the left of your bar. You have to replace fishing line if you let the line snap. With the cost of bait at 50 cr each, if you drop, say, 20k crowns into bait, that is 400 catches assuming you have the time. The difficulty of reeling in the fish is based on what fish it is. The type of fish is valued for the harder it was to catch, explained later. Generally, this is going to be very easy, even for the harder fish. You just have to be careful is all.

This is the "doesn't let you just AFK and win" type thing added to fishing, which is why it should be somewhat easy.

>>> The fish you catch.

I do not have exact names / pics etc. but just a general idea of how it will work. As I said earlier, there are going to be some fish valued more than others. All fish you catch will be turned into the Master Angler. Most fish will not have any crown value to it at all, and turning it into the Master Angler only gives you points for the leaderboards.

The fish you catch will net you points on the leaderboard, depending on its weight. There is no actual "weight" or anything to the fish, it is just some random number generated within a certain range by the master angler. Since I do not have names for fish etc, I will use the following fish listed in order from most common > most rare: Fish A > Fish B > Fish C > Fish D > Fish E > Fish F. Finally, there is Fish X. Fish X will eat your bait automatically, working like... I don't know... a piranha or something? One of those annoying fish that just snag off the bait, forget the name.

Fish A - Most common. Chance to catch, 48.99%. Point Value: 1-5 points (RNG by Master Angler)

Fish B - Chance to catch, 30%. PV: 10-20 points (RNG by Master Angler)

Fish C - Chance to catch, 10%. PV: 25-50 points (RNG by Master Angler)

Fish D - Chance to catch, 5% PV: 75-125 points (RNG by Master Angler)

Fish X (the bad one) - Chance to have bait eaten, 5%

Fish E - Chance to catch, 1% PV: 250-500 points (RNG by Master Angler)

Fish F - Chance to catch, .01% (1 out of 10,000 fish, if you do the math it will cost you on average 500,000 crowns of bait to find one and a lot of time but that is without calculating the 1/20 of all bait being taken by Fish X). PV: 200,000 - 300,000 points (RNG by Master Angler).

Obviously made more for those lucky people of the week, not exactly sought after. With the point values, it is more about who gets lucky and catches Fish F rather than those who have the time to waste; however, those with the time to waste will also have an advantage (One being a better shot at Fish F). But with how luck works out, you will have to spend roughly 10 hours a day at a good shot at Fish F. But you aren't supposed to do that, it is made for the one lucky person to win.

You will catch one fish roughly every 20 seconds (that seems reasonable to me). Somewhere randomly between 10-30 seconds, a fish will start yanking on your line. Doing the math, a guy who spends 6 hours a day fishing will gain less points than some lucky guy catching Fish F with one cast. I based that giant 200,000 - 300,000 off of this, none of these numbers were randomly chosen. I did some calculator work and came up with point values which will, on average, have each fish group (D, B, C, etc) net roughly the same amount of points, excluding the crappy Fish A which nets roughly half of the points of a different fish.

So the whole points, catch Fish F and win.

>>> Leaderboard. Right above is the point values and such and how you win (basically a rigged point system that makes the people who catch Fish F the most win).

The winner is whoever has the most points which you probably figured out by now. The top 10 people will receive the Master Angler Hat costume head piece. I view this as a fishing hat-looking thing, with a snipe on it. The hat is received by mail from the Master Angler.

The Master Angler Hat is BoP just like the fishing poles. They come in different styles, militay, cool, regal, etc. etc. When the Master Angler sends you the hat you won by mail, you are randomly given one. Divine, Prismatic, Volcanic, and Shadow are a bit rarer than the others.

This is all I have so far... what do you think?