It has always been my impression that what and where fish spawn is independent of the fisherman. When the fisherman comes along to fish a certain tile, the possible fish that can be caught there already exists and it is a matter of checks/rolls to see which ones are caught. I do not believe that the fish that is caught is actually generated in the water tile at the time of the cast. This the fish finder is not spawning fish, it is locating which tiles they exist in. The ability to catch them is still the exact same as it is without the fish finder. My issue is not with how hard the fish are to catch. My issue is fish spawning in places that can't be fished.
You're wrong on that, I'm sorry, because you've confused two different elements of the system. I'm going to have to go into a bit of detail about how I know, so bear with me.
"possible fish that can be caught there already exists", is correct. The areas the fish can be caught are listed within the Order of the Dragonfish books.
As an illustration, there was a huge debate over where the Void Lobster was, because for months after High Seas no one had actually got book 6 to prove where it was, and we didn't know if we were fishing the right spot and it was hugely rare, or we were in the wrong spot;
http://stratics.com/community/threads/hunting-the-void-lobster.241722/
One of the Devs explained it should be very, very rare even at 120 fishing. So there's a skill based component too it. That is your individual fisherman element, the skill you have tweaks the odds;
http://stratics.com/community/threads/bugged-lava-lobster-traps.239050/
But notice you are also expected to still need to be very, very lucky. Which confirms that it's
odds based too. Not specific tile based, except within the area defined by the Order books/lore set up. If it was, you couldn't have skill and area taken into account too.
It was then proven it still wasn't spawning even so, as hundreds of fishers were now putting Lava Lobster traps into the Stygian Abyss lava rivers and getting nothing; The fix went in on Publish 80 later that year;
http://www.uoguide.com/Publish_80
Where was the bug?
Not in the fish list. Void Lobsters were in the spawn list for the Stygian Abyss lava tiles, the Devs thought we'd just been unlucky so far. It was in the Lava Tiles they were supposed to be coming from. All and any of them... the reward is generated by the tile type within the catchment area, and the tile type wasn't working;
http://stratics.com/community/threads/void-lobster.285467/
Within an hour of the patch hitting Europa for testing, and thanks to a donation from the Lady Foxglove, I had a Void Lobster (possibly the world's first too, as no one else was there looking). So, what does this tell us for fish again?
That yes, there's a master list of possible fishing reward for any tile within the catchment area; those results are set by odds, tweaked by bait and suit and skill, and generated on the fly
by the tile for the fisher if they are individually able to catch there. There's not "10 fish" there at any time, there's a 1 in 10 chance you'll get one if you sit there and use that tile.
What you get wrong is saying "This the fish finder is not spawning fish, it is locating which tiles they exist in. The ability to catch them is still the exact same as it is without the fish finder". That second part isn't true. The fish finder is changing the odds to nearer 100% for only you, and generating a random spawn point from the available area where you should be.
It's doing the same as the Mining maps in fact; there is a roughly 8x8 node where ore can spawn. When you mine that, you roll against your skill and the drop table for which comes out as Iron and which as Ore X. Below 65 skill, even if another ore is there on the drop list, you won't get it;
http://www.uoguide.com/Mining
It will always be Iron instead. What you get on each swing of the axe above that is either Iron or Other Ore. What the Mining Map does is choose a random node, and set Other Ore to 100%. Is it telling you where the Ore already was? Even if it did, someone could mine it before you used the map and take all your ore, flip the Ore type to a different type by mining it all out, and your map would then be totally worthless. So it has to be fixing the odds and type for the duration of the map time.
The actual problem you have then is that you're misunderstanding how the fish finder works; Which is possibly bad design by the Dev Team I do acknowledge. But the locations for Fishing is geographically limited by the wider fishing set up, and that's done on a
tile type basis. Holy Mackerel (and Zombie Fish) can
only be caught in Gravewater Lake. However the whole lake is flagged for that. It's not that the Fish are currently living in one node in the middle of the lake... they aren't, they're at any square on the lake, as you earlier understood. So the Fish Finder is randomly rolling on any square where they could be too, then fixing better odds just for you at that spot. That's where it goes wrong from your experience. What you seem to want is that it can only be generated on the coast where you can reach it.
In order to do that, they have to complicate the fishing system even further. They either need to delete nodes that can't be reached, such as in the middle of lakes, but then Holy Mackerel
can't be caught anywhere in Gravewater Lake... or they need two separate node-lists, one for reachable by boat or in theory, and one reachable by land...
And whether it's actually possible to turn particular tiles off I don't know; I have my suspicions it might not be, without a major code overhaul. Have a look at a map of Malas...
http://uo2.stratics.com/maps-and-locations/malas
There's only 1 piece of water on the entire map. My suspicion is the check is even simpler than for mining; "Water In Malas? Yes/No. If Yes, odds on fish are Normal Fish xx, Holy Mackerel yy, Zombie Fish zz".
Indeed have a close look in fact at all of the Rare/Legendary fish, and they're
all in every tile across specific subservers (as can be seen with the Pinco UI in the EC)
http://www.uoguide.com/Fish
Twisted Weald, Terathan Keep, the Dungeons, they're all unique maps. Which means a programmer would have to go in and manually check every single tile to see if it can be reached by someone with a fishing rod, then making a new database with the co-ordinates of just those tiles, then pointing the random chooser at those...
However, an alternative solution, once you understand what the Fish Finder is really doing, is to just have it proc the odds change where ever you're stood once the map is triggered. That would mean dropping the roleplay excuse of "The fish are to the North!" as if you were actually chasing real fish that are living on the map at a specific spot right now... but secretly behind the scenes, they aren't really anyway. It's just telling you if the tile it's chosen for the bonus is above or below you. Instead, it could just go "Used on Map X, Rare Fish Here is X, change chance of X to 100% now."
But... after all of that, hopefully you'll understand now why I said earlier that in the meantime you can just fish anywhere from Gravewater Lake say and use bait instead, and just grind them out. You're not buying a map which tells you where the exciting super-fish hidey hole is, and thus missing out on all the Holy Mackerel bonanza that's just out of reach... without the map, that's just a normal water square too, and where you're stood makes no difference at all.
And save the Fish Finder for Deep Sea areas, don't use it on the Dungeon Mini Maps where the majority of the Water tiles are in hard to reach places. So Trammel, Felucca, Tokuno... places where it'll only spawn in Deep Sea tiles and thus is reachable by boat, but not the Lost Lands, or Shame, or Twisted Weald where the water has large swathes blocked off, is under huge piles of monsters, or just doesn't allow boats.
And Legendary are unaffected by Fish Finders anyway, so their odds are always, always the same. Which actually makes Void Lobsters easier to catch than Legendary Fish... because you can multiply the bait bonus by leaving traps with it on in the water until they catch something or sink, where as the fishing rod check resets every time you re-cast. The worst fish to catch is actually the one in The Prism Of Light then;
Notice I get 3 Rare Fish just messing about setting up to wait out the Legendary. Get your skill up. Get the bait. Don't worry about the Fish Finder, it's only of use for specific fish anyway due to how it finds the tiles. Going for Rare/Legendary crustaceans? Anywhere you put a trap is just as good as anywhere else. Don't sweat the Fish Finder.
