Snow Crab

[Squid 727]

I finally got enough money to buy my fist crab boat, The Scarlet. Skip to snow crab season, buy 50 pots and a 3 day old tip. Head out to crabs, see them in location on sonar. Bait and set 30 pots right over crab. Pots soak for 18 hours, until blue. Haul all 30 pots in and get a grand total of 21,000 lbs of snow crab. Why the hell does the boat hold 154,000 lbs of cargo if that's what I'm haling in? Does snow crab fishing just suck this bad in this game? It's fun, but why make deep line the only lucrative fishing? We all know crabbing is more worthwhile and profitable than this game portrays. Any tips? Thanks.

[StormSurge]

Well first....If you think you should be able to drop 30 pots and fill your whole boat up then maybe wrong game for you. I have also just started crabbing with same boat and based on the mechanics of the game, it is going okay. I have been averaging about 280 crabs per pot with some well over 300 crabs and had one at almost 400 crabs in the pot. Snow crabs should be around 300 to 400 crabs per pot when you land on the school of them.


Keep in mind that crabs move a lot and you really have to find these guys in masses on the map in order to fill your boat. However do not think that you should fill your boat just dropping 30 pots cause that does not even happen in real life. A simulator is supposed to replicate what real life experience is. It is just a game but a simulator game.

The big thing about this game is to find out where on the map they begin their migratory movements. Then you can follow them around getting better averages per pot. That is at least how the other fishing has been going for me. Just like in real life, you have to go hunt the fish just like any other critter you hunt. :)

[knighthammer]

With the same boat and max pots of 50 I can set and pick up around 7-9 times before running out of bait. you will never fill even 1/4 of the boat with one lay of 30 pots. With the way i do it I get about 500-600 lbs per pot average. Some are more some are les.

[Squid 727]

I never said I thought I would "fill the boat" in one shot. I was using the sonar upgraded fully and could see the crab clustered. I didn't expect to get 70-80 thousand lbs, but thought maybe 30. This wasn't my only haul. I was basing it off of 4 individual hauls. I found it strange that I could blindly deepline and catch more than using "tips" for snow crab.

[Murderous_mofo]

I get your pain. There's a painful disconnect with the overall game design. Sometime's it's "we're trying to make it like real life" and other times it's "here's your dopamine hit."

Nowadays games are built with that work/reward cycle in mind...but this is just so...disorganized. In both games now, I've never had the want to keep playing to get to try the trawlers, which seem like the coolest part. Probably won't.

[knighthammer]

Originally posted by Squid 727:

I never said I thought I would "fill the boat" in one shot. I was using the sonar upgraded fully and could see the crab clustered. I didn't expect to get 70-80 thousand lbs, but thought maybe 30. This wasn't my only haul. I was basing it off of 4 individual hauls. I found it strange that I could blindly deepline and catch more than using "tips" for snow crab.

I guess I am miss understanding then. Did you only drop and pick up your pots 1 time or 3? I have notified the Devs of a potential fish leak issue that i am gathering data for them to be able to trouble shoot. I have noticed that if I lay my pots and pick them up and try to drop more down the number of crab hits on the sonar are very low. However if I reload the game before dropping again then the crab show a lot more on the sonar. It has taken me a couple days to get all the saved file and screen shots together for them and will be handing it over in the morning. But it can take a bit of time to track down where the issue is at. If you would like you can use the work around of reloading the game after each time you finish hauling pots and as soon as I have more info I will pass it along.

[knighthammer]

I also have a link that can help when fishing. it explains the sonar a little better it is:
https://miscgames.freshdesk.com/support/solutions/articles/36000252706-how-does-the-sonar-work-

[StormSurge]

Originally posted by Squid 727:

I finally got enough money to buy my fist crab boat, The Scarlet. Skip to snow crab season, buy 50 pots and a 3 day old tip. Head out to crabs, see them in location on sonar. Bait and set 30 pots right over crab. Pots soak for 18 hours, until blue. Haul all 30 pots in and get a grand total of 21,000 lbs of snow crab. Why the hell does the boat hold 154,000 lbs of cargo if that's what I'm haling in?

This part of your post is why we assume you are only talking of those 30 pots. You did not mention the other hauls you made. So it appeared to us a readers you were only talking of the 30. Hopefully with more info the developers can see what is going on and fix it.

Thanks to knighthammer for being proactive in helping the community. This place grows on you. Cant wait to see where we are 1 year from now. :)

[Squid 727]

This game is great no doubt. I'll have to max out pots and make quite a few more hauls. Just haven't had the luck with crabbing that I thought I would. Wasn't really thinking of multiple hauls before return to port either. Thanks for the insight.

[StormSurge]

Originally posted by Squid 727:

This game is great no doubt. I'll have to max out pots and make quite a few more hauls. Just haven't had the luck with crabbing that I thought I would. Wasn't really thinking of multiple hauls before return to port either. Thanks for the insight.

I would not max out pots as still not sure that would equate to filling up your boat. Multiple hauls is what happens in real life for sure. I do not know of anybody who goes out and fills storage in one setting. Most fishing boats are geared for multiple days at sea and dropping several times before heading back to port. Of course weather, breakdowns and injuries can also happen that make a boat head to port. I have the storage maxed out on my Scarlet so unless I score big then most likely will be ending due to no bait versus filling up a hold. Here are some SS I took of my trip last night with just the purpose of lending some insight or even some help if it indeed does.

Anyway I took off and headed down to the SW corner of the map into the deep sections as I saw crabs previously there. After arrival I started dropping pots but then the crabs just stopped showing so ended that drop at 6 pots. I skipped time till traps were blue and picked up(just over 3000lbs for 6 pots). I then went to deeper water and started searching but was not finding nothing. So I turned into the shallow waters and crab were again on screen so dropped 23 pots inline to give it a whirl. I was both impressed and little disappointed much like you were in the catch after picking them up. In total I had dropped 29 traps and my grand total was just over 18,000lbs. That averages out to just over 600lbs per pot.

I started with 50 pots when I bought Scarlet but sold 20 as I found I can set and pick up 30 with no problems in regards to the timing issue of when they are blue and then go red. This way I carry only what I need and pots not making money are not sitting on deck. That is just me though. Anyway here are some screens of that trip.......

This is my new drop after heading into shallower waters.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2381725667

This is showing a nice cluster of crab habitat. :)
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2381725706

Then when you zoom the sonar history out to 1000m it makes your stomach hurt as you look at all that crab and you wind up with what I feel was a subpar catch.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2381725734


To the developers.....You have done well by putting in the averages but sometimes people do go out and have great hauls. You have bad days, you have average days and then you have the mother of all days. You have incorporated the bad days and the average days but you have not given us the players the very good days.

Bad days - Hardly catch fish at all.
Average days - You are catching the average and that seems to be the case for the game now.
Good days - You catch well above the average and then able to buy groceries and a new car.

That is one thing I have noticed even about the longline and deepline fishing too. It is always only an average catch. Very seldom do you ever go out and have a super great catch that fishermen do experience in real life too. Since this is a simulator then we as players should be able to feel that exuberance of pulling into port once in awhile with a catch that turns heads.

[knighthammer]

There is still tweaking that needs to be done and I think with the issue I found with crab disappearing after dropping an picking up a set unless you restart the game after picking up each set when that is fixed and the tweaking done it will get better. The issue with the “fish leak” will take some serious time to hunt down as it is not the easiest thing to find and fix. I do know though that’s the Devs won’t give up and will work very hard on the game. We just have to be a little patient and give them some time. They also have people pushing for the console version and their team is not a big studio team so it take a bit longer than big titles. Also thanks for the compliment Storm. I try to make sure everyone’s issue get reported and communicate as much as I can. If you guys ever think I can work on being better at something let me know.

[Tregon]

I looked into wiki, still using longlines so have not tested personally, but pots have longer distance requirement and longer soak times.

So if you put pots as close as possible you get worse haul.

[Squid 727]

Hey thanks for the tips everyone. I appreciate it.

[knighthammer]

Just an FYI the Devs did find the "fish Leak" issue I was talking about and should have a fix in next update.

[StormSurge]

Originally posted by knighthammer:

Just an FYI the Devs did find the "fish Leak" issue I was talking about and should have a fix in next update.

Thats awesome to hear. Tell them we all said THANKS!!

[knighthammer]

I will pass it along and the update should be any day now they are just doing final testing on it.