Magnet

Magnet

Type	Tackle
Location	Crafting; Fish Shop; Golden Fishing Treasure Chests; Krobus; Festival of Ice; Casino
Recipe	Fishing (Level 9)
Sell Price	15g

The Magnet is the odd one out among baits: it does nothing for the number of fish caught and everything for the number of chests pulled up alongside them. With a Magnet on the line the treasure chance roughly doubles, turning a lucky find into a regular event. Because it occupies the bait slot rather than a tackle slot, it leaves the rod free to carry a Treasure Hunter as well, and the two bonuses add together. Its description claims fish dislike the taste, but in practice they bite exactly as quickly as they do with plain Bait. It arrives late in the Fishing skill, and one Iron Bar makes three of them, which makes crafting far cheaper than Willy's asking price.

The in-game description reads: Increases the chance of finding treasures when fishing. However, fish aren't crazy about the taste.

Recipe

These are the ingredients one batch needs.

Name	Image	Amount
Iron Bar		1

Use

Treasure chests appear at random during the minigame as a second target sliding up and down the track. Holding the fishing bar over the chest while still keeping the fish inside it fills the chest's own progress bar, and a successful catch delivers both. The Magnet simply makes that second target show up far more often, which is the whole reason to use it.

The chests are worth chasing. Ordinary ones hand over spare bait and tackle among other finds, and the golden version that Fishing Mastery unlocks adds Iridium Bars, Books of Power, pearls and Fairy Dust to the list. A long session with a Magnet on the rod often earns more from the chests than from the fish.

Stacking the bonuses is the point. The Pirate profession at Fishing level ten doubles the base chance on its own, a Treasure Hunter in the tackle slot adds a little more, and daily luck, a Special Charm and a luck-boosting meal such as Lucky Lunch all nudge it higher. A farmer with all of those running finds a chest on something close to every other cast.

Dropping a Magnet into a Crab Pot wastes it, since a pot has never produced treasure.

Upgrades

Fishing level nine teaches the recipe, which is late enough that the rod and tackle are usually sorted first. One Iron Bar yields three Magnets, so a single trip to the Furnace covers a whole fishing trip.

Willy stocks them at the Fish Shop for a round thousand gold each, which is a bad bargain next to the recipe: buying the Iron Ore and Coal for a bar from the Blacksmith works out at a few hundred gold per Magnet in the first year, and still well under the shop price later. Krobus sometimes offers one cheaply on a Wednesday, the Casino sells them for coins, and the Traveling Cart lists them at a random price that is occasionally a bargain.

A few arrive as gifts rather than purchases. Winning the Ice Fishing Contest at the Festival of Ice for the first time pays out a Magnet, Willy sometimes hands one over at the Feast of the Winter Star, and Golden Fishing Treasure Chests turn them up now and then.

Notes

Anyone with luck at the Casino minigames can walk out with Magnets for nothing, since the shop there takes coins won at the tables rather than gold.

The claim in the item's own description that fish are put off by the taste is flavour text and not a mechanic. The bite speed matches plain Bait exactly, so the treasure bonus comes free of any hidden cost.

A Magnet is worth more at the shipping bin than most bait, but selling them misses the point: the chests they open are worth considerably more than the fifteen gold a spare one fetches.

All Tackle and Bait

Every entry in this group, with its key details.

Name	Image	Price
Bait		-
Bait (item)		1g
Barbed Hook		500g
Challenge Bait		1g
Cork Bobber		250g
Curiosity Lure		500g
Deluxe Bait		1g
Dressed Spinner		500g
Lead Bobber		150g
Magic Bait		1g
Magnet		15g
Quality Bobber		300g
Sonar Bobber		250g
Spinner		250g
Tackle	-	-
Targeted Bait		0.1 × Fish Price
Trap Bobber		200g
Treasure Hunter		250g
Wild Bait		15g