To get started, head to a Hobby Master in Michel Delving, Thorin’s Hall, Bree, and Rivendell. They will send you to a Fishing Supplier, and you are now ready to fish. Like any good hobby, fishing is easy to learn, but there is quite a bit to it once you get going. In addition to all the different fish, you can craft (or obtain crafted) fishing poles that increase your skill, or even catch fish that are specific to certain areas. The Angler’s Guide to Fishing in LOTRO, a Community Guide in the LOTRO Lorebook, is a great place to look for details on all things related to the Fishing Hobby. The most important thing to learn from it, or at least the one that would be pretty difficult to calculate on one’s own, is that there is currently no apparent benefit to using bait when fishing.
The most ‘useful’ rewards are some fish that can be used in cooking recipes for buff foods, but you can also get Trophy Fish, which can be mounted by a taxidermist in Bree to be used as decoration for your house, and you acquire titles as your Fishing skill increases. It also gives you something to do while you wait for an afk member, provided there is some water around.
In fact there are plenty of ways to enjoy Fishing. My kinship recently held a fishing derby: entry fees were collected, a raid was formed, and prizes were given to those catching the most Trophy Fish in 15 minutes. I wasn’t even in the competition (I was a marshal there to keep track of people’s catch) and it was still absurdly exciting to watch the clock tick down. There was even a tie that required a fish-off to decide the winner. We also found an awful lot of skulls and old weapons in the pond behind our leader’s house, resulting in many funny comments at his expense.
