This page summarises how to catch Curious Crate.
About Curious Crate
- Contents: Knothide Leather, Netherweave Cloth, Fel Iron Bar, Weather-Beaten Journal
- Value: Vendor: 20c - Contents worth more.
Catching Curious Crate
- Notes: Rarely caught from any pool in Outland (4-5% of the catch). Also from open water in Nagrand, Netherstorm, Terokkar Forest and Zangarmarsh (under 1% of the catch).
- Commentary: There are no pools primarily containing Curious Crates.
- History:
- 3.3: Contents improved: Knothide Leather replace scraps. Higher amounts of cloth and ore. Thanks Gummo.
- 2.3: Weather-Beaten Journal first found in contents.
Learn More
- Pools and Wreckage - Describes how to fish pools such as schools or floating debris, where to find pools, and how to efficiently fish them.
- The Burning Crusade - Fishing changes in the first expansion.
- 2.3 Changes - Patch 2.3's changes to fishing, including the pool Tracking Journal.
Comments about Curious Crate
Below are readers' comments about "Curious Crate":
more 3.3 changes
Gummo, December 2009:
Old behavior: If you did a successful cast, then tried another cast that failed (e.g. "Your cast did not land in fishable water"), your first cast still persisted.
New behavior: the second failed cast will cancel your first cast.
Loot change: Curious Crates now give up to (at least) 5 netherweave cloth or 5 fel iron ore, and (so far) up to 3 Knothide Leather. Haven't seen Knothide Leather Scraps yet.
espiru, December 2009:
My "Fingerless Gloves" with "Enchant Gloves - Fishing" (+2) now is automatically (+5)
The same in 3 charanters.
Salty Modarn, December 2009:
espiru wrote:
My "Fingerless Gloves" with "Enchant Gloves - Fishing" (+2) now is automatically (+5)
The same in 3 charanters.Mine also mysteriously upgraded. I have screen shots with an effective skill of 670.
Rod + Line + Lure + Hat + Gloves + Boots + Tuskarr + Rumsey
40 + 5 + 100 + 5 + 5 + 5 + 50 + 10 = 220This is the highest possible fishing score prior to the kuluak fishing derby.
Gummo, December 2009:
I have now caught a Curious Crate with 6 netherweave cloth. I'm pretty sure the Knothide Leather Scraps have been replaced by 1-3 Knothide Leather.
Bartiler, December 2009:
I wonder if they got rid of the +2 enchant for gloves since mine also got upped to the +5 fishing. did they just be nice and give us all with +5 since ours were already enchanted? anyone get the old +2 fishing enchant since this last patch came out?
el, December 2009:
The learnt spell still says "+2".
The strange thing about enchantments is that technically, the number is simply written into the description. For most other spells, the description references the data actually used by the game.
I don't think that is "bad coding": The enchant itself appears to be triggered by a server-side spell, so I assume that the game client simply doesn't have the data. But it might explain why an enchant formula can do something different when applied...
Thanks all the information (on this and Curious Crate).
Bartiler, December 2009:
Interesting El, never looked at it that way .
Just got back from hillsbrad farming and the +2 enchant still drops ^_^.
Gummo, December 2009:
El, a bit of a correction to your change to Curious Crates, the lower amount isn't 5, I think it's 2, and I've never gotten 6 fel iron ore, just 5. So for now, I think it's 1-3 Knothide Leather, 2-5 Fel Iron Ore, or 2-6 Netherweave Cloth. I haven't paid strict attention to lowest amounts, though.
palm, December 2009:
Just received 4 borean leather scraps from a reinforced crate today. Fished out of the river in Crystalsong Forest
smot_poker, December 2009:
I was fishing in the little lake in winterspring and caught a recipe of some sort. My bags were full at the time so auto loot didn't pick it up and I cast too fast and lost it. I managed to see the word owl on it... So i'm guessing it's a JC trinket recipe. Anyway I notice no mention of it on the site, and have fished there alot and never caught it before, so I'm guessing it's something new.
el, December 2009:
Intriguing. Recipes are unexpected because, well, they get soggy in the water! Recipes do very rarely appear in Old Azeroth's crates (at least Mithril Bound Trunk), but those aren't found in inland water (all Winterspring is inland).
el, December 2009:
I just caught Formula: Enchant Bracer - Superior Spirit from Frostfire Hot Springs. And it can still be read! Or at least could be if I was an enchanter.
At a guess, any random world drop recipe of the appropriate level could be lurking. This change probably occurs elsewhere - very likely in similar (425 skill) zones, but possibly more widely across Azeroth.
vickieanne, December 2009:
Could be incredible luck, but post 3.3 I caught two Mr Pinchy's within minutes of each other. Don't want to boast, I know he's all about luck, but is it possible the drop rate has changed?
Gummo, December 2009:
It wouldn't surprise me if they upped the Mr. Pinchy rate, since it's still needed to get the Salty title. But it's hard to measure changes in low drops rates...
Nemari, January 2010:
Just another data point for a possibly increased droprate: After I read this thread, I decided to go fishing this morning. I got him on my 5th pool. In my bags are 14 furious crawdad and 6 golden darters. I was also lucky to get the pet at my first wish.
Szarsky, January 2010:
.. Fishing is so fun :) who knew you could catch http://www.wowhead.com/?item=2555
in Ogrimmar... yay 1200+ fish, but no Old crafty. ;(Got bored and went to fish Mr.Pinchy... after about 212 catches.. I got the crate and the pet in first wish, also noticed, the Knothide leather dont comes as scrap anymore, got about 12 crates, 4 of those contained 3-4 knothide leather
el, January 2010:
So it looks like world drop recipes are showing up in any inland Old Azeroth water, even the easier waters, like Ogrimmar.
Jon M, January 2010:
My sincere apologies if this is already known to you
I have a level 20 Alt fishing open water off the dock in North (he just took the boat from Menthil).
I have fished for about 20 min almost every day.
Skill 450 + strong pole with + 75 lure.
I get approx 1% catch of crystalized water and 1% curious crate.
The crates break down to 33% cobalt ore (3-5), 33% frostweave cloth (3-5) and 33% borean leather scraps (3-5).
No money, no greens
I have done this long enough to accumulate almost 30 cobalt ore, 12 full borean leather (5 pieces combine to make 1 full piece) and 28 frostweave.
I hope this is helpful
Jon M
Outland Crates - Why no Greens?
katie333, June 2008:
When I first starting fishing the Outlands I was pleased to find a variety of different pools and fish. I was a little disappointed that Curious Crates only netted (literally!) a few Fel Iron Ore, Leather Scraps or cloth. I have never seen anything other than these (or scrolls, steam pump flotsam etc). Pre-outlands, crates yield (small amounts of) silver, multiple crafting reagents, as well as a fairly good ratio of greens and even the occasional blue.
So, why, I wonder did they stop this practice in the Outlands, where they improved overall loot everywhere else?
el, June 2008:
The lack of anything exciting in the Outland crates is seen as a let-down by a lot of people. It's a missed opportunity to add that little element of surprise.
The most likely explanation is that fishing was forgotten in the rush to get TBC finished. The clearest evidence for this can be seen in the last 2 zones to be completed: Shadowmoon Valley consists entirely of useless catches, while water in Blade's Edge isn't even fishable. So the theory goes that the crates were intended to contain Outland greens, but Blizzard simply never found time to put them in.
It is also possible Blizzard decided that fishing was already very profitable, and adding potentially valuable greens to the mix was excessive.
More generally there are 2 factors that seem to dictate design decisions:
- Fear of fishing 'bots: Hence the bias to pool fishing, which is exceptionally hard to automate.
- The Social vs Gameplay pendulum: Sometimes Blizzard view fishing as an entirely social activity, and sometimes as something that is core to success in other parts of the game. The balance between these objectives seems to change, often without apparent reason.
The Burning Crusade introduced Furious Crawdad, which were very hard to catch when TBC was launched. They cooked up to provide the only +30 stamina food in the game, so became an essential buff on a raid tank. Clear example of fishing for gameplay reasons. But then the pendulum started to swing again: When the Skyguard faction first appeared on test servers, a +30 stamina buff food was found on their vendors (with Friendly reputation, which is easy to attain). Basically removing the role of fishing to provide that food. The change didn't occur, but Highland Mixed Schools were tweaked to make Crawdad fishing easier.
