Setting Up the EvenMoreFish Plugin on a Minecraft Server

Why Bother with a Fishing Plugin

Vanilla Minecraft fishing works, but the loot pool tops out quickly. Cast, wait, reel in salmon or an enchanted book, repeat. After a few stacks you have seen everything the system has to offer. EvenMoreFish takes that single mechanic and turns it into a small economy. You can pull in hundreds of custom species across four rarity tiers, stumble onto special bait, sell what you catch through an in-game shop, and join timed competitions hosted right in the world. This guide covers how to install the plugin on a HolyHosting Minecraft server, what each major feature does, and the configuration touch points you will probably want to know about.

Downloading the Required Files

Three separate jars need to land in your plugins folder. Skipping any of them will leave EvenMoreFish in a broken state, so grab them all in one go before touching the server.

• Open the EvenMoreFish listing on Spigot and click Download Now near the top right.

• Save the file somewhere obvious on your computer.
• Repeat the same step for Vault and PlaceholderAPI. Both are hard dependencies, not optional add-ons.

Vault handles the economy hooks that let players sell their catches, while PlaceholderAPI feeds dynamic values into chat messages and signs. Without either one, custom fish either fail to spawn or refuse to sell.

Installing on the Server

The HolyHosting panel exposes a standard plugin folder, so the upload itself only takes a few minutes. Have all three jars within easy reach before you start.

• From your server panel, open the FTP / file manager. Confirm you are pointed at the correct server instance before going any further. Uploading into the wrong instance is the most common reason a fresh install does not appear.

• Type your password and press Login.

• Open the `plugins` directory and click Upload in the corner.
• Drag the three jars into the upload area and let each one reach 100%.

• Head back to your panel and Restart the server so it picks up the new files.
• After the server is back online, log in and run `/plugins`. If the names show in green, everything loaded cleanly.

If the `plugins` directory does not exist, your server is most likely running vanilla. Switch the version selector in your panel to Spigot or Paper, restart once so the folder generates, and then come back to upload. You can also create the folder by hand in the FTP root if you prefer that route.

Getting Started In Game

Once the plugin is live, the basics are exactly what you would expect. Craft a Fishing Rod, find a water source, and start casting. Lakes, oceans, rivers and even three-block puddles all count. If you have an enchanting table and a stash of XP, spend some on the rod first. Lure III noticeably reduces bite times, and Mending turns your rod into a permanent tool as long as you keep gaining experience from the catches.

Catching Fish

Hold the rod, right-click toward the water, and watch for the bobber to dip below the surface. Reel in the moment it does.

A chat line then tells you what came up: species, weight, rarity, and any extra flavor text the item carries. Some catches are not even fish, just unique items. You can sit and click for as long as you like, or set up an AFK farm if you want bulk hauls. Either way, keep spare rods nearby unless you went the Mending route.

Rarity Tiers

Every possible catch belongs to one of four tiers. The species are flavor, but the tier decides how often something appears and how much it pays out in the shop.

Common covers the bulk of what you will see. Tadpoles, Tuna, Rockfish, Black Carp, Lemon Shark and a long list of similar everyday critters. Weights run from 1 to 30 cm, so do not expect trophy money for them.

Rare mixes in stranger finds. Penguin Feathers, Jellyfish, Coral, Squid Ink and Frogs all live here, along with a few oddities that double as crafting components in other plugins. Weight range is 20 to 150 cm.

Epic brings in the more memorable catches such as Whales, Dolphins, Axolotls and Turtles. Several have short lore blurbs attached, so mouse over the item in your inventory to read them. Sizes land between 125 and 800 cm.

Legendary is the long shot. Starfish, SpongeBob and similar oddities can clock in anywhere from 800 to 4000 cm. Most players will never see one, and that is exactly the design intent.

Bait

Bait shows up as a normal catch and stacks directly onto a fishing rod. Shrimps are the everyday filler, while Epic Elixirs and Legendary Lures sit at the top of the list. Each bait type defines how many fish it can influence before it runs out, and some only nudge a single rarity tier. Mixing baits on the same rod is allowed, so feel free to experiment.

Selling the Haul

When your inventory is bursting, open the shop with `/emf shop`. Prices scale by both size and rarity, which means the trophy catches earn far more than a stack of common minnows. The command is locked by default, so regular players need either a permissions plugin or operator status before they can sell anything. The Commands section below covers that side.

Hosting Competitions

Competitions are short, server-wide contests that anyone can join just by fishing. Operators can start one manually with:

`/emf admin competition start [seconds] [type]`

Replace `[seconds]` with the duration you want, and pick a `[type]` from `LARGEST_FISH`, `MOST_FISH`, `SPECIFIC_FISH`, `SPECIFIC_RARITY` or `LARGEST_TOTAL`. Most servers leave manual starts to admins and instead schedule competitions in the config so they fire at fixed times every day or week.

Commands and Permissions

If you want regular players to use `/emf shop` or any of the other admin tools, you will need a permissions plugin. LuckPerms is the typical choice and pairs cleanly with EvenMoreFish. Operators bypass permission checks entirely, which makes testing easy: log in with an OP account, run the command, and then mirror the result on a normal rank. The plugin documentation lists every node, so keep that page open the first time you wire ranks up.

Editing the Config

All the meaningful tuning lives inside the plugin folder. Catch rates, prize tables, available species and competition behavior all sit in separate YAML files with descriptive names (`rarities.yml`, `fish.yml`, `competitions.yml`, and so on).

• Open the FTP / file manager from your panel.
• Log in, open `plugins`, and then the `EvenMoreFish` folder.

• Pick the file you want to tweak, for example `config.yml`, and click Edit on the right.

• Make your changes and hit Save at the top.

• Return to your panel and Restart the server so the new values take effect.

The official EvenMoreFish wiki documents what each setting does in detail. Worth bookmarking before the first deep dive, because some of the placeholder syntax is not obvious from the file alone.

Troubleshooting Common Issues

Plugin refuses to load. Confirm Vault and PlaceholderAPI both sit inside the same `plugins` folder on the correct server instance. They cannot be in subfolders. Restart the server after uploading them and check `/plugins` again.

Players cannot catch custom fish. This is almost always a missing PlaceholderAPI. Install it and restart. If the dependency is already there, disable `requires-fishing-permission` in `config.yml` and restart, or grant the `emf.use_rod` permission through your permissions plugin.

Commands return a no-permission message. Either add the relevant permission node to the group, or run the command from the in-panel console. Worth double-checking the argument order too, since one typo in `competition start` is enough to make the whole line silently fail.

Wrapping Up

EvenMoreFish takes one of vanilla's quieter mechanics and turns it into a feature players will actually log in for. The install is short, the configuration is forgiving, and the rarity ladder gives long-term goals without forcing anyone to grind. Pair it with LuckPerms, schedule a couple of automatic competitions per day, and fishing stops being the activity people do while waiting for something better to happen.