Nate’s Blade is back in Fisch as a permanent reward, no longer tied to a one-off Black Market event. It now comes at the end of the six-part Nate’s Quest line, and it arrives alongside Miso, a cat companion that follows you around and feeds you a passive Luck boost. The footage below puts both through the Terminus Challenge and a high-value brine farming run to see whether the payoff matches the grind.
Quick answer: Nate’s Blade is a stage 9 rod earned by finishing the six-quest Nate’s Quest line, and its defining traits are a guaranteed mutation on every catch plus a control bar that grows as you reel.
Nate’s Blade stats and passives
Nate’s Blade is a stage 9 rod built around high Luck and consistent catch value rather than raw control. It starts with no control at all, which would normally make the reeling minigame harder, but its passives are designed to compensate as a catch plays out.
| Stat | Value |
|---|---|
| Lure Speed | 119% |
| Luck | 244% |
| Control | 0 |
| Resilience | 44% |
| Max Kg | inf kg |
| Line Distance | 444 m |
| Progress Speed | 100% |
The passive kit is what makes the rod worth chasing. On every catch you are guaranteed one of three mutations, and while reeling the rod can slash the fish for bonus progress and a brief stun.
- +100% fish weight on catches.
- +50% progress speed.
- Guaranteed Lumpy, Rockstar, or Bubblegum mutation (one per catch).
- 25% chance per fish movement to slash for +6% progress, stunning the fish for 0.35 seconds.
- Control bar grows in size while you are catching a fish.
Balance changes in the Nate’s Quest update
The return of the rod came with two adjustments worth knowing. The control bar’s growth now steps up incrementally rather than sliding up smoothly, which changes how the reeling window feels mid-catch. The three guaranteed mutations also had their value raised sharply.
- Rockstar: 2x → 4x
- Lumpy: 2x → 4x
- Bubblegum: 2x → 4x
Because a mutation lands on every catch, that doubled multiplier is applied constantly rather than occasionally, which is the main reason the rod is treated as a money tool.
What the Miso companion does
Miso is a beige cat companion that appears after the questline, shown here at level 10. Its description reads “A cheerful, beige cat. Good vibes rub off on everyone nearby, last until a hooked fish makes it angry.” That line maps directly onto how it works in play.
Standing near Miso gives you Miso’s Aura, a passive +20% Luck boost. While you are reeling, the cat periodically reacts to the hooked fish and grants a progress speed boost, shown on screen as +20% True Progress Speed. The Luck aura stacks on top of Nate’s Blade’s already high Luck, which is why the pair is treated as a Luck-focused loadout.
Terminus Challenge performance
The first real test for the loadout is the Terminus Challenge, a 25-wave gauntlet of boss fish. Nate’s Blade and Miso were equipped and the challenge started from its interaction prompt.
The rod cleared a long run of high-level bosses, including Frosthorn, Leviathan, Scylla, Plesiosaur, and Wyvern, with the slash passive and progress boosts carrying it through each reel.
The run ended at wave 18 against the Ancient Kraken, with the on-screen message “Terminus Challenge Failed! (18 / 25)”. The rod made strong progress but did not finish the full 25 waves in this attempt.
The Desolate Brine Pool money run
The second test is a cash farm in the Desolate Brine Pool during a Brine Storm. The idea is to fish the storm’s unique catches while the Luck and mutation stacking push every fish’s sale value up.
A Sundial Totem speeds up the celestial cycle to help trigger events, and the Brine Storm opens up unique fish such as Stormgazer, Acidic Brine Sovereign, and Acidic Caustic Starwyrm. Touching the acidic liquid downs your character and respawns you nearby, which costs 2,000 C$ each time but is used deliberately to reach higher-multiplier catches.
The Brine Storm was nerfed in this update. The active event now lasts around 5 minutes, followed by roughly a 7-minute cooldown before another storm can be triggered.
Selling the haul at the Merchant in Moosewood Village settled it: 58 fish caught during the run sold for 13,764,284 C$. That is a strong single-session payout, and it is the clearest demonstration of what the mutation stacking is worth.
Is Nate’s Blade worth the questline?
The verdict from the run is skeptical. Despite the multi-million payout and the Terminus progress, the takeaway was that Nate’s Blade and Miso feel underwhelming relative to how long the six-quest line takes to finish. The rod performs, but the effort-to-reward ratio is the sticking point rather than the raw numbers.
If you value the guaranteed 4x mutations and the Luck stacking for farming cash, the rod does its job. If you are weighing the time cost of the full questline against other stage 9 options, that is the trade-off to go in expecting.
