The Spider Crab is the boss that teaches you how every boss in How to Fish works: it’s summoned with a bait, it drops a quest trophy, and the trophy — not the kill — is what moves you forward.
Where It Is and How to Summon It
The fight happens on the starting lighthouse island, right off the shore. The boss doesn’t roam: the fisherman NPC tells you a “long-legged creature has been stealing my beer” and that you can “rage bait it with an empty beer can.”
Getting the can takes three steps:
- Buy a beer from the shop.
- Hand it to the fisherman — don’t drink it yourself, that just wastes the money.
- He empties it and gives you back the can as bait.
Cast with the empty can near the shore and the Spider Crab rises out of the water on its stick legs, boss health bar and all.
Gear: You Have Almost Nothing, and That’s Fine
There’s no gun for sale at this point in the game — this fight is done with starter melee. The reference solo run won with a knife sharpened at the shop bench plus brass knuckles; a four-player co-op group each carried a basic knife. If you’re short on cash, do what the fisherman suggests: catch and sell crabs with the crab rod until you can afford the beer and a blade.
The Fight: Let It Stun Itself
The boss has one key attack — a fast dive-bomb lunge — and one key weakness: it stuns itself when the lunge lands. That’s the whole fight:
- Sidestep the lunge. Don’t try to trade hits head-on; players report getting nearly one-shot that way.
- Attack only during the stun window, then back off and reset.
- There’s a fight timer — stall too long and the boss starts leaving, forcing a re-summon.
- Seagulls stay active during the fight. In co-op they’ve picked up downed players mid-fight, so treat them as a hazard, not scenery.
In co-op, downed players drop their held weapon (easy to lose in grass or water), so revive fast and grab dropped blades immediately. Everyone hitting during the same stun window is perfectly fine.
Step by Step
- Finish the tutorial, then talk to the fisherman to activate his quest.
- Farm crabs for money; buy a beer plus a knife or brass knuckles.
- Hand the beer to the fisherman and take back the empty can.
- Sharpen your knife at the bench and eat to full health.
- Cast with the empty can near the lighthouse shore.
- Sidestep each dive-bomb, hit during the self-stun, back off, repeat.
- Watch the timer — keep dealing damage between dodges.
- Pick up all drops: sell or eat the meat chunks, keep the shell.
- Give the shell to the fisherman for the boat keys.
- Buy the $10 radar before you sail — you’ll want it for every island after this.
Common Mistakes
- Drinking the beer. The bait only comes from the fisherman emptying it; a co-op player lost $12 learning this.
- Trading hits head-on instead of waiting for the self-stun. The reference runner’s first attempt failed exactly this way.
- Handing in meat chunks. Only the shell advances the quest — the trophy-not-meat rule holds for every boss in the game.
- Ignoring the timer and spending the whole fight running.
- Co-op spawn glitch: the boss can appear but be non-interactive and invisible to teammates. The fix that worked: save, quit, and remake the lobby.
Watch It Done
Jump to:
What Happens Next
Shell → fisherman → boat keys. Grab the radar, board the boat, and follow the blip to Island 2, where the daughter NPC’s leech quest starts the next chain. Crossing details are in How to Reach the Second Island; the next boss is the Giant Piranha.