Is it even possible to set up a polymer farm on a solo game?

[Conan of Oz]

I've been watching YouTube videos of people doing it. Many say they are "soloing ARK", but at least one I think is playing on a PVP server.

I've been reading comments and answers her too. I can't say anything looks that encouraging.

So how are the YouTube crowd doing it?

I did several experiments today. I spawned several wild Kairuku into a pen with my hungry sabertooth waiting below. That worked fairly well, the the tiger wouldn't harvest *all* of the bodies.

I tried a Moschops for the polymer farming benefit, but he mostly ran scared from the penguins.

BUT when I mated a tamed pair of kairuku, I could not kill the offspring. Nothing short of an admin cheat would end their lives.

I slapped my head, went into server settings, and enabled friendly fire;. Nope, still couldn't kill them. And even when I admin killed them, I couldn't harvest the bodies.

I read somewhere that you had to play PVP, so I turned off the PVE setting. Still no joy.

The Goal is to have all of this run by itself. A male plus 1 or more females produce a steady flow of eggs-to-offspring who wander off a ledge and drop into the slaughter pit below. I use Automated Ark, so anything the tame harvests will soon be pulled and sorted into storage locations -- the organic polymer specifically going into the freezer until I'm ready for a batch of polymer conversion, or I need the organic for making something.

I've got a good Argentavis, and she'll get me across the north of the map (my base is in the NE of "The Island") to the kairuku spawning area. I cryopod a pelagornis with me to do the harvesting, pack it all in the argy (she can carry a crapton), and back we go.

But it's like "been there, done that". I just want to automate this like I've seen folk do on YouTube.

Is it possible on a solo server?
And if yes, what settings and/or mods do I need to make it work?

[necaradan666]

I'm not really sure, I have this feeling WC patched the game at some point and made poly farms unworkable, but I can't really remember.

Used to make them this way. 2 level structure with hatch frames to make the second floor, 2x2 foundations. Wandering moschops on the ground level, a few penguins up top breeding away. Penguins are their own air cons, so babies are born and start wandering, they fall through the hatch frames and starve to death, the moschops auto harvests the dead bodies.

As to settings it's been years since I made a poly farm, I think when I did it I was basically playing on default SP apart from harvest and tame. I can't get a poly farm working at all these days because I boosted my maturation settings and play with PVE settings on. You'll probably need to be playing PVP with friendly fire turned on.

Main issue with settings that are boosted past default is making sure the babies die quickly enough to prevent them having access to any nearby feeding trough and surviving. So normal food drain, near to normal maturation settings as you can stand.

One other issue I used to have was that it could be awkward actually getting the babies to reliably fall through the hatch frames.. but now that I think about it WC have made that easier for us, just remove some of the ceilings that make up the second floor entirely since the penguins no longer need to wander themselves to mate. They'll just sit there watching their babies fall to the ground floor.

[Conan of Oz]

Yeah, I thinks it's been nerfed.

The mechanical part still works, but you cannot harvest the babies; unclaimed or claimed.

Now, when breeding for mutations, I've got to go through the painstaking process of leading them away; then set them on aggressive and wander. Leave them to perish in the unknown jungle.

Irritating. But it's either that or an admin kill all the time. Breeding has become a non-functional activity now. I mean you can still do it, but the inability to dispose of unsuccessful offspring, or harvest them for their drops, has broken it IMHO.

[Tachyon]

Super Structures (successor to S+) has a Euthanasia Gun. Right-click a dino to mark it for death, left click to kill it.

[Conan of Oz]

You have to claim it first. And you still can't harvest the body.

[necaradan666]

I think it's just the 'unclaimed baby dino tribe' that's totally protected.

When breeding I claim every baby and use the SuperStructures Euthanasia gun to kill them, I do get the resources for harvesting them. It's still a bit annoying and time consuming, but it sounds way better than 'the long walk'. I refuse to use the admin cheat to kill babies cause more than once I have wiped all my dinos when I aimed wrong :C

[SivartStoneheart]

I haven't tested it yet but in a Solo game I have PVP turned on but friendly fire off.
I assume PVP will allow me to attack unclaimed monsters(babies) but friendly fire off means I will not hurt my tames by mistake.

I was watching a video of someone trying to do it with Moschops but the default nature of the dino is too passive and would not harvest by default. I would recommend (tied for first)Sabertooth, (tied for first)Thylacoleo or (third)Therizinosaur but not as good.

[Vesuvius]

Originally posted by Conan of Oz:

You have to claim it first. And you still can't harvest the body.

you could set your SP game to PvP and simply set up a turret/velo to kill unclaimed.

[Tachyon]

Originally posted by Conan of Oz:

You have to claim it first. And you still can't harvest the body.

You have to claim it because otherwise you'd get endless polymer for no work at all, and they presumably didn't want that. Yes, you can harvest the body after using the Gun. I use it for harvesting mutton. Right-click sheep, left-click sheep, harvest corpse.

[Conan of Oz]

Originally posted by Vesuvius:

Originally posted by Conan of Oz:

You have to claim it first. And you still can't harvest the body.

you could set your SP game to PvP and simply set up a turret/velo to kill unclaimed.

I tried that. They won't attack the babies.

If I spawn in wild ones, it all works, but that defeats the purpose. I couldn't get turrets or tames to target unclaimed, or claimed/released dinos.

As some have suggested, I found I could kill the dinos once claimed with the S+ Euthanasia gun, but again, that defeats the purpose which is automation.

[Conan of Oz]

Yesterday, I started a fresh map of The Island.

I was out harvesting with a tame dilo on guard for me, when I turned and accidentally whacked it with my metal pick. I still had "friendly fire" enabled and PvE mode disabled from my previous experiments.

The dilo dropped unconscious with very little health.

Now I'm wondering if FF is determined at the start of the map, and later, though you can change the setting, the server remembers the starting value.

I'll have to try this and see...

[Laffyistired]

Originally posted by Conan of Oz:

You have to claim it first. And you still can't harvest the body.

let me change what I said simple Gacha that can make poly from stone and snow owl pellets
it drops crystal and u can get it that way a lot faster no fuss

[bard.nilsn]

"Used to make them this way. 2 level structure with hatch frames to make the second floor, 2x2 foundations. Wandering moschops on the ground level, a few penguins up top breeding away. Penguins are their own air cons, so babies are born and start wandering, they fall through the hatch frames and starve to death, the moschops auto harvests the dead bodies."

This still works. Set the moschops to harvest bodies and passive. I use this on tek-dinos to.

[Conan of Oz]

Originally posted by bard.nilsn:

"Used to make them this way. 2 level structure with hatch frames to make the second floor, 2x2 foundations. Wandering moschops on the ground level, a few penguins up top breeding away. Penguins are their own air cons, so babies are born and start wandering, they fall through the hatch frames and starve to death, the moschops auto harvests the dead bodies."

This still works. Set the moschops to harvest bodies and passive. I use this on tek-dinos to.

I'll try that.

[SivartStoneheart]

That is why I said do PVP with FF off. Stop ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ with the moschops. Use Dire Bear, Sabertooth or Thylacoleo. The Dire Bear seems to have good weight and now the wiki is showing better gather numbers.

[SamtheCossack]

Originally posted by SivartStoneheart:

That is why I said do PVP with FF off. Stop ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ with the moschops. Use Dire Bear, Sabertooth or Thylacoleo. The Dire Bear seems to have good weight and now the wiki is showing better gather numbers.

Yeah, Moschops really haven't seemed worth it for a while. They are nice if your tame rates are boosted as an early tame, because you can usually tame a low level one with a single berry if your rates are 3x taming or so. Otherwise they are pretty useless, which is a shame, because I kind of like the derpy little things.

For singleplayer games, PvE vs. PvP seems to be mostly a function of which you value more, no cryosickness or the ability to slaughter babies. No real way of doing both at the same time.