My single player experience

[Grey Dragon]

I usually only play single player games as I have never had fun playing multiplayer games, but overall, people seemed to think that Ark's single player experience was worth it, so I decided to give it a go. I boosted the experience gain by 50% to compensate for the fact I wouldn't be getting extra experience from a tribe.

It took me a long time to reach a point where I could actually start taming medium-sized dinosaurs, but I eventually got there. I decided to ride around on my parasaur and do a bit of exploring. I found a lot of useful items and gained a lot of experience through finding notes, but then I got ambushed by two raptors while gathering materials and killed along with my parasaur, losing all of my gear.

This pattern has repeated itself twice so far. I don't think the difficulty of the game is unfair, but every loss is crushing. I have to start gathering materials and rebuilding my gear almost from scratch every time. I can't simply go back and get my lost gear because it's always guarded by whatever killed me the last time.

Is it really worth it to keep trying?

[Junker-2047-]

Take advantage of single player and tailor the game to how you enjoy playing. I personally hate the constant dying and retrieving corpses and 4hr tame time and grinding resources.

So I 6x the tame speed. Double gather rate. 6x weight capacity. 2x xp gain. Lately I've been using the /fly console command to jet all over the map to explore and find dinosaurs to tame.


Just play how you want. Getting insta killed by every random dino in Ark will just make you uninstall the game. I used to think I was cheating myself out of the challenge but them I realized taming a dino for 14 hours using kibble that took 9 hours to make isn't a challenge. This game was built with giant clans and pvp in mind. I thats not your scene then just play your own game.

[behemoth227]

Build a base. Store your valuable gear. If you're just going exploring, take the bare minimum, nothing you cant stand to lose. That includes dinos. A parasaur was a good choice for early exploration, they're decently fast, can usually take a few hits, and have decent cargo space. They are not, however, suitable for heavy combat. Your default response to a threat should be to flee. Also, don't get attached to them, view them as disposable as well.

Expect to die. A lot. And to not always be able to recover your gear. Stone is the best choice for base building in single player. Most dinos cant break it down. and its much cheaper and easier than metal. On most maps, building on the shore is safer than building inland.

[Grey Dragon]

Originally posted by behemoth227:

Your default response to a threat should be to flee.

Small problem. The predators that ambush me and take me out are always faster than me, so if I run into them, death is inevitable.

Still, thanks for the advice.

Originally posted by Junker-2047-:

Take advantage of single player and tailor the game to how you enjoy playing. I personally hate the constant dying and retrieving corpses and 4hr tame time and grinding resources.

So I 6x the tame speed. Double gather rate. 6x weight capacity. 2x xp gain. Lately I've been using the /fly console command to jet all over the map to explore and find dinosaurs to tame.

This makes a lot of sense. Thanks, though I don't think I want to go as far as using flight cheats.

[Veeshan]

It absolutely is but you'll want to REDUCE your XP rate to make it sane as you've probably seen, and employ a paradigm of leaving the base ONLY with things you can afford to lose.

For reference the "original" rates (like back during release) is now 0.25 (with the Single Player Settings toggle off). That'll make it important to set up your farm, tame dinos for eggs, and upgrade to gathering dinos when appropriate. (However breeding at that rate is pretty brutal.)

I've actually lowered XP BELOW 0.25 occasionally because it's just so clearly un"balanced".

PS - https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2527492534

[Zac's Dad]

These are good tips posted previously. I will simply add to level up your speed attribute. There will be a point where you can outrun many things. Raptors run at what the game calls your speed to be 113% - A lot of people learn to run backwards and throw bolas at raptors. I've seen that save a few people from raptors when they can't out run them.

I also have my experience rates tuned down. I basically turn off the XP for 'just standing there'. I too play solo -- on my server and am in no hurry to get anywhere. After all its a survival game.

[Grey Dragon]

Thanks for the useful tips everyone.

Latest problem: a pack of raptors got into my house and trashed the place, so now I REALLY have to start from scratch.

[Q̴̡̼̽̒̕u̸̘̪̾͊̚͜e̴]

Originally posted by Grey Dragon:

Thanks for the useful tips everyone.

Latest problem: a pack of raptors got into my house and trashed the place, so now I REALLY have to start from scratch.

If you can, try building a stone base (or at least house) as raptors can't damage stone.
As for your parasaur, some dinos have extra abilities you can use by pressing 'c' (not sure what it is on the controller). The parasaur's ability causes dinos to flee

[Junker-2047-]

Originally posted by Grey Dragon:

Thanks for the useful tips everyone.

Latest problem: a pack of raptors got into my house and trashed the place, so now I REALLY have to start from scratch.

Change the setting to disable structure damage. Unless you like rebuilding every day.

[EzRyder]

like people say, the game is designed for MP for the most part
i play mostly SP myself tho it takes some customization to do it and enjoy it the way i like
take some time to look thru all the Advanced settings first off, many are self explanatory, like the structure decay (i agree disable this on sp)
another thing that helps me get over the 'hump' is just experience, for example using a raft with a dino trap can get you some strong(ish) dino's fairly early (like some raptors for guard dogs maybe), and taming a flier early on so you can explore with less danger
not exactly tips just things to consider - i also use some mods to help
sp is diff but can be a lot of fun

[Grey Dragon]

Getting a lot of good info here. Btw, just accidentally tamed a pegomastax. I think it liked the fruit it stole from me.

[🦊 Hermit]

Bolas are absolutely invaluable. I keep a stack of them on my hotbar even in endgame when I'm running around in tek gear. They can totally save your life several times over if you're ambushed.

Also, remember that dinos will go for the easiest meal they can get. So if you're being chased and you run past a parasaur or phiomia, the pred will probably turn on the dino and leave you alone to make your escape.

I find approx. 124 movement speed is enough to outrun almost anything on the map, however a lot of stamina will probably pay dividends along with that. Even if you are only keeping pace with the thing behind you and can't lose it, you'll be able to run for ages and so have the chance to locate a herbivore you can sick it on to as per the paragraph above. Also, trees and rocks are your friend - kite a dino around some scenery and they'll likely get stuck or at least slowed significantly.

And if all else fails, travel around with a large pack of dilophosaurs. They may be weak alone, but as an army they can be surprisingly powerful. They're very easy to tame, so can be replaced quickly if you lose a few. And if things really go south you can leave them to cover for you while you get out of there.

[TheReverendGreen]

Originally posted by Grey Dragon:

I usually only play single player games as I have never had fun playing multiplayer games, but overall, people seemed to think that Ark's single player experience was worth it, so I decided to give it a go. I boosted the experience gain by 50% to compensate for the fact I wouldn't be getting extra experience from a tribe.

It took me a long time to reach a point where I could actually start taming medium-sized dinosaurs, but I eventually got there. I decided to ride around on my parasaur and do a bit of exploring. I found a lot of useful items and gained a lot of experience through finding notes, but then I got ambushed by two raptors while gathering materials and killed along with my parasaur, losing all of my gear.

This pattern has repeated itself twice so far. I don't think the difficulty of the game is unfair, but every loss is crushing. I have to start gathering materials and rebuilding my gear almost from scratch every time. I can't simply go back and get my lost gear because it's always guarded by whatever killed me the last time.

Is it really worth it to keep trying?

bruh you can literly scan for danger with the parasaur? use that to avoid the raptors use dododex if you don't even know that they can do that.

[Sir Loin]

with i think 115% run speed pretty much nothing will catch you, makes getting out of a bad situation much easier

[Serious]

I played this game more than 2000 hours now, only singleplayer or non-dedicated coop together with my brother:
The standard ark setting is horrible for singleplayer. I don't or will ever understand how some players can enjoy this game without console or mods :-D
but that's a matter of taste.

Here is my list of singleplayer necessary mods you should add:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=566887000
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=760865850
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1404697612
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1837445660
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1251586701
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=889745138

For coop gameplay
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1705579268


Additional i highly recommend to learn the most important console commands.
Stuff like: ghost, fly, walk, god, saveworld, infinitestats or destroywilddinos, dotame, forcetame,...
Don't play singleplayer without them.


Non of these mods make the game easier or you lose any kind of imertion. You just safe a LOT of time and unnecessary frustration about really odd decisions the devs made towards a stable and entertaining singleplayer experience.

[Veeshan]

Originally posted by Serious:

Non of these mods make the game easier or you lose any kind of imertion. You just safe a LOT of time and unnecessary frustration about really odd decisions the devs made towards a stable and entertaining singleplayer experience.

What a ridiculous claim. ALL of these mods eliminate huge swathes of gameplay, by design (both the gameplay and the elimination of it).*

Don't confuse your personal preferences for some kind of quality. Many of us LOVE the mechanics you mod out.

*Ofc this isn't to say that your mods don't bring other gameplay into focus.