ARK: Survival Evolved

ARK: Survival Evolved

Custom Dino Levels
 This topic has been pinned, so it's probably important
KitzyKatty  [developer] Jul 31, 2020 @ 5:05am
Questions & Answers
Does this mod work for modded dinos?

Yes, it does!** Both vanilla and modded dinos should be affected by this mod. I have personally tested the mod with Gaia, Primal Fear, and Kraken’s Better Dinos to verify this.

**Caveat: Any dinos that simply spawn into the map in the normal fashion will be affected by the mod. However, any mod that has a special spawn mechanism (ex. item summoning) will be dictated purely by that specific dino mod. An example of this is the Dreadful Rock Drake from the Gaia mod. This creature is spawned by killing another creature instead of it just spawning on the map like regular creatures. As a result, the Gaia mod has full control over its spawn levels due to this mod not being able to tap into that mod-specific spawning mechanism.

What is the default setup for the mod?

The default settings have the equalized dino levels option set to true and the full range of dino levels capable of spawning.

What do the various options do?

The mod has three main options for altering dino level distributions:

1) Ragnarök-like levels - This will activate the same settings that maps like the Center, Ragnarök, and Crystal Isles uses. Higher levels have a boosted chance to spawn, though level weights overall are still skewed toward the lower range. Some levels outright never spawn with this setting active. On max difficulty, levels 5, 10, 30, 35, 40, 65, 70, 75, 80, 105, 110, 115, 120 and 125 will never spawn.

2) Equalized levels – This option allows the full range of levels to spawn (using default mod settings) and gives every level and equal chance to spawn. You are just as likely to come across a level 5 dino as a level 150 dino with this option active. This is the default option for the mod. This is also the option that must be active in order to customize the minimum and maximum dino level, should you wish to do so. Further info on that is in the “How to: Using the .ini configs” discussion.

3) High levels – This option inverts the level distribution of the vanilla game. Instead of being heavily skewed towards lower level dinos, this option heavily skews the levels toward the higher end!

Finally, the MinLevel and MaxLevel ini options allows players to customize the dino level range allowed to spawn. If you wish, you can have only a certain range of levels spawn or even just all dinos spawning in at max level!

I'm not seeing 150 max dinos. Why not?

The mod itself does not automatically set the max difficulty setting option to true. That is part of the base game. In singleplayer, you should put OverrideOfficialDifficulty=5.00 in your GameUserSettings ini under the [ServerSettings] section.

How do I make only certain dino levels spawn?

Check out the “How to: Using the .ini configs” discussion for the details on that and several examples.

Do wyverns and rock drakes still spawn at their higher than normal levels? What about the tek dinos?

Wyverns, rock drake, and tek dinos still all spawn at their higher than normal values.

What about the little level 1 creatures, like jerboas?

Jerboas, glowbugs, leeds, and the boss creatures should all be unaffected by this mod. Titanosaurs and bees ARE affected by this mod, though I have added additional ini settings so players can chose whether that occurs. The mod defaults to prevent this from happening.

Does this mod work for any difficulty setting, even if it is overridden via the ini?

Yep, it respects the difficulty setting being used.

Does this mod work on modded maps?

Yes, this mod works on any map, regardless of whether they use vanilla spawners or have custom ones.

If a new dino is introduced to the game, will this mod work on it?

Yes! As soon as the new dino is introduced to the game, this mod should instantly alter its level distributions.

What happens to my tames if I remove the mod?

You keep them! The mod can be cleanly removed at any time, since it does not directly modify the dinos themselves.

Does the mod order matter?

Nope, you can put it first, last, and anywhere in between.

Do I need to do a dino wipe if I add this mod to a in-progress game/server?

A dino wipe is recommended if you want to immediately see the benefits of the mod. It will work without a wipe, but only dinos spawning AFTER the mod is installed will be affected. Dinos already spawned on the map will be unchanged.
Last edited by KitzyKatty; Aug 29, 2021 @ 11:38pm
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Does this work with Play As Dino?
KitzyKatty  [developer] Aug 1, 2020 @ 12:05am 
Depends on if that mod does some sort of special spawning mechanic for the dinos. The Play as Dino mod author does mention a lot of core blueprints were changed, so can't be 100% sure. If it is the typical "dinos spawn in on the map", then it should.
Shinygati Aug 1, 2020 @ 2:39am 
So what settings should i be using if i only want say from lv 100-150 appearing? i've tried setting it up accordingly via ini with different ini configurations but it's as if the mod isn't even installed at all.. am i doing something wrong? i already removed the old mod so i'm out of idea's.

[CustomLevelDistrib]
MinLevel=20.000000
MaxLevel=30.000000
WantsEqualLevels=False
WantsRagLevels=False
WantsHighLevels=False (also tried setting to true)
KitzyKatty  [developer] Aug 1, 2020 @ 3:51am 
Setting all the options to false does essentially turn off the mod, which is why you are seeing that behavior. In order to utilize the min and max level options, you must have the equalized levels option set to true, not the high levels option. So, to set the mod up how you described, your ini should look like this:

[CustomLevelDistrib]
MinLevel=20.000000
MaxLevel=30.000000
WantsEqualLevels=True
WantsRagLevels=False
WantsHighLevels=False
Shinygati Aug 1, 2020 @ 5:12am 
That did indeed do the trick so thank you, i guess i was a little confused as to what the equalized option does and thought it was like every level from 1-150 has an equal chance of spawning rather than user defined levels.
Originally posted by KitzyKatty:
Depends on if that mod does some sort of special spawning mechanic for the dinos. The Play as Dino mod author does mention a lot of core blueprints were changed, so can't be 100% sure. If it is the typical "dinos spawn in on the map", then it should.

Thank you
Veni Aug 14, 2020 @ 3:03pm 
Does this work with spawn override commands in the ini. We are trying to add dinos without using the crossark mods.
KitzyKatty  [developer] Aug 14, 2020 @ 6:56pm 
Yep, ini spawns work with this mod. I've used ini settings to add griffins to SE and verified they are affected.
LoneWolfHBS Aug 17, 2020 @ 8:40am 
I noticed Giant Queen Bees are affected too and spawn in the full level ranges. Correct me if I'm wrong but aren't they supposed to only spawn between 1-5 like Titanos and Jerboas?
Veni Aug 17, 2020 @ 4:28pm 
All level 5.
KitzyKatty  [developer] Aug 17, 2020 @ 8:52pm 
Ah, forgot to add that one to the list. The rule is that level 1 creatures are unaffected (and any modded creatures that base their level on the same mechanic that jerboas, glowbugs, etc do. However, ones that have a limiter to only spawn at the lowest level (like level 5 for a max difficulty default) ARE affected, as the mod removes that limiter. The next update I do will give players control over the titanosaur level, so I might as well add bees too.
slud Aug 26, 2020 @ 3:00am 
I installed the mod and the [CustomLevelDistrib] is not in the GameUserSettings.ini
Veni Aug 26, 2020 @ 3:50am 
You need to add it yourself
Barista76109 Aug 30, 2020 @ 2:37am 
I'm too stupid for this lol. I have no idea what my dino level is, my server just says "what do you want your max dino level to be?" I say "600" and its done. but level 20's are still spawning. I just dont know what number I am at to do the math of it. I would like levels 100-600 and everywhere in between but something tells me that if 100 is the lowest then they will only spawn in levels 100, 200, 300 etc and nothing in between like 150, 180, etc. can someone talk to me like I'm a toddler in what my .ini code should be? or if its not possible to have all levels from 100-600?
KitzyKatty  [developer] Aug 30, 2020 @ 7:47pm 
Hi betterworkitout. I can see how that server runs things makes running the calc more complicated, so let's see if we can't figure stuff out together. First off, I've got a question for you:

When you have your server set up normally and have the max level at 600, are the levels you see in increments of 20 (ex. lowest level possible is 20, then 40, 60, 80...580, 600)? If so, then the server is set for a difficulty value of 20.

So, you want levels between 100 and 600 with an increment of 1 (i.e. levels 100, 101, 102...598, 599, 600), correct? If I understand your server right, then telling it you want a maximum level of 30, should set the difficulty value to 1. As a result, setting the mod's ini settings like below should do the trick:

[CustomLevelDistrib]
MinLevel=100.000000
MaxLevel=600.000000
WantsEqualLevels=True
WantsRagLevels=False
WantsHighLevels=False

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