How to Tame (Taming Guide) - Ark: Survival Ascended Guide - IGN (2024)

Ark: Survival Ascended is set apart from many other games in the genre with its robust taming mechanic that lets you befriend and ride many different dinosaurs and creatures. With this taming guide, you'll learn everything you need to about how to tame in Ark: Survival Ascended.

How to Tame in Ark: Survival Ascended

Here are the basic steps you need to take before setting off to tame anything in Ark: Survival Ascended.

1. First, gather the right materials:

• A Weapon to Knock it Out
• Extra Narcoberries / Narcotics
• Its Preferred Food

Then, you can:

1. Hunt and Knock Out the Target
2. Tame the Target With Food

Click on any of the steps to jump to that part!

Acquire a Weapon That Knocks Creatures Out

The first thing you need to do is acquire something that can effectively knock out a creature.

If you look at a creature's stats, you'll see a bar for "Torpidity." Essentially, you need to deplete this bar before you deplete the dino's health pool--then, it will become tranquilized, allowing you to proceed with the taming process of adding food to its inventory.

Certain weapons will do more torpidity damage than regular damage, allowing you to tranquilize your target effectively.

Option 1: A Club

The most straightforward weapon that deals torpidity damage you can make in the early game is the Club. This is a melee weapon, though, so it can be difficult to handle a creature that's running away (or trying to kill you.) Honestly, it's not recommended as it would take quite a while to do enough torp damage to knock a larger creature out, but it can help get you some Dodos and other small critters.

Option 2: Narcotics (Tranq Arrows, etc)

narcotics and the item you need to make them: narcoberries. You'll find them pretty commonly by gathering in bushes. You'll use narcotics to make Tranq Arrows and other torp ammo - like Tranq Darts for rifles!

Get Extra Narcoberries / Narcotics

Okay, while you're at it crafting weapons, stock up on extra narcoberries, or even better, narcotic. A creature's torpidity will fill back up over time, and if it wakes up before it's tamed, you'll lose it!

You can force the beast to eat narcoberries or narcotic in its inventory to keep it eepy.

Collect Preferred Food

First, is it an herbivore or a carnivore? Though some creatures have specific preferences, there's a general tier list of food depending on their category.

Preferred Carnivore Food:

Some creatures have very specific preferred food, may also like fish, or may only like fish! If they're not eating what you're using, try something new - especially if they're an aquatic species.

1. Preferred Kibble
2. Raw Mutton
3. Cooked Lamb chop
4. Raw Prime Meat
   - (Unique cases - Fish)
5. Cooked Prime Meat/ Prime meat jerky
6. Raw Meat
7. Cooked Meat/ Cooked Meat Jerky
8. Other Kibble

Smaller and lower level carnivores will require less meat. Fifty should be good for Dilos and Raptors. Carnotaurs should be happy with about 50-100. T-Rex's and the like will need closer to 200. If you can manage to find Raw Prime Meat, this will make the taming process go by much faster as it's about 4x more effective than regular meat. Prime meat is hard to come by and spoils very quickly. You can extend the time it lasts by putting it in a tamed creature's inventory - things in general last much longer when carried by tamed creatures' rather than you!

Cooked Prime Meat lasts much, much longer but is only about twice as effective as regular meat when taming. It is best to look for prime meat when you are ready to start feeding or in the process of feeding, but can be prepared earlier if you have a Refrigerator to preserve it for longer. Raw Prime Meat can be gathered off of any animal from Stegos and Carnos to other large creatures, and even includes the Argentavis (giant eagles). Carvinores will prioritize eating prime over other raw meat, so if you are in the middle of feeding there should be no need to remove the lesser meat until the prime is eaten.

Preferred Herbivore Food:

1. Preferred Kibble
2. Preferred Berries
3. Preferred Vegetable
4. Other Berries
5. Other Vegetables
6. Other Kibble

Mejoberries are your best bet as a catch-all for herbivores, but some might prefer something else. For example, the Equus prefers rockcarrot. Mejoberries are easy to acquire, as you can gather them from almost anywhere from bushes. Vegetables are a little bit more tricky--you'll most likely have to find seeds and grow them yourself.

Smaller and lower level dinos will require fewer berries; around 50 should be plenty for creatures like Dodos and turtles. For Parasaurs, Trikes, and the like, 50-100. Bronto-sized dinos will likely need close to 250 or so berries. It's always better to over-estimate than be under-prepared. If needed you should be able to harvest more from bushes around your unconscious soon-to-be pet.

Hunt and Knock Out the Target

Now that you've acquired an appropriate weapon, food, and extra narcoberries or narcotics, you can attempt to tame the creature!

Before setting off, check your tamed creatures' settings and make sure they aren't going to kill your target accidentally.

The target may flee or attack you, so be prepared for either outcome. Be sure your stamina is full before attacking in case you need to chase it a long distance. If it turns to attack and it's relatively slow you should be able to either back up as you shoot or just sprint some distance away and turn to fire a few more before running again. If it's fast it would be best to be somewhere up high like a tall rock or above it on a cliff that it won't be able to climb.

Tranq ammo will deal torpidity damage to a creature over time, so it's best to shoot it at a cadence of about every five seconds. If you're worried about your shots hitting, though, it's fine to keep shooting--you'll just have used more ammo than necessary by the time it's knocked out.

Once you've dealt enough damage to a creature, it might run, whether it started as aggressive or not, as a means of self-preservation. This can make it difficult to land the final shots - especially for aerial creatures that can fly away, for example. To make things easier, consider making pens to lead creatures into and trap them. This prevents a target from harming you or running away, allowing you to land a knock-out more easily!

Tame the Target With Food

Presumably, you've now knocked the target out. Great job! Now, you're racing against the clock to get the "Taming" bar full before the "Unconscious" bar depletes.