Blaugust Day 18 – ARK: Die Another Day

…and another, and another, and another.

(EDIT – ARK had the last laugh. Seems that the server settings sliders do *not* affect single-player games, judging by the GameUserSettings.ini file I just poked around in. Which explains why I wasn’t godlike… or even nooblike… Anyway, read on.)

Yesterday’s play session was the typical second session of any new game, and this applies to all games — computer-based, card games, board games — you get the picture. It’s also known as Your Beginner’s Luck Has Run Out, Byatch!

I went on and on about dying in yesterday’s post, but truth be told I did more almost-dying than real dying — hell, it was only 3 or 4 times in total over a few hours and most of those were newbie mistakes from gawking at the scenery too much and not seeing the dinosaur for the trees.

So when I fired up the game this afternoon, it was with confidence that I was going to get way more done than yesterday, since I was no longer such a noob.

WRONG!

Yeah…

It started out nicely enough, just to lull me into a false sense of security. I made it back to my original ‘house’ (well, foundations) and was admiring the gradual goldening of the beach as the sun came up behind the headland…

I think I found the perfect spot

…when I noticed the brontosaurus who had spent most of the previous day peacefully browsing by the water’s edge coming my way.

That’s nice, I thought to myself. Large peaceful herbivore, not too smart. I’ll have to shoo him away so he doesn’t squash my foundations.

And then he fell over, and I noticed he was kind of covered in gore. Yes, it’s really obvious! Maybe I was dazzled by the sunrise or something.

“Oh look,” I thought, “he’s sleeping! How cute.”

… And then I saw the dinosaur chewing on his ass. Literally.

Hmmm, I wondered. I sure hope that huge brontosaurus will be enough to keep the aggressive one sated for a while and— is it looking at me? Is it coming this way? IT’S COMING THIS WAY!!!!

You can guess that happened next. And the damned thing was only level 1. AND I had the settings skewed in my favour! (Or so I thought. After this afternoon I’m wondering if maybe I’m moving the sliders towards the DIE BYATCH! end of the scale.)

I respawned in a hurry because I’d just found out that you can loot your shit off your own corpse if you get there fast enough, and I’m lucky (so I think at the time) to respawn right on that same beach, which as I now know is not a given. The Dickosaurus is still hanging around, probably burping up an Ysharros rib or something…

…because, as it turns out, if you’re killed by a carnivore then you’re SOL — or (to be gross), soon to be SOD. You have been eaten by a grue.

(NOTE: Poop is a thing in this game, so get used to it. Dinosaur poop comes in small and medium that I’ve seen so far, but there’s also human poop (which I should never never NEVER have picked up, even if it was my own) and presumably other-entity-poop that I just haven’t yet come across. YHBW.)

Let’s cut to the chase and make the rest of this a bit more concise.

Ysharros is such a noob she thinks the dodo loves her. It’s just a health icon.

Dino won’t leave and eats Ysh a few more times. Ysh, driven by death-rage, decides to make a new survivor – for no reason whatsoever other than to not only lose all her items but also lose all her levels, only to get a change of hair colour. Kids, don’t let /rage-quitting drive you!

Note to self: broken tree stumps do NOT happen by themselves

Okay then, I think proudly to myself, I figured something out! Avoid big dinos!

And then I ran into these little guys (and their even smaller brethren), who killed me. And killed me. And killed me. And I found the best use for selfie-cam, because it sure as hell isn’t to send pix to my besties on Whatsapp-ARK.

I know their names now. The Shitlist has them forever. I may have to tame one just so I can kill it– okay that’s a lie, but I’ll think really bad thoughts about them!

By this time I’ve spawned somewhere way to the east of where I started, probably because I didn’t pay attention to the spawn-zone choice, and I’m probably lucky it didn’t respawn me on the north side of the island which is apparently where dinos go to play with tasty human treats. I get killed a few more times trying to work my way back west to see if Ysharros 1.0’s house foundations are still where she put them even though I made a new character, but I never make it that far because I keep dying and the dinos that kill me are getting smaller and smaller. They’re mocking me, I know it.

x2 because I ran right into him AGAIN

…and so on.

Ysh, driven by death-weariness after something like 8 deaths — all of them to carnivores so screw you and your attempted corpse run, byatch! — decides to hit back in the only way she can.

SHE DELETES THE FREAKING WORLD

Take that, dinosaurs!

(BUT NOT HERSELF)

(AND SETS THE OPTIONS TO EVEN MOAR EASY*)

(And takes to writing about herself in the third person)

Bwahahahaha! … Isn’t that kind of cheaty? Oh who cares, this is a solo game.

Yay! Supply crate! Noooooo! It’s Level 15+ to open. This game hates me.

I eventually made it all the way back to my starting beach because — well, I don’t know why since it wasn’t even the same world, but after you start working on your toes to count the number of times you’ve died your goals tend to become a little more basic.

Only to find $#*@$^# Spinosaur 2.0 waiting for Ysharros 2.0. Crouching, by the way, is surprisingly helpful for avoiding becoming dinner. Who’da thunk it? Dickosaur 2.0 got bored and went off to kill dodos on the other side of the river and I crept out of hiding.

I’ll be taming me one of those bad boys right after I’m done hiding. And finding food. And building a house. And putting down my boxes (oh yeah, that was my one piece of good luck – the newbie beach supply drop had 2 small boxes in it, woot storage… once I can figure out how to get into them once they’re dropped). And making some weapons, preferably nukes.

Actually, it was 18:51 in game when I had to log out and I’m currently just hoping I’ll make it through the next night. What if surviving nights 1 and 2 was sheer luck and my campfire attracts my hungry dinosaurs?

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I have since discovered that I am not alone in being damn near corpse-camped by ARKian dinosaurs. Be warned, the language is colourful. This is the same person who made the very simple, easy-to-follow Dinosaur Taming!! video Aywren originally linked to.

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* Assuming she’s right about the way the sliders work. This is up for debate.