The Refining Forge and Industrial Forge in Ark Survival Evolved

Refining Forge

You won't get far in Ark Survival Evolved without a refining forge.  The humble refining forge is needed to convert raw metal and scrap metal into metal ingots, so you can craft useful items.  It is also needed to make gasoline. The refining forges are small and don't take many resources, and no rare ones. Industrial forges are bigger in every way.

Resources to Craft A Refining Forge

• 125 stone
• 5 flint
• 65 hide
• 20 wood or fungal wood
• 40 fiber

If you have a large tribe or just big ambitions then you need a lot of metal made into metal ingots.  So you either need a lot of refining forge or one gigantic industrial forge.  In Ark, the industrial forge runs on gasoline only.  It processes raw metal into ingots in batches and with amazing speed compared to the refining forge.  The industrial forge will make gasoline just like a small one, and so, makes its own fuel. It will also burn wood into charcoal, which is very handy if you require large quantities of gunpowder for your Ark adventures.  

Resources to Craft an Industrial Forge

• 2500 metal ingots
• 250 crystal
• 600 cementing paste, or achatina paste
• 400 oil
• 400 polymer, organic polymer, or corrupted nodule

Level 80 survivor

gasoline for fuel

While the Industrial Forge is expensive and huge, you will get a lot more out of it, than the more expensive Industrial Grinder.  Even though I am a solo player, late in the game I will build an industrial forge, rather than operate 3-5 refining forges.  It makes even more sense in single player since your metal won't be refining into ingots when offline.  

The Industrial Grinder In Ark Survival Evolved: Is it worth it?

The industrial grinder in Ark Survival Evolved is a high costly item that you are only able to craft late in the game.  It doesn't make anything useful, it turns already crafted items, structures etc., into their raw resources.  You get fewer resources back then was put in when they were crafted.  

Reasons to craft the industrial grinder

1) You are part of a large tribe on PvP server and frequently loot bases and gather of surplus stuff you don't need, but are still valuable in their raw material

2) You constantly collect items from loot drops and have a crazy collection of ascendant Paracer saddles and don't even have a Paracer.  That's me.

3) You want to make a video or blog post about the industrial grinder That's me too.

Most people who play Ark aren't ever going to need an industrial grinder, but some of you will find yourself in a large tribe and collector of expensive but useless items.  So...

What resources are needed to craft the industrial grinder?

3,200 metal ingots

2,000 crystal

600 cementing paste or achatina paste

600 oil

600 polymer, organic polymer, or corrupted nodule

gasoline to run it

a lot of room at your base

A survivor at level 64 and above

OUCH!  That is a lot of resources, you, or your tribe are going to need to harvest or loot a lot of resources to build one.  You may have to build an industrial forge to get all that metal. For most, the industrial grinder is too expensive to make. It just isn't worth grinding out all those resources for what you get back.  I built one out of curiosity and to write this post and make a video.  I habitually visit loot drops and supply crates and get great gear that I will never use, but I just put that stuff in the grinder and I can't hit that grind all button.  My ascendant Paracer saddle goes right back in the vault.  

Top 5 Most Annoying Creatures in Ark Survival Evolved

 

Ark Survival Evolved has some truly annoying creatures in the game.  Many of these don't necessarily cause your character great personal harm, but they steal your stuff, stun you, blind you, etc.  Most tend to be small little turds that aren't very useful for much, especially in PvE.

My Top 5 Most Annoying Creatures in Ark

1 Pegomastax

2 Troodon

3 Microraptor

4 Ichthyornis 

 5 Yutyrannus

 

I will say I wish the Ark devs would remove some of these or their most annoying traits from the game.  I have gotten rid of the Pegomastax spawns completely and reduced the Ichthyornis spawns on my current server.  My base is on the beach, and I have plant species X in crop plots, just to take out any Ichthyornis that might fly by and try to steal from my inventory.  I hate those little buggers, but I'll just have to deal with them.  

Best Metal and Crystal Location Arctic Biome Genesis

I think the best place in Ark Genesis Pt. 1 to get metal, crystal and obsidian is the Arctic Biome, and the best place is the path that wraps up around one of the mountains, about dead center in of them map.  Probably the best way to get up there is a bloodstalker, or a grappling hook and start collecting at 71.9 lat and 31.0 long.  If you need to come on foot or with some smaller dinos start at the cave entrance at 78.2 lat 28.0 long.  If you have larger dinos you can come up over the hill at 70.2  36.6 long, but that area is getting very dangerous.  

The best metal, crystal and obsidian location map in the Arctic Biome - Ark Genesis

Where to Harvest Silk in Ark Genesis?

Finding silk in Ark Survival Evolved Genesis is easy, but weird.  Biologically in makes no sense at all but silk is found by harvesting corals in the ocean biome, and they are pretty much everywhere.   Simply swim down, or take a tame like a frog and harvest the corals by hand or use a sickle.  You can also get plant species Y seeds from these same "plants", and equally weird these corals also yield berries.  Also making no sense is getting mushroom wood and thatch from other coral types.  I guess the Ark devs care less about biology as the game evolves, but I remind myself that it is just a game! 

How and Where to Get Wyvern Eggs in Ark Survival Evolved

There are several ways to get wyvern eggs on the Ragnarok map of Ark Survival Evolved.  Most of these that I am going to discuss concern the trench on Ragnarok.  However, these methods will work for Scorched Earth and Valguero too, but won't be as applicable to the wyvern cave on Ragnarok.  When I discuss methods I am going to focus only on creatures and tools that can be used in the base game maps, so I'm not going to talk about snow owls, and glide suits for example.  

Wyvern Egg Locations

Ragnarok Wyvern Trench East end - lat 26.4 lon 64.9 West end lat 24.0 lon 71.2 Ragnarok Wyvern Cave Area lat 70.9 lon 40.9

Wyvern Cave Entrance  lat 68.8  lon 42.0  (SW Tropics) Valguero Wyvern Trench East end lat 09.0 lon 79.5 West end lat 8.5 lon 80.1 Scorched Earth Wyvern Trench North end lat 30.1 lon 14.9 South end 72.8 lon 21.5

Lost Island Wyvern Locations

Methods (warning don't head straight back to your base even if you think you lost the wyverns!)

1. Grab and Distract

Use a Pteranodon (the best after griffin) or another flier, grab an egg take off, and lead the wyverns to some large wild creature that will distract them long enough to make your escape.  Brontos or mammoths in Ragnarok are good candidates, smaller creatures seem to have less chance to agro the wyverns.  A better variation of this is to have a tame creature or several to sacrifice.   Before you make your egg run set them up along the planned path of escape.  A flier or large creature is the best.  Set your tame to aggressive, so it will attack the wyverns.  If you don't the wyverns may not agro on your tame that is just sitting there. NOTE: I suppose on PvP this could lead to a tribe war if it goes wrong. 

2.  Blast Them! (my favorite)

Set up an array of turrets to distract or destroy the wyverns.  This is a great choice if you are a single player, or on a server with a low population. Set up an array of about 10 plant species X or three auto-turrets.  Plant species x turrets are the cheapest way to go especially if you've got a lot of tames pooping.  This is also a good way to collect wyvern talons.  NOTE: Building an array of turrets might not be advised if there is already a lot of building on a server, or maybe a PvP server. You decide if it is ethical, or if it will get your tribe in trouble.  I usually play single player or on a private server, so I don't know.  

3. Griffin 

The griffin is the one of the best creatures to use to get eggs, but you can only find them on Ragnarok, which is a bit of a shame.   Use the griffin's dive ability to swoop down on a wyvern nest, position the griffin for a quick escape.  Repeating dive and climb is fast enough to eventually lose the attacking wyvern.  Combine the griffin with method 1 or 2 for best results.  

Other methods

I've heard a lot of other methods in the comment section of my YouTube videos on getting wyvern eggs  I haven't tried these myself, but these have been suggested by multiple commenters and seem to make sense, so I think they are legit.  

1) Tame/breed powerful Argentavis(s), and destroy the wyverns and get eggs.   
2) Grab an egg, get killed, and pick up your bag after the wyverns go away.  

Other Tips:  

Pick up low-level eggs and eat them.  This will cause new eggs to spawn which might lead to higher egg levels.  After a time, the eggs spoil in the nest, but remain there forever.  As soon as you pick them up they disappear.  That is another good reason to destroy the low-level eggs.  

Wyvern is pronounced Why - vern :)

Original video where I mispronounce wyvern

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How to Get High Level Dino Spawns in Ark Survival Evolved

To get high level dino spawns in Ark Survival Evolved you need to change the difficulty settings.  In single player it is easy (often server settings are similar).  Under the General settings tab adjust the slider all the way to the right set it to 1.  That will get you max level dinos of 120 on the Island Map (and maybe Scorched Earth) and 150 on the dlc other maps.  If you want to get higher levels than that you can manually enter a higher difficulty level than 1.

Popular Difficulty Settings

The Island/Scorched Earth
Difficulty	Wild Dino Max Level
1	120
1.2857	150
1.5714	180
2.7142	300
All other DLC maps
Difficulty	Wild Dino Max Level
0.7777	120
1.1111	150
1.2222	180
2	300

It will take some time for higher level creatures to spawn in.  You can speed the process up, by killing off the creatures yourself or you can use the destroy wild dinos command (destroywilddinos).  That will remove all the wild dinos, and depending on your system, it may take several minutes for new ones to spawn in.     

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Where to get Element Shards In Ark Genesis

Element Shard Crystals

Element shards can be harvested from the reddish crystals in the Volcanic Biome of Ark Genesis.  There is a road that leads up and around the main volcano in the Volcanic Biome that has a large number of Element Shard crystals.  The crystals are purple and easy to harvest with a simple metal pick.  Of course it's Ark so it is a very dangerous place, so keep your wits about you.  Here are some of the locations of the element shard crystals around that road.  

Lat and Long of Element Shards

19.5  82.4

19. 0  78.1

18.5  79.6

20.5  84.4

19.3  74.0

26.3  69.4

28.2  71.4

27.7  73.9

27.3  73.3

Element Shard Crystal location in the Volcanic Biome of Ark Genesis

Where to Get Tree Sap in Ark Genesis

In order to get tree sap in Ark Survival Evolved you need to find the poison trees in the Bog Biome.  Once you find the large glowing tree walk up to it to grab resources.  Be sure there are no hostile creatures around first because the tree will blast poison at you.  Once poisoned it will be very hard to see, just like if you get spit on by a dilo.  Not only will you collect sap from the poison tree you will also find Congealed Gas Balls, Absorbent Substrate, and Bio Toxin. Tree sap is sometimes awarded after a mission is completed.  

Poison Trees in Ark Genesis give Tree Sap

Some of the locations of the poison trees in Ark Genesis are:  


Toxic Mire

86.0 73.8

84.3  76.3

85.3  77.6



Fetid Pools

54.6  83.0

56.3  84.2

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Cactus Sap Location Ark Genesis

The place to find cactus sap in the Ark Genesis dlc is in the Artic Biome.  That doesn't make a lot of sense, but that's where they grow.  They also don't look very obvious, the cactus looks like a spiky purple cucumber.  Tree sap in Ark Genesis can be found in the poison trees.  

Lat and Long of Cactus Locations 

85.9   35.7

86.7   31.6

The Cactus in Ark Genesis 

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How to Tame a Ferox and Ferox Locations

The Ferox is a cool little creature that turns into a monster.  You can find the Ferox in the Artic Biome of Ark Survival Evolved Genesis Part 1 dlc.   Right now there is a Ferox cave where you can find the little guys and a lot of Polar Bears too.  It is located right by the  Searching the Frozen Zone mission at 70.8  26.2  .  There are tons of Ferox spawns there, and I wouldn't be surprised if they nerf the Ferox Cave soon.  If they do I have found a few locations where the Ferox spawn in the open.  They are in eastern section of the Artic Biome where there is a constant blizzard.

Free Roam Ferox 80.8  43.6
61.6  50.4

Cute freshly tamed Ferox at the Ferox Cave in Ark Genesis

Good luck taming, a Ferox,  the only thing hard about it is not getting killed by all the dangerous creatures or freezing to death.  One or two darts will knock them out and feed them a few berries, and they are yours.  You can also passive tame them, which is just a waste of element.

Ark Genesis Bog Biome Metal and Crystal Locations

Here are some good locations of metal crystal and green gems in the Bog Biome of Ark Genesis Part 1.  In general a good place to look is at the base or inside the giant trees.  To my  knowledge obsidian and oil do not spawn in the Bog Biome.

Metal
54.2  72.8
71.5  64.7
67.0  67.3

Metal plus Crystal
76.6  57.7
75.9  81.8
80.1  59.2

Green Gems (can also be found way up giant trees)
75.5  78.4
63.3  73.6

Poison Tree Area
86.0  73.8

How to Defeat the Insect Swam in Ark Genesis

The Insect Swam in Ark Survival Evolved Genesis is a real pain the butt to put it  mildly, but there are a few ways to deal with it.  The easiest is too jus move to the water.  The swarm will not attack you while you stand or swim in the water.  It will leave your dinos alone too.  The next thing to do is attack the swarm with a melee weapon.  I find that a spear or pike works best, but many swear by the torch.  The torch is a more satisfyingly way to kill the swarm, but I find I break a lot of torches.  You can also outrun the swarm once it targets you.  Then be sure to lead the swarm to a wild dino, or maybe a strong tame dino and the swarm will be distracted.

Building a structure is a also a good way to avoid the swarm, BUT it must be big enough so that they can't attack your body if it messes through.  A two by two hut will work, but it must be 2 walls high.

Hopefully Wild Card will greatly reduce the number of swarms in the game.  I don't have a problem with the swarm being a pest once an hour, but every few minutes is way too much.  Good luck survivors.

Bloodstalker Locations and Taming in Ark Genesis

The Bloodstalker is a game-changer in the Genesis dlc since it is the fastest way to get across most maps without fliers.  They are relatively easy to tame, you just need to craft a syringe and make lots and lots of blood packs.  It might be helpful for you to also have a preserving bin to store the blood packs in.  Then you need to find the bloodstalkers.  They hang out in the massive trees in the bog biome.   

I have found them at the following locations:

72.3   75.2

68.4  77.9

74.3  75.7

68.0  77.7

After you find one, put your blood packs in the far right slot of your hot bar ("0" slot on PC).  Get underneath the bloodstalker.  If you are close enough it will send out a web and drag you to it.  Then the bloodstalker starts feeding your blood packs instead of you!  Taming the bloodstalker doesn't take a lot of time, but it can take a lot of blood packs.  As I write the game hasn't been out long and people say it takes a lot of packs, maybe a 100 or more to tame a high level. 

With my slightly boosted rates it took a short while and 12 packs to tame a level 20 bloodstalker.  Good luck taming a blood stalker, or should I say getting enough blood packs, either way, once you get one of these creatures the new Genesis dlc will get much easier, but it will still be hard.

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