Random dead deer? (Ep 3)

[ajb1978]

So this is interesting... I'm replaying Ep 3 again, and completed the white stag side mission.  Loaded down with a bunch of stuff I started making my way back to Thompson's Crossing via an extended and serpentine route.  I made a detour to avoid a bear, mag lensed myself a fire in that unmarked barn way south of the farmhouse to warm up.  Got on the road, headed east over the bridge, then north right through the thick of the wolf pack outside the red barn to nab the Forest Talker cache in the unmarked barn north of it.  Then east through the birch forest, nabbed some birch bark, then finally headed south again intent on completing my journey back to Thompson's Crossing.

The reason behind that whole explanation is to make it abundantly clear I had been outside for hours, and at no point had done any hunting.

Halfway between the birch forest and Thompson's Crossing, I saw a dead deer in the middle of a wide open field. Upon investigation, I found that it was 42% frozen, but was not a "ravaged" deer carcass.  Meaning it hadn't been felled by a wolf.  What's more, it had a full 9.1kg of meat, both gut, and the hide intact.  It was as if I had shot it myself....but I hadn't.

Has anyone else encountered something like this?

[ManicManiac]

@ajb1978

I think I know what you might have found.  I have seen similar things happen in a particular spot over by the lower wing wreckage at the base of Timberwolf Mountain.  For me what was happening was that a wolf would fell a deer, and a bear would happen to wonder by & spook it off the kill before it had a chance to finish "ravaging it."  At first I wasn't sure what was happening, I'd just find a nearly fully in tact deer dead by the wing.  Later on I happened to be passing though the area and happened to see it actually play out.  It was an interesting series of events to watch.

[ajb1978]

1 minute ago, ManicManiac said:

For me what was happening was that a wolf would fell a deer, and a bear would happen to wonder by & spook it off the kill before it had a chance to finish "ravaging it." 

Interesting, but the nearest bear is the one way back in the birch forest that wanders out to the barn and back.  He never comes in the direction where I found the deer.  I thought maybe it was a timberwolf attack, because timberwolves don't actually stop and eat a deer.  They just kill it and go back to their patrol, leaving behind a non "ravaged" carcass.  However I hadn't advanced the main story to the point that Timberwolves start to appear...so there goes that theory.

[ManicManiac]

@ajb1978

In your case it may not have been a bear that interrupted the wolf's feeding.  It might have been that the wolf was de-spawned as it was eating... or it's possible that something else might have spooked it (moose will have the same effect too).  It could have been any number of things I suppose, but I'm still reasonably confidant that you found a wolf kill where the wolf's feeding was interrupted for whatever reason.

Edited February 29, 2020 by ManicManiac

[ajb1978]

59 minutes ago, ManicManiac said:

I'm still reasonably confidant that you found a wolf kill where the wolf's feeding was interrupted for whatever reason.

I've got a hypothesis that stems from hearing wolf howls during a blizzard, but never encountering any actual wolves.  I think the wildlife might still be out and about, just invisible and otherwise unable to interact with the player in any way.  But maybe they can still interact with each other.  There are timberwolves that spawn in when you talk to Father Thomas the first time.  There are also some deer on the north end of town, which could get close enough to hypothetically grab aggro from a timberwolf patrolling Thompson's Crossing. So I'm wondering if one of those hypothetical invisible not-yet-in-play timberwolves may have killed the deer.

[ManicManiac]

@ajb1978

That could be too. 

[Hotzn]

Unfortunately, I can't explain the deer OP found. But I remember wayyy back in some earlier version of the game, shortly after bears had been spread on the other maps (at first they were only in PV, then they also appeared in CH and ML), I once found a dead wolf in CH. At that point I had not yet shot, stabbed or otherwise interacted with a wolf in CH in any way which could have killed it. For a moment I thought that maybe some kind of interaction with a bear had happened, that a bear might have killed that wolf. I never found out though.

What I wanted to say is that it is really intriguing that we sometimes find things in the game which are hard to explain, isn't it? Imagine that in the stone age, legends may have sprung up from such inexplicable findings.