Coastal Highway. Wildlife acting up. Have no clues on what's going on. But I'm glad it happened. And my thermal underwear have a new color now.

[SysGhost]

Sooo.. Here I am. Just arrived to the Coastal highway on this run. Knowing the area to some degree from a previous run I know that I want to head for the Coastal Town, and set up a base inside Quonset Garage. Just as I enter the town area there's one wolf snarling at me. I quickly whip up the revolver and lands a bullet between the eyes of the wolf just as it starts a run towards me. It slops down to the ground with a sad whimper. -"Look at that! food situation solved on arrival."

I harvest the meat, skin and intestines off the wolf carcass and heads inside the mentioned garage  to set up a base. Organize things and collect wood for the fire barrel inside.
Now, this is the moment that makes me go "W.T... F ... is going on????" followed by a surprised "Dang!" Ami I lucky or what?"

Here's what's been going down outside Quonset Garage just now:
I plop out the front door to collect more wood from the pallets outside. Just as I pop out a huge honking moose stares and threatens me just to my right. I shit my thermals. At the very same time a wolf on my left snarls at me. This is where I go "Nope! I'm not dealing with this shit!" turns a quick 180 degree and beg I am fast enough with the door to get away. Just as I do that, the moose charges. I'm not sure if it charges me, or the wolf. I'd assume it's me but I'm not sure. I just barely got back inside with the moose snout just entering my peripheral vision.

I pause for a second trying to process what just happened. I plan ahead a little by preparing my rifle and make sure it's not jammed. Then heads back out the back entrance. I sneak around the corner only to see the moose slowly walking off towards the ice/sea, and a wolf carcass just outside the front door. "WT..F... What just happened? What killed the wolf? Did the moose ki...." 
*Roar* A bear just detected me from behind. I turn white as a sheet thinking that I'm done for now! In a frenzied panic I just run forwards past the moose enraging it in the process, while I dash for the car that I aimed for just up ahead. I can hear the moose once again charging me as I ran past it. Just as I reach the car door, and with the moose's antlers tickling my ass, there's an enraged bear to follow. I barely got inside the car. Both my thermal pants have changed color now. I swear there's a couple of bricks in the pants too.

Moose disengages the charge and slowly walks towards the sea/ice again. The bear slowly heads back towards the coastal town. I wait for them both to make some distance away from me before I pop back out. Knowing that moose are a rare sight I don't want to miss out on the opportunity to get meat and skin to last me for a long time. That moose skin satchel sure would fit nicely now. With the price in my mind, I pop out of the car and sneaks towards the direction the moose went. I prepare the rifle and make sure there's no jam.

Up and over the snow banks and onto the ice. I see the moose with it's hind towards me. I take a shot and makes the moose a new one in the rear. The moose sprints off and I quickly follow by distance making sure I have enough buffer zone to act in case it goes south. The moose turns around towards me, slowly walking. It hasn't seen me yet. I crouch down to be less visible and take aim for a nice headshot. *Blam* Nice hit! I bet it's critical too. The moose once again runs off out towards the open sea. I once again follow safely behind. Rinse and repeat this process for a couple of times and the moose finally slops down. Score! Finally! I got what I wanted. I get up and quarter the moose while it's not frozen.

I then grab the skin and guts first and heads back towards the coastal town area to dump it off inside the garage. But just as I'm arriving, I once again see the bear roaming around.
I better deal with this bear or it'll make a snack out of my my sorry ass. I head towards a car so that I can quickly plop inside once I taken a shot on the bear.I'd rather wait for the bear to bleed out than trying to engage in a futile struggle with it. I stand by the side of the car and aims the rifle over the car top towards the bear that is now roaming the front of the garage. Just as I'm about to take the shot I notice yet another two wolf carcasses further up in the background. "Gee. This garage is quite popular. Even the wildlife seek it out."

The bear is now close enough that it's detecting me. And I'm still carrying all these guts so I'm quite smelly too. I take the shot. *BlaM*, and without looking if it was a hit or not I plop inside the car to avoid the bear charge. I... hear nothing... Wait... Why is it so quiet. The bear should either be enraged or be whimpering off by now. I can't see anything from the position of the cars seat. I ... decide to get back out and... wolf snarling. I pop back inside the car quicker than a bullet. "Holy cr*p! Not again! .. .whyyyy?". The wolf sudednly whimpers and runs off. -"Is the bear still alive??? I couldn't see".

Well... after a few moments when I'm kinda sure the wolf is far away I dare look out again. It's dusk. The bear lies dead infront of the garage front entrance together with the previous wolf carcass. I take notice of two other wolf carcasses behind the garage where the moose came from. Lemme count this encounter:

1 Moose dead out on the ice. Quatered.
1 bear dead just outside the garage front entrance.
3 wolf carcasses I know I didn't kill. One with the bear carcass and the other two further behind the garage in the background.

For only a few shots and a whole lot of bricks in my pants, I'd consider this engagement a lucky fucking success.

 

But... I still can't process what happened to the wolves. I know I never took a shot at em. Not even to scare em off. I did just arrive to set up base here. Now I have more meat than I probably can consume within a reasonable time. I thought bear/moose couldn't kill wolves. Do you guys have any clues on what's been going down here? Theories? I'm kinda stumped and amazed of the whole ordeal.

[ChillPlayer]

So first off, because of bear, moose and tons of wolves in the area, Quonset is probably the last place in CH I would consider for a long term base As for what happend, I cannot say - on which difficulty do you play? Because wolves usually run away when a bear or moose enters their field of perception. But then I also noticed that wolves behave differently when I smell, for example I cannot scare them away with a torch, which otherwise works like magic.

My guess would be that your smell did make the wolves ignore the moose/bear and then the wolves got killed by them. But that's just a guess, I'd love to see this once in action.

[Leeanda]

Not that I've ever heard of it happening before but I suppose the wolves must have got in the way when the moose was charging?  

What a  welcome party that was !🙂 Probably why most people prefer their bases elsewhere.

[SysGhost]

2 minutes ago, ChillPlayer said:

So first off, because of bear, moose and tons of wolves in the area, Quonset is probably the last place in CH I would consider for a long term base As for what happend, I cannot say - on which difficulty do you play? Because wolves usually run away when a bear or moose enters their field of perception. But then I also noticed that wolves behave differently when I smell, for example I cannot scare them away with a torch, which otherwise works like magic.

My guess would be that your smell did make the wolves ignore the moose/bear and then the wolves got killed by them. But that's just a guess, I'd love to see this once in action.

Well.. This is still an easy "walk in the park" voyageur. I'm more for exploration as of now before I engage a long run with interloper.
And now that you mention it. I was still carrying some raw wolf meat and guts from the first wolf I killed. If I recall correctly now, it was 3 points on the smell meter (maxed out)

[SysGhost]

6 minutes ago, Leeanda said:

Not that I've ever heard of it happening before but I suppose the wolves must have got in the way when the moose was charging?  

What a  welcome party that was !🙂 Probably why most people prefer their bases elsewhere.

That's where I'm different. Having wildlife just outside is something I consider a "nearby food court" and a "fresh hides for the taking" equally as close.
Then again this is after all just a voyager run so I'm not too concerned of wildlife engagements. I'd be planning this differently on interloper for sure.

But yeah this might be a wee bit too close. Never knew the area would be this popular. Knowing these animals are near this area, I never thought it all be there at the very same time.

Edited January 3, 2022 by SysGhost

[Leeanda]

3 minutes ago, SysGhost said:

That's where I'm different. Having wildlife just outside is something I consider a "nearby food court" and a "fresh hides for the taking" equally as close.
Then again this is after all just a voyager run so I'm not too concerned of wildlife engagements. I'd be planning this differently on interloper for sure.

Well I'm on pilgrim so I always make my base there. Never get that much wildlife though!  Usually 1 bear and 1 wolf are resident. Only ever had the moose once ,so meat/hide wise you're set for life.... Hopefully 🙂

[hozz1235]

I've never heard of a bear or moose killing any other animal - even accidentally.  Didn't think HL made it possible.

[SysGhost]

1 minute ago, hozz1235 said:

I've never heard of a bear or moose killing any other animal - even accidentally.  Didn't think HL made it possible.

Another far fetched theory of mine would be when I was approaching the Coastal Town area I casually scared off a few wolves from the fishing huts I was concerned about. Just hip-fired the revolver a few times in the general direction. They whimpered off and I never though of it any more. Besides they ran out towards the sea so I don't see how they' end up behind the garage. If that would be the wolves I later saw behind the garage, it must be some fracking extremely lucky hip-shots.

Well.. .that's the only thing I can recall being remotely close... and with a big fat emphasis on "remotely"

[hozz1235]

That must have been it.  They then back-tracked and bled out.

Very good story - thanks for sharing!

Edited January 3, 2022 by hozz1235

[Leeanda]

Or it could just be an extremely lucky but weird bug. There's plenty of them at the moment. But no offence. You could just be a crack shot with the revolver!🙂

[SysGhost]

This describes it quite well:

https://satwcomic.com/happy-friendly-animals

[Leeanda]

14 minutes ago, SysGhost said:

This describes it quite well:

https://satwcomic.com/happy-friendly-animals

🤣🤣🤣

[RandomPlayer]

I've had something similar happen to me, but there was only one wolf and not three.

Long story short, pilgrim difficulty mode game.  I had spawned in DP and spent some time there forging arrowheads and whatnot.
as I transitioned into CH, I was meet with the three wolves that typically patrol the ice there.  I shot at one with the rifle and they all ran away.
As I rushed to the Quonset hut I ran into another wolf just outside the front door.  I shot him with the bow at close range and killed him.   I went inside
and unloaded my gear.   I went outside only to harvest the  dead wolf by the door, but suddenly there was a moose in the back yard and a bear 
rambling down the street towards me.    I shot the moose and he ran away.  I shot at the bear he ran away too.

I ended up with one dead wolf...

[ChillPlayer]

1 hour ago, SysGhost said:

I'm more for exploration as of now before I engage a long run with interloper.
And now that you mention it. I was still carrying some raw wolf meat and guts from the first wolf I killed. If I recall correctly now, it was 3 points on the smell meter (maxed out)

Even on Stalker this can be a tough spot to camp, more wolves and they do more damage, bullets are also more precious (well, at least they were until the introduction of the ammo bench).

I assume the maxed out smell meter will overwrite the default behaviour of wolves and I could indeed imagine the bear going after them. But this could be easily tested, just stand on an unreachable cliff with wolves and bears nearby and pack yourself full of meat or guts. The tricky part though will be reaching the cliff before the predators reach you but I think it's doable. Should you choose to test this out, please record a video

 

[I_eat_only_wolf_meat]

3 hours ago, ChillPlayer said:

So first off, because of bear, moose and tons of wolves in the area, Quonset is probably the last place in CH I would consider for a long term base

It's not bad on interloper.  Probably because the amount of wildlife drops off as time passes.  You still need to be careful with your scent-meter, though, because wolves pop up from the hilly terrain and can be pretty dangerous if you slip up.

Notwithstanding the hostile wildlife situation, it's a great base.  Crafting table, inside fire, loads of storage, easy access to lots of hunting and fishing, and plenty of cars to sit in to ward off cabin fever.

[Jaspo]

I just recently confirmed that bear will not attack a wolf, on Voyageur, if the wolf is currently eating a carcass.

It's a bit hard to see, since they are far away, but the bear is next to the river and the black shape next to it right on the river's edge is the wolf eating a deer.

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/1827897766232283642/95511B1A916458C5EDB0E1A9470AAEAD104405EE/?imw=5000&imh=5000&ima=fit&impolicy=Letterbox&imcolor=%23000000&letterbox=false

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/1827897766232283980/D7F651E5177BFE54DB1B0A2593E94D565BD2B034/?imw=5000&imh=5000&ima=fit&impolicy=Letterbox&imcolor=%23000000&letterbox=false

The moose might kill wolves though, I know that patrolling wolves will flee from them. I believe they flee from bear as well; I seem to recall hearing a wolf get scared by the ML trapper's bear once.

On the subject of glitchy CH wolves though, this happened on a custom game:

 

 

Edited January 3, 2022 by Jaspo

[SysGhost]

16 hours ago, Jaspo said:

I just recently confirmed that bear will not attack a wolf, on Voyageur, if the wolf is currently eating a carcass.

It's a bit hard to see, since they are far away, but the bear is next to the river and the black shape next to it right on the river's edge is the wolf eating a deer.

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/1827897766232283642/95511B1A916458C5EDB0E1A9470AAEAD104405EE/?imw=5000&imh=5000&ima=fit&impolicy=Letterbox&imcolor=%23000000&letterbox=false

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/1827897766232283980/D7F651E5177BFE54DB1B0A2593E94D565BD2B034/?imw=5000&imh=5000&ima=fit&impolicy=Letterbox&imcolor=%23000000&letterbox=false

The moose might kill wolves though, I know that patrolling wolves will flee from them. I believe they flee from bear as well; I seem to recall hearing a wolf get scared by the ML trapper's bear once.

 

I can confirm that wolves will flee from a bear when spotted. Seen that happen many times in Pleasant Valley, Thomson's crossing.
I have however never seen what happens when a bear and a wolf are in very close proximity of each other. (i.e. attack/kill range)

Are you sure that moose might kill a wolf if in range/close proximity?

If so that would explain the situation I had with a wolf snarling at me from my left and the moose charging me from the right. The moose would end up almost on the wolf just fractions of seconds after I've went back inside. Very much like the SATW comic strip I've linked in a previous post above in this thread.

[Jaspo]

I don't know for sure if moose or bear can kill wolves; I've never actually seen it happen.