When do you stop taking animals?

[TonyInPleasantValley]

I have so much meat available on TWM that it isn't funny. Want to make a few more rock cache's to store it and get it out of site. Trying to decide if I stop killing wolves and beer on TWM until I work through the 100's of kilos of meat I have laying outside my cabin.

[Kranium]

Cooking skill level 5? Never stop. Don't just survive - thrive.

[Sito]

Um... Yeah that's a bit much. Definitely lots of meat available on TWM.

[ManicManiac]

For me is it's not really a matter of when to stop taking animals... but more deciding when it's really necessary to take an animal in the first place.  

I find one can survive fairly comfortably for a good long while without really needing to take animals at all (providing one is able/willing to be nomadic).
Personally, I find it more challenging to only hunt/fish when it's really necessary.  This way, I minimize using up ammunition/arrows in the early game in favor of having more resources to use when needed much later on.  Between rabbits and fish just by themselves, one can gather enough calories day-to-day without having to accumulate hundreds of kilograms of meat that ends up laying outside in a stockpile someplace.  

Now to be clear... all playstyles, tactics, and strategies are of course all fine and perfectly valid...  The only delimiting factor being each survivor's ability apply and refine them until they find what methods work best for them (or which they find the most enjoyable).

However, since the question was seemingly asked... I'm offering discussion on the merits of only hunting that which is really needed.  This not only pushes us to be more careful and deliberate with how and when we use our resources, but also helps us reassess that's really needed to sustain a run for as long as we wish (assuming we don't make too many blunders which on Great Bear Island can prove fatal.  

For me this often takes the form of (for lack of a better description) "personal challenges" that test our abilities to live small, but also live well.  When it comes to hostile wildlife it also challenges us to sharpen our situational awareness so we can evade and avoid getting ambushed, mauled, trampled, or swarmed (in the case of Timber Wolves).  The same is also true when it comes to harsh weather conditions.  The level of situational awareness we develop can help make crucial decisions when it comes to when and how far to venture out... and what supplies we might bring along should the situation "turn on a dime."

To address the question of, "But what about all the pelts we have laying around; far more than we could reasonably really use?"
Well for that, I'd remind folks that we don't have to harvest pelts we don't really need from carcasses (whether found or hunted).  If all we really need is meat/raw gut, then we can simply just harvest what we need and let the rest be disposed of when the carcass "decays away." 

[Merrak]

I've been pretty selective when I decide to fight/harvest. On larger prey, I typically try to get them to run away. I have 5 caches at TWM around the Hut, and 4 of them are for food. I wait until the caches start getting low before I resume hunting.

On the other hand, if I'm traveling zone to zone...I'll often hunt wolves for meat. Plus, gives me a chance to level my archery skill.

[conanjaguar]

With that much meat, it might be a fun (albeit risky) exercise to feed the local wolves .

In all seriousness, though, I think having about two week’s worth emergency supply of meat and water is the optimum amount. You can forage and hint regularly, while still having that two-week reserve in case you get parasites, get stomped by a moose, or just want to read up on a backlog of skill books that one collects on just about any difficulty.

That being said, if anything attacks me, and I shoot it, then I don’t think it wise to waste the meat… or the hide/guts, for that matter. As @xanna would say, it’s “my head canon” that Will/Astrid wouldn’t want to dishonor the spirit of the wolf by not taking everything.

I wouldn’t exactly apply the same logic to firewood, though. You can never have enough of that in this game.

[Leeanda]

My porch at pv used to look like that😁.    I suppose it depends on your level . Pilgrim you don't need meat for quite a while ,loper is the total opposite.  ,Cat tails will only get you so far.  There's hunger rate ,high/low respawn rates ,weapon availability and luck..   I kill bear and moose when I can so I have food to fall back on which sometimes happens early in the game..  you can never be overprepared but being underprepared can be fatal. 

 

[TonyInPleasantValley]

So most of the meat I accumulated was to get to level 5 on a couple of skills. Only thing I have left is mending, which is usually one I finish early due to lots of scrapes with animals, but somehow this run it will end up being the last skill I get to 5, if I am so lucky. It is hard on TWM to not accumulate a lot of meat. Walk out your front door and you are almost always greeted by a wolf over near the creek, deer by fishing hut, fish galore, bunnies over past the ledge, and an occasional, periodic bear strolling right up to your camp area. Level 5 rifle, pistol, bow means you're most likely going to kill whatever you hunt. I almost always take everything, as I too am of the mind if you kill the animal you should not let it waste (though in nature, nothing really goes to waste...just gets eaten by something else). I am going to try to lay off the animals for a while, unless I see a moose, as I want to craft a cape. I usually shoot the beer, cuz I don't want to run into one when out and about...that is the only thing that gives me pause...should I leave beers alive around where I live or not...hmmm...

I also have smaller piles like this at some other locations so I don't get tempted to carry  meat when transiting to other regions. I find it so much safer not smelling like meat or guts!!

[Kranium]

What I did on my 500+ day Interloper run was to stockpile enough supplies (mostly meat, fire fuel, reishi, and birch bark) to recover from intestinal parasites or broken ribs, in every moose spawn region. Plus I'm kind of a prepper IRL, so there's never a large enough stockpile. (however I don't go overboard hunting IRL like I do in TLD)

 

In late game, I try to nab wildlife by luring them towards wolves, scaring the wolf off, then nabbing the carcass for myself. No hunting implement needed, and it's a fun challenge.

[hozz1235]

tbh, I rarely actively "hunt".  There are so many opportunities to bag something as you're running around doing other stuff.  I stop shooting at deer once I have "enough" hides.  I will still passively search for bear and moose, just because those are more uncommon and I like to have a surplus of hides.

[SuperStriker16]

I’d recommend going from big kill to big kill. My first and main save is on voyager and to conserve rifle ammo, I’d go out and just kill a bear or moose with the rifle (I live at the Quonset garage so it’s pretty easy to get big kills when they come to you) and use a bow on deer to fill in the gaps between kills if I need to. Cook meat when you’re about to eat it to gain 50% condition on the meat to prevent food poison. For the revolver, use it for self defense against wolves but don’t hunt with it unless you don’t have something better to use because it is inaccurate and lacks stopping power. Only really hunt when your meat supply is low but not out that way you don’t waste but if you fail or get hurt, you can come back to some food.

[hozz1235]

15 hours ago, SuperStriker16 said:

My first and main save is on voyager and to conserve rifle ammo

I also try to conserve ammo, but unless you're a really bad shot and blowing through ammo, you should never run out.  I had a 2,000+ day run and still had tons.

[SuperStriker16]

I'm mostly talking about the mid game (day 20-70 or so) when you have like  mabye 15-20 rounds and cannot travel to make more bullets. way before you're

able to afford to slaughter every deer, bear, and everything else breathing in the region when you have like 200 extra rounds 250 days in.  I know what you mean though, sometimes it feels like I have too much ammo. Not everyone is a crackshot with a rifle though.

30 minutes ago, hozz1235 said:

I also try to conserve ammo, but unless you're a really bad shot and blowing through ammo, you should never run out.  I had a 2,000+ day run and still had tons.