Breeding Calculator

My ARK Breeding Calculator calculates timings and food requirements for raising baby creatures in ARK. This page is to hold any comments on the calculator and provide some background. This page was written as of V224.2 of ARK. Implementations of all the calculations discussed below can be found in the Breeding Calculator.

Source code can be found here. Commits now serve as the changelog.

To Do:

  • Food quantities by trough as well as by stack
  • Add fish meat?
  • Update below text with new food rate calculations
  • Add all the new dinos

Dev Kit

For a primer on finding data in the dev kit, see my Taming Calculator page. For breeding, the relevant blueprints are [Creature]_Character_BP, DinoCharacterStatusComponent_BP_[Creature] and, for creatures which lay eggs, PrimalItemConsumable_Egg_[Creature]_Fertilized. To get the basic timings for breeding, we can filter by 'baby' in [Creature]_Character_BP. The relevant values are Baby Age Speed, which seems to be constant across all creatures, and it's multiplier Extra Baby Age Speed Multiplier. To get the total time taken for the baby to mature in seconds, divide 1 by the product of these values. Baby Age Speed represents progress per second, with 1 being complete, so we multiply the speed by the corresponding multiplier, and then divide 1 by the result to get time taken in seconds. Gestation time works the same, but using the Baby Gestation Speed and Extra Baby Gestation Speed values. Note that even non-mammals have the gestation values, they simply aren't used.

For egg-laying creatures we must instead look in PrimalItemConsumable_Egg_[Creature]_Fertilized. The egg incubation seems to be bolted on to the durability mechanic, to to calculate the incubation time we filter by 'durability' use the values Egg Lose Durability Per Second and Extra Egg Lose Durability Per Second Multiplier. We can see from Initial Value Constant a little above that this value starts at 100, as in 100%, rather than the 1 used by the other timings, so here we divide 100 by the product of our speed values to get the time taken in seconds.

Food rates are the next item of interest. In DinoCharacterStatusComponent_BP_[Creature] we can filter by 'baby' to find Baby Dino Consuming Food Rate Multiplier. This determines the rate at which babies consume food, although I am not completely sure of the formula just yet, so I am using my own constants for the maximum and minimum baby food consumption rates for each creature in the current implementation.

Changelog

(Old, see commits for recent updates)

16-01-22
Added Dodo, Oviraptor

15-11-23
Initial Version

Written by Crumplecorn
Last Updated 23/11/2015

Comments

KoreRekon replied on

I'm just curious if you plan to add fields for server config options like BabyFoodConsumptionSpeedMultiplier and BabyMatureSpeedMultiplier to the breeding calculator?

Hawthorn Thistl... replied on

Second this request. The calculator is great but it'd be a lot better with a breed multiplier setting for servers like the one I play on that use them.

Crumplecorn replied on

New breeding mechanics are coming within the next few days. I'm holding off making any changes until then as they may render the calcualtor obsolete.

Zombiee replied on

Previous to the implementation of the Giga, the food formula worked out to:

Food lost per sec = 2.36 - K + (2.36 * X)
Where k was BaseFoodConsumptionRate * BabyDinoConsumingFoodRateMultiplier
(previous Quetz values: -0.0035 * 40 = -0.14)
and X was equal to percentage complete ( currentwt / maxwt ).

I have been unable to determine exactly what changed thus far, but maybe this outdated information can help you out.

Zombiee replied on

Correction: 2.36 - K - (2.36 * X)

Knochenkratzer replied on

I wonder if you calculate with stacks of 20 meat or 19 meat, because you never know how long the first meat in the stack lasts before spoilage. I think it would be better to calc with stacks of 19 meat just to be sure.

Crumplecorn replied on

I may get around to doing this at some point, although the trough calculator is only supposed to be a guide anyway, so I'm not really concerned with this level of precision anyway.

Bradley replied on

Hi, really love your calculators, been using your taming one since you made it :D. Found a bit of an issue with the breeding one and don't know what it is caused by. The Trough Calculator on my google chrome only lists "N/A" on Loss% and 0 in all other fields. However, when using an incognito window in chrome or just using firefox the calculator works correctly.
Corrupted / faulty file saved during one of the sessions using the app maybe?
Cheers, Bradley (8bitpineapple)

Crumplecorn replied on

You are right about the cause I think. I put out an update a while back and only realised afterwards that the cookies created by the earlier version were incompatible and caused this issue when loaded.

Clearing your cookies should fix it.

Bradley replied on

Okay, thanks Crumplecorn :)
I figured that clearing the cookies would fix it. Just wanted to make sure you knew the cause of the incompatible cookie before I removed it.
Hearing it's just an incompatibility issue between the previous and current version is a bit of a relief :) would be worse if there was a bug in your program that made broken cookies
Cheers, Bradley

Zippy replied on

Love your calculators man, they're the best. Just FYI though you don't have anything for dodo on the breeding calculator ;)

Crumplecorn replied on

Thanks, the lack of dodo was pointed out to me a while back, and I thought I had put it in, guess I forgot. Haven't been working on the calculators a lot lately, busy in-game. I'll get it in in the near future.

Farogan replied on

Hey thanks for the nice tools!
I played today a bit with the design of your calculators and published a userstyle.
You should definitely look at the shadow on the typefaces it makes it unpleasant to read.
You can up the transparency of the background than you don't need the shadows. In my userstyle i took some color from the background in the top background and together with the light rays it gives a nice contrast.

https://userstyles.org/styles/123122/ark-taming-calculator

Farogan replied on

Ahh i forgot to say it works with both the Breeding and Taming calculators. And you need to install the extension for firefox or chrome to use my userstyle. Just search for Stylish in the Addons.

Druud replied on

Still no Dodo calc.. plz implement it..

/D

Crumplecorn replied on

Done now ;D

d0ct0rpa1n replied on

is there any way you add on the option for server stat increase, such as maturation increase?

Crumplecorn replied on

Should be easy, it's just a case of finding the time. I'm back to working on the calculators, but the taming calculator needs work first.

Gizardpuke replied on

Hello Mr Crumplecorn.
just checking out your breeding calculator, and noticed that its not taking the breeding modifier into effect.
e.g. im on an unofficial server, and it has a x3 multiplier on everything except food effectiveness. this includes taming. i cannot see how to apply that in your breeding calculator.

Crumplecorn replied on

As I said to the other guy above, I'll be adding this, I've just been busy with the taming calculator recently.

Aquaman replied on

It would be great if you could add kibble as food type :D

Crumplecorn replied on

Does anyone actually use that? Seems like a terrible idea considering the amount you'd need.

Jhin replied on

I'm wondering if it'll be possible to add a "How long until the Buffer eclipses the time remaining (before progression)" timer. As in - I'm rearing twin brontos right now. The Current Buffer is 30 minutes and there's 7 hours left until it's Juvenile - how long until those timers meet in the middle? How long until the Current Buffer is 3h30 minutes and the time remaining is 3h30 minutes. Because that's the point I can in theory leave them and just fill the trough. I mean - I check back regularly anyway, but for extremely long tames it'd be helpful to know.

Martin replied on

This would be a very handy thing to have. Then we'd know at which point we could safely leave the baby to turn into juvenile. Then it can feed itself. No more waiting up all night when my wife wants me in bed with her.

Stony replied on

Thank you so much for this calculator, I've been asked by my players to host a mirror because they frequently have issues connecting.

I was wondering if you would give me permission to do this, I would add canonical tags and an iframe of your site as the primary, the backup would only appear if your site went down for whatever reason.

I've personally never had any issues connecting to your site but I do not use the calculator myself, this is only at the request of my players.

Thanks again for the excellent work and frequent updates

James replied on

Awesome calculator. its been extremely useful for my breeding, but any idea when itll have new dinos like dimetrodons and those newer things.

Kahlin replied on

If I may make a suggestion, add the option to set how many raw meat are in a stack for the trough calculator, as there are some servers that have mods that allow stacks, maybe even an option to add stack like you do dinos, as on my server, it allows meat to stack to 100, but I can also grind raw prime into up to a stack of 10k.

Leasoncre replied on

Can you add a script/button that will start a script that will automatically change the weight of the maturing Dino so users don't have to keep updating it manually?

i'd like to see all the info/times/stats update live as things progress. (also good for keeping tabs on things if the page is left open and a user is not in-game to watch)

[Start Sync] button next to the weight field would start the automatic updating/calculation and maintain a close synchronization with the in-game Dino's stats, provided all the multipliers are filled in correctly prior to 'sync' start. [make the weight field and multipliers non-type able when script starts to prevent user-error]
[Stop Sync] button would replace the start sync button and (when clicked) make the weight/multiplier fields type-able again.
-refreshing the page or reloading it should reset everything as one would expect

Thanks! love the calculators!

Cest7 replied on

Hello

A feature I would really like to see in your breeding calculator is how much food is required for the remainder of the baby session. Essentially, how much food you have to leave on it at which weight until it has enough to reach juvenile unattended.

Napali replied on

hey,
i really like your calculators and have been using them for a long time now :)

i just thought about something: would it be possible to implement something in the trough calc section (or make a new one) where you can put in a time value, you want your babies fed and it calculates the best raw/cooked ratio (least amount of food needed).

that would be awsome.

greetings :)

Maireen replied on

ape taming needs to be fixed... have it set +52 levels when its only +46 levels @ 77.8% for lv 120
many have commented about this on Ark official forum as well

Volzke replied on

Hello, was wondering if it was possible for you to add crops as a food option for herbivores. Currently that's all I feed my herbs as it takes less crops than berries. Much appreciated, I love this webpage it's super helpful! Keep up the great work!

Markus Feußner replied on

Could you please send me the formula you used for calculating the food?

I tried it with a sequence according to the Breeding page in ARK-Wiki but i get different results (about 5-8% after i add the 0.8 per second).

I need this to calculate the needs of a baby until it can be left alone to farm additional food in an area (which varies) in my Excel Sheet.

Alternatively i request a field, which shows how much you need till the Desired Buffer is reached (sequences are not the easiest to calculate - not even with excels help^^).

The time is nice already (used it in my Sheet) but real helpful would be if we had above functionality, so i know how much fridges i need to build before hand and how much food i need in near proximity (useful for big bases with more than one storage area)

You can reach me via eMail: player8472@gmail.com

If i want to publish something using your formula i will of course ask you first.

birdonwheels5 replied on

Hi, I've been using your calculator a lot over the past few weeks, and it's been working awesome! We have had 0 starved babies. But there is one thing it's missing... I've been playing around with my Spino and I've noticed that it's ridiculously easy to farm raw fish meat, like I'm getting maybe 10k per hour with a spino. Could you add Raw fish meat to the trough calculator? It might be a little difficult because dinos eat that first, it only stacks to 20, and you need twice as much to equal raw meat. But if you add it I'd greatly appreciate it. Currently I'm just filling 7 troughs and crossing my fingers throughout the day. I'd like to use it at night but I'm afraid of losing babies.

Azeri replied on

Is there a list of temps for eggs? Argie eggs die at same temp as Rex eggs hatch with no health loss

Sassy replied on

Just curious if & when you will add the new animals like the Allosaurus, Tapejara & the others? Really need the new info for those please :)

Crumplecorn replied on

Updates will be slow as I no longer play Ark and I have much less free time these days. But, I may add them at some point.

Crumplecorn replied on

There will be no further updates to the breeding calculator.

Bleu Forge replied on

If you're dropping this project, could I get the source files from you to potentially work on it further?

Darkblood replied on

I will second that request for the source code. Your street cred on the ark community is huge man. :) Allow others to carry the torch now.

Freyaa replied on

Yes, please! Been checking this page daily since I started hatching wyverns. :(

Rob replied on

Will this be updated with new dinos and all? Been using this for a long time now miss it a lot without the new dinos

Duke403 replied on

I love crumplecorn so much, i just wish it was updated soon, so many new dinos. I think they might be done with dinos for a bit after the 2017 Jan 30 patch. PLZ update and thank you for making it in the first place.

Ryley replied on

Please update this! It is the best site for ark I love it!

Frodo replied on

Any chance you could add the new Dinos?

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