Best Singleplayer/Server Settings | Ark: Survival Evolved 

Im honestly perfectly fine with default settings so long as creatures are max 150. the only instance where i would increase xp gain is on maps without explorer notes and the time it takes to grind alot of metal for instance is usually enough time for the metal from a previous run to smelt. Mating speed multipliers are really the only default setting that i find to slow.

For taming dinosaurs I like to set the taming multiplier to 2 and dino food drain to 2. Taming x2: cuts the number of feeds required and number of hits to taming effectiveness in half. Dino food drain x2: makes the dinos starve out in half the time, and cuts down on the wait time for passive feeding. Together this cuts the default taming time by 1/4, but still keeps a difference between kibble taming vs mutton/crops/prime meat etc... but almost completely removes need for narcotics. Considering changing to taming x2.25 & dino food drain x1.75 to stay balanced. (But it is REALLY nice not having to wait forever after that first passive feed)

Yay, you still do videos of Ark! :) This guy is still the number one person to whom I follow. He has given so many good tips and tricks on Ark Survival Evolved that I follow. And because of these tips, my gaming in Ark has been sooo much smoother. I've been able to survive longer and tame better dinos. These videos are sooo helpful. Thank you very much for all the helpful advice!

The difficulty slide in single player is super important. So first thing it does is that it changes is your Dino levels. So 1.0 is max level 120 so multiply your amount by 120 to figure out the max level. To get max level 150 you could use the command like in the video, but what I think is a better experience is checking the maximum difficulty box. This setting pretty much changes everything the difficulty slider does. The slider also changes overall loot tables for drops. I found on lower settings that it is really difficult to find things like Rex saddles and other important items. Maximum difficulty makes it so the whole loot table is available like in official settings. Finally the slider changes the difficulty of bosses. Bosses take increased damage the lower the slides is. This makes bosses so underwhelming when you beat them in like twenty Rex bites.

Finally I’ve been waiting for this one for a while

4:10 I highly recommend keeping the night cycle on if you want a Megalosaurus since if you make nights go by quickly then they'll become useless since they're nocturnal

First video I've seen of yours. You seem super genuine and it's awesome. Detailed and informative as well. Top tier video man thank ya

THATS WHAT I NEEDED THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!! 1:36

When you hit a pteranodon 5:39

even with 450+ hours I still get tips from you pterafier, keep up the great work

Will using the command line in ARK to set OverrideOfficialDifficulty=5.0 make this permanent or must it be entered each time the game is played? Which config file would this go into?

Truly a great video. Video and audio quality is PRO. I have been playing a long time and have a great handle on all this BUT it took a lot of digging and experimenting to get settings I like. Thx and keep it up!

Keep in mind that on console, you don’t have to use the slider for settings, you can also type in your own values in the little box next to the slider.

tysm for the ark settings and how to set up servers in the same video

The issue I as a retired senior one of millions and million finding we have a lot more time than unretired do. And new to video games. This game as other AAA games do, have a very high learning curve. The settings which can make it an easier process has it's own learning curve. Increaseing a setting that actually decreases something is confusing as hell. As a completely new NOOB!!!. We first need to adjust the settings which will allow us to play long enough to learn how to play the game. We have time, so the grind isn't nearly as important as it is to live long enough to grind.

Dude you are awsome i got into Ark not to long ago like a few weeks ago and am so into it that i watch gameplay 24/7 and you are one of the best channels i have found keep it up

I think you should have went into more depth on the "use single player settings" option it changes significantly more than that and the main problem it presents is it is exponential (It seems) with other settings you change like xp and taming speed. Good video though

My guy lose the hoodie either way great video

The first video that's actually useful

Just started ark… on my 3rd vid of yours and it’s so helpful thank you! Earned another sub!

I love your videos. I have a couple sp saves and a mp on CI. The CI server is boosted because most of my tribemates have full time jobs and kids. The goal was to be able to accomplish stuff in the limited time we have per day. It's not too easy, i still die from time to time. It's a fun escape, not another job grinding our spirit into paste. I've seen some criticize servers like ours but the game was made to be customized and enjoyed. If the game is stable and you're having fun, cool. I mean that is the point of games right? Your video doesn't judge and gives a good run down, but will you release another video about the ini files?

this is perfect for me thanks! it helped me fix my difficultties with the game settings so thanks alot once again!

So actually official setting difficulty doesn’t change the cap lvl, it changes how often you get higher lvled creatures. Just wanted to clarify! I’ve had modders say that’s how it works when I’ve asked.

This was very helpful! I been trying to find a video to understand wtf the settings do and out of the dozens of videos I watched this was the only helpful one

I mainly play on single player with SP turned on and 1.75xp 3.0 gather and 3.0 taming with 0.3 resource respawn (cuz on sp im pretty sur you have to have the area loaded in)

Legit never subscribe to ANYTHING, but I just hit that button. Your guides have helped me learn this amazing game. Thank you for your time and effort making these videos, bro

Single player settings also affects tamed dino stat and stat gained per level it seems. I find it easier to level up to get to 1000 melee with single player settings on than off.

Is there any way of increasing the level Dino’s spawn at? Not max level, I mean is there any way to consistently get higher level spawns(without using command because I don’t like those)

So glad I found your channel. So much free help and solid advice. Thanks so much for all your hard work.

A really helpful guide! Just used your referral link to set up my own Ark server for me and my friends.

Ótimo vídeo tutorial e ajuda demais quem quer configurar um server e quem quer jogar host/solo. Adorei e deixei meu like❤

You really helped me and my mate a lot regarding the difficultyOffset/override topic. There is so much confusing or contradicting information out there regarding that. #KUDOS

This video was very helpful I copied most of the settings but tweeked a few for single player so the first 30 to 40 levels are fast but it slows down quite a bit afterwards and explorer notes gives insane xp so when I find one it's time to make some gains and give myself 50 cryo pods so I can play ark like pokemon all taming, mating, breeding, and farming can be done in 15 mins or less I've never heard of this game until it went free on the PS4 this month and I've really been enjoying it thanks for the info

Finally Ptera posting one of these.I was looking for some good settings for a while now,but they were either too hard or made the game too easy. Thank you Ptera

The only change I have in my players stats for single player is fortitude *2 and weight times 500 on charachter and dinos because I don’t really like it that you can’t really bring lots of stuff with you. For me like having a very high weight stat works well since im used to having loads of stuff on me. Thats what I like about minecraft you don’t have any weight constrictions and cary as many as you want as long as you have the slots for it.

Very Helpful! Also, will I have to re-input the console command every time I log in? (overrideofficialdifficulty=5)

Not sure if is on the wiki, but the setting "use single player settings" also boost the stats of the your dinos, have only seen that stat boost on imprinted dinos, when I found out I did not test for regular tames.

I have one piece of criticism with these single player settings, they would only work for someone using a server because if anyone tries playing single player with any of these breeding rates they’ll be waiting 1day and 8 hours for a Rex to fully hatch and grow. This may not be a problem for people using s+ whilst on a server but for people who play single player it’s not really suitable. The only way these breeding rates would work for people in SP is to turn on “Use SinglePlayer Settings” which will dial the fully hatch and grow time down to just over an hour for a Rex.

I got to say in general I do criticize videos a lot. Based on the flow, how long people Babble on about nothing, and general common sense. THIS IS THE BEST VIDEO I THINK I HAVE EVER EXPERIENCED. YOU MY FRIEND ARE A LEGEND!!

Yes!!! Another top tier vid ptera! Keep up the good work :D

5:36 Ok... He is the first youtuber who actually made me like.

Why do videos on RU-vid always start halfway through whenever I click on them. Also your videos have helped me enjoy the game. I played aberration with my friend (first time I ever played ark) and we farmed that server for 4 weeks but ultimately quit the game entirely because it was so broken and unfair. Like they say dark souls is punishing but ark is leagues more punishing. Not even close. It borders on blatantly unfair. Your little tips and tricks helped manoeuvre around the island

“Hey are you still with me?” *unleashes inner demons* “Good moving on!” I was brushing my teeth when that happened and man did it confuse the hell out of me 😂

If you buy a server, does that include 1 map of your choice or a cluster of maps? Just wondering because server tether sucks and I want to play with friend without it.

To play some pve with this man would be spectacular

thank you very much this video was a big help.

Great video! I just started a single player game recently and it took ages to research what all of the setting do lol. This would have been so helpful. A little more explanation on difficulty settings: Wild Dinos can have up to 30 base levels. The "overrideofficialdifficulty" setting acts as a multiplier, changing how many in game levels the Dino gets per base level. So difficulty 1 = max level 30, difficulty 5 = 150, and difficulty 10 = max 300. It also means that if you have difficulty set to 5, for example, you will never see a wild Dino who's level isn't a multiple of 5. Difficulty also changes how good of loot you get from drops and stuff so the higher the difficulty the more OP your saddles and armor will be late game. On the aberration let's play server (with 10x difficulty) it seemed like every drop was an ascendant saddle lol If you're looking to buff Dinos without it buffing loot too much you can set hard clamps for the stats, but as far as I know it doesn't actually decrease the cost so... rip.

Fantastic video, I never even thought about changing anything 😂😂😂

thank you so much for the gportal part

thank you man this really helped me i whas stuck with a max of 145lv dino and that whas really rare now i see more high lv dinos spawn and its 150lv

Just want to say, the "Best" settings are down to your personal preference and these aren't a one size fits all sort of thing, these sorts of videos are better for players just starting out as a sort of preset for those players as they learn the settings for themselves and tweak them to their preferences. I don't follow a lot of things in this guid (an example would be flyer speed on and single player settings disabled). I find these more rewarding, and in turn more fun. so I would recommend you use these if you want, but fine-tune the settings to your or your group's needs. (and what you find most fun! Ark is hard, but rewarding when done right, so that's the most important thing)

Dude! When I started watching you had 2k subs! You're almost at 100k!

Yess great video thank you! Hahah loveee the ending 🤣🤣

That definitely got my attention😂

How much blow can Rob Lowe blow if Rob Lowe could blow Rob... 😂

This video is great however I feel the singleplayer aspect wasn’t covered all that well, especially in regards to things like imprinting in singleplayer. It’s virtually impossible to change imprinting to a point where you aren’t getting 1% at a time. You can change how often you need to imprint however that‘a still 100 imprints to do which is very tedious.

Hey pt the command isn’t working for me on scorched earth and I was wondering if you know what to do

I've been tinkering with g-portal for a couple of months and one thing that I was wondering is when creating a server cluster, have you found that it is best to add slots to your initial gamecloud and then add servers to that gamecloud? I haven't really seen any type of guide/wiki that lists pros and cons. One pro I could think of is if in the future I would have multiple clusters, keeping them bundled within a gamecloud could make management easier but I wonder if it might screw with performance. I noticed in the vid that it looks like you have multiple servers running in the same gamecloud so curious what your experience has been. Thanks for awesome content btw and loving the monarky series you all are doing!

The fact how he’s like oh yeh g portal you can do all this and that that ark dosent let you do just find your ini settings and you can do everything g portal can

thanks this vid helped me alot have a good day

I made a single player world and loaded in I went to update my weight and it went to like a billion and I was confused and then nothing could harm me it’s was very boring and I’m tryna figure out at the moment how to change it to a normal game with a normal difficulty to have fun but also not suffer

Hey man, great video! I’ve been playing for about 2 weeks now on my own G Portal server. Do you know if I switch maps whether or not I will lose my character since I’m technically still on the same server? Thanks

Nothing specific to say, i just love your content

Very helpful indeed! Thank you!

I play on configuration 5,as I call it “super weenie hut junior mode”,it’s ark pretty much as easy as it can get,I use because, I don’t like hard games😂 and I like it that way

starting to think these settings didn't hold up quiet well as i hoped but i'm trying to use them for single player solo play throught give me somethign to do till ark ascended comes out

THANK YOU FOR TELLING ME THIS I've been looking to see where high level dinos are but I can't find any besides tek

I can't with the voice over🤣🤣

when you do the command for the difficulty does that save for the entirety of the world or do you have to redo the command every time you log on your single player world?

Are diseases the effects that appear next to your Dino stats ur riding or your stats in the bottom and top right of the screen if you have an effect?

@pterafier do you know if there is a way to change game.ini settings in Lost Island? Like, I need to set weight, health, and stamina to higher levels.

For max difficulty what if your playing on a console like Xbox can you use g portal or is that even a option?

I love watching your videos. I have a question. I'm just going to play ark with my friend. I don't want to enter any server. Do I have to rent a server for this or is it possible to join the game from Steam? I tried this once, but when my friend moved away from me, it would teleport to me.

Hi guys the overrideofficialdifficulty=5 doesn't work for me .. I did the dino wipe and tried it multiple times .. I still get dinos of level 12 and 36 and such .. please help me.

This is really helpful thanks :D

For single player I don't see baby imprint amount multiplier. Is it called something else for single player?

I had a question about console dedicated servers. For some reason, I had to restart mine when I switched from an Xbox one s that was hosting, to my new xbox series x console. My player profile data was there, but all server data from the "one" would not transfer and I had to start a fresh new server. Regardless, my question is, when we started I began it on crystal isles so friend's and I could grab some xp and wyverns, and then move onto a newer map. For some reason though, all of us can't tame a crystal wyvern to save our lives. Whether it be regular crystal or prime, they take one feeding, then never ever get hungry again. So if you're laying on them awaiting a 2nd time to feed, they just fly around forever. If we hop off to let them travel for a bit, eventually the begin to lose taming and then it drops to zero just to try try again. Its really frustrating and if anyone had any insight on it, I'd appreciate it. Because I returned to default settings in an attempt to resolve it, and that didn't work. So I don't understand why on official servers I can tame even a max level wyvern with regular crystal if I have enough time, luck, and I'm left alone. But on my own dedicated server it won't work at all... 😞

Me: turns nights off Also me: gets attacked by raptors My megalosaurus: zzzzzzz Me again: *dies* Meg: zzzzzz

I've been looking EVERYWHERE does the egg laying timer affect tames that are breeding or does it only affect unfertilized eggs ????

Will I have to use the overrideofficialdifficulty every single time I log back in to my single player works or will it stay a pawn leaving

When usong the override command for difficulty in SP, would you have to use the command everytime you login?

Hi I'm wondering whether these settings are on ark MOBILE.... Or is it only available on ps/PC/Xbox?

When I input the admin command to max the levels, do I have to input it every time I log in?

How did he know I wasnt paying attention for 5 seconds?

These are pretty much th3 same settings I have on my Non Dedicated Server for the family and friends. Nice to know I got something right lol. On a side note. Have you got a video on how to use dinos wondering harvest settings. Or how to do it. I can't get my dinos to go off and collect for me on their own.

A server I am playing on gives 1000 increase in weight per stat point spent. Would I be correct in saying that the multiplier would be at 100.

There is a setting I think should be on default is passive defenses harm riderless dinos. If not then they are useless.

1:50 does this also apply to a non dedicated session with 2 players?

@pterafier Like always nice and clear video. But is G-portal actually good? I been looking for a server and most providers charge 15-18 dollar extra for 16G Ram in order to run Genesis Part2. Does G-portal cover this? Or do we also have to adapt ?

I have question so my friend has ps4 server most of his settings are x5 across the board but, Brontos for example barely give 1 prime if lucky, and obsidian rocks most of the time gives only stone

How to do this on ps4 I struggle to finde haigh level dinos my dificulty is 0.8 will the high ones spawn eventuly???

How do you know on console if the commands you executed to raise the difficulty worked?

Hey pterafier the overrideofficialdifficulty don´t work for me do you now if the command has changed

I was reading through the game ini and realized under server settings that the difficulty was back down to 1 even though I had already done the whole override thing in my last session (this is SP btw). Will I have to override and Dino wipe every time I get on?

how long does it take for low level dinos to be replaced after the commands

Did you read my mind !? You published this video (yes I'm a bit late on my to-watch list :P ) exactly the same day as I decided to play SP again ! 1:56 FFS, really ? And here I was going through GameUserSettings ini >_< But there's an ingame command ? I hate my life. (does it keep when you load the game again, or do you have to do it each time ? I'd rather not have to destroy all dinos when I'm specifically logging in to keep taming those I have noticed but not have time to befriend the last time) 3:48 I believe those settings exist in SP too. At least I know for sure the decay timers are in there because I tweaked that one (up to 3hrs until despawn, so I don't have to rush to my bag :P it's so easy to be distracted in this damn game) 7:22 Word to the wise : if you're using the Immersive Taming mod, LOWER your taming speed a little. Immersive Taming is very fast compared to regular taming, even without kibble and cheaper because petting/caring adds to the taming progress ; so what would be a reasonable-to-improved speed with tranq arrows will unincentivize trying to get more elaborate baits with Immersive Taming. Unless of course you're one of those people who like to instant-tame everything that moves, in which case, godspeed. 9:20 I like to increase oxygen, too (for myself and tamed dinos). It's not an OP stat like melee, and it allows me to take my eyes off the oxygen meter. Given that underwater gameplay is often stressful (because eels & cnidaria), it's one thing not to worry about as much, and it makes it easier to enjoy underwater exploration and such. One last note about the singleplayer settings : not only does the difficulty slider reset every time you launch the game, but the "STRUCTURE DMG REPAIR COOLDOWN" one (further below on the same "General" tab) will too, the default being 180 (and my preference being 0 :P ). That is, in seconds, how long you have to wait until you can repair a damaged structure (for instance if a giga is biting your ceiling, you have to wait 3 minutes to fix it). It's highly inconvenient and will probably never be corrected, so if you have changed this particular setting, keep an eye on it and do a bit of scrolling in your left hand settings before loading your save.

When i play on The Center with friends when they go in the water they teleport to me every time how to fix this please help the "Barrier is on 5000+" but still they tp to me so hard when i go somewhere!

1:51 am playing on pc please do you know for how long this command will remain i mean what if i closed the game ? do i need to write it in every start ?

Great video thanks

Smooth voice to listen too, thank you