After some time playing Lorwolf, I believe I have figured out the most efficient way to look for Wild Wolves. So with Full Release finally here, I thought I'd remake this guide to share some tips and tricks with others who might find them helpful as well. And while this was initially intended to help with finding wolves, it's very useful for campaigning for food and items too!
(This guide is made specifically about the Goldsea campaign, but this should all still work in other campaigns as they are very similar.)
First thing's first, assemble your team. Only use one wolf in your team! It might seem beneficial to use more than one to share the EXP and have a higher chance at defeating enemies, but twice the amount of wolves, means twice the amount of stamina loss, which will double your food costs. And exploring doesn't supply enough food to use more than one wolf. Companions, however, don't use up any stamina, so always add those to your team if you have them!
It is highly recommended to level your wolf and companion up to level 10 as well. It will take a little while but is incredibly important for defeating enemies. I've found that the fastest place to do this is the 3rd area, Eluis' Watch.
After you've chosen your team, you have to select the right area to campaign in. This guide has been changed to focus on the fourth area, ‘Western Barrens’. (I think this is the best area in terms of food, as well as general loot)
If you click on this area and scroll down before exploring, you will see that there are a number of possible scenarios that you can encounter in this area. I will explain what you should do in each of these scenarios to find and befriend Wild Wolves more effectively. Also, please be aware that the area and some of these scenarios require you to complete quests to unlock them. So, if you find that they aren't appearing for you, you should focus on some of the quests first!
Battle: Broch - You should always attack these. You don't lose anything if you lose the battle, but you gain items if you win. The outcome of the battle is determined when you click ‘Attack!’, so if you refresh the page after the battle starts, you will automatically explore again without having to watch the entire battle. (And don't worry, you still receive all the items if you won the battle!). These also help you keep some of your food stores up, which has become incredibly important with the lack of options to gain food! It would be faster to just skip the battles entirely though, so if you don't want to battle or can't refresh easily, you won't be losing out on any wolves, just loot.
Battle: Vespen - This is a tough one. Generally you should always attack and refresh this one much like the Broch, but the battle is very hard to beat with just one wolf and companion. Still though, you won't lose much time by trying, and it would be a shame to miss out on the possible loot!
Discover: Something? - Oh hey, this is a new one! It doesn't really matter what you do here, you can click it and gain some trinkets and EXP, or you can skip it entirely to save a small bit of time. It's up to you, really!
Encounter: Moth - Always, always click these. They give you free food in only one click and it is essential to keep going. They appear frequently enough to sustain a team of 1 wolf if you also battle the Broch encounters. The only reason you might want to skip these is if you want to find wolves as fast as possible and have enough food stored so you skip every scenario that isn't a wolf.
Encounter: Wild Wolf - Wow, you did it! You followed all of the steps and now you've finally come face to face with a Wild Wolf! This scenario offers two options: barking a greeting and wagging your tail. Good luck! It's entirely up to you what you choose here, as far as I've found, they both have the same chance of befriending.
Speaking of chances, here are some of my findings:
(Please take into account that this data was from the Early Access of Lorwolf. I don't think the rates have changed since then, but I will be updating this when I have the time to test them in Full Release.)
Out of 100 Wild Wolves I found, I barked at half of them and wagged my tail at the other half. I had befriended exactly 3 wolves with each of the options. Implying there is no difference in their chances to befriend wolves.
Out of 225 Wild Wolves I found, I befriended exactly 24 of them. Implying the chances of befriending one are 1 in 9.375, though it is more likely the chances are 1 in 10.
And if you fail the encounter? No worries, you now gain a Knucklebone Token if you fail an encounter. Collect 50 of these and you can exchange them to guarantee befriending a Wild Wolf! So long as you have 50 tokens and 15k pebbles in your inventory this mission will have a chance of showing up with your hunts (in the hunting profression). It will take 30 minutes to complete, but once you finish the hunt you'll be rewarded with a beautiful new wolf. Though it is very likely you'll already have befriended one by now, so if it's more appealing to you, you can sell them on the flea market for a bit of cash instead!
Other helpful tips:
- If you're on PC, refresh your page instead of clicking ‘Ignore’, it's so much faster!
- If you always click at least once after refreshing, you'll have completed your encounter and given yourself enough time to see if it's a Wild Wolf or not before refreshing again. Do remember to click a second time if it is a wild wolf though!
- Edit your auto feed to include the Broch food drops. They will just keep piling up otherwise! Plus it will help you greatly with not running out of food too quickly.
- Feed your wolf before exploring on an empty stamina bar. If you explore while their bar is empty, it'll send you to a different page. And while it only takes a couple of extra clicks to return to exploring, I find it really disrupts the flow. And any extra clicks are a time loss, so keep an eye on your energy!
- If you find you've stored up a lot of food, you could try refreshing at every scenario for a bit. Since you already have the food, you won't have to waste any time collecting it during your search of a Wild Wolf. This does mean you will run out of food very fast, so make sure you have a lot of it, and save a little bit so you can still complete other activities. This method can be extremely fast but be extra cautious with it, as it's very easy to refresh past a Wild Wolf encounter if you get into a flow. (-Thanks, Voltsy!)
- Alternatively, you could campaign with a team of 2 wolves and 2 companions for a little while as well. This will help a lot with defeating the Vespen boss, so you'll be making a lot of money while waiting for those wolves to show up!
- Sell your trinkets! If you've been doing this for a while, you'll have probably saved up a ton of trinkets. It's best to sell most of these for pebbles, mainly the plushies. You could even use the pebbles you gain from these to buy more food to keep on hunting.
- Put on some music or a movie in the background. You're likely going to be doing this for a while, so you might as well make it a little more tolerable.
- And lastly, get something to drink and maybe to eat as well. It's really easy to lose track of time when hunting, but it's important to stay nourished and, especially, hydrated! Staying hydrated will help increase your focus, and so there's less of a chance you'll accidentally skip a Wild Wolf encounter!
(I think that's all of them, but I probably forgot some so feel free to add more)
And that's about it! If anything is unclear or if there are things I've missed that you think I should add, please let me know! ^^
Hopefully this guide was helpful to you. And don't get discouraged if it takes you a while to encounter a Wild Wolf, or if they keep running away! It's all based on chance, but so long as you keep going, you'll get one eventually.
I wish you all the best of luck on expanding your wolf armies. Happy hunting! <3
Roo
