How to Tame an Ankylosaurus in ARK

 

    The Ankylosaurus is tagged Docile in its own infobox, but "docile" doesn't mean "walk up and feed it" — the wiki's Domestication table lists its Taming Method as Knockout, the same tranq-and-feed process used on aggressive tames, and it is explicitly not Torpor Immune. This guide walks through exactly what ark.wiki.gg documents for the Ankylosaurus: how easy the knockout actually is, which kibble and foods it prefers, how many knockout shots and how much torpidity decay to plan for at Level 1 through Level 150, and what trap options, saddle level, and base stats wait on the other side. Anywhere the source page doesn't give a figure, this guide says so instead of guessing.

 

Taming Method: Docile, but Still a Knockout

 

    Don't let the Docile temperament tag fool you into skipping the trap. The wiki's own KO Strategy section is explicit about why the knockout itself is easy, even if it's still required: "Ankylosaurus is relatively easy to knock out due to its slow movement speed. Even when attacked, the Ankylosaurus is easy to outrun, making nearly any ranged attack effective. The best method to knock it out would be using Tranquilizer Darts, Tranq Spear Bolts or Tranquilizer Arrows, but if neither are available then a simple Slingshot will do the trick but may take longer than a tranquilizer dart or arrow. The Ankylosaurus does not receive increased damage on headshots due to the heavy armor that covers its body." That last line matters tactically: don't waste effort chasing headshots the way you might on a less-armored dino — the source is clear there's no bonus for it here.

 

Best Foods and Kibble for Taming

 

 

    The Domestication table lists Regular Kibble as the Ankylosaurus's Preferred Kibble, with Kibble (Dilo Egg) also named as a Preferred Kibble option. For non-kibble feeding, its Preferred Food category is Crops, with Spinach Seed called out specifically. Regular Kibble is crafted from, per the wiki: 1× Cooked Meat Jerky, 1× Medium Egg, 5× Fiber, 2× Longrass, 2× Savoroot, 1× Water.

 

    The Level 1 taming-food table shows why kibble is worth crafting: just 2 Regular Kibble tames a Level 1 Ankylosaurus in 0:03:12, against 40 Berries taking 0:24:01 for the same job. That's 40 − 2 = 38 fewer items and roughly 21 fewer minutes with kibble over the slowest listed food. Fresh Barley, Fresh Wheat, and Soybean all sit in between at 20 units and 0:24:01 apiece — identical to each other in the source table. The wiki flags all of these figures with a caveat worth repeating: "the values are for optimal cases, always bring extra supplies!"

 

Knockout Shot Counts and Torpidity by Level

 

 

    Each level bracket in the wiki's taming table lists six knockout shot-count figures in descending order — the text this guide draws from doesn't preserve the weapon-icon labels attached to each number in the original table, so this guide reports the range rather than guessing which figure belongs to which weapon:

 

• Level 1: 42 down to 1 shots
• Level 30: 116 down to 3 shots
• Level 60: 191 down to 5 shots
• Level 90: 267 down to 7 shots
• Level 120: 342 down to 8 shots
• Level 150: 418 down to 10 shots

 

    Doing the arithmetic on the extremes: the top-count weapon needs 418 − 42 = 376 more shots to knock out a Level 150 Ankylosaurus than a Level 1 one. The wiki also gives a Torpidity-depletion rate and a total depletion time for each level, which tells you how long your feeding window lasts once the dino is down: 0.3/s at Level 1 (23:20 total), climbing to 0.5/s at Level 30 (38:29), 0.66/s at Level 60 (48:52), 0.79/s at Level 90 (56:24), 0.92/s at Level 120 (01:02:20), and 1.04/s at Level 150 (01:07:13).

 

    That Level 1 pair checks out arithmetically against the creature's own base Torpidity stat: the Base Stats table lists wild Torpidity at 420, and 420 ÷ 0.3/s = 1,400 seconds = 23 minutes 20 seconds — exactly the "00:23:20" the taming table lists for Level 1. Torpidity itself scales at +25.2 per wild level past the base, which is the underlying reason both the shot counts and the depletion windows grow so much heavier at higher levels.

 

Trapping, Saddle Level, and What You Get

 

 

    Before you start shooting, pin it down: the wiki lists the Ankylosaurus as Immobilized By Chain Bola, Large Bear Trap, Plant Species Y Trap, and Net Projectile — any of those stop it from wandering off mid-tranq, which matters since it's still mobile enough to outrun a slow shooter even at its low speed.

 

    Once tamed, you'll need Ankylo Saddle (Level 36) before you can ride it. The Base Stats and Growth table gives these wild-level figures: Health 700 (+140 per level), Stamina 175 (+17.5 per level), Weight 250 (+5 per level), Melee Damage 50/30 (+2.5/+1.5 per level), and Movement Speed 100% (with a +2% taming-effectiveness bonus available). On the kill/drops side, the wiki lists Drops as Hide, Keratin, and Raw Meat, and XP for kill at 24 XP — both documented for context, not as taming steps.

 

Trap it before you tranq it. A Chain Bola or a ring of Large Bear Traps stops the chase before it starts. Load Regular Kibble or Kibble (Dilo Egg) into its inventory the moment it's out, and budget your feeding window against the Torpidity-depletion time for its level — 23 minutes at Level 1, over an hour by Level 150. Bring more ammo than the table says; the wiki's own note is to always carry extra supplies.

 

Running your own ARK server

 

    Trapping an Ankylosaurus, stockpiling Regular Kibble, and timing a feeding window against its Torpidity decay is a lot less stressful when you're not also racing a shared server's restart schedule. A private ARK server keeps your trap standing and your tribe's kibble stash exactly where you left it, with no risk of another tribe wandering into your KO in progress. It also makes multi-person taming runs easier to schedule, since you're not waiting on whoever else happens to be online.

 

Conclusion

 

    Taming an Ankylosaurus comes down to what the wiki actually documents: it's a Docile creature that still needs a full Knockout tame, Regular Kibble or Kibble (Dilo Egg) is its preferred food, shot counts and Torpidity-decay windows scale hard from Level 1 (42 shots, 23 minutes) to Level 150 (418 shots, over an hour), and a saddle waits at Level 36. Which exact weapon produces which shot count in that six-figure range isn't recoverable from the source text used here, so this guide reports the range honestly instead of assigning numbers it can't verify.

 

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