Base Stats (Wild Lv150)
| Stat | Base Value | Per Level (Wild) | Per Level (Tamed) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Health | 600 | +120 | +5.4% |
| Stamina | 200 | +20 | +10% |
| Weight | 220 | +4.4 | +4% |
| Melee Damage | 100% (32 base) | +5% | +1.7% |
Taming Guide
| Food | Amount (Lv150, 1x) | Time | Effectiveness |
|---|---|---|---|
| Regular Kibble | 12 | ~22min | +99% |
| Fresh Barley | 50 | ~35min | +85% |
| Mejoberry | 160 | ~1h 10min | +65% |
Resource Harvesting
Ngl the Doedicurus is basically the MVP of stone gathering and I've tamed so many of these over the years because honestly you just can't build anything big in ARK without one it's that simple the stone harvesting is absolutely ridiculous because the Doed hits stone nodes for like 4 to 5 times more stone than you'd get with a metal pick and honestly the first time I used one I literally couldn't believe how much stone I was pulling per node it was kind of mind-blowing tbh and the 75% weight reduction on stone is honestly what makes this creature broken for farming because stone is stupidly heavy normally and without the reduction you'd be making like three trips for every load but with a Doed you just roll around collecting thousands of stone and it barely registers in your weight bar also it gathers sand with the same 75% weight reduction which is super useful on Scorched Earth and in desert biomes where you need sand for glass and electronics and stuff like that but the obsidian harvesting is kind of whatever it can grab small amounts from specific nodes but honestly that's not why you tame a Doed you know you're here for the stone and the stone alone imo and here's something I've messed around with a lot you can set the Doed to wander near stone nodes and it will autonomously harvest stone for you while you go do other stuff and if you pair it with a weight-specced dino following it around you've got yourself a passive stone farm that runs while you're offline or crafting or whatever I've done this on a bunch of servers and it works surprisingly well as long as the area is safe and you've got good fencing up and there's no predators around to wreck your Doed because that would suck
Shell Defense Mode
Okay so. The shell defense thing. Honestly kind of wild. I've died to enough wild Doeds to respect it deeply. The way it works is when the Doedicurus takes damage while nobody is riding it it just curls up into this tight ball and gets a 90% damage reduction from literally everything like all sources and that's one of the strongest defensive abilities in the entire game ngl but in my experience this makes taming them way harder than the HP numbers suggest because you're pumping tranq darts into it and it just curls up mid-fight and suddenly your darts are doing practically nothing and the whole process takes way longer than you'd expect the first time I tried to tame one I was like why is this taking so long and then I realized it kept curling up every few seconds which was honestly pretty frustrating lol they can't move while they're curled which is kind of the tradeoff and they'll uncurl after about 10 seconds of not taking any damage so you just have to keep shooting to keep it from uncurling or wait it out and resume but as a defensive creature it's honestly amazing like I've had wild Doeds tank entire packs of raptors by just curling up and waiting it out and that kind of survivability is pretty much unmatched for a gathering dino I've probably used the shell mode for defense more than I'd like to admit and it's saved my Doed from random therizino attacks and alpha raptor encounters you know the usual ARK chaos where everything wants to kill you and your tames
Farming Strategy
Alright so here's the thing about farming I've tried every combo in the game and the Anky plus Doed plus Argy setup is honestly the holy trinity of ARK resource gathering and I will die on this hill you carry an Ankylosaurus for metal in one claw and a Doedicurus for stone in the other with your Argentavis and you fly out to the resource-rich mountains and you harvest both metal and stone in one glorious trip and it's just so efficient it's kind of beautiful honestly I've literally built massive bases off this combo alone you just do a few runs and you've got thousands of metal ingots and thousands of stone and you're ready to build an industrial forge a vault a whole industrial district basically you get the idea for the Doed specifically you want to prioritize melee damage when leveling because more melee equals more stone per node and that's really what you're here for the more stone you get per swing the fewer nodes you need to clear which means faster farming runs overall and less time exposed to danger out in the wild but you also absolutely need weight because even with the 75% reduction stone is still heavy especially when you're hauling thousands of it at a time so I usually do like a 70/30 split between melee and weight depending on how I'm using it and what the server harvest rates look like your mileage may vary of course and the rolling attack is honestly one of my favorite things about the Doedicurus because it can roll around as a movement ability when you're on flat terrain and it's way faster than just walking which is great for getting around your base or covering ground between stone patches tbh I probably spend more time rolling around on my Doed for fun than doing actual serious farming because it's just fun to roll but in terms of practical use it actually helps a lot when you're clearing out large flat areas and need to move between nodes quickly and if you're on a server with boosted rates you're basically swimming in stone within minutes of taming a decent Doed it's kind of ridiculous but in the best way possible trust me you need one of these