Animal spawns nerfed?

[Reyvar]

95% of my time spent in online has been spent hunting. I'm not playing online for other people - to me they add nothing to the game. I just like having a custimizable (and female) character.. and if RDR2 is anything like GTA they'll ignore single player and focus solely on adding huge numbers of cool stuff to multiplayer.. so I want to play that.

So that said - I've spent a fair number of hours doing nothing but loading my horse up with animal carcasses and selling them to the butcher.

Tonight though, I spent nearly an hour running around Lemoyne and found a grand total of two ravens. Those two ravens, flying together, where the only living creatures I encountered in the whole of the state. Areas I'd hunted extensively previously that had extremely reliable spawns (as in, there's almost never not animals there) were totally barren even after a half dozen trips in and out of the area.

I encountered no spoonbills at the places they normally appear. There was not a single alligator along the riverbank. No ducks at the pond. No deer running around. No rabbits, racoons, or packs of wild boars. Nothing.

There was only a single other player in the entire region, and they were quite far off from me at all times - so I don't think they were the reason for the desolate environment. The only thing I can think is that R* totally destroyed the animal spawn rate - or the region I was in was just plain bugged for some reason.

[volta2001]

I just made a post on this issue. Definitely nerfed. I rode through grizzlies east and didn’t see a single small game animal or bird. Only a couple deer. Pathetic 

[Qbert]

Could be a lagged lobby happens a lot, not just to animals but affects hideouts and stranger missions as well. Try a different lobby and see as I just did a bunch of hunting a bit ago. I know if you stop hearing birds chirp your lobby is bonked, p2p for ya

Edited December 22, 2018 by Qbert

[Virus..]

Change sessions after a while? I dont hunt at all. But when i feel like it, i find boars near rhodes like always, deers everywhere. Finally found a moose for the first time online...i was going for some treasure at calumets ravine and found a western moose drinking water. Seven dollars... its something.

Edited December 22, 2018 by Virus..

[Qbert]

Yes after awhile or sometimes even when you join your session your lobby can be glitched for you. If you check the map sometimes during this the stranger icons don't even show up, as well as your lack of wildlife. Sometimes I've came to a butcher to find him like standing beside his counter\stall and not behind it like it should be and you can't interact with him or anyone for that matter. Used to just change lobbies but I found out if I die or respawn through the settings it fixes things so I'm thinking this stuff is only on the player side

[Pocket Fox]

Haven't noticed any nerf myself, maybe I'm hunting in a dif area.

 

Which area do you believe is nerfed?

[Reyvar]

4 minutes ago, Pocket Fox said:

Haven't noticed any nerf myself, maybe I'm hunting in a dif area.

 

Which area do you believe is nerfed?

The entirety of Lemoyne was devoid of life, outside of those two ravens. I circled the entire area 3 times over and didn't find anything, when I can normally just cross the bridge outside of Rhodes and collect $20 in animals every 5-10 minutes.

[ThaBirdCoot]

Lag or server acting up most definetly. I get dozens of animals spawning not even trying to hunt at some moments so I just be like ok come on iiin. Poor squirrel bastards it was literal genocide last few hours. 

[Reyvar]

Whatever it is, it's still happening. Played single player for a couple hours, then got back online and did another trip around the state. Couldn't find a single thing to shoot other than the trees.

If this is intentional, I really don't get what they're thinking. Taking what's more or less the only thing to do other than PvP out of the game is just silly.

[areyouchappin]

I have never experienced this, I see lots of animals all the time. It honestly sounds like a glitch or session issues, have you tried resetting your console or internet connection?

[Reyvar]

3 minutes ago, areyouchappin said:

I have never experienced this, I see lots of animals all the time. It honestly sounds like a glitch or session issues, have you tried resetting your console or internet connection?

No - because literally everything else in the game is working fine. I just finished a story mission with three other players without issue, and I've been wandering around picking herbs to sell to the doctor as I search for any form of animal life.

Yesterday I made several hundred dollars in a couple hours hunting, today there's nothing on the map aside from a couple of birds and a single boar I found a few minutes ago outside Saint Denis. It's as if they reduced the animal spawns to 5% of what they were yesterday.

[areyouchappin]

1 minute ago, Reyvar said:

No - because literally everything else in the game is working fine. I just finished a story mission with three other players without issue, and I've been wandering around picking herbs to sell to the doctor as I search for any form of animal life.

Yesterday I made several hundred dollars in a couple hours hunting, today there's nothing on the map aside from a couple of birds and a single boar I found a few minutes ago outside Saint Denis. It's as if they reduced the animal spawns to 5% of what they were yesterday.

Wow, that's crazy, I hope they didn't put some sort of limit on hunting.

[ALifeOfMisery]

Like OP, I spend the majority of my time hunting. I don't hunt in the same area as OP, I'm mostly in and around the West Grizzlies.

 

I haven't noticed any major changes. Over the last day there does seem to be less small game such as rabbits and squirrels. Also I haven't seen a single eagle or owl in places where I usually find them.

 

However, I've found far more sheep, rams, elk, deer and foxes around the area I usually hunt.

 

tl;dr I've noticed changes, but not the lack of animals OP has witnessed.

[rusbeckia]

You‘ve just been in a laggy session. I‘ve been hunting in Lemoyne for all night yesterday, no problem. Everything spawned as usual. 

This is due to server latency I guess. That‘s also the reason for the clustered spawns that happen sometimes

1 hour ago, Reyvar said:

Whatever it is, it's still happening. Played single player for a couple hours, then got back online and did another trip around the state. Couldn't find a single thing to shoot other than the trees.

If this is intentional, I really don't get what they're thinking. Taking what's more or less the only thing to do other than PvP out of the game is just silly.

Don‘t say they‘re taking away something from online if this only happens to you.

 

I mean, yeah, it‘s probably on their side, but they don‘t take away „the only thing to do besides PvP“

 

EDIT: btw I also hunt >90% of the time and it sometimes happened to me that areas appeared really empty, but animals always spawned after a while

Edited December 22, 2018 by rusbeckia

[rusbeckia]

Tbh, as ALifeOfMisery said, I noticed way more bucks than usual in/around Lemoyne and sometimes animals on the border of your minimap disappear randomly. But no empty regions for me

[ALifeOfMisery]

1 minute ago, rusbeckia said:

Tbh, as ALifeOfMisery said, I noticed way more bucks than usual in/around Lemoyne and sometimes animals on the border of your minimap disappear randomly. But no empty regions for me

Honestly, perhaps naively, I just saw it as either RNG or R* attempting realism. 

 

As in, just because say an eagle can usually be found in a specific area, there won't always be one there, or a wolf might have scared deer away from an area where they can usually be found etc.

 

I haven't, so far, been in an area devoid of wildlife, but if it happened, I'd assume the lobby had bugged out and I'd change session rather than spend an hour circling the area in an attempt to force spawns.

[rusbeckia]

45 minutes ago, ALifeOfMisery said:

Honestly, perhaps naively, I just saw it as either RNG or R* attempting realism. 

 

As in, just because say an eagle can usually be found in a specific area, there won't always be one there, or a wolf might have scared deer away from an area where they can usually be found etc.

This is it. I noticed that too. Let‘s say you kill an alligator with a rifle in the swamps, you can be sure that all herons etc will be gone then. If you kill more alligators in a small geographic location, all other alligators will flee. It takes a few minutes and riding away from that region to make them respawn. 

 

Also I observed something interesting at a place where a cougar spawns. There is usually also a lot deer around in that forest and if you shoot deer with a rifle this will make all the other bucks flee and it‘s therefore more unlikely to get the cougar, cause no animals for it to hunt are around. 

 

That‘s also an argument to use thhe bow as often as you can, since it won‘t frighten other animals. 

 

They really put much thought in the biome!

[Ghoffman9]

6 hours ago, Reyvar said:

95% of my time spent in online has been spent hunting. I'm not playing online for other people - to me they add nothing to the game. I just like having a custimizable (and female) character.. and if RDR2 is anything like GTA they'll ignore single player and focus solely on adding huge numbers of cool stuff to multiplayer.. so I want to play that.

So that said - I've spent a fair number of hours doing nothing but loading my horse up with animal carcasses and selling them to the butcher.

Tonight though, I spent nearly an hour running around Lemoyne and found a grand total of two ravens. Those two ravens, flying together, where the only living creatures I encountered in the whole of the state. Areas I'd hunted extensively previously that had extremely reliable spawns (as in, there's almost never not animals there) were totally barren even after a half dozen trips in and out of the area.

I encountered no spoonbills at the places they normally appear. There was not a single alligator along the riverbank. No ducks at the pond. No deer running around. No rabbits, racoons, or packs of wild boars. Nothing.

There was only a single other player in the entire region, and they were quite far off from me at all times - so I don't think they were the reason for the desolate environment. The only thing I can think is that R* totally destroyed the animal spawn rate - or the region I was in was just plain bugged for some reason.

I honestly do think they are working on a single player DLC. Many speculate a RDR1 remake is in the works with the RDR2 Engine, it will also included Mexico that can also be explored in the online mode. Why else would they go to great lengths to recreate the original Red Dead map in such perfect detail? From the Macfarlene Ranch, to Thieves Landing, to even that little church you go to when you first bump into Seth Briars. Its all there. You can even explore the foundation of what will be Mexico early via glitches. Its because of all this is why I am certain.

Edited December 22, 2018 by Ghoffman9

[fejkb]

Try going to some place where other players won’t show up. Desynchronization in p2p makes animals teleport, change into other species or disappear. Sometimes when other player is around animals won’t spawn at all. Same thing with gang hideouts. If I’m solo in my posse and there is noone around, it always spawns for me.

[RayD70]

It's a bug related to lag. It hit me all the time until about a week ago. I thought it was gone for good, but last night it happened a few times.

 

When it happens, go into a town. If the only NPCs you see are vendors, you won't find any animals either. Just switch lobbies. If it keeps happening, check your own connection.

 

[Danish Crusader]

This usually happens on fridays, saturdays and sundays, where more people are playing and a lot of people(Including me) cannot play more than 10-15 minutes before getting kicked from the game.

There is still some server side issues that needs to be ironed out, like the animal spawns, vendors that stop working and missions that won't start. Hopefully, Rockstar will throw out a patch for it sooner, rather than later.

 

Or, it could also be that some idiot(Like me) was hunting with dynamite to get the Award and was scaring everything away =P

Don't judge until you try it, it is A LOT of fun =D

Edited December 22, 2018 by Danish Crusader

[DonnieVega]

3 hours ago, rusbeckia said:

This is it. I noticed that too. Let‘s say you kill an alligator with a rifle in the swamps, you can be sure that all herons etc will be gone then. If you kill more alligators in a small geographic location, all other alligators will flee. It takes a few minutes and riding away from that region to make them respawn. 

 

Also I observed something interesting at a place where a cougar spawns. There is usually also a lot deer around in that forest and if you shoot deer with a rifle this will make all the other bucks flee and it‘s therefore more unlikely to get the cougar, cause no animals for it to hunt are around. 

 

That‘s also an argument to use thhe bow as often as you can, since it won‘t frighten other animals. 

 

They really put much thought in the biome!

Either that or it's just really buggy sometimes. Maybe there's no cougar or deer simply because nothing at all is spawning without it being intentional.

 

Animal carcasses (and human) just despawn way too easily. Except when you're in a solo session. When you find yourself alone in a lobby you can get way further from the carcasses and they won't despawn. You can also kill a lot more compared to a crowded lobby where carcasses despawn easily when more than 4 or 5.

 

I really hope they find a way to fix the despawning of corpses because I'm sure I've missed a couple of treasure maps from ambushes and gang hideouts because of it.

[rusbeckia]

15 minutes ago, DonnieVega said:

I really hope they find a way to fix the despawning of corpses because I'm sure I've missed a couple of treasure maps from ambushes and gang hideouts because of it.

Yes me too! Imo it‘s breaking the game, when carcasses despawn that easily, in a game where hunting is one of the few major gameplay mechanics. It really doesn‘t make sense. 

I hope that this is just buggy and will get fixed, and is not r*‘s way to prevent us from making money...

 

also if u kill an animal with a scope outside the bounds of the minimap it will despawn instantly, which is just plain stupid.

Edited December 22, 2018 by rusbeckia

[Pocket Fox]

Had a stroll around Lemoyne, 3 blue herons, one spoonbill, 2 gators, bunch of turtles and toads.

 

Doesn't 'appear' to be any less than usual. Spawns can be bs sometimes though. Like... gators everywhere!  Then next time... no gators.

 

:s

[Reyvar]

57 minutes ago, Pocket Fox said:

Had a stroll around Lemoyne, 3 blue herons, one spoonbill, 2 gators, bunch of turtles and toads.

 

Doesn't 'appear' to be any less than usual. Spawns can be bs sometimes though. Like... gators everywhere!  Then next time... no gators.

 

:s

Yeah, that's more or less the norm in my experience. Maybe a touch on the heavy side even. I'll give it another go this morning and see what happens I guess.. even restarted the PS4 and router just to be sure.

[Jason]

Like others have said, it's a lobby issue. Some lobbies have broken spawns for whatever reason.

[Reyvar]

1 hour ago, Jason said:

Like others have said, it's a lobby issue. Some lobbies have broken spawns for whatever reason.

That does indeed appear to be the case. Both lobbies I was in last night (heck, three if I joined a different one after the mission) had no animals to speak of.

This morning everything is back to normal.. which is good, as my character was getting quite hungry and I had to fill her underweight ravenous belly.

[clinical oppression]

Yeah this happens alot , as others have said just change sessions. I will hear a lot of animals but with eagle eye on there are zero tracks anywhere. This is my main indicator , I'll check eagle eye ... move along for 10-15 seconds then check it again . ....if there is nothing the session is useless and I change out   Next time this happens I bet you wint spend an hour looking .....you'll be out in less than 10 minutes . There are times i will even change out when there is wildlife around but it's too sparse  . Half the times I've done this I spawn in to a flock of herons flying my way lol . 

Edited December 22, 2018 by clinical oppression

[Van_Hellsing]

Sometimes all the gators are gone. Switch sessions and select an area were you do not want to be. So you want to be in Saint Dennis, select New Austin and ride to Saint Dennis. 

[sudoinit6]

9 hours ago, DonnieVega said:

 

I really hope they find a way to fix the despawning of corpses because I'm sure I've missed a couple of treasure maps from ambushes and gang hideouts because of it.

 

Kill all but leader.

Loot all bodies.

Kill leader.

 

This method has worked for me every time. The bodies don't start despawning until you kill the leader.