Ravager

The Ravager or simply Cave wolf, is one of the Creatures in ARK: Survival Evolved's Aberration expansion.

Behavior
The Ravager is an aggressive pack animal which usually travels in packs of 3 to 5, attacking most herbivores its size or smaller. Even without a pack, a Ravager can be very aggressive and dangerous, but if there's only one, then they won't get any buffs for being in a pack. When tamed, the Ravager is a great mount for transport or scouting; it has decent weight, speed, and stamina and it’s capable of climbing up zip lines and vines.

Appearance
The Ravager is a mostly hairless almost scaly, quadrupedal canine predator. It has large ears, possibly for hunting at low light levels, and it possesses large teeth and claws for ripping apart prey. It is around the size of a dire wolf, but has a jump comparable to a thylacoleo although in a more vertical direction for overcoming obstacles. Alphas will have a reddish orange glow around them to distinguish them from the rest of their pack.

Combat
This section describes how to fight against this creature.

General
These creatures will attack you if you get too close and are powerful even at low levels, especially with its bleeding attack and the pack buff. They are a common spawn. They will sometimes run away when you approach much like raptors.

Strategy
Keep clear of this creature. If you are going to be attacked however, running into water occasionally will work and will sometimes break aggro, but don't always count on it.

Weaponry
Melee combat is not recommended with its Gnash attack. Shooting it instead with a ranged weapon at a distance works best.

Dangers
If you are out at "night" without a capable mount, be very careful, the Ravagers DO NOT glow and the most visible way to spot them in the dark is if you see a pack alpha.

They are very fast and will easily run down a low level player. They also hunt in packs (receiving the pack bonus) and have a slow attack that "Gnashes" a player. The Gnash attack is powerful and can even kill a Spino with ease as it induces a harsh bleed.

They are able to climb player placed zip lines to get to you. Be cautious!

Weakness
They can easily be stopped by using a bola. You can use a Raptor to attack Ravager, make 2-3 attacks, run away from Ravager's attacks, heal and attack next time (similar strategy can be used on Raptors against every slower opponent). Megalosaurus, Carno and Spino can easily kill Ravagers.

KO Strategy
Using a will make it stand still so it's easily knocked out, like a dire wolf tame or a sabertooth.

The pack bonus on Ravagers makes them more difficult to tame so it is recommended that you bola the Ravager you wish to tame and either kill its packmates or simply lead them far enough away and lose aggro.

Roles
Transport/Scouting: The Ravager's decent stamina and speed, the ability to use Ziplines (natural or unnatural), coupled with its jump make it an excellent early game mount, especially for travelling great distances. Look at a zipline until you see a cursor and jump to mount the zipline. It is able go up and down the ziplines, walk back to turn around and is able to sprint up and slide down. It is also able to jump from zipline to zipline. (Level up and )

Transport:  Wood, Fungal Wood, Thatch, Metal, Green Gem, Fiber, Crystal, Obsidian, and  Stone weigh less while being carried by the Ravager. These resources weigh only 50% of their usual value.

Hunter/Meat Gatherer: The Ravager's decent base damage coupled with its pack bonus makes it an excellent hunting animal, especially in groups. While mounted, players can use the bite attack (default ) for gathering things such as, , etc., while the paw swipe attack (default ) will gather mostly meat. (Level up, , )

Damage: Ravagers gain a pack buff when in a group of 3 or larger in a similar fashion to the Allosaurus or the Dire Wolf giving the pack increased damage and damage resistance. This can be utilized to its fullest potential using a large group of Ravagers for the purpose of taking down large prey, in warfare against other tribes, and as a base defense. Be mindful that tamed Ravagers do not inflict a bleeding effect. (Level up, , and )

Guardian:

Travel:

Combatant:

Guard Dog:

Defenders:

Scout:

War Pack:

Weight Reduction
The Ravager reduces the weight of the following resources by the listed amount while they are in its inventory:

Notes/Trivia

 * The Ravager has a roar ability activated by pressing ,. Like the it cannot roar while running. If you are on a zipline this will cause them to hang upside down.
 * There is a saddle skin available for the Ravager. Similar to the Parasaur Founder saddle it adds a purple blanket-like piece decorated with the Ark "A" with studs on the saddle.
 * Ravagers do not take fall damage, see Fall Damage for more info.
 * The Ravager is capable of climbing across zip lines and vines. On consoles holding down while moving on the zipline increases the movement speed.
 * Ravagers set to follow will follow you on ziplines. However to prevent them from jumping onto the zipline in front of you it is suggested to whistle stop, get on and move up the zipline, then whistle follow again.
 * (Baby) Ravagers on follow will attempt to jump towards the nearest zipline to catch up with the survivor or dino they are following.
 * When on a zipline on a Ravager, to operate the whistle radial wheel you need to use RS to select instead of LS.
 * The Ravager is the second member of the in game Genus Canis ,the other being the Direwolf.
 * In fact the Canis genus is a real life genus that contains the Grey wolf, Dingo, Coyote etc.
 * since there are no Aberrant, the Ravager might simply be a mutated wolf, adapted to the warmer, darker environments of the caverns (this is supported by their size- almost identical to that of a direwolf, its genus and pack mentality, lack of radiation tolerance, and various other similar abilities and features)
 * The second part of Ravager's scientific name, Barghest, can be found in English folklore, where it's the name of a being that usually takes a shape of a monstrous black dog, and is considered an omen of death. The most notable similarity is the folklore's creature's ability to inflict wounds that would never heal and the game's bleed debuff the Ravager applies.
 * Like, Ravager’s appearance also resembles that of one of the depictions of the famous mythical creature known as the Chupacabra.
 * In one depiction it is said to take the form of a strange breed of wild dog similarly to the Ravager.
 * The other depiction resembles that of the as a bipedal creature with fangs and a body highly reminiscent of a demon.
 * The creature was first announced in Community Crunch 102 on September 9, 2017.
 * Ravager's roar is similar to the sound of dying.
 * Like and, when a Ravager roars other pack member also roar.
 * Tamed and Imprinted Ravagers do not inflict the Gnashed status effect.
 * The Ravager is one of the few native Aberration creatures that isn't immune to.
 * The first shown image of the Ravager, that being the torn dossier of it, is rather unlike the final design, in that it is much less dog-like, with little to no hair, gremlin-like ears, more spikey protrusions and a neck frill, making it look even stranger than it already does.
 * The neck frill on the torn dossier belongs to a reaper.
 * Raw mutton recover Ravager's hunger around 200 points