Imprinting is one of the most complicated mechanics, but it’s also one of the most effective ones to mature your baby dinos. Our guide will provide you with all the info about Imprinting symbols, as well as tips on how Imprinting works in Ark: Survival Ascended.
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What’s Imprinting and How Does It Work in Ark Survival Ascended?
During the breeding process of any creature in Ark: Survival Ascended, you’ll be prompted to take care of that creature during its maturation period. That’s when you can use Imprinting to increase the creature’s stats by various means, which will be discussed below.
Note that Imprinting works in different ways depending on the settings of the server that you choose to play on. But the general process looks like this:
- Find or breed a baby creature of your choice.
- Interact with the baby creature once it shows the “Wants Care In: [Timer]” prompt.
- Accomplish the Imprinting tasks, including feeding, cuddling, walking, etc.
- Complete all the tasks within the given time in the Imprint menu.
- Proceed until the creature matures into an adult.
I highly recommend reaching a full 100% Imprint success on as many tasks as possible, because this will add another 20% bonus to your creature’s base stats.
How to See What Imprint Symbols Mean
Once you open the Imprint menu of your baby dino, you may see only a handful of symbols without any explanation. This happens because you probably have your gamepad connected to your PC, which the UI interprets as the “Show Less” option.
If you want your Imprint menu to show text instead of symbols on PC, then either disconnect your gamepad or simply hover your mouse over your baby dino. If you have the same issue on Xbox, then you need to connect a PC mouse to your console via USB port.
All Imprint Symbols Listed
The three Imprint actions are represented by three symbols, which appear as white symbols to signal the possibility of Imprinting. Then the symbols start flashing red, alerting you to the urgent nature of the action, which you must execute as soon as possible to avoid losing points. Here’s what the symbols mean:
- Baby dino on its back means that it wants to be cuddled.
- Baby dino standing on its feet means that it wants to be walked.
- Baby dino with a food icon means that it wants to be fed.
You can also see symbols for stats that can be improved with Imprinting below:
- Cross: Health.
- Lightning: Stamina.
- Tank: Oxygen.
- Meat: Food.
- Barbell: Weight.
- Fist: Damage.
- Foot: Speed.
- Stars: Torpidity.
What are Imprint Bonuses?
There are certain modifiers that apply Imprint bonuses to your creatures when performing specific actions. As I mentioned above, if you reach full Imprint affinity with your baby dino, it’ll get a 20% bonus on all its stats. But there are a few extra bonuses that you should consider, including specific damage and resistance bonuses, Health and time-out bonuses, and reduced incoming damage bonuses.
All Imprint Bonuses Listed
- You’ll get a 30% increase to your dino’s damage and resistance if you’ve achieved a 100% Imprint affinity and you’re currently riding that creature.
- You’ll get only a 10% bonus to your dino’s base stats if you achieve only 50% Imprint affinity, which also includes an extra 15% bonus to your dino’s damage and resistance.
- If your dino has increased Health, then you’ll have more time to deflect damage during hostile attacks, which is equal to your dino’s Health bonus. For example, if your dino has a 20% HP bonus, you’ll gain 20% more time to deflect incoming damage.
- Your outbound damage is increased by the same percentage as your reduced incoming damage bonus. For example, if you’ve achieved a 10% bonus on reduced incoming damage via Imprinting, then your outbound damage gains the same 10% bonus.
How to Fix Baby Dino Not Imprinting
It’s possible that your baby dino may be refusing Imprinting. If that’s the case, then you need to fix this issue by doing the following:
- Provide the baby dino with its comfort food (each dino type has one).
- Adjust the speed of maturing and cuddle intervals using console commands.
- Adjust Imprinting percentages on the server settings via the admin console.
Lastly, you can set your own individual baby dino Imprint multipliers by editing the “game.ini” file, which can be found in the Ark: Survival Ascended folder on your PC. Use the following settings for best performance:
- BabyCuddleIntervalMultiplier=0.022
- BabyMatureSpeedMultiplier=45
- BabyImprintAmountMultiplier=2
That’s everything you need to know about the Imprinting symbols in ARK: Survival Ascended. Stay tuned for more ASA tips and tricks articles, such as best locations to farm oil and how to switch to first person view.
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