Dododex
ARK: Survival Evolved & Ascended Companion

Tips & Strategies

If you're taming these use a cannon it will be 1-2 cannon balls, ensure the cannon is about 3 foundations from the trap and 4 pillars high. Easiest tame ever and op
More Karkinos Taming & KO Tips
Had more luck with the catapult but instead of spacing shots out just violently shot it with the boulders (body) until knocked out. Spacing it out resulted in dead Dino after 50 boulders. Spamming resulted in 16 boulders and knocked out.
Alright, first time ever taming one of these things, after all the 2500 hours playing this game. Here’s how it went solo on aberration. Here’s my full experience. If you need help, I’m sure this will help.
To start, I crafted a catapult (not a cannon), 6 stone gates, a foundation and 3 walls, 4 ceilings, 5 ladders, and 2 large bear traps. I set off and searched the bioluminescent zone with a rock drake, because I found none in the green zone.
When I found one, it was a 125 and in the lake, quite deep. I shot it with a rifle, and they take reduced damage from bullets. Lured it to the shoreline where I had cleared out creatures with my rock drake and placed 3 stone gates and 2 bear traps. Once it was trapped, I quickly got around it and placed my other gates to trap it.
Now, the awkward bit. Directly facing one gateway, head on, I placed the foundation. Out of reach from any of its attacks, maybe 2-3 foundations away from the gate. I placed 3 walls, on the furthest side of the foundation, and the ceilings above. The catapult went on top, and ladders went up to the ceilings so I could access the catapult and shoot down onto the karkinos.
Then, I noticed the gate top blocked the catapult’s angle. So I had the idea to build 2 stone gateways and placing them facing outwards, basically using each sides of the gates to keep the gap small, but removing the barrier that was the top of the original gateway. 3 pillars either side would likely do the same thing. Destroying that original gate was a bit awkward, and it grabbed me once, but I think it hit me into my gate and dropped me.
The boulder is crafted inside the catapult, and costs 3 metal ingots and 30 stone. I harvested up 3 forges and a smithy on the foundation for the metal, and I tried bear traps but ended up not really needing them. I was not at all prepared. Fortunately I could get plenty of resources in the blue zone.
When shooting the crab, hitting it was awkward. I had fired maybe 7 boulders at its core and only one did torpor. I used a glowbug and dimetrodon body to drag to it and feed it. Was a little awkward but it worked out eventually.
Then I used my magnifying glass after each shot. Very carefully, as I didn’t want to risk being picked up. In the future I would place a bed or sleeping bags, just in case. But I kept trying to find the right spot, and I learnt that hitting it right on the forehead seemed to work best. Not its face, but not right on top of its shell either. Though, I found some success hitting it right on top too. It was awkward, but when it faced me while aggro, and just stayed there, I spammed a good 5-6 shots into it, which really helped. Dropped it shortly after when it started moving. Fed spoiled meat and went to grab resources for a saddle nearby.
Cryod it and went home with my rock drake. Left my trap there in case I ever want to try getting another crab and it’s nearby. Though it’s a nice amount of resources to get back if you want to demolish it after. Just make sure you demolish from the top down. Doesn’t really matter on ascended though.
That’s my full first experience with the crab, no tutorial watched. If you want to, it’s probably smart to. But I wanted to give it my best shot on my own, and I think I did okay. If you want to let me know how I did, you know how to tell me. Hope my experience helped you with your own karkinos taming.
These guys are on Ragnarok ASA. They are in a cave east of the southwest islands
Tranq Arrows/Darts DO NOT WORK!!! To knock this out you need to use a catapult and shoot in only on it's back. If you shoot it on it's legs it will kill it.
@Stormwebb19
Cannon balls discrease taming effeciency significantly! So for high tame level, always use boulders. Please let other people know! :)
Pretty easy to tame. Trap it in a circular form of stone Dino gates, place catapult low if catapult is high the crab will die. Then shoot it with a catapult. Cannons insta kill the crab, do not use cannons
If you mess up and the Karkinos ends up having low hp. Find a small creature, kill it(do not harvest it) and bring its lifelless body to the Karkinos. Stand near the dead body so that when the Karki hits you it also eats the body and regains full hp but the torpor still remains. Hope it helps
If you are missing with your catapult and it's dying, drag dino corpses to it and let the karkinos eat the corpses. It will heal him up a lot then try again with the same torpor you left off with.
This tame is like the Rock elemental, but do not shoot it in the head. Shoot it right in the back of it's shell. Anywhere else will kill it fast.
To the guy who said "rare on floaty islands on crystal" that is a load of crap found 20 on 1 ISLAND!!!