All methods to get Element on The Island

Element is important for the endgame in ARK Survival Evolved and to keep your High-Tek base running you will need a steady supply of Element. But how do you get this supply on The Island?

The Island is not an Element friendly place and Element can only be farmed through Bosses or Tek animals. There is no other way to aquire it without mods or transferring animals over. 

Getting Element through the Broodmother

The Broodmother is the first boss on ARK Survival Evolved The Island and will provide the winning tribe with Element once defeated. This is how much Element you get when defeating the Broodmother on The Island:

Element reward when killing Megapithecus

The Megapithecus is the second boss on The Island and a fairly easy boss as well. When defeating Megapithecus you will also get an Element reward for the whole group. This is how much Element you will get:

Element aquired when defeating The Dragon Boss

The Dragon is the third and probably also the most challenging boss on the Island. It is the boss where the most people struggle to defeat it first try. Since the Dragon comes with its own challenges, the Element reward is bigger than with the other two bosses. This is how much Element you will get:

Source of the Element numbers

The Overseer will not get you Element or loot, since it’s an ascension boss and will respawn you char fresh in your bed without items. 

Getting Element with Tek Animals

On The Island you will see Tek Animals spawning when you are lucky. When you harvest them, one of the resources you can get from them is Element Dust. This can then be turned into Element itself when you have the Engram unlocked for it.  So let’s assume you breed these Tek animals to farm them for Element Dust – to calculate the efficiency of all available animals we first calculate the duration in which they grow up.

• Tek Parasaur: Growth time: 1d 2h 40 m
• Tek Quetzal: Growth time: 5d 12h 16 min 30sec
• Tek Raptor: Growth time: 1d 13h 2 min 13sec
• Tek Rex: Growth time: 3d 20h 30 min
• Tek Stego: Growth time: 2d 3h 26 min 25sec

After that we harvest them to see how much dust they give when farmed, and then we put this into relation to the growing time, so we can find out with which animal we use our time better and more efficient.

Different farming methods will give different amounts

There are 2 different farming methods we are trying out to find the one that is the most efficient in combination with the right animal. Please keep in mind that Mantis and Chainsaws don’t spawn / exist on the Island so if you don’t have a cluster, you have to stick with handfarming.

But in case you have access to Mantis and/or chainsaws, these would be your calculations:

Farming with a chainsaw: 

• If you use a primitive chainsaw then Tek Rexes are the most efficient animal to farm
• If you use a damaged capped chainsaw then Tek Parasaurs are the most efficient animal to farm

Farming with a Mantis and a Pickaxe:

• a mutated Mantis with a primitive Pickaxe works best with Tek Parasaurs
• a mutated Mantis with a damaged capped Pickaxe works best with Tek Parasaurs as well

The overall most efficient method to farm Element Dust from Tek animals is a with a mutated Mantis holding a primitive pick. This way you get about 4 times as much as a chainsaw on a Tek Rex. 

Is it worth to farm dust from Tek Animals?

If you have no other chance and you find a method to automate it, then go for it. Usually you are not that lucky and its really not  worth the effort. I would stick to the bosses and try to get a good boss farming group together that can run the boss without issues.