Need some advice on Hounds.

[RubixRed227]

Hello none starvers, 

long time fan, short time survivor here. 

I've attempted to avoid looking up too much but i have to break my rule here. I've beaten my record of survival to day 57 but the periodic hound attacks are what always ruin me.

i can normally take them head on but the last lot were particularly troublesome, there was about 5 and defeated them but a couple days later i was attacked again which was too much for me and died. i barely had 3 days to lick my wounds before the next lot were chasing me down.

i had a quick read after and people recommend "Teeth Traps" but unfortunately i only had about 7 fangs at the time, how can i fend them off regularly? and how can i recover swiftly after?

 

(relevant info) I play on basic mode with RoG disabled so i can get to grips first and my loadout i had at the time was Football helmets, log suit and a spear.

 

please be kind to a hungry survivor.

[MTX1234]

Don't use the spear on hounds or giants use a hambat instead, or a shadow sword if you can craft one.

A single pigman or a bunnyman should help in fighting or distracting the hounds, lureplants also work.

Also seasonal hounds will help you fight, ice hounds freeze other hounds and fire hounds damage nearby hounds, so kill them first!

[Ridd]

I'm no pro, but...

I haven't played in a while, but if I was overwhelmed I would run the Hounds into Lureplants or Tentacles, since they attack anything that comes near them, making them a good distraction for the Hounds. I've never really depended on Pigs, but they can definitely be a great help too.

I was also able to hide from Hounds with the Bush Hat, but it's kind of hard to do that since your character will repeatedly get out of the disguise to let you know hounds are coming (duh.) So you'll definitely need to keep an eye on your character and make sure he or she stays in the bush.

If I got hurt I'd usually faff around my base until nighttime, and then sleep in a tent to recover Health and Sanity, but if a tent isn't an option for one reason or another, then Dragonpies, cooked from a crockpot, give you a good bit of health and are easy to make;  I think it's just one Dragonfruit and sticks, but that might have changed.

 

 

[Nullum]

Tooth traps, even just for a few of them, makes a great deal for dealing hound attacks. Don't underestimate those traps. Because for every hound attack I encountered I make the most of those teeth in the early days. And actually for ice hounds give a fair more value of teeth than others so use that advantage.

And you could use their own enemies or neutral groups of mobs to your advantage like beefalo, pigs, bunnymen, etc.

[trippill]

What always worked for me when dealing with large hound waves was creating a tunnel out of stone walls, then lining the inside with grass walls. When the hounds showed up, I'd light the walls and only have to deal with a couple survivors. The walls are cheap and easily replaced. This setup got me past day 200 in Vanilla. 

[dronuspk]

I've almost never used Tooth Traps on hounds as most do, usually I'm nearby a ton of Pigs (or spiders on Webber) and they will trigger aggro if you run around them for a few seconds. That really trivializes them.

[Masterofstarve]

I usually have my own big pig village near my base, so i just lure them there. When they start barking they try to change target. They target one of the pigs, and so it begins...

Later though i think you can make a small room with stone walls and a staright hallway out of there, and in that hallway you basically place toothtraps in, make sure you have a fire pit and and endothermic fire pit in the stone room because of attacks during night or summer

[Ispin69]

Yeah tooth traps are the way to go but early on you can't get those unless you kill hound mounds or get attacked.

 

Early on like people have said, base somewhat near either Pig Village or Volt Goats or Beefalo.

1. Beefalo make easy work of those hounds but during spring when they have red butts, the beefalo will kill you.
2. Pigs are great, if the hound bites one pig, the other pigs will join in too. Issue with pigs is full moon they will go werepig and attack you.
3. The best are the volt goats for me, good for every season. They aren't as powerful as beefalo (goats will die faster) but they surely won't attack unless you accidentally hit them.

As soon as you get some tooths, start making the tooth traps for your base entrance or outside of base. Stone walls with traps inside a long hallway.

[Rellimarual]

You can run them around a swamp, a bunch of spiders, pigs, beefalo (the best). Be careful that fire hounds don't burn down the pig houses, though. Worse comes to worse, keep running. They'll get distracted by bees, birds, frogs, whatever, until you've got a manageable number to fight. Then you can go back and pick off the stragglers. Do this until you get enough teeth for traps and then you'll be set, but sometimes they come when you're not near the traps, so it's good to have a couple of methods.