Hi Guys
I've done a lot of reading on breeding and watching youtube and have bred my fair share of dinos, so why not try to make a guide from what I've learned and applied... (note some of the information may be incorrect so any rectifications are welcome as Wardrum loves to let us figure stuff out for ourselves)
Whats Max Wild levels your find on official serves?
Easy - Level 30
Medium - Level 150
Hard - Level 300
Exceptions are inside Ice & Swomp Caves where higher level dinos spawn
So how does stats work on wild dinos?
Simple it's all random... random... random... all dinos have fixed Level 1 Stats, so when a wild dino spawns it is randomly given a level... lets say level 15, Ark will randomly apply 15 level ups to be added randomly any of the dinos level 1 stats either Health, Stamina, Oxygen, Food, Weight, Melee Damage & Speed (Note: Speed, when wild dino gets tamed, will revert to 100% and any random level ups will be lost levels)... So knowing this and you want to become a breeder know that STATS is Everything! and your Wild Breeders (Generation 0) dinos are key.
So, knowing that stats are randomly allocated you want to trank & tame dinos as close to the Server Max Level you can find to gain the spawn level ups (The Golden Taming Rule is "IF ITS LOW ITS NO") and when wild dino tamed you also gain more random taming level-ups depending on the efficiency you tame it at. e.g: I find a level 30 Argie, Perfect Trank it then Perfect Tame it Argie will wake up tamed and Level 44 with all 44 level-up randomly allocated. Now you can check its stats and really see how good it is and how many stats lost to Speed, Food & Oxygen.
What is perfectly Trank & Tame?
Perfect Trank is when tranked dino takes No further damage after it becomes unconscious, either from you firing another trank dart or arrow, you accidentally punching it or a wild dino taking a bite. Every time an unconscious dino take damage its taming efficiency will decrease thus you will start losing taming level.
Perfect Taming is when you tame perfect tranked dino with best possible efficiency losing no taming levels, this is only achievable by using the correct kibble/super kibble and usually soothing balm to speed up tame time (e.g. Argies prefer Stego Kibble). So if you feed a Tranked Argie one of its lesser preferred food its taming efficiency will be affected and it will tame to a lower level. Ark has made the game that if a tamed wild has lost levels due to taming efficiency its babies will regain those levels (randomly) and only for Generation 1
Avoid losing taming efficiency as it will just add another few rounds of breeding that can cost your days, weeks or even months
Breeding Base Stats & Generation 1
Breeding Base Stats is the Stats a Wild Dino (Generation 0) has after Perfect Taming (before any leveling up by you or a Baby Dino has at birth (before imprinting by you ) this is the raw stats your breeding to improve and is the only stats important when breeding.
So you now have your Generation 0 (Wild Tame) Male and Female (Both Lvl 44) and each have their own random stats, so now its time to breed them to get the all best stats from both parents onto one baby e.g Male HP 600 and Female HP 720 baby has a 55% chance to be born with a higher stat from Female (same goes for everything except speed which will always be 100% at birth)
So, oh let's say, after 4 attempts of breeding your generation 0 male and female a baby female is born with the best stats from both parents and it is born level 52 (not level 44 like parents)... this is because levels of dino are determined by Level 1 Base Stats plus the random level-ups... you have now just combined the highest random level-ups from both parents into 1 baby so its level will be higher than parent and this is your First Generation 1 key breeder and the backbone of your breeding program.
Next step is to get a perfect pair Generation 1 breeder so you now use the born female (daughter) and breed it with your generation 0 male (father)... they will have some stats exactly the same but you're now looking to breed a male with exact same stats as Generation 1 Female (daughter), why so you can start breeding for those crucial mutations you will need to breed your super dino.
Good breeders kill babies, sad but true, don't keep babies you don't want to use, sell or kill them off you have limited dino slots and breeding can use up a lot fast
Mutations
Let's talk mutations now before we get to Generation 2 Breeding as it is possible that a mutation can occur while you breeding your Generation 0 Wild tames or your Generation 1 and Generation 0 parent to create your same stat perfect pair.
Every egg hatched from Generation 0 wild tames has a very slim chance for a baby to have a mutation and can be hard to spot, every mutation has 2 parts a color mutation and stat mutation, but one of these mutations can be dormant in the baby and only pop in a future generation. So, a baby born with a color that parent doesn't have, but stats the same or one stat higher than either parent but the color of baby same as parents become a tricky thing to spot before you have your perfect breeding pair and this is where those Breeding Base Stats you are keeping a record of comes into play, compare both parents stats with babies stats and compare the baby color with parents color.
Generation 2 (Perfect pair breeding)
Ok so you have now bred your Generation 0 (father) with your Generation1 (Daughter) and a baby is born with exact same stats and level as Generation 1 (Female) now you have a perfect breeding pair, why because their babies will be born with exact same stats and level as the Generation 1 (Daughter) and Generation 1 (Son), because they are identical.
Thus breeding them will give you either more identical stat female to breed with the male to increase your chances of mutation, now you keep breeding them and wait for a mutation to occur.
You will immediately see that baby has mutation as it will be born 1 or 2 levels higher than parents (1 level for stat mutation & 1 level for color mutation, if neither stat dormant), now you compare baby stats with parents and if the mutation is a stat or color you want to keep it to become a generation 3 breeder but still continue breeding the generation 2 perfect pair for more or different stat or color mutation.
Generation 3 (Specific Stat/Color breeding)
Ok so lets say baby born from Generation 2 parents has a cool colour mutation and the weight mutation your were looking for now its time to start breeding it to get another mutation, so breed Generation 3 with mutation and one from Generation 2 (zero mutation) untill you get another mutation and from this point you ALWAYS use a Generation 2 opposite gender zero mutation to breed with the mutated one.
Why here Ark mobile breeding become vague because on other other formats (PC, Xbox, etc.) breeding history and mutation stats are available and a 20/20 mutation rule apllies, which in all likelyhood applies to mobile also. It is that if both parent have 20 out of 20 mutations (which were unable to see on mobile) no further mutations possible. so be using a Generation 2 zero mutation as one parent the other can go to well over 20/20 mutations (174/20 possable) and becase one parent mutation free mutations will continue occur.
Generation 3 breeding is where you split breeding do a breeding line HP another Weight etc. and once you want to combine them you Breed those mutated ones with each other and you will have your Generation 4 super good or super dino.
Backbreeding
Backbreeding is used when you want to remove wasted stats from your breeding line and only is used when breeding lines get close to the max dino level (Bred Dino Level 379 + 71 Level ups = Lvl 450 and dino will despawn). So to clear unwanted or wasted stats breed you high level super dino with a level 1 wild tame untill a baby is born with the specific stats you want to keep as a lvl 1 wild tame has no waisted stats... Very few breeders ever take breeding to that level and those that do know a lot more about the subject than me.
General Does and Dont's
Keep records of Breeders Stats.
Dont kill off Generation 0, 1 & 2 Breeders they can be used to breed different mutation Line or fix a line if you pass 20/20 mutation.
Hatch in bulk.
Alway be on the lookout for new blood either from wild tames or another tribe on server.
dont level or imprint your breeders (false basic stats will just make your own life difficuilt
Finally
I truley hope this answeres a few quetions out there and give some of you a better understanding about breeding and if your wondering the process to breeding a crazy good or even super dino take a lot longer than days or weeks it will take months and even years on official servers that dont have breeding multipliers.
