Introduction
Hello! Welcome to the guide!
What is this guide about?
This guide is all about the pesky new social mechanic that is having new or returning fans of the JWE game scratching their heads. It used to be that herbivores would all live in harmony, the only limit was the size of populations. Now you try to make a lovely enclosure full of diverse sauropod species and the dinosaurs become enraged! So what gives? I will try to help by explaining what I have learned through playing the game myself. All of the testing has been done (so far) in Hard Challenge mode. This guide is broken down into sections, which are summarized as: An overall explanation to the new social mechanics. A collection of charts depicting the social stats of each species, which are further broken down into; herbivores, carnivores, flyers, and marine species. Then finally a list of what combinations of species I love to use to maximize the number of dinosaurs in each enclosure.
Hopefully you find this guide helpful! Let's get into it!
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
There are many sites/guides that revolve around the same idea of trying to create good enclosures using the new social mechanics. I definitely want to be sure that you find what you are looking for, so I will be sharing links to other sources that have additional information. Enjoy! Happy park building!
-JWE2 Toolbox : Lists a lot of enclosure options.
PROS: It lists a wide range of enclosure ideas, easy to navigate (with pictures!), and includes the preferred food type.
CONS: Doesn't list enclosure size, doesn't include all species as it only details enclosures that would be smaller than 5,000 square meters (so I guess the only space indicator is that each enclosure is less than that), some of its enclosures don't work with species that are impossible to put together (flyers and carnivores) or species that will kill each other (pleisiosaurs and kronosaurs).
LINK: https://jwatoolbox.com/games/jurassic-world-evolution-2/enclosures
LINK TO GOOGLE DOC CHARTS
Sorry about the issues with the link.. I changed the settings so it should be anyone with the link can view. If you wish to edit then you can download the sheet yourself. This is the new link, please let me know if it works now!
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/14Gb84leKrQ_4COlTx1mZI1FoQJd4JJ20X32kWX0HtE0/edit?usp=sharing
Social Mechanics Explained
Social Mechanics
What are they! What is dinosaur comfort? And how do I know my dinosaur's social needs are met?
No worries! The new mechanics of your dinosaurs social needs can seem very daunting, as there is a lot more to keep track of. However, once you understand the basics, the rest will become very easy to understand. What are the basics?
To Summarize
Your dinosaurs each have a social need, which plays into their overall level of comfort. If you want your dinosaur to be comfortable, you will want to be sure their social needs are met. Every species has their own needs. The social need is broken up into:
How many of its OWN kind does it need?
How many of OTHER species can it tolerate?
WHAT other species does it tolerate?
Keep in mind that when answering these question, part of the answer is determined by the size of the enclosure. A dinosaur may not tolerate as many other species if its enclosure is too small!
Before we get into explaining those aspects of the social need, we need to understand the fundamental difference between how the social need was determined in the first game and how it is determined now. That main difference is the introduction of the Territory mechanic.
Territory Explained
Your dinosaurs will now create a Territory within in their enclosure. Unlike the first game where your dinosaur magically mapped out their entire enclosure at once, thus adjusting their comfort levels instantaneously, your dinosaurs now develope a territory within the enclosure. Essentially the dinosaur moves around within the confines of the enclosure until it is at 100% comfort. Once it is satisfied, its territory is complete. It is unlikely that a dinosaur will leave its territory once it is finished, allowing you the option of designing certain areas of an enclosure to cater to certain species. Cohabitation occurs when the bounds of these territories overlap, the area of a territory is highlighted when you look at a dinosaurs comfort stats as it walks around. Theoretically two dinosaurs that hate eachother, but have enough space to not have their territory overlap, should have no problem existing in the same enclosure. In my experience this has never worked out. I tried to house Nasutoceratops and Pentaceratops together, their territories did not touch at all, and yet the alpha of my Nasutos would continue to stalk over to the territory of the Pentas to pick a fight. Territory is the factor that encompasses all of the mechanics we are going to go over.
How many of its own kind does my dinosaur need/want?
This part is pretty self explanatory. It is exactly the same mechanic as the first game's Social stat for your dinosaur. Although in the second game, your dinosaurs are significantly more tolerant of large family sizes. Your dinosaur has a desired herd/pack (or flock or school) size. Some species, such as Homalocephale, desire a large herd size in order to be happy. Other species, such as Tylosaurus or Brachiosaurus, are just as happy being alone as they are in a small group of their own kind. And then further still, there are a few species that absolutely will NOT accept another or their own kind in their enclosure! (glares at Indominus) You can find out how many of its own kind a species wants by checking their comfort needs in the hatchery before you synthesize them.
Typically Ornithomimids, Hadrosaurs, Pachycephalids love large herds. Smaller Carnivores love large pack sizes. Flyers enjoy large flock sizes. Ichthysaurus enjoys a large school.
How many other types of dinosaurs, other species, can my dinosaur tolerate in their territory?
This is very similar to the first game's Population mechanic, with the difference of it being determined by territory overlap rather than by how many different species are housed within an enclosure. What does this mean? A dinosaur that doesn't like a lot of other species CAN live in an enclosure with a bunch of other species IF its territory bounds don't overlap with the other territories. You can check the bounds of a dinosaurs territory by looking at its comfort needs while it is out in its enclosure. There is also a territory view in the viewport. You can see all the different territories, and where they overlap. Cohabitation is determined by the overlap. Every species can tolerate a certain percentage of cohabitation, an amount of their territory overlapped by another.
Typically Ornithomimids, Hadrosaurs, Sauropods, Pachycephalids, and Flyers can tolerate a lot of cohabitation. Marine reptiles do NOT tolerate other aquatic species. You can try but similar to carnivores any peace in cohabitation is temporary. Eventually they gonna eat eachother.
What other species get along with eachother?
This is the biggest change between the games, and is also likely the one that is the most confusing. As mentioned dinosaurs now have preferred species to live with, and will actively fight species they dislike. Like most social needs, they can be checked by looking at a dinosaurs comfort needs in the stats of the hatchery. Luckily though there is actually a very simple trick to understanding this mechanic. Remember these rules:
Species of the same TYPE can NOT live together.
Armoured herbivores can NOT live together.
Carnivores and Herbivores can NOT live together.
Carnivores should be separate!
No one actually likes Compsagnathus, they just want to eat them!
You may be asking, what is a species Type? That refers to the larger family of dinosaur that a species belongs to. Previously I mentioned Hadrosaur, Ornithomimid, etc. It's the same distinction as saying Canine or Feline. For example Dryosaurus and Gallimimus are separate species, but they are both Ornithomimids.
Armoured herbivore refers to the dinosaur types that are heavily armoured, the Stegosaurids, Ceratopsids, and Anklysaurids. They are typically more aggressive and do not tolerate one another.
Flyers, Hadrosaurs, Ornithomimids, and Pachycephalids are the exceptions to this rule. They actually do not mind sharing an enclosure with other species of the same family. Similarly, select species of armoured dinosaurs will accept another. For example, Nasutoceratops likes Anklysaurids, but still hates Ceratopsids and Stegosaurids.
The last important thing to note about cohabitation is that technically there is a third option besides Liking or Disliking another species. A species can be Neutral to another. The difference is whether they will benefit from existing with another species type. If a dinosaur likes another species type, its comfort level will actively increase. If they dislike them, their comfort will actively decrease. If they are neutral, as in a type is not listed in Liked or Disliked, then nothing happens. The species still counts towards cohabitation, but it won't affect the other species mood. Going back to Nasutoceratops, it may like Nodosaurus and gain comfort from them, but Nodosaurus doesn't gain comfort from ceratopsids.
Overall, an enclosure with:
One Sauropod species
One Ornithomimid or Pachycephalid species
One Hadrosuar species
One Ceratopsid or Anklysaurid or StegosauridIs going to be the best base for any enclosure setup.
Herbivore Stats
Preferred Foods and Social Needs of Herbivores
In this portion of the guide we will examine the different Herbivore Species enclosure needs. These charts were created with the goal of outlying which species would work best being enclosed with which other species. They do so by listing the dinosaur species, the food type that species prefers, what dinosaur family they belong to, and what other dinosaur family types they tolerate.
For food types the foods are divided into;
Fiber (blue)
Leaf (green)
Fruit (pink)
Nut (Yellow)
If a species prefers the food type listed, you will find a letter present in the column associated with that food type. The letter pertains to whether the food type they prefer is of the Tall type (shortened to T) or is of the Ground type (shortened to G). So for example, we can look at Gallimimus and see that in the green square for leaf there is a G, meaning that this species prefers to eat Ground Leaves.
Further to the right of the chart you will see the species dinosaur family listed. As mentioned, the dinosaur type is the overall family that the species belongs to. These families are;
Sauropod (Shortened to SA)
Anklyosaurid (Shortened to A)
Ornithomimid (Shortened to O)
Ceratopsid (Shortened to C)
Stegosaurid (Shortened to ST)
Hadrosaur (Shortened to H)
Pachycephalid (Shortened to P)
You will see that there are columns for each of these types. For each species it is detailed whether or not they get along or tolerate the other dinosaur type. This is represented by a green square if the species will tolerate that dinosaur type, and a red square if they will NOT tolerate that dinosaur type. For example, Amargasaurus is listed as a Sauropod, and we can see that the SA column has a red square. This means Amargasaurus does not tolerate other Sauropods within its enclosure.
NOTE: There are two species that were recently announced, Minmi and Wuerhosaruas, which have full lines of green squares. This is temporary, as we do not yet have them in-game.
Below are the charts, these are just screenshots of the chart that I made. I will provide a link to the Google Doc spreadsheet, so feel free to use it for yourself! I hope to update this spreadsheet as undoubtedly new species will be introduced.
Carnivore Stats
Carnivore Food, Environment, and Social Preferences
This section of the guide is for listing out all the important stats of our Carnivores. The charts provided detail whether a carnivore species desires Rock or Sand in their enclosure, and then what food type is required for it to be comfortable. These charts are a lot simpler compared to the Herbivore charts.
In the chart is first listed the species of carnivore. Then there are colour coded columns;
Rock (purple)
Sand (yellow)
Meat (red)
Live Goat (green)
Fish (blue)
If a Y is present in the box, then that means that the species wants this in their enclosure. For example, Compsagnathus has a Y in both its sand and meat boxes. This means that Compsagnathus requires sand and a meat dispenser in its enclosure to be comfortable.
NOTE: Certain species can feed off of other feeders that are not given a Y in the box. This is due to the feeder not actually contributing to their comfort level. A Tyrannosaurus can eat from a meat dispenser, but in order to maintain its comfort it needs a live goat dispenser.
You may notice that there is nothing to include what species are friendly to other species. This is due largely to the fact that in general, carnivores do NOT live peacefully with other carnivore species! Even if a species is listed as being "liked", they still can sometimes get into fights or even kill eachother. I will list out what carnivores have species they "like" and have had some success in housing together.
Carnotaurus likes Majungasarus and Albertosaurus
NOTE: Majungasaurus and Albertosaurus do NOT like eachother.
Majungasaurus like Carnotaurus and Qianhousaurus.
NOTE: Carnotaurus does NOT like QIanhousaurus.
Allosaurus like Ceratosaurus and Metricanthosaurus.
NOTE: Ceratosaurus and Metricanthosaurus don't get along.
Suchomimus and Baryonyx are best friends and LOVE eachother.
Compsognathus is liked by everyone, as a snack!
Nobody likes Indoraptor or Indominus. Velociraptors claim to? But both hybrids actively hunt them.
I think as a general rule carnivores should be kept separated. Its not worth it. The only ones I've never had fight are Baryonyx and Suchomimus.
Below are the charts I created. I will try to keep them updated as new species are introduced. I also will include the link to the Google Doc chart in the Intro so you can feel free to use/edit as you wish!
Flyer Stats
Pterosaur's Statistics
For this portion of the guide we will take a look at our lovely new flying reptiles! The Pterosaurs are a new addition in the second game. They can only be made in an Aviary, and they require an Aviary in order to be safely housed. I would've said "in order to be comfortable", but actually if your Pterosaur manages to escape, it actually can find a suitable environment somewhere in your park and nest there. Of course they also will eat your smaller dinosaurs and your slower guests so probably best to keep them within an Aviary :)
Pterosaurs (and eventually marine reptiles) are even easier to keep happy. It seems the descending order is Herbivores being the most picky, then Carnivores being so-so, then Pterosaurs only really want one thing, and then lastly Marine Reptiles end up being the easiest to keep comfortable.
For the flyers they only have a few options of what they want to be comfortable (that is in addition to the open space, water, and fish that they all need); Rock, Sand, or Forest.
In the chart you will see the list of Pterosaur species currently known to be available for the game. I will be sure to update it as new species are introduced! Next to each species is a column for Rock (purple), Sand (yellow), and Forest (green). If the species requires the item mentioned in the column, then there will be a Y in the related box. For example, Tapejara has a Y in the green Forest box. This means that it requires Forest in its enclosure. You may notice that Maaradactylus is blank, it is blank because the species actually does not require any of the three options in order to be comfortable. It literally just wants water, fish, and open space.
Really quickly I will run through what the Pterosaurs want (in general) for their enclosures.
Social and Cohabitation
Pterosaurs have a higher than average social need, with most of them needing at least 3-5 of their own kind in order to be comfortable. Keep this in mind when picking a spot for your Aviary, you will definitely need at least 3 Aviaries put together for any of these flying reptiles.
In terms of what Pterosaurs can live with what, all of them are pretty comfortable with sharing their space with eachother. I have only ever seen them fight in instances of them escaping. So really the only limit is the space within an Aviary, as well as if you can provide enough of what each species desires.
Food
All Pterosaurs eat fish from a fish dispenser. They also all want a fair amount of water in their enclosure. I try to place the fish feeders in front of viewing galleries so guests are guaranteed to get a good view!
Geosternbergia is the most difficult to keep happy, as it desires a large amount of Forest in its Aviary. For just one of them, you need at least five Aviaries. At that point you can hold about five of them until you need to start adding an additional Aviary.
Below is the chart I created in Google Docs. If you want to use the chart for yourself there is a link to it in the Intro of this guide. Feel free to use it as you'd like!
Marine Stats
Marine Reptile Needs
Lastly for the stats section of the guide we will take a gander at our Marine Reptiles. Marine animals are also a new addition to our parks. They can only be made inside a Lagoon, and they require Lagoons in order to be housed safely and comfortably. Easily these are the quickest to cover, so let's get right to it!
To understand the Lagoons, let's just quick run-through these things.
Lagoons require a LOT of space. Even the smallest species, Ichthysaurus, needs at least 3 lagoons to have enough space. And every other species is significantly larger than they are. For comparison, my Tylosaurus was not satisfied until he had 7 lagoons all to himself the selfish bugger.
Marine reptiles should NOT be housed together! Sorry to say, but they just hate eachother. It's not so much that they actually have preferences for different species like the Herbivores and Carnivores do, rather they just flat out will kill eachother eventually. Even my lovely friendly Attenborosaurus ate half my Ichthys. It's very unfortunate that we can't make one large lagoon teeming with marine life, but I am still happy we get to make them at all!
Most species just want to live alone. Besides the Pleisiosaurs and the dolphins, (who want a good school size of 3-5) our marine reptiles just want their space to themselves.
Lastly, there aren't any environmental factors beyond;
Open Space
and... drumroll...
Fish!
That's literally it. As long as you have about 8 Lagoons together with a few fish feeders, it should be able to house 1 of any of the marine species available to you. So enjoy! I still made a chart for consistency's sake? It doesn't have any info on it beyond listing out the species available to you. So enjoy! Again, a link to it is available in the Intro section of the guide. Feel free to use as you'd like!
Winning Enclosures! Herbivores
Let's get down to it, this is what you guys really care about right? Really the entire reason you are reading this is to get the secrets to amazing enclosures. So let's jump in!
As mentioned previously, the best way to maximize a herbivore enclosure is to have the following types in the enclosure:
One Sauropod
One Hadrosaur
One Ornithomimid or Pachycephalid
One Ceratopsid or Stegasaurid or AnklysauridObviously there are a few exception to this rule, this is just a generalization. The following are a series of enclosure arrangements that try to adhere to this guide. The arrangements follow all the previous rules mentioned in the guide, including taking Environment, Food, and Social needs into account. The arrangements are also organized by the necessary size of the enclosure. Size is determined by fence lengths.
With any of these enclosures feel free to scale them up or down, add or remove dinosaurs, or through in some compys. These are just ideas that have worked in my parks. Enjoy!
A small enclosure is about 3-5 full fence lengths squared.
A medium enclosure is about 5-7 full fence lengths squared.
A large enclosure is anything larger than a medium.
The Starter Paddock-Small
The reason this enclosure works is for two reasons; One, all of these species are the typical early game species usually available on every map. Two, they all have very cheap food type, either being ground leaf or ground fiber. This is a great enclosure to start your map off with! And as an added bonus it can easily be expanded to include a larger number of species.
-Amargasaurus
-Nasutoceratops
-Nodosaurus
-Struthiomimus
Fruit Lovers Ground Edition-Small
This enclosure works to house dinosaurs that prefer ground fruit as their only food. You can also expand it later to include dinosaurs that prefer tall fruit as well.
-Archeornithomimus
-Chunkingosaurus
-Iguanadon and/or Ouranosaurus
The Second Enclosure-Small
Based on what species you typically have access to after the first enclosure is done. These dinosaurs also prefer cheaper food. (Fiber and leaf)
-Chasmosaurus
-Gallimimus
-Pachycephalosaurus
-Polacanthus
Ari's Favourites-Medium
This enclosure is the one I go to because its my favourite :) It is based off of what dinosaurs are my favourite ones. Don't really work together but I LOVE THEM!
-Dryosaurus
-Homalocephale
-Minmi
-Olorotitan
-Parasaurolophus (my favourite dino)
Hadrosaur Pasture-Large
An enclosure based all around the lovely Hadrosaurs that this game has to offer. It works because; It is easy to maintain (no escaping dinosaurs 24/7), it is a lot of species in one enclosure, and it is perfect for tours because they won't attack the vehicles! Feel free to add some small herbivores into the mix for extra cuteness.
-Corythosaurus
-Edmontosaurus
-Iguanadon
-Maiasaura
-Muttaburasaurus
-Olorotitan
-Parasaurolophus
-Tsintaosaurus
Winning Enclosures! Carnivores
Winning Enclosures! Aviaries And Lagoons
Source: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2670093428
More Jurassic World Evolution 2 guilds
- All Guilds
- How to mod JWE2
- Dinosaurs by Era
- Cute dinosaurs
- pls add these things
- Jurassic Park Operation Genesis
- Jurassic Park Operation Genesis ()
- How to become Dennis Nedry
- Changing Voice-Over Audio to any available languages
- how to HONK HONK
- How to save your stuck Mosasaurus from starvation