If You Had to Start Again What Would You Do Differently?

[MoonpieSpotlight]

If you had to start anew with a new account, how would you approach the game any differently? For me, I would spot and track more and kill less. That's because you need to be able to score an animal in a comp in order to know you're not wasting time. You cannot judge by looks always, and the low end skills for scoring is a joke. A range of 66% of the total score is basically no skill at all. You see a red deer, your spotting skill says 180-270 or something like that, you guess it's at least 200, You shoot it, it's 183. The next one says the same thing. You shoot it, it's 240. Makes the skill pointless.

Also, I wouldn't purchase certain objects. The roe deer call is really erratic as far as effectiveness. It seems to attract females only, with the occasional spike. I've captured video of larger male roe deer totally ignoring the call, staring out into the trees instead, and walking right by like neither the call nor the spray was even present. Maybe it's that way IRL, never hunted one.

What would you do differently?

[cajunman45]

If you had to start anew with a new account, how would you approach the game any differently? For me, I would spot and track more and kill less. That's because you need to be able to score an animal in a comp in order to know you're not wasting time. You cannot judge by looks always, and the low end skills for scoring is a joke. A range of 66% of the total score is basically no skill at all. You see a red deer, your spotting skill says 180-270 or something like that, you guess it's at least 200, You shoot it, it's 183. The next one says the same thing. You shoot it, it's 240. Makes the skill pointless.

Also, I wouldn't purchase certain objects. The roe deer call is really erratic as far as effectiveness. It seems to attract females only, with the occasional spike. I've captured video of larger male roe deer totally ignoring the call, staring out into the trees instead, and walking right by like neither the call nor the spray was even present. Maybe it's that way IRL, never hunted one.

What would you do differently?

Never would have bought the 30 30 and the 308 rival hand gun waste of money

[INTIMID883R]

Never would have bought 3 full duck spreads, as the host still is the only setup the come to.

[MoonpieSpotlight]

Never would have bought 3 full duck spreads, as the host still is the only setup the come to.

I didn't know that. I've never been in a MP game. Good information though. They should give you back your money for that since I'd bet the information isn't readily available, or is it?

Not to derail my own thread, but why are waterfowl competitions MP only? My guess is the incredible number of animals that would have to be processed otherwise.

[aridus]

I wouldn't do anything different because I wouldn't learn that way. As for judging score, it takes practice but I'm getting it. I've got mules pretty well down now and can guess within about 5 points of the actual score usually. Though there will always be odd ones that are impossible to read from a distance since it can go by things you absolutely can't measure by eye, such as the difference in circumference per side and the cumulative differences between tines. No amount of staring is going to let you catch that unless a tine is obviously shorter or something.

[knott]

sure wouldn't buy the broken owl caller

[caledonianblues]

What would you do differently?

Find another game that doesn't suck the life and money out of you

I once thought what it would be like if I had to start again, e.g. if EW lost all the data and had no backups. I know, a totally unrealistic scenario, but just imagine how many frustrated people there would be around the globe! The only thing that would console me if that happened, would be knowing that HooCairs would be crying for longer than me

In all seriousness, I probably wouldn't change too much about how I play the game. I'm not a hardcore player by any means, but I would probably work more on spotting and tracking and I would try to maintain a higher lifetime accuracy (better shot placement, less impatient shots).

[TapChan]

I would definitely change my playstyle. I'm currently struggling to get 600 score for extra weapon holster and I really regret using 9.3x62, .300 and Snakebite/xbow on such easy prey as whitetail are. I would try to kill whitetails mostly with crappy .243 and .270, leaving those mentioned before for tougher game.

[Maverick_2014]

Not spend as much. Got a lot of stuff that in retrospect I could have done without.

Have a full duck spread, had to check the map the other day to remember where I put it!

Paid $20 for a goose spread to do goose missions that paid back 1/10th the cost of the spread. I don't use either of them - I haven't the patience to sit and wait for flocks of birds to arrive every 20 minutes so I can shoot 1 or 2.

Alas. It's only money. If I hadn't used it on EW I would have wasted it on a 50 year old bottle of Scotch.

[Dillion1111]

I would have bought the pathfinder bundle instead of the trail runner for one because as time went on I ended up buying those other weapons.

I recommend that to all that ask me now.

I would have bought only 1 spread of duck and goose decoys instead of 2 of each type, although 2 spreads brings in the birds without even calling.

I would have not bought any bows except the Python, (the Snakebite, Recurve and Longbow) are all pretty much worthless now, I wanted the others because of their power, but now I regret that decision.

Would not buy the .44 revolver and just get the custom .44 instead (now I have both)

Would have got my tracking information up quicker had I known.

The stupid turkey owl caller


With all that said, I love this game. I don't really have too much regret on the weapons as I'll probably own all of them at some point more for leveling them up and increasing my hunter score.

My favorite weapons:
Python
Crossbow
.22 Air Rifle
.22 Pistol
12Ga O/U
.44 custom & .454
.300, Inline Muzzle Loader


Next weapon I plan to purchase (Muzzle Loader)