As you play through Aska you'll find that you run into a formidable creature, the Wolf. At least in your early days. As you progress through the game, you'll find there is more to the Wolf than just a challenging early enemy. They can in time, become faithful companions to not just you, but to your entire village and outposts.

Warning: Build your Kennel BEFORE you try to capture a Wolf Pup. Else you shall be sorry...

Technically, the very beginning is you have to create a Hunters building to unlock some of the buildings you'll be using. So if you don't have hunters yet, get on that first. You'll need the meat later to keep your Dogs alive!

Kennels are a defensive structure you can acquire relatively early in the game in order to tame those vicious wolves into mans best friend. This is where you take your captured wolf pups and deposit them, in order to be raised into faithful dogs. Who will be both your friend and your fierce ally. You can find the Kennel as a build-able structure under Building --> Defenses --> Kennel.

Kennels are also the main method of feeding your Dogs as they mature and become members of your village. Not as villagers, but as guardians to your village.

Kennels have 1 storage container, on the back of the Kennel structure where you can deposit cooked meat or raw meat. This is where your mature dogs and your pups being raised primarily feed from.

You may have 1 worker assigned to the kennel. They've got one job. Feed the dogs. As long as they have access to a warehouse Raw Food Storage container with meat in it, they'll refill the kennels storage once it runs out.

When your Wolf Pup matures into a full grown dog, they will by default be released from the Kennel but guard the kennel they were raised in.

WARNING: Dogs struggle sometimes to deal with fences and seem to have a limited distance they will travel to a kennel in order to eat. While I have no official figures or units of measurement on how far a dog will travel for food, thus far I've been able to have dogs roughly 10-12 cottage lengths away from a Kennel with food supplied where they will eat. Further distances I've found dogs not go to at all in order to eat.

If you wish to have a Kennel protected by fences, I suggest making a half circle of fences around your Kennel. With the open side facing your main village wall. This leaves an open gap, without a gate, for the dogs to pass through and reach their food. I've done this very tactic and it's worked well to ensure invaders attack a wall before the Kennel itself.

Again Warning: Build your Kennel before trying to capture a Wolf Pup. Else ye shall be sorry.

The next step in acquiring your very own dogs is to first, acquire some wolf pups. This is done in the following way.

First, find the Wolf Pup Trap under the Building --> Defenses menu.

Second, building Wolf Pup Traps... There's a few ways to go about this.

You can bring the materials to build the wolf pup traps with you and build them at the Wolfar Den. You'll want to wait till you find the Wolfar Den before you build a trap if you go this route. So you can just hustle your way over to the Den.
Or
You can build them back at base and just load them into a sled and take a few with you to the Wolfar Den.

I'm not a fan of dragging around a sled so I tend to take the components to build one and/or chop trees down near by to get the sticks and just take rope. You will also want take a knife for skinning or just take some raw meat. You'll need 1 raw meat per trap. Cooked meat may work, fish meat may work, Raw Meat does in fact work.

Third, find yourself a Wolfar Den. You'll find them as you explore your map and they'll be one of the red icons on your map. If the icon of the Wolfar Den is grey on the map, the Wolfar Den may be dead and not respawn wolves. I say may because I've had "dead" large cemeteries respawn skeletons. Not sure if this happens with Wolfar Dens.

Fourth, go all redrum on the wolves at the Wolfar Den. Take'em all out. Not only will they be annoying, they provide a component you will need to setup your traps, meat. Will explain more on this in a moment. However it'll be easier to setup your Wolf Pup Traps without them pesky wolves around.

Fifth, build or grab your trap while at a Wolfar Den location. You'll be holding it like a Large Rock as it's considered a large item.

Now... when you find yourself just holding the trap. Just chuck it out. Throw it to the ground just like you'd throw anything else in the game, key "E" by default for me to throw down what's in my hands. Note you have to be pretty close to the center of the Wolfar Den area for the trap to be considered "Validly Placed". Hover your mouse over a trap you've set on the ground and it will tell you if it's too far away and not validly placed on the Wolf Pup Trap options.

The trap will land on the ground. The last steps are to look at the trap, add your raw meat to the trap, and activate the trap. And now... We wait.

Now wait. You will eventually see, on the left side of your screen, a message that a Wolf Pup Trap activated (the literal text is a bit different but roughly the same). The message only shows for about 5 seconds so it's easy to miss. Periodically it may be worth just running out to check your traps. It doesn't matter if your at the Wolfar Den or not when an opportunity to activate a trap occurs. I've watched a trap activate and a wolf pup appear inside. You can literally stand next to the trap and it may activate and catch a wolf pup.

Here's where some of my personal experience comes in. I've sat at Wolfar Dens with traps built just to watch what happens for a notable period of time so I believe the following all to be true.

Wolf Pup Traps have roughly, as a guess, a 40%-60% chance to catch a wolf or to break. When a Wolf Pup Trap breaks, you can salvage it to get back half of your supplies. So it's not a bad idea to carry around some extra Wolf Pup Trap supplies while you're in the process of trapping wolf pups.

Wolf Pup Traps trigger, as far as I can tell, only when wolves spawn. So if you go to a Wolfar Den, don't kill any wolves, and the den is fully loaded with wolves, drop a trap, set it up and activate it, you may never catch a wolf. I've had this experience happen several times and waited multiple in game days, restarted the game, etc and no wolf pup traps would activate. However every time I kill off all the wolves, and wait. After 1-2 in game days (sometimes even sooner, but rarely) a wolf pup trap will trigger when I would expect a wolf to spawn.

Tip: Setup 2-4 wolf pup traps at a time if you want 2 or more wolves any time soon. It'll feel like a 50/50 chance that they'll trigger and catch a wolf pup until you've tried as many times as I have and get a better feel. Just take my advice, setup a few traps.

Note: You will see wolves spawn without triggering a trap. I believe the breakdown is something like...

On Wolf Spawn the following may happen if a Wolf Pup Trap is present.
10%-20% chance a wolf will spawn.
40%-60% chance a Wolf Pup Trap will break, aka Wolf Pup Escapes.
40%-60% chance a Wolf Pup Trap will catch a wolf.

I know that doesn't exactly add up to 100% but it's figures something like that. But now you have an idea how to trap wolf pups. What do you do with them? Read On.


Summary:

• Acquire build items for Wolf Pup Trap into your inventory + 1 Raw Meat or 1 knife to skin wolves with.
  
• Find a Wolfar Den and kill all the wolves.
  
• Build a Wolf Pup Trap at the Wolfar Den. Or 2-4 traps.
  
• Add Raw Meat to the Wolf Pup Trap. 1 Raw Meat per trap.
  
• Activate the Wolf Pup Trap.
  
• Wait for the message that a Wolf Pup Trap activated.

This is a fairly simple step, so we'll be brief.

When a Wolfar Pup Trap activates and catches a Wolf Pup, you can pick up the trap just like a large stone or a log or any other large item and carry it around with you.

So at this point, you'll need to have your Kennel already built. You pickup your caged and captured Wolf Pup into your hands and run your awkwardly running self back to your Kennel.

Once at the Kennel, deposit the Wolf Pup Trap with a captured Wolf Pup in it, into the Kennel. Just like you're dropping off a large item into a structure you are building. You're now raising a wolf pup.

You need to make sure either you yourself or a worker assigned to the Kennel loads the food storage at the back of the kennel with meat. I typically just throw raw meat into it. But the worker throws in cooked meat along with raw meat. So keep that in mind.

You now finally have a dog. Well... You're probably watching your dog grow right now. But soon! You will have a dog!

Once your Wolf Pup fully matures (100%) you will get a message that your pup is ready to leave the Kennel, or... something along those lines as a message.

Upon becoming fully grown, the dog will leave the Kennel, stand near by, and automatically become a guard for the Kennel. It will defend the immediate area. It will feed from the Kennel when hungry.

You may approach your dog and take a few actions.

Look at it's inventory, which really just shows it's stats.
Add the dog to your party, and it will follow you around and fight with you.
Pet the dog, which will heal your dog rapidly and give you a buff if you pet it until the little timer thingy finishes. What does this buff do? I have absolutely no idea. But it'll be there! Says you'll be happier. And honestly, you probably will be.

As a party member, the dog will attack other creatures you are fighting. You can set the dog to defensive or aggressive. Honestly, haven't played with these much. But seems self explanatory.

Note: When your dog helps you kill an animal, it may eat the animal in part or mostly depending on it's hunger level. We'll get more into feeding in a moment. But keep that in mind if you're really out to get a lot of meat. The dog may take it's share.

And then there's Guard Dog. You may add the dog to your party, then approach various structures to assign the dog to the structure and defend the structure. For example, kennels and barracks, you can walk you dog over to these structures and have your dog defend them even when you're not there. You can even assign the dog to a single villager and have the dog guard the villager. They'll follow that villager around and defend them. Assigning a dog works the same when assigning to a Building or Villager. See below.

How?
Add the dog to your party.
Walk up to a structure you want the dog to defend.
Hold down shift (for just a moment).
Your menu will change for that structure and you'll have a Guard option.
Press "T" by default, while still holding shift, and the dog will be assigned to the structure.

Note, if your dog and structure are too far from a kennel to eat at, they may starve. Plan your kennel placement accordingly. See "Kennels" in this guide for more info.

You may approach any dog you've assigned to a structure as a Guard and add them back to your party. Then assign them somewhere else or keep them as your own personal guard.

Sleeping... Special note about dogs sleeping. As it stands, dogs sleep at night and wake up for very little including their own hunger. This may affect your ability to have a dog follow an NPC at night as expected. The dogs are apparently have some sort of sleep disorder and not much will interfere with it. Keep that in mind as you assign your dogs.

So... You'll see that your dog has a "Dog Food" or similarly titled stat. Yes, they will starve if not fed.

Here are all the ways I've tried to feed dogs and what's worked and what hasn't.

What's worked for me.

Keeping the dogs within 10-12 cottage lengths away from a Kennel that is loaded with food. Dogs will travel back to the kennel, eat their fill, and go back to wherever they are guarding.

Dropping a Meat Hunk, not a piece of meat, but a whole meat hunk, the ones you carry like a large stone, in front of my dog. It'll tear it apart and eat the smaller meat parts that the meat hunk breaks into.

What I've read and have not tried...

Hunting with my dog or having the Dog assigned to a Hunter. Where the dog assists in killing animals and feeds off of the animals remains. This is supposed to work. Haven't tried.

What I have tried that does not work.

Dropping Raw Meat onto the ground. Not Meat Hunks, but just raw meat. The dogs don't care about it at all.
Dropping Fish Meat on the ground. Nope.
Dropping a whole salmon on the ground. Nope.


Generally, its easiest to keep your dog near a kennel to keep them fed. But when in need, kill a wild animal with it in your party or when the dog is near you and it should eat from the animal.

WARNING: Dogs may struggle with fences and gates. I've seen them teleport past fences and gates, but I've seen them sit stuck behind them too. This may keep your dog from eating and cause it to starve. Keep an open gap in any fencing you have around a Kennel. I usually keep two open gaps.

Additional Warning: Dogs may just sit in one spot and not move after being assigned to something as a guard. Pet the dog, through the full timer, then make sure they start running around and don't just sit back down. A dog who just sits down and doesn't move may not go searching for food and starve.

To sum up, here's all you do in short version. Haha... you read the part first huh? Wait.... No?

.... .....

Rude...

Summary

• Build a Hunters Hut or Hunters House
  
• Build a Kennel
  
• Acquire the build components for a Wolf Pup Trap and 1 raw piece of meat per Wolf Pup Trap or take a knife.
  
• Find a Wolfar Den and kill all the wolves.
  
• Build a Wolf Pup Trap at the Wolfar Den (or 2-4 traps).
  
• Drop the Wolf Pup Trap on the ground.
  
• Add Raw Meat to the Wolf Pup Trap.
  
• Activate the Wolf Pup Trap.
  
• Wait for a message that your trap has activated.
  
• Acquire a Wolf Pup Trap with a Wolf Pup inside and caught.
  
• Carry the captured Wolf Pup in the Trap to a Kennel and deposit the Wolf Pup in the Kennel.
  
• Keep the Kennel full of food and the Wolf Pup will grow into a Dog.
  
• Use your fully grown dog as you see fit. They're now your best friend. And will probably die. And then your villagers will eat it. But still your best friend!

I don't even know why I added this section. But that's it. Feel free to add any of your wonderful 2 cents and ideas. And good luck with the dogs. May they eat you out of house and home!