Hunting in Sword & Shield Simulator

Hunting is on the Early Access feature list next to mining and tree chopping. It is not the main loop. The anvil still pays the rent. This page exists because the store page, Devlog #20, and Devlog #25 all treat hides and game as real inputs, while launch-week reviews treated deer as a storage bug. You need both facts before you fill the cart with meat.

Pair this with How to Get Materials and the materials list. If you came here from a Bloodlands shooting-range quest, also read How to Travel Regions — the Day One Patch added extra arrows there on purpose.

What the studio actually named

Wildlands Interactive lists hunting as a way to source the forge. Devlogs describe stalking deer or wolves, then taking hides to a trapper and a tanner so the kill becomes leather and fittings instead of a rotting trophy. Devlog #25 (Holtsdorf Forest) goes further: hunting challenges under the canopy, craftsmen who are not bound to the anvil, and a herbalist who wants poppies, sage, yarrow, and nightshade. That forest is the story road toward Talstein. It is not a fourth Steam-listed region beside Danburg, Bloodlands, and Grainmill. Walk what your map actually opens.

The Day One Patch (1.0.26.08.12.3) is the first live hunting note after launch: a preview for deer meat, and a fix for the axe resetting when you hit wolves. If your hatchet still forgets itself mid-swing, update the build, then test on a wolf, not on a unique quest animal.

How to hunt without wrecking the evening

1. Save in town. A chase into collision is how Early Access eats an hour.
2. Take a weapon you can remake. Do not bring the only masterpiece you need for a contract.
3. Hunt what a quest names. Open-world farming of every deer is how reviewers ended up with unsellable males piled at the forge.
4. Skin or pick up only what the UI previews. The new meat preview is there so you stop guessing whether a carcass is food, junk, or a quest flag.
5. Haul hides if the trapper or tanner is the next beat. Leave bulk meat if the cart already groans. See cart priority.
6. Smelt and forge after. Hunting is a side trip. The forge checklist still runs the shop.

Deer, wolves, and the storage trap

A long Steam review said male deer could not be sold or stored, then duplicated into a blocking pile. Female deer being storable while males are not is player-reported, not a design document. The Day One Patch added a meat preview; it did not claim the duplicate-deer pile is gone. Until patch notes and your session agree, hunt for a named quest, not for a leather empire.

Wolves are combat, not a farm. The axe-reset bug made that fight dishonest. After 1.0.26.08.12.3, test one wolf with a spare hatchet. If the tool still vanishes from the hotbar, that is a regression — record it. Do not empty the armory into the woods.

Trapper, tanner, herbalist

Not every craftsman is Richard. The trapper and tanner exist so hides become resources. If you cannot find them, you are probably still in the first Danburg hour. Finish Getting Started and one honest forge loop before you look for a tanning rack in the fog.

Herbs are a stealth tool, not a second combat system. Devlog #25 names a sleeping powder that makes lockpicking easier. That is flavour for lockpicking, not a reason to strip every bush on day one. Gather what a quest or the herbalist names. Nightshade is still poison in a story that already has a prison.

Bloodlands arrows and side quests

The Day One Patch added rewards for Bloodlands side quests and more arrows for the shooting-range side quest. If you came to this page because a range ran dry, update first. Then hunt or craft only the ammo the quest still withholds. Do not invent a fletching tree the store page never published.

Hunting feeds leather, meat, and a few story beats. It does not replace coal, iron, or a working grindstone. When the deeper hunting system on the roadmap lands — more animals, more resources, more arrow variety — this page will grow. Until then, stalk what the marker names, preview the meat, and get back to the anvil before the cart becomes a zoo.