Ark: Survival Evolved is a game that tests your survival skills, patience, and willingness to run away when the going gets tough. In Ark, players need to be ready to spend a lot of time collecting and harvesting the resources they need to build the items they want. The issue with this is sometimes, collecting those resources isn’t as simple as walking up to a tree and punching it. Occasionally, the resources you’ll need become more complex to find and generate, meaning you’ll have to put in more effort.
Related: How to get Silica Pearls in Ark: Survival Evolved
Cementing Paste, or CP is a resource that most Ark players will need as they progress through the tiers of the game. It’s vital for building almost every structure above Stone tier, and it’s the foundation of many PvP bases. Without Cementing Paste, you’ll be unable to place spam, construct your walls, or craft a Fabricated Sniper Rifle. That means you’ll need a lot of it, and you’ll need to keep generating it as you go.
Cementing Paste can be collected, found, or generated in Ark. This means that based on your patience levels, needs, and the multiplying rates on your server, you’ll want to choose the option that’s best for you:
Beaver Dams for Cementing Paste
The adorable Castoroides is Ark’s giant version of a beaver. These fluffy, generally peaceful creatures mill about in river catchment areas and are an excellent wood harvesting tool for the starting player. They’re also the ones who make the Beaver Dams that you can find around their general vicinity. Beaver Dams can be opened like any item cache and will hold an array of resources inside them. Wood, Silica Pearls, Rare Mushrooms, Rare Flowers, and Cementing Paste are what you’ll find inside. Of course, once you access this nest, the Castoroides will all attempt to kill you for touching their homes, so you’ll need to work quickly.
A note, if you’re playing on a server with other players, don’t leave the unwanted resources in the dam. Instead, hold your cursor over it and press “O” to popcorn the unwanted resources. This makes sure that the dam regenerates later.
Achatinas
These slow-moving snail-like critters inhabit the swampier regions of the map. They’re non-aggressive creatures and won’t be much of a nuisance to you as they squelch on past. However, they’re a great source of Achantina Paste which is the natural form of Cementing Paste. To get Achatina Paste, you’ll have to knock them out and tame them with a Sweet Vegetable Cake. Once they’re yours, you’ll need to make an enclosure for them and set them on wandering with enough Veggie Cakes in a trough to keep them alive.
Crafting and Grinding
Cementing Paste can be made by crafting it. The combination of Chitin/Keratin and Stone in a Mortar-and-Pestle, or a Chemistry Bench will allow you to output CP. This is probably the quickest way of generating CP, but it’s also the most expensive and will result in you and your tribe farming for days.
Certain unwanted saddles and items when ground in your Industrial Grinder will return a certain amount of CP to you. If your tribe loves farming Gen 2 drops, then you’ll be able to get quite a bit of CP from this. Just remember to remove the CP before you say Grind All, or you’ll be left with a heap of Chitin and Stone.
