Raft – How to Spear / Stab the Shark (Useful Tips)

How to Deal with Sharks

All credit goes to Jeff !

When the shark attacks your raft, you can run up to it and stab it. If you are in the water, stay still and wait for the shark to approach you.

The shark pauses for a fraction of a second and then opens its mouth and “jumps” at you. Hit your attack button as soon as the shark opens its mouth. You will hit it and that will interrupt its attack. If you turn quickly enough, you can even hit it a second time in the tail as it swims away.

I’ve only played in first person so I can’t say how it works in third person.

A wooden spear takes 30 hits to kill the shark, a metal spear takes 15 hits. The shark will start to show bloody spots as it gets closer to dying. I’ve never been able to figure out the timing with the machete to use it effectively against the shark.

Bows work as well, and can even be used underwater, but if you don’t kill the shark quickly enough, your arrows will start despawning before you can get them back.

Another strategy is to use shark bait right beside your raft. When the shark starts biting the bait, you can hit it. It will come back to the bait and you can continue to hit it.

A few more tips in regards to the shark are:

• Park your raft a fair way from any island you want to get resources from; this way, once you get on the island, the shark will stay circling your raft and you shouldn’t be in agro range while looting underwater
• If the shark is chasing you, get on land and the shark will return to circling your raft
• The shark will not attack your raft if you are not on it
• If you stay on the far side of your raft from the island and wait for the shark to be swimming away from the island and goes past your raft, you can run toward the island and jump into the water; this will sometimes put you in the water outside the shark’s agro range and you can swim to the island without having to deal with it
• When you kill the shark, if you stop harvesting resources from it after getting four shark meat (let go of the E key), you won’t get the shark head but you will get more time without a shark because the shark body will need to despawn before the timer for spawning a new shark can start
• Fortified foundations are shark proof so if you can get the entire perimeter of your raft fortified, the shark will no longer attack it

Hope this helps!