Legacy:Bear

Bears are considered the toughest and most vicious animals in the game. Bears will, like Boars, attack you unprovoked. A level 10 bear will hit for approximately 800 HP. They sometimes will attack you and kill you while you are unconscious. To get to you, bears will destroy any objects obstructing their path with lower than Soak 25, meaning only Palisades, Brickwalls and wall of Strongboxes can stop bears from chasing you.

The quality of all bear materials (Raw Hide, Meat, Intestines, Bones/Teeth) is equal to Bear Level*20. Raw Hide, Intestines, and Meat are softcapped by Survival and your carving tool. Bones are only softcapped by Survival

Combat Behavior

The bear is going to start off with using a move that gives it 6 (!) initiative and a boost move before attacking you with either a swipe or a bite (the most dangerous of the two). Then it will fill up its attack and defense like most other animals. Fortunately it does not try to gain advantage like the boar or auroch does.

Bears go berserk when they're close to death, and they will start using a skill to instantly refill their attack bar. You will need to be ready to do a lot of damage fast if you plan to finish the bear before it finishes you.

Once a Bear yields in combat due to archery, even if they go berserk, they will not attack you if you continue to use archery.

If sufficiently confined in a small space, a Bear that has yielded in combat will not attempt to escape, even if it can easily break through the barriers holding it.

How to fight it

Melee: Bears can take off a large chunk of defense, if not outright hurt you. You will need combat stats of around 150 to combat against a lvl X bear melee without calling down thunder. If not, then you are best to fight against it at a range where it cannot hit you. You want to opt for slide if your defense starts to drop, especially after an attempted bite. Otherwise you can use dash or even slide to keep your defense high while gaining initiative.

Alternative tactic for X bear and ~70 Melee skill: Get behind some cover (boat or wall will do) and start calling down the thunder till you get 30 initiative. Then opportunity knock the bear 4 times in a row, immediately followed by a valorous strike. Retreat, repeat. You should not lose more than 40 hp each time with proper gear. The third strike should be a simple sting (remember, the bear has ONLY 800 HP, and you can do up to 300 damage at once!) to put him aflame. Then, finish him off with a valorous strike.

Cheap ranged tactic: Shoot at the bear from a boat. Eventually he will run away. Immediately break combat, and he should stop running. Get within shooting range and snipe him again, he will try to run again, so break combat and continue in that pattern until he dies. You lose most of the LP from this method, but at least you get all that yummy bear meat while not becoming food yourself.

Other cheap ranged tactic: Shoot at the bear from a boat or shallow water that's out of its reach. When it runs away, don't break combat; this fight isn't over yet! Stand on dry land where it would be able to attack you and just wait there. The bear will usually come back for more, but its motivation will be completely crushed and it won't even bother to attack you. It'll just follow you around. Pelt it with another stone and it will probably run off again. Move away from the spot you were just standing at; if you remain in the same spot, the bear will come back, but it will run away and never be seen again as soon as it does so. Moving a little bit usually causes it to hang around. With some luck, you'll be able to kill the bear and get the full LP.

Another cheap ranged tactic: Try to lock the bear in or out of your palisade or brick wall. You can shoot the bear safely from the opposite side of the wall without it running off. This is only effective if you find a bear close to a gate. The one word of caution is to make sure you have enough time to run back into or out of your gate and lock it back before the bear catches you.

If your combat skill is not high enough, then use range to shoot it where it cannot reach you or simply avoid it.