Melee Damage

Melee Damage in ARK: Survival Evolved is a basic statistic for both players and creatures. It is a measure of the amount of extra damage dealt when attacking, or yield when harvesting renewable resources. Thus, a higher Melee Damage kills creatures and other players, as well as harvest resources, in fewer hits. It also increases the total yield of resources harvested from a renewable resource, and improves the chances of receiving any rare resources. Base damage depends on the tool or weapon in use, and Melee Damage is a multiplier of this base damage.

Formula

Melee damage is affected by 4 factors: Weapon Base Damage, Weapon Damage Quality Multiplier, Survivor Melee Damage Multiplier and Server Settings: Player Damage.

Melee Damage = WBD * WDQM * SMDM * PD

For example, a survivor with 200% Melee Damage wielding a 150% damage sword on a server has 2.0 Player Damage setting will do 540 damage:

540 = 90 * 150% * 200% * 2

Increasing

Putting a point into Melee Damage for players increases their damage modifier by 5%.

Notes

• Some servers "clamp" resource harvesting, meaning that each source has a max amount of resources it can yield, regardless of how much your melee damage allows you to harvest with each hit.
• Eating  Battle Tartare,  Enduro Stew and beer temporarily increases your melee damage.(currently bugged and  Battle Tartare and  Enduro Stew do not give additional damage)
• Attacking while you are out of  Stamina increases your  Torpor.
• Increasing melee damage affects the damage output of player melee weapons, but not of ranged weapons. It also increases the damage of most dino attacks.