- Conan Exiles Waterskin Guide - March 6, 2023
- Conan Exiles Derketo Guide - February 11, 2023
Intro
The waterskin is, without a doubt, one of the most critical survival items in Conan Exiles. It enables an exile to carry cooling, life-giving water into even the most inhospitable environments, significantly extending exploration time. This is especially valuable in hot desert environments where natural water sources may be unavailable or guarded by powerful foes an exile isn’t yet ready to fight.
The sealed waterskin, acquired by an exile right at the beginning of gameplay, is especially important in the early game before more powerful options for hydration and cooling become available. Find more about it in this Conan Exiles Waterskin Guide
Key Details Up Front
Not much needs to be said about the waterskin: it holds water and can be used to quench thirst anywhere and provide cooling in hot biomes.
The game provides access to a basic sealed waterskin right off the bat, no matter where your exile starts (that goes for both the one starting point in the Exiled Lands and the multiple potential points of entry for the Isle of Siptah). It would be best to look around your starting area a bit to find it, but that’s a search as worthwhile as it is quick and easy—locating the waterskin and picking it up should be your priority in the game.
Once you’ve got your sealed waterskin, use it to take a drink (you get a milestone for doing so!), look for somewhere to fill it up (hit the number you’ve slotted it under in the quick bar while at a water source), and start exploring.
Description
The waterskin is a portable drinking vessel formed from leather and sealed against leakage. It has a cork or cap to keep its contents from sloshing out as an exile moves around their environment. In Conan Exiles, it can carry only water (so don’t go trying to fill it with berry pulp or wine or whatever else—it just won’t work).
How to Obtain
A sealed waterskin (weighing 1.12 pounds and providing 10 drinks that give you 25 hydration apiece) can be found right along the Broken Highway in the Exiled Lands, next to a letter from a prisoner of those lands who had lost all hope and wandered off toward the Cursewall to die, after leaving behind the last of his precious water for the next poor soul to pass that way.
It’s fate, rather than charity, which supplies a sealed waterskin to an exile washed ashore on the Isle of Siptah. Within just a few quick paces of whichever starting point you choose, a waterskin can be found on the sand, among the debris and the bodies of the dead crew of the shipwreck that stranded the exile there. (Additionally, you can sometimes find another sealed waterskin in the inventory of one of those corpses.)
If, for whatever reason, you lose your free starting waterskin or are forced to discard it, you can always make another out of 5 hides and 5 twine as an essential perk of the Survival feat tree. You don’t need to spend anything to learn how to craft one.
Other Waterskin Options
You can hold onto your basic sealed waterskin for your exile’s entire lifetime, and you’ll manage just fine with it, but some alternatives do exist.
Like the standard sealed waterskin, these other waterskins sit in your inventory (or in a container, if you place them there), so they can’t be damaged or destroyed. Like the sealed waterskin, however, they can be stolen from your corpse in PVP, so be wary of that if you’re on such a server because these are precious resources to lose, and recovering them requires you to go back and once again complete the arduous battles that allow you to earn them in the first place.
(Because the Deep Drink and Healing waterskins look so much like the sealed waterskin in your inventory, you might luck out and end up with a PVPer mistaking either of those for the basic waterskin in a rush to loot the most valuable items from your body and move on, but the Khari waterskin looks just distinct enough, with a sort of yellowish tint to its inventory icon, that it’s unlikely to be missed.)
Alternatives in the Exiled Lands
You have access to two better waterskins in the Exiled Lands:
The Deep Drink waterskin is available in Hanuman’s Grotto as a potential drop from killing Valis the Loyal. It weighs just under twice what the sealed waterskin does (an even 2 pounds) but provides twice as many drinks (20), with the standard 25 hydration per drink.
The Khari waterskin is obtained as a possible drop from the undead kappa in the Wine Cellar dungeon. It also weighs 2 pounds but grants a tremendous 25 drinks at an even bigger 50 hydration a pop, making it the best option for pure hydration in the game.
Both these waterskins are legendary drops.
Alternative on the Isle of Siptah
And there’s one alternative waterskin exclusive to the Isle of Siptah:
Either of the undead kappa bosses in the eastern half of the Isle of Siptah (one near the Circle of the Ravager and one in the Chamber of Sacraments) potentially drops the Healing waterskin. This waterskin weighs nothing(!) and contains 15 drinks. These drinks only restore a measly 14 hydration apiece, but the real allure here is the small healing effect granted by its water. Since no animation (thus, no time delay) is associated with drinking from a waterskin, you can spam a series of minor heals for your exile in their time of need.
Like the Deep Drink and Khari waterskins, the Healing waterskin is a legendary drop.
Console Command Waterskins
Two other waterskin options exist if you want to use console commands: the improved waterskin and the survivor’s waterskin.
The first of these, the improved waterskin, is in no way “improved”; it’s flatly inferior to the standard sealed waterskin. Sure, it grants 35 hydration per drink, but it weighs 5 pounds. For less than that weight, you could instead carry four sealed waterskins and have access to far more water.
The second option, the survivor’s waterskin, could be worthwhile. It provides 45 hydration per drink and weighs 1.5 pounds. That’s a significant improvement over the sealed waterskin, and it’s almost as good as the Deep Drink waterskin (though still flatly inferior to the Khari waterskin, which has no equal).
Exiles used to be able to make either of these waterskins at an artisan’s table, but these have since been removed from the game as craftable items—presumably, to make room for the legendary waterskins (and to make the latter desirable enough to be worth the boss fights to earn them).
Conclusion
The waterskin is crucial to surviving and thriving, whether in the Exiled Lands or on the Isle of Siptah. It’s one of those essential pieces of equipment no early-game exile should leave home without, and it always keeps being a great resource. Later-game waterskins are, in various ways, even better, and they continue to provide excellent survival value in your exile’s inventory.
FAQs
Question: Is one sealed waterskin enough?
Answer:Â Under most circumstances, even just having the one basic sealed waterskin you get at the beginning of the game will be sufficient for an exile’s hydration needs almost anywhere in the Exiled Lands or the Isle of Siptah.
If you’re going to be spending a lot of time running around in a location with no available water for refilling your waterskin, though—say, somewhere like the Unnamed City in the Exiled Lands—it might be worth your time to bring along an extra sealed waterskin or two, just in case. The additional waterskins won’t weigh you down, but the excess water you bring along in them can be a real lifesaver.
Question: Which is better—a waterskin or purified water?
Answer: In terms of raw numbers (weight and hydration), purified water ekes out the advantage over the sealed waterskin, but you get a sealed waterskin right when you start playing, while purified water isn’t available to craft until you’ve unlocked the stove at level 29.
Pound for pound, purified water is still better than the Deep Drink waterskin, while it’s inferior to the Khari waterskin, and you can’t make a straight comparison with the Healing waterskin.
Of course, waterskins can be filled anywhere you can find water, while purified water requires a crafting process at a base.
Question: Is there any way to get the Deep Drink or Khari waterskins on the Isle of Siptah or the Healing waterskin in the Exiled Lands?
Answer:Â Currently, no. At least not without resorting to the use of console commands.
These items might be made available for both play regions in the future. However, they’ll likely be kept exclusive to their respective places of origin to help maintain a sense of distinctiveness between the Exiled Lands and the Isle of Siptah.