I noticed that. I killed four deer in a little wooded area and two of them disappeared before I could get to them. They weren't even that far apart.
I think they have a dynamic system. The more people around the area or region there are, the highest the chance some animals will disappear... I don't know. Might be a bug. Sometimes Saint Denis is quite populated when there aren't players around but usually not a lot of NPCs at all. Might be a memory thing. Don't know if in the XB1X or PS4Pro is better.
This finally happened to me today. I was riding into Valentine to get rid of all my hunting stuff (I even had a wild horse with a deer carcass), thought I saw a deer, took a couple shots at it, but nope it was a player and I almost killed him. So I rode away, hoping he wouldn't retaliate. He didn't. But, the game doesn't let you go to shops for x amount of time after you attack another player or their horse. So I kept riding around Valentine in and out of town hoping that it will eventually let me sell my stuff. Then, this guy sees me with all my stuff and kills me. And it spawns me nowhere near him, so I think he took all my stuff and sold it. But I can't be entirely sure, since he really didn't have a ton of time to be able to do that.
If you're mostly alone and can carry the second horse around, that's nice. A perfect deer or buck carcass should sell for 10$. If you have 2, that's 20. Not bad at all. Plus all the pelts.
Best hunting spot for me so far has been Great Plains, but usually a couple other people are hunting, and a ton of people sit around Blackwater. But north of Strawberry in the mountains there's virtually nobody, but sometimes it can be hard to find stuff.
I've been the swamps, north of Saint Denis, on the coast, since day 2 basically. I get something beteween 40-50$ per hunting trip when there are more people around the area and 70-90$ when I'm alone and relaxed. It probably takes around 15 to 20min, Here's a video of what I usually sell and get at the butcher:
Also, be careful if you try hunting with two horses. Because I had a stack of pelts on my personal horse that I couldn't sell for some reason. And none of the pelts on him showed up in his inventory. I think the online mechanics with having a wild horse and your personal horse is broken when it comes to pelts.
I don't try this because it's too riskin in Saint Denis. Today, for 2 occasions, 2 pairs of dudes decided to come after me after I intercepted their stranger missions (I destroyed the charriot or whatever is called). They were passing just a few meters behind me so I did it. There must be a stanger mission in SD that sends people through the swamp and if I'm there, it's easy XP. But then, the people doing the mission came after me. ^^ I usually don't give up so they parley or leave. Good thing I bought the pump-action shotgun.
If I'm on a stranger mission and get intercepted and lose it, good for the guys who did it. It's a game mechanic. It's not griefing imo. I never shoot someone first in free roam, unless it's to intercept a mission.
I do think there are quite a few bugs atm with the hunting and general controls and menus. More often than not my horse will get suck in place and not come if I try to whistle. I won't even wishtle for some reason. Other times, while selling stuff to the bucher, some items will get stuck. The information in the gerneal stats of our character is also wrong in some of the points at least.
Out of curiosity, I've killed 228 NPCs (I guess from the main missions and stranger missions), died 300+ times and killed 1300+ times. Most of the kills were people who shot me for no reason and I went after them until they parley, flew away or logged off. It's the only way they will not do it again to me at least (or will be less likely).
Also didn't realize the value of rabbit carcasses. Good ones are worth like $1.20. For a while I would just skin 'em and leave 'em.
I don't think you can skin rabbits(?). At least in SP, Arthur picks them up and put them inside the satchel, like frogs and sparrows.
But I've noticed when I kill small animals, I'm getting always perfect pelts, even if they have 1 star. Dunno if it's because I've finished the hunting challenge or if it's a bug, but it's nice.
Portrait
I got a few invites but I prefer to play alone atm because all I'm doing is hunting.
