I used to get them all the time when I was just starting out. I think I had one on my very first night, it scared the bejeezus out of me when it ran around the back of the RS tent at me.
i’ve found several but it definitely doesn’t happen as often as it did back when the game first game out and the probability of them spawning was pretty high. i don’t really play at night anymore, though, so i haven’t seen any as of late ^^.
I still encounter them at night, although not as common as before. They always catch me off-guard when I see them though. They just appear out of nowhere and the next thing I see is I've already been attacked.
I honestly wish there was a free month or two. I hate it when I’m playing past 7 with the main camera and a fuzzy fiend comes out of no where. No matter how many times it happens I always get jumpscared by them.
I came across two last night on my island they must be back in season. I decided to try and farm em on spiral island epic fail so many damselflies next to none spawning
I saw a tarantula the other night when I was making a new net. The camera zoomed in and there was a little spider running into a fence. It luckily respawned when I went back into the crafting menu so I didn't have to deal with it
Back in spring, when the game first launched, tarantulas spawned frequently. Until I learned that they did not attack you if you didn't have a net equipped, I was constantly getting ambushed.
I may have done a thing or two on a few mystery islands to turn them into tarantula islands. They spawned endlessly. Returning home with my pockets stuffed full of tarantulas was, somehow, a very satisfying thing to do.
I saw them all the time in the first few months of playing, until the scorpions turned up. They were really common, actually. Someone in one of my discord groups actually caught about 20 of them one evening, it was pretty broken.
I think they changed something about their spawning behaviour since then, though, because people have reported not being able to make islands spawn as many tarantulas anymore & I have only seen one or two since their return.
They used to take me out constantly at the beginning of the game before I knew they were super hostile if you have your net out. I saw several every night. I didn't realise that they were around November-December and one got me by surprise the other night when I was spawn camping my rotten turnip for ants I was shocked when I saw a tarantula hanging around there instead of ants.
I haven't been seeing tarantulas as frequently. I like them better than scorpions. Since they have a round silhouette, I find them easier to focus on and catch than scorpions. The other problem is that they sometimes seem to jump out at you from nowhere and you die. Other times, you see them but they immediately run away from you and vanish into a cliff or something. It's definitely been harder to catch them, imo.